For the past 30 years, Australian automotive industry policies can be characterised as managed decline. Beginning in the 1980s with the Button Plan, the aim of policy was to consolidate the industry and…
Within eight months of taking office, South Korean president Park Geun-Hye embraced her predecessor’s green growth strategy and now champions the so-called Green Growth 2.0 policies.
EPA/Kim Min-Hee
Like Australia, South Korea had a change of government last year. And like Australia’s, Korea’s new government was keen to distance itself from its predecessors’ legacies – particularly its “Green Growth…
Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s free market, small government leaning overlooks the real issue of social inequality.
Lukas Coch/AAP
Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s address to the World Economic Forum in January delivered a plain, pragmatic message. The best remedy for the uneven recovery of the world economy, according to Abbott, is a…
Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane have drawn a line in the sand on industry assistance…or have they?
Alan Porritt/AAP
Announcing the decision to refuse assistance to SPC Ardmona, Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane said: “I think it is a clear delineation of where this government believes we need to go with industry policy…
A down-to-earth bloke with a CV to make some other leaders blush, Peter Cosgrove was made to be a modern governor-general.
AAP/Dave Hunt
In racing terms, there are favourites, odds-on favourites and unbackable favourites. Then there is Peter Cosgrove. About the only person not certain over the past three months that Cosgrove would be appointed…
Tony Abbott’s small government message played well to a WEF audience.
AAP
As widely anticipated, prime minister Tony Abbott’s speech to the World Economic forum (WEF) stressed the absolute centrality of the private sector as an engine of economic growth. Outlining Australia’s…
Finishing touches go on at the World Economic Forum, where Tony Abbott will outline his G20 agenda.
AAP
When prime minister Tony Abbott delivers his speech outlining “Australia’s Vision for the G20” at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland on Thursday, he will have the attention of some of…
Should Australia change tack on its relationship with Indonesia and start keeping the nation at ‘arm’s length’?
EPA/Romeo Gacad
The decision by the Australian government to turn asylum seeker boats back into Indonesia’s territorial waters and its ports was always a high-risk game. It is no surprise that it has ended in a serious…
2013 saw a decisive change of government in Australia. What else happened?
AAP/Lisa Maree Williams
Three prime ministers, four Labor Party leaders, two popes. 2013 was nothing if not a hectic year for the Politics + Society desk at The Conversation. And while it’s repeated so often as to go beyond being…
Former prime minister Paul Keating argued governments need to use their political capital to drive reform. But this is becoming increasingly difficult in a poll-driven political climate.
AAP/Paul Miller
Throughout Keating, a series of interviews that finished airing on the ABC earlier this month, the former prime minister makes reference to the notion of political capital in relation to the Labor government…
Business Council of Australia and now National Commission of Audit head Tony Shepherd is unlikely to make recommendations that don’t fit with the Coalition’s agenda.
Nikki Short/AAP
The Abbott Coalition government, like the incoming Labor government before it, has marked the beginning of its term with a raft of reviews, including the wide ranging National Commission of Audit. Given…
Tony Abbott has faced many unexpected difficulties in his first 100 days.
AAP/Daniel Munoz
It is just 100 days on Monday since the election, but the Abbott government lacks that air of excitement that power often brings. Rather, it is staggering towards Christmas, mugged by moving from rhetoric…
The school funding row left NSW premier Barry O'Farrell and prime minister Tony Abbott with fences to mend ahead of Abbott’s first COAG meeting.
AAP/Paul Miller
Personality matters in Commonwealth-state relations. A change of leader always brings with it a different approach to managing the relationship between the jurisdictions that make up the Australian federation…
“Building cars in Australia is just not sustainable.” That was GM Holden managing director Mike Devereux, announcing the closure of Holden. Ominous words for Toyota as well. Toyota responded that Holden’s…
Tony Abbott’s government has lacked the assured certainty the Coalition showed in winning office.
AAP/Stefan Postles
For every opposition, the prospect of taking office – attaining politics’ ultimate prize, often after years of hard grind – can be relied upon to drown out the little noises of self-doubt and self-criticism…
Tony Abbott has announced his priorities for the G20 in Brisbane next year.
AAP
With Russia handing the G20 host baton to Australia this month, and combined with our UN Security Council seat, the biggest year of Australian diplomacy begins. Prime Minister Tony Abbott had a backdrop…
Any resemblance to actual people – living or dead – is coincidental.
Troy/jacqueline poggi
The Ancient Greek philosopher Socrates was condemned and put to death for “corrupting the youth” of Athens. The same fate is unlikely to meet contemporary philosophers. Indeed, it is much more likely for…
Australia must develop a stable, close and mutually respectful relationship with Indonesia, its government, its leaders, and its people.
EPA/Adi Weda
Every so often over the last 50 years, Australia’s relations with Indonesia have hit stormy waters. The present tensions over the spying scandal may not be the most serious, but they are serious enough…
What’s behind the public, media and political response in Indonesia to the revelations of the extent of Australia’s spying activities?
AAP/Eka Nickmatulhuda
Expressions of public outrage in Indonesia at allegations Australia had engaged in the phone tapping of Indonesian politicians – including president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, his wife and Cabinet members…
Tony Abbott needs to learn a thing or two about Indonesian culture if he’s to have a successful working relationship with his Indonesian counterpart.
EPA/Made Nagi
There’s a widespread perception in Australia that Indonesian president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono’s reaction to Australia’s phone tapping is all about playing domestic politics in Yudhoyono’s home country…