A multi-disciplinary response to family violence – building communities of action

The federal inquiry into family, domestic and sexual violence was announced by the Honourable Marise Payne and the Honourable Senator Anne Ruston on the 4th of June 2020, and public hearings commenced last week following the Inquiry receiving over 150 submissions. Whilst advocates across Australia met this new Inquiry with scepticism, the Inquiry does provide an opportunity to rethink reform, and in particular highlight opportunities to address some of the lesser-known aspects of gendered violence that are critical to a whole-of-community response.

Today’s analysis is provided by CEO Stella Avramopoulos (@stellaavram), Laura Vidal (@lauraemilyvidal), and Madeleine Ulbrick (@maddyulbrick) of Good Shepherd Australia New Zealand (@goodshepANZ, @GoodAdvocacy) who argue that a multi-disciplinary and cross-sector response presents opportunities for action to prevent all forms of violence against women and their children. This piece is part 1 of 3, and draws on the Good Shepherd submission into the Inquiry which can be read in its entirety here.

Omniscience is the enemy of social progress

Admitting when we don’t know the answer is scary and uncomfortable. In this article originally published on The Mandarin, Professor Kristy Muir, UNSW Sydney argues that admitting we don’t know is also necessary to social change.

Policy and governancePower to Persuade20 June 2019cross-sector relationships, social services

Different problems, same solutions: Using a social determinants of health approach to work cross-disciplinary and cross-sectorally

Bridging the evidence-policy gap is a recognised challenge for researchers and policy makers alike. In today’s blog post Hannah Badland, a Principal Research Fellow at the Centre for Urban Research, RMIT University, talks about the value of inter-sectoral partnerships to solve complex problems. Using the example of a new global framework, The New Urban Agenda, she discusses how agendas that draw on cross-sectoral collaborations can help advance policy action in complex policy areas such as the social determinants of health.

What can employers do to address social wellbeing?

There has been a growing focus on mental health and wellbeing in the workplace in the UK. The role of employers in relation to mental health and wellbeing is becoming increasingly pronounced and the business sector is responding to shifts in both policy and public opinion. As 2019 gets underway, employers may be deciding to scale up their business model, or be making plans to remain agile in difficult and unpredictable markets. In this re-post from employee benefits, Dr Sarah-Jane Fenton and Professor Fiona Carmichael suggest that central to those strategic objectives, and not as an afterthought, needs to be a serious consideration about how to support employees’ mental health and social wellbeing.

Beyond NAIDOC 2018: Our Responsibility to Celebrate the Voices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women

The theme for this year's NAIDOC Week, held from 8-15 July 2018, was "Because of her, we can". In the following article, republished from IndigenousX with permission, Antoniette Braybrook calls for the ongoing celebration and acknowledgment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, who work tirelessly for the community, and whose views and experiences are often invisible to policy-makers. Antoinette Braybrook is the CEO of Djirra (formerly the Aboriginal Family Violence Prevention and Legal Service Victoria) and the National Convenor of the National Family Violence Prevention Legal Services Forum. She also tweets @BraybrookA

Navigating the path to financial security: Restoring safety for family violence victim/survivors

A new model of service delivery developed by WEstjustice in partnership with McAuley Community Services for Women is improving the financial security of family violence victim/survivors. In this post Stephanie Tonkin of WEstjustice discusses the extraordinary results being achieved through the Restoring Financial Safety project and recommendations for future policy action.

Inclusive and sustainable development: A joined up social policy agenda?

In this piece, Social Policy Whisperer Paul Smyth reflects on inclusive and sustainable development, and asks the question of whether social policy can provide a unifying framework for a range of disparate social and environmental issues.

Trailblazers working together in cross-sector initiative to address financial exclusion

The Financial Inclusion Action Plan (FIAP) is an innovative collaboration that sees organisations across industry, government, not-for-profits and education coming together to improve financial inclusion and resilience across Australia. Here Vinita Godinho and Abigail Powell explain the importance of a program such as this and reveal findings from the evaluation of phase one of the FIAP program.

The Cost of Collaboration: More than budgeted for?

Collaboration is a popular and often routine exercise for the public, private and community sectors to develop a common purpose, as well as co-design and/or co-deliver policies or services. But the costs of these interactions are often underestimated. Robyn Keast, Michael Charles and Piotr Modzelewski argue that a detailed cost-benefit analysis should be undertaken before undergoing collaboration.

Policy and governancePower to Persuade13 April 2017Collaboration, cross-sector relationships

Call for papers for 9th International Social Innovation Research Conference: Public Policy and Social Innovation stream

The ninth annual International Social Innovation Research Conference (ISIRC 2017) will explore the theme Beyond Boundaries? Organisations, Systems and Social Innovation. Chris Mason and Robyn Keast are calling for submissions for the Public Policy and Social Innovation stream before 28 March 2017.

ConferencesPower to Persuade7 March 2017innovation, cross-sector relationships

Social justice, social enterprise and the market: Challenge or opportunity?

Dr John Butcher (ANZSOG Adjunct Research Fellow) recently addressed the Australian and New Zealand Third Sector Research Conference. His presentation offered expert reflections on the practical challenges of cross sector collaboration, and outlined the contribution of his recent open access ANZSOG/ANU Press book The Three Sector Solution: Delivering public policy in collaboration with not-for-profits and business.

Why commissioning is like a unicorn

Today's post from Dr Helen Dickenson is on how the existence of high-quality commissioning is a bit like a unicorn, elusive and prone to unintended stabbiness. It first appeared on her website.

Policy and governancePower to Persuade26 September 2016cross-sector relationships

Reform and the (not so) new role of stewardship

Australian reform discussions have of late focused around some seemingly new language and ideas concerned with stewardship and commissioning. This is being touted as a fundamental change in what government does, but what does this actually mean and will it really lead to significant reform? Helen Dickinson asks these questions and more in our latest post.

Increasing Personal Resilience will not fix Structural Unfairness.

By Gerard Brody and David Tennant

Gerard Brody is the CEO of the Consumer Action Law Centre and David Tennant CEO of Shepparton–based FamilyCare. Both participated in the Advisory Committee for the CSI/NAB Financial Resilience in Australia 2015 Research.

Finance and economicsPower to Persuade14 September 2016social services, cross-sector relationships

Integration and Implementation insights - Integration, part 2: the "how"

In this post, Julie Thompson Klein draws together and guides us through the “abundance of resources” that exist to help teams working on inter- and transdisciplinary projects find common ground and advance common goals. The post includes links to five searchable repositories to assist researchers in this sphere. This post originally appeared on the Integration and Implementation Insights blog and is reposted with permission.

InnovationPower to Persuade9 September 2016research, cross-sector relationships

Working across boundaries: how insights from feminist thinking can make us better at collaboration

Concurrent with Putting Women at the Centre: A Policy Forum, we are running some accompanying blog posts. In this post, Helen Dickinson (@DrHDickinson) draws on her forthcoming article 'What can feminist theory offer policy implementation challenges?' to explore how feminist thinking can help us move beyond a simplistic view of collaboration as coordinating activity across a number of actors.

ANZSOG call out for examples of cross-sector partnerships

In partnership with Curtin University, ANZSOG (Australia and New Zealand School of Government) Research has recently funded a number of case studies that look at joint efforts of public, not-for-profit (NFP) and business sector actors working together on public policy problems. This letter below is a call out for examples of recent and ongoing policy/service delivery initiatives that rely upon coordination and cooperation between public sector entities and not-for-profits.

Policy and governancePower to Persuade22 July 2016innovation, research, cross-sector relationships

Stemming the revolving door phenomenon: the importance of strategic advocacy in the community legal sector

The community legal sector is well positioned to identify need for systemic change, to act upon that need and to generate policy improvements with significant public impact. Jacki Holland of Good Shepherd Australia New Zealand discusses how, by engaging in strategic legal advocacy, community lawyers can venture beyond traditional case by case approaches to tackle systemic and common legal problems through novel means generating broad community benefit.

Book review: Grassroots to Government: creating joined-up working in Australia

To celebrate the launch of the new website, we have included today a review of the book written by Power to Persuade founder Gemma Carey: G rassroots to Government: creating joined-up working in Australia. This review was written by Power to Persuade moderator Luke Craven and is reposted from the Croakey site.

Policy and governancePower to Persuade16 March 2016cross-sector relationships

Power to Persuade symposium wrap-up

Managing for outcomes, the non-fungible value of social capital, quasi-markets, social impact bonds - last Friday's fourth annual Power to Persuade symposium at ANU's University House had it all. Here's a symposium wrap-up from UniMelb PhD candidate Sue Olney (@olney_sue).

Policy and governanceSophie Yates24 September 2015cross-sector relationships

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