IPA Review – Spring 2022

‘Traditional combat… [is] now accompanied by prolific disinformation and the manipulation of whole communities and societies. What if a lie, told repeatedly, and across many platforms, prompts, inspires or motivates others… to turn a blind eye to atrocities, or worse, become complicit in them?This is no longer a hypothetical.’ – Jacinda Ardern, UN General Assembly, 24 September Maybe Jacinda Ardern

The conservative battle to win back lost ground here and abroad requires renewal and entering new territories, argues Sydney-based writer and cultural critic Adrian Nguyen. Centre-right parties and governments across the West have recently proven to be disappointments, especially as a consequence of forgetting the core values that made them unique and strong. Soon after delivering a long-delayed Brexit, the

If educator and novelist John Marsden agrees our kids should be free to take risks; why not also adults?, wonders IPA Adjunct Fellow Cian Hussey. How ironic for a book called Take Risks to come out at the height of the panic-driven response to COVID. As former Prime Minister Tony Abbott said on numerous occasions, we adopted a ‘safety only’

Support for a republic fades as people better understand the role of the Crown in upholding democracy and good governance, argues author and mathematician Nigel Greenwood. During eight years researching my book on the Crown and its reserve powers, I spent a lot of time in libraries in Oxford, London, and Brisbane examining the monarch’s responsibilities as ultimate guarantor of

The most important challenge facing Australians today is personal rather than political, argues Sydney-based psychiatrist Tanveer Ahmed. The worsening mental health of young people became a sensitive topic during the pandemic lockdowns. In the battles over safety, children became political footballs. In the early days of lockdowns, public health authorities claimed they were protecting children from harm. Meanwhile, doubters pointed

Knowing more about historical events helps up make a better tomorrow, but lots of forces in our society seem determined to bury, malign, or misrepresent the past. Establishing the correct perspective from history and from values is essential to understanding and addressing very current issues such as inflation, social cohesion, democratic dysfunction, and the rising levels of anxiety and depression

The self-inflicted ruin of Sri Lanka provides salutary lesson for other countries including Australia, warns IPA Research Fellow Kevin You. Sri Lanka became independent, not in the aftermath of a bloody revolutionary war, but after a prolonged period of careful planning. From the British it inherited a mature democratic tradition, well-established Western-style public institutions, a Westminster system of government, and

Australia’s continued success as a ‘nation-state’ depends on maintaining the political will to prioritise social cohesion, argues IPA Senior Fellow Sherry Sufi. In his victory speech on 21 May 2022, incoming Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promised to “bring Australians together” and “to seek our common purpose and promote unity”. Party leaders from both sides tend to espouse such inspiring sentiments

In 2022, Australia ran an exemplary democratic election in Federal politics. It removed a conservative Coalition government and replaced it with an ALP government. That this was accomplished peacefully, legally, without censorship, police interference, or any kind of physical confrontation should be celebrated. The fact the defeated government immediately and gracefully ceded office, that the new government stepped in and

Government responses to COVID widened the chasm between productive workers and their ‘professional’ overlords, argues historian and IPA Adjunct Fellow Bradley Bowden. The arbitrary actions of Big Government during the COVID-19 lockdowns highlighted a wider problem: the ever-growing reach of the modern State. I advanced the original argument in ‘The Rise and Rise of the Modern State’ (IPA Review, Summer

The seventh of November each year has been designated ‘Victims of Communism Day’ in the US state of Florida through State legislation sponsored by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. This is the Gregorian calendar date of the storming of the Winter Palace in 1917 by the Bolsheviks (Julian calendar 25 October, hence the so-called October Revolution). The November date was celebrated

The spectre of inflation now scares most around the world. Predictions by some economists and central bankers that it would be temporary are proving wrong. Money is losing value at an accelerated pace. Even economies where the authorities are engineering a recession are heading into a sustained inflation wave. Stagflation—inflation while growth stalls—is back. Relearning the lessons of history is