Christianity’s effect on Australian politics is far from waning.
Jonathan James
In a nation labelled secular, many of our elected representatives have strong religious ties, and this affects they way they the country is run.
Donald Trump may not have been the 1%’s preferred candidate, but he embodied its message.
Reuters/Joshua Roberts
Making self-interest seem normal and a commitment to fairness an elite aberration has been a long-term project.
In jettisoning Alfred Deakin, the Liberals made a great mistake and showed the thinness of their historical memory.
National Library of Australia
Like Malcolm Turnbull, the three-time prime minister Alfred Deakin was sometimes accused of lacking substance, but he had core political commitments from which he never wavered.
Like its Tasmanian predecessor, the marriage plebiscite has been engineered by the leader’s intransigent opponents.
AAP/Lukas Coch
Malcolm Turnbull’s postal plebiscite on marriage equality is on the cusp of recreating the mistakes of Doug Lowe’s Tasmanian dams plebiscite.
This is a potent slogan, although there is a deeply conservative undertone to the idea that love always requires marriage.
AAP/Joel Carrett
The marriage equality movement could still back the plebiscite on condition that its results are binding.
The Referendum Council contends there should be a place for Indigenous voices in Australia’s Constitution.
AAP/Lucy Hughes Jones
Bodies established around the world to hear ‘black’ voices have an enduring problem: they advise, but are rarely – if ever – heard.
Surely, things were easier in the past.
shutterstock
There has been much attention paid to the widespread resurgence of populism. Restorationism in Western democracies is a subset of this.
Malcolm Turnbull has reasserted this week that the Liberal Party needs to be in the ‘sensible centre’.
AAP/Lukas Coch
While a lot of people just shrug impatiently at insider politics, a substantial number have turned to ‘outsider’ players.
Malcolm Turnbull’s speech reminded his Liberal colleagues that he has not stolen the party and his leadership is legitimately Liberal.
Reuters/Hannah Mckay
Malcolm Turnbull’s claim that Robert Menzies’ party was meant to be one of the ‘sensible centre’ has some validity – but it may also be that that centre has shifted significantly, too.
The reference to Tony Abbott in his London speech gave Malcolm Turnbull some body armour.
Lukas Coch/AAP
If he was emphasising he’s a centrist, that is hardly a surprise, although when he translates it into policy it annoys the hell out of those on the right.
In political terms, the Howard government faced little opposition to the Northern Territory Intervention.
AAP/Alan Porritt
The Northern Territory Intervention implemented coercive measures that would have been unthinkable in other, non-Indigenous communities.
At a demonstration, Faith Bandler (right) and her daughter Lilon (2R) appeal to national unity as grounds for constitutional amendment.
Aboriginal Studies Press
The 1967 referendum was the culmination of a long struggle for both Aboriginal rights and respect, for social esteem as well as equality before the law.
For almost all of its cumbersome history, the British Empire was a very ramshackle affair.
Shutterstock
Australia ingratiating itself into a post-Brexit, British-instigated Anglosphere would be a futile exercise in counterproductive nostalgia.
Painting the 1967 referendum as a ‘success’ in terms of effective reform for Aboriginal people is problematic.
AAP/Marianna Massey
The 1967 referendum fell far short in giving people what they thought they were voting for, and in giving Aboriginal people what they wanted from it.
Theresa May is at the helm of a more global post-Brexit Britain.
Andrew Yates/Reuters
The concept of ‘the Anglosphere’ gained in importance after the Brexit referendum as an alternative to the EU – and it could now impact Anglo nations, like Australia.
The MV Tampa rescued 438 asylum seekers from a stricken boat in the waters between Indonesia and Australia.
Wallenius Wilhelmsen/AAP
The Tampa incident in 2001 has formed the underlying basis of the approach to asylum seekers attempting to reach Australia by boat ever since.
The Hawke Labor government had a strong incentive to seek a new approach to industrial relations when it came to office.
National Archives of Australia
The Prices and Incomes Accord was a series of agreements between Labor and the ACTU where unions would moderate their wage demands in exchange for improvements in the ‘social wage’.
Gough Whitlam speaks to reporters after being dismissed as prime minister.
National Archives of Australia
The Dismissal soured politicians’ taste for brinkmanship. It revealed the likely consequence of a loss of political legitimacy.
B.A. Santamaria (left) played a significant role in the Labor split and the formation of the Democratic Labor Party.
Wikimedia Commons
Viewed from today’s post-Cold War and secularised society, the conflicts at heart of the Labor split appear curiously arcane. Yet its ghosts remain.
Barnaby Joyce and Scott Morrison have channelled 1940s-era debates in their comments on housing affordability.
AAP/Sam Mooy
It’s not the first time Australia has grappled with concerns about affordable housing. History offers insights that can help inform contemporary debates and policies.