Patient competence and professional incompetence: disagreements in capacity assessments in one Australian jurisdiction, and their educational implications

The determination of capacity to make medical, personal and financial decisions has significant individual and social implications. Medical and other health professionals are traditionally relied on by courts and tribunals to provide clinical and psychometric evidence of the presence or absence of capacity, or competence. Concern has long been expressed over the variability of these assessments. A survey of 285 decisions of the Queensland Guardianship and Assessment Tribunal (GAAT) between 2005 and 2008 was conducted to estimate the incidence of disagreement between health professionals in capacity assessments; to provide examples of conflicting assessments and models of assessment used; and to consider the educational implications of disagreements. While the final capacity determinations by the GAAT appear sound, this case series, and other studies in the capacity literature, strongly suggest the need to improve the education of health professionals, especially doctors, at undergraduate and postgraduate levels, in the practical assessment of capacity as a fundamental clinical skill.     

Moral Economese of Scale? Crisis,Discursive Change and the Varying Authority of Economists

This article examines the varying authority in contemporary governance of 10 prominent economists trained and based in America during the most recent period of economic instability. Despite stemming from diverse backgrounds and adopting a variety of roles, these private actors have each increasingly sought to combine moral authority with the technical authority that has been widely challenged since the outbreak of financial crisis in 2007. The shift from esoteric scientific jargons of economese towards more explicit engagements with overtly ethical issues in a moral economese is identified as an important discursive change through which these actors sought to reconfigure their contested authority. Yet this article maintains that persistent prioritisation of market values impedes rather than supports such attempts to reassert authority. Blends of technical and moral forms of authority are considered highly unstable and not conducive to enhancing the authority of these and other prominent private actors in global governance.     

Liberals and Australian Foreign Policy*

Since the Second World War, Liberal governments trying to adapt to a rapidly changing international environment have been mindful of Australian interests, and especially the ongoing search for security. Adapting to declining British power, to militant communism in East and Southeast Asia, and to a new, under‐defined alliance with the United States was no easy task. The Colombo Plan for aid to South and Southeast Asia and the dismantling of the White Australia Policy represented two forms of positive engagement with Asia. Since the 1970s, Liberal governments have played significant roles in the strengthening of the Commonwealth; strengthening ties with key countries in Asia; and maintaining a sometimes problematic security relationship with the United States. On this latter point, however, the most recent Liberal governments have not performed well, in becoming more subservient to the Americans.