School of Social and Political Sciences - Theses
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ItemOvercoming obstacles to reform? : making and shaping drug policy in contemporary Portugal and Australia( 2006-10)National drug policy development is essential for effective drug policies, yet the process through which they emerge, the role of evidence and the theoretical basis for drug policy development are poorly understood. The present research adopted a cross-national analytical-descriptive approach to examine drug policy development between 1994 and 2006 in two nations: Portugal and Australia. Through contrasting atypical reforms - namely decriminalisation in Portugal and the Illicit Drug Diversion Initiative (IDDI) in Australia – with the preceding periods of typical reform, it provides a detailed examination of how atypical reforms are proposed, negotiated and adopted. Moreover, it critically analyses the application of three public policy theories – Multiple Streams, Advocacy Coalition and Punctuated Equilibrium – to identify common drivers and processes underpinning the developments. Through a primarily qualitative approach involving interviews with 42 expert policy makers, supplemented with secondary sources and publicly available evaluations, this research demonstrates that the major drivers of atypical reform are policy advocates and their ability to convert opportunities into pragmatic responses. In Portugal policy entrepreneurs utilised the emergence of a problem opportunity, typified by a public health crisis in Casal Ventoso, to form an alliance between experts and politicians and adopt a paradigmatic change: decriminalisation. Policy entrepreneurs in Australia used the emergence of a highly politicised opportunity to convert what was initially a doctrinal solution of “zero tolerance” into a more humane response: drug diversion. The research reveals that the process of policy formulation has critical impacts upon the mechanism, implementation and potential outcomes of reform, most notably whether there is evidence-based policy or policy-based evidence. It concludes by identifying practical and theoretical implications for more effective drug policy development, including the need for greater application of the theory of Punctuated Equilibrium. The current research asserts that policy makers must have realistic expectations over the role of evidence in policy making, but that the likelihood of pragmatic reform may be enhanced through expanding attention from “what works” to include alternative tools of persuasion. It further recommends that greater attention to the latter may increase the likelihood of effective reform. Due to the formation of an alliance between politicians and experts the Portuguese policy making process facilitated a more pragmatic reform. However, a paradigmatic change – and hence the potential for effective drug policy – would not have been possible without advocacy for a new vision of the drug user as a citizen.
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ItemAustralia's online censorship regime: the Advocacy Coalition Framework and governance compared( 2000-04)This study assesses the value of two analytical models explaining particular contemporary political events. This is undertaken through the comparative evaluation of two international models: the Advocacy Coalition Framework and Rhodes’s model of Governance. These approaches are evaluated against an single case study: the censorship of computer network (“online”) content in Australia. Through comparison evaluation, criticism, and reformulation, these approaches are presented as useful tools of policy analysis in Australia. The first part of the thesis presents the theoretical basis of the research and the methodologies employed to apply them. It begins by examining how the disciplines of political science and public policy have focused on the role of politically-active “interest”, groups in the process of policy development and implementation. This focus has lead to ideas about the role of the state actors in policy making, and attempts to describe and explain the interface between public and private groups in developing and implementing public policies. These, largely British and American, theories have impacted upon Australian researchers who have applied these ideas to local conditions. The majority of this part, however, is spent introducing the two research approaches: Paul Sabatier’s Advocacy Coalitions Framework and Rod Rhodes’s theory of Governance. Stemming from dissatisfaction with research into implementation, Sabatier’s framework attempts to show how competing clusters of groups and individuals compete for policy “wins” in a discrete subsystem by using political strategies to effect favourable decisions and information to change the views of other groups. Governance, on the other hand, attempts to apply Rhodes’s observations to the changing nature of the British state (and by implication other liberal democracies) to show the importance of self-organising networks of organisations who monopolise power and insulate the processes of decision making and implementation from the wider community and state organs. Finally, the methodologies of the thesis are presented, based on the preferred research methods of the two authors. The second part introduces the case serving as the basis for evaluating the models, namely, censorship of the content of computer networks in Australia between 1987 and 2000. This case arises in the late 1980s with the computerisation of society and technological developments leading to the introduction of, first publicly-accessible computer bulletin boards, and then the technology of the Internet. From a small hobbyists’ concern, the uptake of this technology combined with wider censorship issues leads to the consideration of online content by Australian Governments, seeking a system of regulation to apply to this technology. As the emerging Internet becomes popularised, and in the face of adverse media attention on, especially pornographic, online content, during the mid to late 1990s two Federal governments establish a series of policy processes that eventually lead to the introduction of the Broadcasting Services Amendment (Online Services) Act 1999, a policy decision bringing online content into Australia’s intergovernmental censorship system. The final part analyses the case study using the two theoretical approaches. What this shows is that, from the perspective of the Advocacy Coalition Framework, debate over online content does not form a substantive policy subsystem until 1995, and within this three, relatively stable, competing coalitions emerge, each pressuring for different levels of action and intervention (from no regulation, to a strong regulatory model). While conflict within the subsystem varied, overall the framework’s analysis shows the dominance of a coalition consisting largely of professional and business interests favouring a light, co-regulatory approach to online content. From the perspective of Governance, the issue of online content is subject to a range of intra- and inter-governmental conflict in the period 1995-7, finally settling into a negotiated position where a complex policy community emerges based largely on structurally-determined resource dependencies. What this means is that policy making in the case was not autonomous of state institutions, but highly dependent on institutional power relations. Overall, in comparing the findings it becomes apparent that the approaches lack the capacity to fully explain the role of key sovereigns, defined here as those individuals with legal authority over decision making in the policy process, because of their methodological and normative assumptions about the policy process. By showing these individuals as part of wider networks of power-dependencies, and exploring the complex bundle of real, pseudo, symbolic, and nonsense elements that make up a policy, the role of Ministers as “semi-sovereign sovereigns” can be accommodated in the two approaches.
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ItemAustralian new left politics, 1956-1972( 2009)A study of the Australian New Left might not immediately appear pertinent to contemporary society. Adherents of New Right economics have been, until recently, unshakable in their global ascendancy over the past three decades. From Russia to Tanzania, discourses of neo-liberalism have become so deeply entrenched in world politics and trade that they have been adopted by the transitional states of Eastern and Central Europe, along with other less developed countries in the international system, despite the fact that all have very different cultural histories and levels of economic development. There have been few exceptions, with one example Hugo Chavez's Venezuela. The discrediting during the global oil crisis of the mid-1970s of the post-WWII orthodoxy of Keynesian economics, social democracy and the Welfare State has played its role in this paradigm shift. More pertinent to the radical left may be that the legacy of Soviet Communism's 'terrors and errors' still looms large in the consciousness of socialist thought, provoking disagreement over what can be salvaged from the cadaver of Marxist theory. The increasing specialisation and integration of world marketplaces since the 1960s has also led to questions over whether the notion of a working class - so essential to Marx's utopian revolution - still exists at all. The rise of 'identity politics' and the relativism of postmodernist thought, seen as at the cutting edge of academic theory since the 1970s, have represented further challenges to those desiring to rebuff the entrenched global logic of consumer capitalism. Capitalism is the only 'meta-narrative' left uncontested by postmodernists, while other ideologies - such as Marxism, feminism and even the discipline of history - are criticised for their failure to adequately address the realities of difference within the groups (i.e. workers, women) that they focus upon. This thesis re-examines a time when the left commanded a degree of mainstream popularity; when hundreds of thousands of Australians took to the streets to protest against the government, and when, however briefly, Marxist sympathisers constituted respectable numbers in academic circles, to ascertain what lessons, if any, might be learnt for 'socialist humanist' campaigns today. The anti-globalisation campaigns of the past decade and recent concerns regarding climate change represent hope as starting points for contemporary mass radicalism. Recently, I travelled beside a thoughtful and articulate man in his late fifties who had been a student at the University of Western Australia during the early 1970s. He had been acutely aware of radicals at other campuses such as Monash at this time, and laughed dismissively that student activists were still saying the same things nowadays. While my travelling companion was amused that contemporary student radicals continue to subscribe to what he sees as archaic and refuted ideas and philosophies, I believe that this constancy is due to the fact that New Left criticism remains highly applicable today.
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ItemSocial enterprise in Australia: achieving private benefits and public outcomes( 2002)In the post-industrial economy, the social role of Australian business is widening in anticipation of the economic benefit derived from the intangible assets of a good reputation, employee loyalty and enhanced legitimacy in the community. Meeting social expectations is becoming a legitimate aspect of an enterprise’s core purpose and functions, not only because of the community’s intolerance of unacceptable corporate behaviour but because the global economy is generating new parameters for business success. Expansion in voluntary community involvement and the formation of social partnerships typifies this new business strategy and is a recent occurrence in Australian business. While community involvement is only one component of the mosaic of the broadening social role of enterprises, it is a window through which the changing social character of business in the global environment can be investigated. Community involvement is the aspect of Australian business that is empirically investigated in this thesis. Advocates for business as a social actor in the public domain depict the business benefits as extensive and the public benefits as self-evident. While this promises mutual gain, both the private and public sectors need to be watchful. Long-term business benefits will not be achieved without integration of the social dimension into the core business strategy of enterprises. Similarly, in the public domain, the potential benefits for the community will be limited without a public policy framework that takes account of the boundary crossing nature of social activity by business. A model of social enterprise is advanced in this thesis to portray the dimensions of the social role of business that will yield private sector benefits and the qualities needed in public policy to facilitate and reward the shared ownership of social conditions.
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ItemThe eschatology of the image( 2001)This research considers the visualisation of the dead body throughout forensic and aesthetic discourse. Weighted toward the photographic image of the dead, the thesis explores routines of framing and composition in forensic practices, and the maneouvres of aesthetic pieces, to more fully understand the ways in which images of the dead body endure in the living community. By examining interdisciplinary practices of representing the dead body in law, criminology, art and forensic medicine, the thesis engages with the conundrum of death and dead bodies in culture. The paradox identified is one of visibility and invisibility, of acknowledgement and denial, which constitutes cultural relations of remembrance and retrieval of dead bodies by way of the image. Of critical concern throughout is the problematisation of visual truth, which repeatedly gives rise to questions of indexation and faith in the sights and sites of the dead. Focussing on the imaging of the dead body in diverse cultural spaces (such as mortuaries and art exhibitions) highlights the way in which these bodies disappear, are indexed to 'evidence', and how cultural practices perform their return. In the panic and disquiet that erupts at the representation of the dead, there remain places of palliation and commemoration, filtered through both forensic and aesthetic pictures and practices. Rather than claiming the body for definite conclusion, the research argues towards the rupturing of the evidentiary. Correspondingly, of crucial importance is the levelling of critical room for forensic images to encourage alternative visions. That is, to outlive evidential concerns. In addition, by revising aesthetic documents created in spaces of formal summary (such as forensic mortuaries), the thesis embraces the aesthetic translation of the dead body for its clues of the real. This thesis traces the imaged dead body to establish a challenge - to reframe notions of evidence both in forensic address and aesthetic display.
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ItemBetter the devil you know?: Australia and the British bids for European Community membership( 2004)In the context of the changing post-war relationship between Australia and the United Kingdom, this thesis examines the three British applications for European Community membership and their implications for Australia. It is argued that the implications went beyond the conspicuous and much publicised impact on trade figures. British accession to the EC - and the preceding negotiations in the 1960s - marked a low point in Australian-British relations in a general sense. In spite of initial pretensions to a 'world role', successive British Governments of the 1960s were ultimately more intent on involvement in the European integration process than on the preservation of Commonwealth links. Faced with economic and political problems of their own, policy makers in London overlooked Australian representations on the issue. The principal research question of the thesis relates to the effectiveness of Australian representations on the issue, which were largely unsuccessful. It is argued that five key factors influenced this outcome, namely: Australia's relatively recent independence from the UK in foreign policy; the disadvantageous British bargaining position with the member states of the European Community; the changing form of the Commonwealth; the critical role played by the United States; and the abrupt and inconsistent approaches adopted by Australian negotiators. It is further suggested that there were three discernible consequences of the whole episode for Australian foreign policy. First, the Australian response to the British applications for Community membership negatively affected Australian-British relations. Second, it tarnished Australian attitudes towards the European Community and complicated Australian-EC relations. Third, it confirmed the increasing importance of regionalism in international politics, and Australia's marginalisation from existing regional forums. The thesis is one of the first accounts to consider the issue in full historical perspective, covering negotiations from the late 1950s through to the 1970s.
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ItemWhen women kill: an exploration of scenarios of lethal self-help in Australia 1989-2000( 2003)Most homicide research in Australia and elsewhere has focused predominantly on homicides committed by men, neglecting to examine in any depth those perpetrated by women. Through a qualitative and quantitative analysis of data collected as part of the National Homicide Monitoring Program this thesis addresses this gap in knowledge through an examination of female-perpetrated homicide in Australia between 1 July 1989 and 30 June 2000. The main research aims were fourfold: to identify the differences and similarities between male and female-perpetrated homicides in Australia; to examine in-depth the circumstances and characteristics of the scenarios where women kill; to assess the relative utility of Donald Black's (1983; 1998) self-help model in explaining why some women need to resort to informal social control, specifically lethal self-help; and to discuss avenues for policy formation in the prevention of female-perpetrated homicide. The most significant findings arising from the research are that women kill in a diverse range of circumstances, and that just one scenario can not adequately capture the phenomenon. For example, women kill to protect themselves from being physically or sexually assaulted; they kill during delusional episodes; they kill out of jealousy or in a fit of rage; and they kill whilst significantly affected by alcohol. They also kill whilst acting on their own volition or whilst acting under the instructions of a male counterpart. However, there was one common thread that linked many of the women offenders examined in this study, irrespective of who they killed: many had suffered adversity and low social status. While low social status predicts that women would be more likely to resort to lethal self-help, not all homicides by women were acts of self-help. Black's self-help theory, as it stands, requires further expansion and elaboration if it is to extend to a wider breadth of women who kill. Since violence is gendered and the homicides committed by women and men differ in important respects, any theory attempting to explain homicides by women needs to account for the gender disparity. Theory needs to recognise that we are all positioned differently in the social, economic, political and cultural spheres of society and that the act of homicide ultimately represents the quality of the lives of the women who kill. Prevention therefore needs to focus on the underlying structural and gender inequalities of women in Australia and improving their lives.
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ItemCorporeal punishment: prisons and sexual difference( 2000)This research explores the corporeality of punishment, arguing that the day-to-day regulation of the prison marks the body of the prisoner in particular ways. Of critical importance are concepts of materiality and subjectivity examined here through a range of disciplinary practices based on notions of abjection, fluidity, space, time and desire. The role of the body in the analysis of punishment, including the way in which the prisoner's body is seen as abject and permeable, is a key concern. It is argued that the questionable material status of the prisoner leads to a range of intrusive surveillance practices that deny the prisoner control over their physical integrity. Such practices include management of bodily waste and other bodily fluids, testing for disease and addiction and subjection to physical violence. The placement and maintenance of boundaries and borders is of crucial concern in terms of both their intransigence and their transgression. It is not only the boundary of the prisoner's body that is in question but also the prison as a site of containment and exclusion, a place where ongoing attempts to shore lip the difference between the outside and the inside are in clear evidence. Such practices include the design of prison buildings, the geographical placement of prisons and other processes of cultural exclusion. The concept of motion encompasses the irruptions of discourse and the routines of the everyday. It is argued that spatial and temporal modes of disciplinary organisation are critical to the materiality and subjectivity of the prisoner. Questions of space point to the built form of the prison and the way in which prisoners move within it. Questions of time focus on the impact of the synchronisation, ordering, sequencing, control and measurement of prisoners' lives. Finally, it is the specificity of sexed and desiring subject positions that is explored. Critical questions of desire and identity, with a focus on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender prisoners are asked in an exploration of the ways in which the disciplinary apparatus works to impose notions of sex- and heteronormativity in the prison and the ability of prisoners to resist such impositions. Desire and identity are no longer fixed, raising the possibility of alternative materialities and subjectivities.
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ItemEcological modernisation, ecologically sustainable development and Australia's national ESD strategy( 2002)Internationally, over the past two decades, many countries have attempted to use national and sub-national strategies-green plans-to integrate environmental and economic policy making, management and activity. Three such plans have been developed in Australia, two national strategies-the National Conservation Strategy for Australia in 1983, and the National Strategy for Ecologically Sustainable Development (NSESD) in 1992-and a sub-national strategy, the Victorian State Conservation Strategy, Protecting the Environment, in 1987. This thesis describes and analyses each strategy, focusing on the development and implementation of the NSESD, the most substantial attempt at green planning in Australia to date. It examines the NSESD in relation to the evolution and adoption in Australia of different discourses of ecological modernisation, and against the requirements for state environmental capacity building necessary to promote ecological sustainability. In relation to the NSESD, this thesis argues that the conjunctural moment-the 'two or three brief shining years' -that stretched from the start of 1989 to the end of 1991 offered a rare opportunity for significant institutional reform in and beyond the domain of Australian environmental politics and policy. That situative context configured a landscape in which new actors, and ideas about ecological modernisation, could flourish. During 1990 and 1991 in particular, it appeared that Australia was undergoing a substantial political, social and economic transformation associated with a range of new initiatives that promised policy stability and, perhaps, ecological sustainability. The most far reaching was the process for developing the NSESD. In 1991, the ESD Working Groups recommended sectoral initiatives that reflected aspects of weak ecological modernisation and capacity building proposals for institutional change reflecting the discourse of strong ecological modernisation. However the context for environmental policy innovation then deteriorated. Economic circumstances again confined opportunities for institutional refonn and, during 1992, institutional inertia overwhelmed the initiatives of the Working Group process. This led to a Strategy that only faintly reflected the innovations of the earlier Working Group phase, lacked strong political or public support, and consequently was implemented only weakly. This outcome was in part conditioned by the legacy of failures associated with the earlier NCSA (failures repeated through the ESD process), in part the result of inadequate policy entrepreneurship and failures of political leadership. Nevertheless, the ESD Working Group process and the NSESD did contribute to and helped consolidate a significant cultural shift towards the now prevalent environmental discourse of weak ecological modernisation.
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ItemStolen generations: the forcible removal of aboriginal children from their families: identity and belonging( 2000)Stolen Generations: 'Identity and Belonging' explores the ways in which members of the Stolen Generations have sought to make sense of, and establish their sense of belonging and negotiate their Indigenous identities. In order to appreciate the uniqueness of the Stolen Generation experience and the challenges faced by individuals in forging their places of belonging, understanding the climate and context in which members of the Stolen Generations lived in is vital. Members of the Stolen Generations were confronted with and have had to come to terms with the paradoxes of history. Members of the Stolen Generations were taken away by, and raised in the very cultures and systems that damaged their societies of origin, and which continued to stigmatise Aboriginality as inferior. Within this context of analysis, the research gives attention to the various ways in which Aboriginal individuals in non-Aboriginal care came to their earliest sense of their Aboriginality. This exploration acts as a commentary of the construction of Aboriginality within the wider non-Aboriginal context - the stereotypes, the racism and the ignorance that informed those opinions. The ensuing search for a fuller understanding of what Aboriginality means to those members of the Stolen Generations is a highly complex and challenging one. For those trying to re-establish their ties with their birth families and communities, the years of physical and cultural isolation make it difficult for individuals to unproblematically find their place/s within the Indigenous families and to negotiate their Indigenous identities. Added to this, the experience of finding places of belonging and acceptance are inevitably shaped and determined by the attitudes and responses of the Koori community towards members of the Stolen Generations. The phrase "bringing them home", which in many ways has become synonymous with the issue of the Stolen Generations, carries with it the assumption that those who were 'lost' simply make their way back home, back to a recognizable and pre-existing community that is ready to welcome these individuals with open arms. The present research draws attention to the fact for most, there is no simple and straightforward route 'home'. This research explores the complexity of this journey - giving careful attention to the ways in which this rupture from cultural heritage and family base poses challenges for those trying to find that 'home' or 'belonging place' and intricacies involved in the negotiation of those Indigenous identities.