The word “mandarin”, as applying to those government bureaucrats closest to political leaders, first became commonly used in Australia after the election of Gough Whitlam’s government in 1972. Since then, heads of significant departments have increasingly come to be seen as an influential part of successive governments. Professor John Nethercote, Adjunct Professor at the Australian [...]
The Hon John Howard, prime minister of Australia from 1996 to 2007, is also an author - his most recent work The Menzies Era - and commentator on Australian politics. As a young MP in 1975, and Liberal back bencher, John Howard witnessed many of the events of November 1975 at close range. On Monday [...]
Professor Michael Wesley is director of the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs and an author, most recently of Restless Continent: Wealth, Rivalry & Asia’s New Geopolitics which is an integrated account of the economic, political and strategic trends across the world's largest continent and which provides a guide for thinking about Asia's future [...]
Paul Kelly is editor-at-large at The Australian, journalist, commentator, author of numerous books and co-author of The Dismissal - in The Queen’s Name. With Troy Bramston, Kelly has pulled together a comprehensive version of the story of events of 11 November 1975 from fresh interviews, new archival material and a reinterpretation of events. On Monday [...]
Dr Gerard Henderson is the executive director of The Sydney Institute, a columnist with The Weekend Australian and a political commentator. In 1987, Gerard Henderson interviewed Sir John Kerr for two articles in The Weekend Australian. He was also a contributor to Sybil Nolan’s edited collection The Dismissal: Where were you on November 11, 1975? [...]
THE HON RICHARD MARLES MP is the Member for Corio and the Shadow Minister for Immigration and Border Protection. In the Rudd Labor Government, Richard Marles was the Minister For Trade. In 2015 the Australian Labor Party debated, and formally adopted it's policy platform on the handling of refugees and asylum seekers. To outline Labor's approach to processing asylum seeker processing, [...]
Marion Mahony Griffin was the American woman who changed Australian history and broke through barriers for women in architecture. Marion Mahony spent 15 years working for Chicago architect Frank Lloyd Wright, in the formative years of the Prairie School of Architecture. After she teamed up with Walter Burley Griffin, she worked with him to win [...]
Professor Anne Tiernan from the School of Government and International Relations, Griffith University is also the co-author of The Gate Keepers compiled from interviews with the most prominent among the CEOs of the prime minister’s office over decades. The book uncovers hidden wisdom about this complicated position and unparalleled insights into how things really work [...]
Gavin King is a journalist and former parliamentarian, as well as the author of Can Do, which charts the life of former Queensland premier Campbell Newman. The biography also merges Campbell Newman's story with a broader discussion on the future of reform in Australia, as told to the author by some of the nation's most [...]
In the political upheaval that saw The Hon Tony Abbott replaced as PM by The Hon Malcolm Turnbull, Australia's Minister for Finance, Senator The Hon Mathias Cormann, was a survivor. Mathias Cormann is a senator from Western Australia. On Monday, 28 September 2015, Mathias Cormann addressed The Sydney Institute to outline the progress made under [...]
