On my last visit to India in April this year, I found the nation in the grip of Indian Premier League (IPL) fever, or so the umpteen news channels had me believe.
With Katy Perry in a kitsch Indian costume…
Schapelle Corby’s fate may be the centre of public attention in Australia, but not here in Indonesia where I currently live and work. The hot topic here for the past few days has been whether or not Lady…
It is time we recognised pornography as part of popular culture. Millions of people watch the content the porn industry produces. And make no mistake, it produces a lot of content.
According to prominent…
Chief Scientist Ian Chubb’s Health of Australian Science report, launched today at the National Press Club, starts on an optimistic note. Australian science is generally in good health: school students…
In the face of the largest mobilisation Egypt has ever witnessed, President Hosni Mubarak stepped down on February 12, 2011. Facing an unlikely coalition of disaffected youth, labour workers, Islamists…
At least one Lockerbie conspiracy theory has been laid to rest this week: that the only man convicted of the 1988 aircraft bombing was faking a terminal illness.
But the death of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi…
Biologists and psychologists like to tussle with human characteristics: what’s inherent? What’s learnt? What’s genetically coded? What’s malleable? Every so often an “expert” will reignite the nature vs…
The ALP and the union movement have never liked scabs. But yesterday we witnessed a labour scab of a different sort as The Wound Formally Known As Craig Thomson continued to be bleed rather than heal…
Craig Thomson’s address to parliament today promised to either clear the air or dig a deeper hole for the embattled MP.
It would be an understatement to say that the Craig Thomson affair has been an unwelcome…
Captain Paul Watson, founder of the marine conservation organisation Sea Shepherd, was arrested last week in Frankfurt, Germany, on an international arrest warrant issued by the Costa Rican government…
Last year – for the first time in modern history – Asia outspent Europe on their militaries. The true significance of this milestone lies in how easily the Asian countries were able to achieve it.
There…
This week marked the first anniversary of the 15-M movement, a precursor of Occupy movements worldwide.
15-M again mobilised its supporters for a 4-day long program of street protests culminating in a…
The trial of former Bosnian Serb Army (VRS) Colonel General, Ratko Mladić commenced in the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) this past Wednesday.
Mladić’s arrest at his…
A small but vocal group is calling on parents to withdraw their children from the National Assessment Program: Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) tests.
But if this call is successful and enough children…
Among all the school payments and defence cuts, last week’s federal budget also quietly committed an additional $5.2 billion to the government’s Closing the Gap program. It’s a vote of faith from the government…
Teacher bonus schemes are yet another example of education reform with the wrong focus. They narrowly look at teachers and their performance, and not the needs of students and their learning. It’s the…
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Last night, Lateline reported on a five-year-old refugee who faced the prospect of being separated from his father forever. His father had failed an ASIO security assessment, which under current policies…
Asia is on the rise, but what is Australia doing about it?
Alexander Baumgartner
The Conversation’s series, Australia in the Asian Century, culminated this month in a roundtable hosted by Ken Henry, chair of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet’s taskforce on Asia.
For an…
Barack Obama has sent a message to same-sex attracted people everywhere: "I'm in your corner".
ABC News
This morning my phone woke me earlier than usual with a text from one of my sons, who regularly taps into American politics in the middle of the night. “Obama has come out for gay marriage – how about…
The Craig Thomson drama shows it's time for unions and politicians to separate.
AAP/Miles Godfrey
The sordid details of Craig Thomson and the Health Services Union affair at one level reflect individual failings on the part of Thomson, HSU East Secretary Michael Williams and National Secretary Kathy…
Accusations against Peter Slipper have prompted him to step aside as speaker.
AAP Image/Penny Bradfield
Speaker of the House of Representatives Peter Slipper has stepped aside following allegations of sexual harassment and the misuse of cab-charge vouchers.
Slipper’s former adviser James Ashby accused the…
Gunter Grass caused a stir with his anti-Israel poem, but political poetry often misses the mark.
AAP/Marcus Brandt
The world of political poetry has suffered some significant losses in recent months. Václav Havel, a poet long before he was the last president of Czechoslovakia and the first president of the Czech Republic…
Should Breivik's hateful diatribe be made public?
AAP/Hakon Mosvold Larsen
The trial of Norwegian Anders Behring Breivik for the murder of 77 people has a special significance for journalists in Australia, and not just because Breivik summoned the names of John Howard, Peter…
Brown: "I'm not here to fear being bitten"
AAP and John Keane
Welcome to “In Conversation”, the first in a series of discussions between leading academics and major public figures in Australian life.
Today Politics Professor John Keane is in conversation with Senator…
It's impossible to separate North Korea's defensive ambitions from its leadership transition.
EPA/KCNA South Korea
In March, North Korea’s external propaganda mouthpiece Korean Central News Agency announced the impending launch of a satellite, the Kwangmyongsong-3, during a four-day launch window timed to correspond…
Is democracy really coming to Burma?
AAP Image/Angela Brkic
Only two years after general elections in 2010, the world will be watching Burma’s by-elections to be held tomorrow.
Although the results cannot change the overall political balance of power with only…
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