John Howard,Economic Liberalism,Social Conservatism,and Australian Federalism

The Howard era saw a further accumulation of power in Canberra and continued the marginalisation of the States. This essay locates John Howard within Liberal Party tradition and examines the way in which his own values shaped his approach to federalism. Howard identified himself as an economic liberal and as a social conservative (although he might be better thought of as a social liberal.) His commitment to small government and a single market unimpeded by state borders together with his lack of sympathy with regional identity had important consequences for the evolution of the Australian federation after 1996.     

‘It's easier that you're a girl and that you're Asian’: interactions of ‘race’ and gender between researchers and participants

This article is concerned with the ways in which ‘race’ and gender interact between interviewers and participants within the research process and the implications of differences/similarities between researcher and participants for feminist research and analysis. The paper discusses issues of power and representation within a research project conducted by the white female author and two Asian female interviewers with 64 British Muslim young men and women. Based on analysis of discussion group data, it is argued that ‘race’ and gender interact between researchers and participants in highly complex and unpredictable ways to produce particular accounts, but comparative analysis of accounts produced with different interviewers can help reveal ‘hidden’ structures of power within the texts.     

Introducing the urban land pooling/readjustment technique into Thailand to improve urban development and land supply

Land pooling/readjustment (LP/R) is a technique for managing the planned development of urban-fringe lands, whereby a government agency consolidates a selected group of land parcels and then designs, services and subdivides them into a layout of streets, open spaces and serviced building plots, with the sale of some of the plots for cost recovery and the distribution of the remaining plots back to the landowners to develop or to sell for development. Widely used in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, LP/R is being adopted in Indonesia, Nepal and Malaysia. The community benefits that the technique can provide in the Thailand situation of weak urban land-use controls and inadequate provision of urban network infrastructure are outlined. The landowner benefits the technique can provide that make it a fully acceptable and feasible technique are identified. Pilot LP/R projects should be undertaken to demonstrate and learn the technique in the Thai context. A draft scheme for one such project, to install distributor roads and utility lines in advance of private land development, is outlined. These pilot projects would also provide the local experience for designing a law, administration and procedures for the wide use of LP/R in Thailand. The main elements of such a national LP/R system are outlined. A similar approach is recommended for the adoption of LP/R by the other developing countries of Asia.     

Governance Issues for Public Sector Boards

The push to apply corporate governance arrangements from the private sector into the public sector is a manifestation of the ongoing search for ways to improve accountability and performance. This small interview study reports on the experience of senior Commonwealth public servants and board directors trying to work within the corporate governance frameworks set out in the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act (1997) and the Financial Management and Accountability Act (1997). It suggests that lines of accountability can be blurred, formal authority can be subverted, and safeguards to protect the public interest, against harms such as political patronage, may be weak or absent. Many agencies do not have appropriate procedures for assessing their own governance arrangements. There is considerable resistance to the notion that a central authority should be established with the dedicated purpose of overseeing governance arrangements and practices in the Commonwealth.     

Dangerous othering in Meg Vandermerwe’s Zebra crossing: Ubuntu – ideals and realities of the 2010 FIFA World Cup

This article explores the process of ‘othering’ in Meg Vandermerwe’s 2013 novel Zebra crossing. Othering is defined as a discursive practice in which one social group defines another in an inferior way. The novel is narrated by Zimbabwean-born albino, Chipo, who crosses the border into South Africa shortly before the start of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Far from finding the better life she had hoped for there, Chipo is instead met with prejudice and disdain from locals. Through her portrayal of Chipo’s life as an illegal immigrant in Cape Town, Vandermerwe shows that while apartheid is over, social division and inter-group conflict are not. All the while juxtaposing this reality against the backdrop of the World Cup and the ubuntu ideals it championed but failed to deliver, Vandermerwe exposes how wide the gap is between theory and practice, ideology and lived reality. Highlighting the power of discursive practices like othering to produce real and violent consequences, Vandermerwe warns that if we do not truly embrace the values of forgiveness, compassion and acceptance, we face a dark future in which a cycle of conflict and injustice is repeated instead of being broken.     

Police Personnel Affective Profiles: Differences in Perceptions of the Work Climate and Motivation

The affective profile model was used to investigate individual differences in police personnel perceptions about the working climate and its influences on motivation. The Positive Affect, Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) was used to assign police personnel, sworn and non-sworn (N = 595), to four affective profiles: self-fulfilling, low affective, high affective, and self-destructive. The work climate was assessed using the Learning Climate Questionnaire (Management Relations and Style, Time, Autonomy and Responsibility, Team Style, Opportunities to Develop, Guidelines on How to do the Job, and Contentedness). Motivation was evaluated using a modified version (to refer specifically to the individual’s work situation) of the Situational Motivation Scale (intrinsic motivation, external regulation, identified regulation, and amotivation). Self-fulfilling individuals scored higher on all work climate dimensions compared to the other three groups. Compared to low positive affect profiles, individuals with profiles of high positive affect scored higher in intrinsic motivation and identified regulation. Self-destructive individuals scored higher in amotivation. Different aspects of the work climate were related to each motivation dimension among affective profiles. Police personnel may react to their work environment depending on their affective profile. Moreover, the extent to which the work influences police personnel’s motivation is also related to the affective profile of the individual.     

The medical licensing examination debate

National licensing examinations are typically large‐scale examinations taken early in a career or near the point of graduation, and, importantly, success is required to subsequently be able to practice. They are becoming increasingly popular as a method of quality assurance in the medical workforce, but debate about their contribution to patient safety and the improvement of healthcare outcomes continues. A systematic review of the national licensing examination literature demonstrates that there is disagreement between assessment experts about the strengths and challenges of licensing examinations. This is characterized by a trans‐Atlantic divide between the dominance of psychometric reliability assurance in North America and the wider interpretations of validity, to include consequences, in Europe. We conclude that the debate might benefit from refocusing to what a national licensing examination should assess: to achieve a balance between assessing a breadth of skills and the capacity for such skills in practice, and focusing less on reproducibility.