The Causes of Emigration from Singapore: How Much Is Still Political?

ABSTRACT:

Efforts to maintain a robust Singaporean economy have had to confront the serious challenge of substantial brain drain from the city-state. To address the negative effects of this problem, Singapore's ruling People's Action Party (PAP) has adopted a policy of increasing reliance on a foreign labor force. Meanwhile, the PAP appears to ignore the continued loss of human and intellectual capital. This study examines the main determinants of emigration from Singapore, specifically the political factors. The analysis is based on two primary data surveys that investigated what Singaporeans think about emigration: the 2006 Asian Barometer and the 2000–2002 Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Australia. Contrary to some previous empirical literature, data from these surveys indicate that anti–PAP and pro-democratic ideas strongly influence the decision of native Singaporeans to leave the island state. These findings likewise suggest that democratization and an expansion of business and technical education would be more effective in preserving economic growth than a policy of importing labor in the face of popular xenophobia.     

Tortoises and Hares: The Race to Shared Services Across Australian State and Territory Jurisdictions

All tiers of government in Australia have recently aimed at enhancing service provision, with shared service platforms a recent innovation. To date there has been no scholarly inquiry into comparative shared service performance at the Australian state level. This article evaluates the experience of different state jurisdictions in adopting shared service platforms within “Whole of Government” approaches to public sector reform. It demonstrates that those jurisdictions most eager to embrace shared services have created organizations susceptible to particular adverse outcomes and that, far from implementing shared services programs, they may have installed monopoly-provider conditions for a range of back-office functions.     

Delivering Community Services in a New World of Volunteering: A Case Study From Sydney,Australia

In a challenging contemporary environment of a mixed economy of welfare, volunteers are a resource much-needed for the delivery of critical community-based services. Yet the context is changing as a result of new state/non-profit sector relationships and increased government intervention. Little is known about how these changes impact on the capacity and commitment of volunteers. This article responds to this gap in understanding through a case study of existing volunteers across community services in Sydney, Australia. Findings highlight the critical importance of supportive management, and particularly coordinators who understand volunteers' escalating needs in the new volunteer world.     

Waging Lawfare: Law,Environment and Depoliticization in Neoliberal Australia

ABSTRACT

When environmental NGOs in Australia successfully sued the nation’s environment minister in August 2015 to temporarily withhold environmental approval for Australia’s largest coal mine, the ruling Coalition government accused environmentalists of waging “lawfare.” Through a critical discourse analysis of Parliamentary debate and media coverage, this article explores the lawfare battles fought in Australia in 2015, arguing that these were a site of depoliticization, in Mouffe’s (2005, Mouffe, Chantal. 2005. On the Political. Abingdon: Routledge) sense of the term. By exploring how the question of legal regulation of coal mining was rationalized, moralized, and stripped of significant political or ideological differences, this seeks to add to our understanding of processes of depoliticization by considering metadiscourses concerning “the law.”     

The meanings,origins and implications of 'the Howard Doctrine'

This article examines the background to the so-called 'Howard Doctrine' of 1999 in response to the problems that Australian diplomacy and defence policy encountered during the East Timor crisis. The article begins by examining the critical reaction both in Australia and abroad to the doctrine which appeared to imply Australia's increased reliance on the 'special relationship' with the US and its role as a 'deputy' of its ANZUS partner in the East Asia region. The article then demonstrates the historical origins of the doctrine's thinking in Australia's reliance since the post-war period on a system of serial bilateralism and special relationships with first the UK, the US and then Indonesia. However, the article also points out the essential vulnerabilities inherent in this type of serial bilateralism and its relative inability to respond effectively to the East Timor crisis. Finally, the article considers the systemic risk in Australian policy as manifested in the doctrine, and the future viability of serial bilateralism in dealing with Australia's regional diplomatic and security agenda.     

Competitiveness concerns in Hong Kong: business fears and government incomprehension

Much of the analysis of the anti-globalization movement that has emerged in the last five years has focused on the degree to which the Internet has played a crucial role in contemporary social movements. It is commonly argued that the Internet helps create ‘virtual communities’ that use the medium to exchange information, coordinate activities, and build and extend political support. Much of the commentary on the web as a means of political mobilization for social movements stresses the degree to which the Internet compresses both space and time, accelerating the exchange of information among whomever has access to this technology. Equally important in this view is the deterritorialized nature of on-line protest and the diminution in importance of ‘place’ in current anti-globalization campaigns. Certainly this argument features prominently in analyses of the campaign against the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) in 1997-98 and the protests against the World Trade Organization (WTO) meetings in Seattle in November and December 1999. Our examination of the antiglobalization movement in Australia however leads us to a different conclusion: that while the Internet does indeed compress time, it compresses space in a different, and indeed quite variable, way. We examine the way in which Australians protested against the MAI and against the WTO meetings in Seattle, and show the differences in the nature of protest in each case. In the MAI case, the protests were well-organized and national in scope, with the Internet playing an important role in organizing the movement. By contrast, in the case of the WTO, the movement was minor and relatively marginal, with the Internet playing little discernible role in galvanizing protest. We conclude that crucial to an understanding of the differences was the considerable difference in the importance of ‘place’ in each case.     

Pacific drift: Southeast Asia and the US‐Australia relationship

There has been much discussion of the economic rise of Asia and an emerging Pacific community. This is nowhere more true than in Australia and the United States. And yet an interesting by‐product of the tremendous change in Asia is that it has contributed directly to a drift in the bilateral relationship between Canberra and Washington. Notwithstanding the universally enthusiastic official rhetoric about Asia, the region is in fact of much greater importance to Australia than the United States. It is no coincidence that as Australia finds itself being increasingly pulled towards Asia, its traditionally very close relationsip with the United States is gradually weakening. This trend can be illustrated by focusing on developments in Southeast Asia and the differential way they are affecting US and Australian interests in three key policy areas: trade, politics and human rights, and security.     

澳大利亚高等技术与职业教育

在我国,高等职业教育中仍有一些基本问题未得到解决。澳大利亚TAFE学院与大学合作,课程的开发和设置、教学模式以就业为导向,把从业所需要的技能、知识、态度有机地结合在一起。文章旨在通过简略介绍澳大利亚高等技术与职业教育,以期对我国的职业教育有借鉴作用。     

澳大利亚的罪犯管理

文章简要介绍了澳大利亚的罪犯管理方法与措施 ,发展趋势及对我国的借鉴意义。     

Refugee status determination in Australia: breaking the rules?

This article looks at the asylum regime in Australia. In particular, it evaluates the procedures that are used to assess claims for asylum and the extent to which they meet international refugee and human rights standards. The article discusses four key issues in the adjudication programme: the appointment of decision-makers to tribunals that hear refugee applications, the accessibility of the review process by asylum seekers, questions relating to the efficiency of the procedures used and the mandatory detention system. It is argued that whereas Australia is party to the main international treaties that seek to protect refugees and asylum seekers, its asylum law and policy is in many ways inconsistent with international norms. To conclude, the author proposes the observance of human rights and refugee standards by asylum states. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.