Les liaisons dangereuses: Relations between police commissioners and their political masters

This article reflects on the difficult and ambiguous relationship between Australian Police Commissioners and their political masters. The article looks at South Australia, Queensland and New South Wales and examines the nature of the conflict arising in these jurisdictions from the ambiguous nature of the roles Police Commissioners and Ministers are expected to play. In exploring the uncertainties and expectations that surround the Police Commissioner–Minister relationship, the article considers what lessons can be drawn from such examples. The article reflects on the political and social ramifications of such altercations and considers ways of managing future conflict.     

Dealing with unfinished Indigenous business: The need for historical reflection

The commitment by both major political parties to the abolition of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission symbolises profound problems that continue to bedevil movement towards meaningful reconciliation in Australia.
Unlike Australia, long-established treaties in Canada, the United States and New Zealand as well as greater theoretical clarity in identifying the process of colonization and its ill-effects on Indigenous peoples have provided stronger foundations for policy and more positive outcomes.
This article provides a theoretical framework for understanding the effects of colonisation in Australia, and policy prerequisites for redressing its damaging effects. These include a treaty, improved economic resources and stronger political, intellectual and property rights.     

Integrated leadership system in the Australian Public Service

On 16 July 2004 the Australian Public Service Commission launched a new approach to leadership capability development for the public service. This approach, the Integrated Leadership System (ILS), is described as innovative and unique by the four speakers who make up this presentation—including Andrew Podger (AO), Public Service Commissioner, Jane Halton, Secretary of Health and Ageing, Anne Simic, Head of People, Qantas, and Dr Peter Shergold, Head of the Public Service and Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.     

A neo-Downsian model of group-oriented voting and racial backlash

We extend the standard Downsian framework to suppose that voters consider the identity of each candidate's supporters when deciding whom to support, rather than considering only the announced policy positions of the candidates. In particular we posit the existence of a class of voters whose support for a candidate reduces support by some other voters for that candidate. Our most important result concerns the conditions under which the addition to the electorate of new voters on one side of the policy spectrum shifts the equilibrium toward the opposite direction. The model can explain why enfranchisement of blacks did not immediately help the election of liberal candidates.     

Voter discernment and candidate entry in pluralitarian election

The paper develops a sequential model of candidate entry into elections decided on the basis of plurality. We analyze the kinds of candidates who are most likely to enter elections and simulate several plausible myopic entry sequences under various assumptions about voter abilities to discern differences in candidate positions. In the cases examined, open elections for “important” positions attract the entry of more than two candidates. Moreover, myopic entry often generates electoral outcomes which depart from the median-mean outcomes of the conventional models. These results are consistent with the observed diversity of candidates in presidential and other significant primary elections which contrasts with many previous analyses of electoral entry.     

‘Cleaning up’ while cleaning up? Pollution abatement,interest groups and contingent trade policies

This paper analyzes the political economy of environmental-policy formation in a trading economy with established rules for administered protection. We argue that the social costs associated with the adoption of an inefficient environmental regime are likely to be compounded by induced restrictions on trade when the effected industries are import competing. The preferences of interest groups for alternative environmental regimes tend to be linked to the legal-institutional setting in which trade policy is conducted. Under existing rules and practices in the area of administered protection, there is reason to believe that interest group preferences for an inefficient approach to pollution control will be strengthened because the adoption of such a regime is more likely to lead to a concomitant increase in trade barriers.     

Leo Strauss: the Ancient as Modern

Although his approach to politics and philosophy were relatively little known outside the United States, Leo Strauss was perhaps the most revered and the most controversial figure in post-war American political science. His followers today form what is arguably the most cohesive intellectual fraternity in the discipline. They constitute a highly influential opposition to the empirical-quantitative course taken by political science and political philosophy.
This study explores Strauss's ideas highlighting the unconventional mixture of substance and style that gives them an arrestingly idiosyncratic character. Substantively, Strauss belonged to the pre-modern intellectual tradition that understood Truth as accessible and knowable through philosophical contemplation. The form of his argumentation, however, his relentless critique of modernity and the moderns, is conducted with all the cognitive weaponry provided for by the modernist intellectual style.     

United States' electricity imports from Quebec and the fair trade issue

Abstract: Hydro-Québec's energy exports to neighbouring American electric utilities have increased substantially over the last decade as a result of conditions created by the oil crisis of the seventies. These increases have mostly been in the form of interruptible energy exchanges. Considering prices and costs of production on both sides of the border, the prospects for further growth of firm energy exports to the United States appear to be reasonably good. Some institutional features of electricity production in Quebec may raise concerns about fair trading. These concerns have little foundation, however, when consideration is given to the size of energy imports relative to the American northeast market, the pricing method of Hydro-Québec electricity exports to the United States, and the role played by the National Energy Board in Canada. Sommaire: Les conditions créées par la crise pétrolière des années soixante-dix ont permis à Hydro-Québec d'accroître de façon significative ses exportations aux services d'électricité américains. Cette croissance a pris la forme, en grande partie, de ventes d'énergie interruptible. Compte tenu des prix et des coûts de production actuels de chaque côdé la frontière, il serait raisonnable de s'attendre à une croissance des exportations d'énergie ferme aux États-Unis. Quelques caractéristiques institutionnelles de la production de l'électricité au Québec pourraient par contre soulever des inquiétudes quant au commerce équitable. Toutefois, ces inquiétudes apparaissent avoir peu de fondements quand on tient compte de la taille relative de ces exportations vers le marché de la Nouvelle-Angleterre, de la méthode tarifaire employée par Hydro-Québec pour ses exportations américaines et du rôle joué par l'Office national de léenergie du Canada.     

Cost-sharing — A necessary component for successful technology transfer

The general objective of this paper is to propose the establishment of a federal cost-sharing policy for reducing risk in transferring technology from the R&D stage to commercialization. Minimization of this risk barrier is expected to encourage diverse groups to participate in technology transfer. Section II focuses on specific barriers that impede technology transfer efforts and it presents policy options to minimize identified barriers. Section III introduces objectives of cost-sharing experiments from which cost-sharing policies can be formulated. In addition, we also identify specific cost-sharing participation criteria and success variables for the policy.