Colette Einfeld
Finding the right levers to influence policies in a complex environment can be very difficult. The Mandarin’s David Donaldson sought and consolidated the views of three academics, including that of UNSW Canberra’s Public Service Research Group professor Deborah Blackman, on policymaking in complex systems.
This article was originally published on The Mandarin.
Read MoreProfessor Deborah Blackman, Associate Professor Helen Dickinson, Dr Karen Gardner, Dr Fiona Buick, Dr Samantha Johnson and Dr Sue Olney from UNSW Canberra’s Public Service Research Group believe that machinery of government changes are often poorly planned, disruptive and costly. Their APS review submission outlines five priority areas for reform.
This article was originally published on The Mandarin.
Read MoreAustralia has many documented barriers to achieving gender parity in the workplace, and while a statistical overview of the pay and superannuation gap, differences in part-time and full-time positions held, and/or the percent of women in senior management or board positions is a good dashboard indicator, the most revealing view is to examine how things sit for women who face multiple barriers to achieving workplace equity. In today’s importance analysis, Catherine Hemingway[1] (@cathehemingway) of WEstjustice (@WesternCLC) shares findings from her Not Just Work report, which explores the high levels of discriminatory actions that recently-arrived women experience in their work places.
Read MoreDoes our Prime Ministry *really* think coal is “clean?” In today’s post, RMIT Master of Social Science student Lanie Stockman (@The_Real_Lanie) analyses government policy using the framework of strategic ignorance. This concept may explain some of the odd stances that are taken in Canberra.
Read MoreLast week, an important research report was launched by the National Social Security Rights Network. Entitled "How well does Australia’s social security system support victims of family and domestic violence?", author Sally Cameron lays out the many and complex ways the welfare system too often increases women’s financial insecurity following a separation due to domestic violence, and in the process compounds trauma. Today’s blog post provides a summary of the main findings from the report.
Read MoreContinuing the discussion on the future of social policy research in Australia, Deputy Director of the UNSW Social Policy Research Centre kylie valentine explains how work in the field has adapted to changes in funding and stresses the importance of multiple disciplines, epistemologies, intellectual traditions, conceptual frames and partnerships in researching the causes and effects of social inequality.
Read MoreIn the wake of the Productivity Commission research paper Rising inequality? A stocktake of the evidence released on 28 August 2018, Paul Smyth considers the future of social policy research in Australia as understanding of the interdependence of social and economic policies continues to grow and change.
Read MoreLiz Sayce - Joseph Rowntree Research Fellow in Practice at the LSE International Inequalities Institute and former Chief Executive of Disability Rights UK - explores tensions in campaigning for rights to work and rights to social protection for people with disabilities and calls for patterns of campaigning and influencing to change to avoid different groups working at cross-purposes. This post was originally published on the LSE Equity, Diversity and Inclusion blog.
Read MoreProfessor Peter Whiteford examines the Productivity Commission research paper Rising inequality? A stocktake of the evidence released last week and cautions us not to believe the media spin that all Australians are better off. To tackle inequality, he argues, we need both policies that generate economic growth and policies that ensure it’s well spread. This piece was originally published in The Conversation on 31 August 2018.
Read MoreAs the Productivity Commission weighs in on decades of inequality research, David Donaldson (@davidadonaldson), journalist for The Mandarin, describes their report and the changes (or not) to inequality in Australia through the lens of one of our most conservative advisory bodies. This post first appeared in The Mandarin.
Read MoreSupport for social enterprise at the federal policy level is low in Australia compared to the UK. In this post, Dr. Chris Mason (@chrismasonswin) of Swinburne University presents his research with Michael Moran using discourse analysis to draw out differences in the way social enterprise is spoken about and supported.
Read MoreDespite being touted the dismal science, the theory of implementation has much to offer. Today we look to policy studies and the way that policy studies researchers think about policy implementation. Lachlan McKenzie (@McKenzie_LD) and Catherine Althaus (@AlthausCat) of ANZSOG argue that policy implementation studies are stuck in a success-failure binary, and with that theoretical stagnation, has hit a ‘brick wall’ in terms of advancement. What lies through the window of such a wall?
Read MoreThe tenth anniversary of the Black Saturday bushfires is fast approaching. This is a useful time for further analysis of what happened during one of the worst peacetime disasters in Australia’s history, and to reflect on what has changed since, particularly in terms of policy and safety approaches. Dr Meagan Tyler (@DrMeaganTyler) and Dr Ben Reynolds argue that thinking about how gendered expectations and assumptions have affected both policy and practice in this space can be a useful way forward.
Read MoreCalls for collaborative solutions to difficult policy problems have recently become louder and more insistent. In 2016 the Australia and New Zealand School of Government and the John Curtin Institute of Public Policy at Curtin University co-invested in a comparative case study of five collaborative initiatives in Australia and New Zealand.
The team’s purpose was to identify important factors influencing the success of collaborative approaches. Here, Dr John Butcher shares a few “take homes” from this research.
Read MoreIn this article, Dr. Shelley Bielefeld, Professor Eva Cox, and the Accountable Income Management Network Secretariat critique the Mindaroo Foundation’s report on the Cashless Debit Card (CDC). They cite the ‘cherry picking’ of results to support claims of success, a lack of attention to human rights, and security issues, among other points. Ultimately, they argue that the benefits of the CDC for communities are “negligible to negative” and that the proposed expansion of the trial would further marginalise those purported to benefit from the CDC.
Read MoreThe ACT specialist homelessness sector has been exploring how it can respond to the research that suggests that 100% of people engaging with services have been impacted by trauma. In this post, Rebecca Vassarotti explores what some of the research suggests and how human services sub-sectors can engage with practice approaches such as trauma-informed practice.
Read MoreWomen face specific challenges when it comes to managing money. They tend to spend more time out of the paid workforce to care for others and this impacts on their ability to generate wealth. The Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) is aiming to address this issue by normalising conversations about money. Check out these interviews where ASIC’s Laura Higgins chats with five influential and inspirational Australian women about their experiences with money.
Read MoreWe spend a lot of time as a local, national and global community considering the wellbeing of children and what is in ‘the best interest of the child’ when they are at risk of abuse and neglect. We spend much less time considering the rights and responsibilities of parents and other family members who have children in the care of child protection services. It is time for a Charter of Rights for Parents and Families, argues Sharynne Hamilton from the Telethon Kids Institute at the University of Western Australia.
Read MoreThe Bruny Island Battery Project is trailing new technology in Tasmania, with the aim of creating a grid that is flexible, reliable, cheaper and based on renewable energy. The researchers involved tell us more in this repost from The Conversation
Read MoreWill it soon be possible to outsource our caring responsibilities for ourselves, our children and our parents to robots? Catherine Smith and Helen Dickinson ask what the human rights, privacy, equity and practical implications for care would be in a tech-dominated future.
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