Quarterly Essay 32 American Revolution

Author : Kate Jennings
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 128 pages
File Size : 54,6 Mb
Release : 2008-11-28
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781921825316

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Quarterly Essay 32 American Revolution by Kate Jennings Pdf

Where were you when America elected Barack Obama? Kate Jennings was in New York, eyes wide open, completing her take on an amazing time: "the run-up to the election ... a time when every day felt like a year and we became slightly crazed from worry but also mesmerised, unable to switch off the cable news stations, obsessively tracking the DOW, VIX, LIBOR spreads, polls in red states. So much at stake." American Revolution is a dazzling and perceptive look at the United States between hope and despair: an election-year kaleidoscope. Jennings describes how and why the US economy fell off a cliff and how an apparently endless run of primaries and an increasingly rancorous campaign culminated in a world-changing victory. She surveys the characters – Obama, Palin, McCain and the Clintons - and conveys the concepts – derivatives, bailouts and moral hazard. This is an essay that shows America in fascinating flux: it is witty and poetic, acute and evocative. ‘The television networks are justifiably in raptures about the historic election of an African-American as the president. All the same ... to reduce Obama to a label, to 'African-American,' does him - and us - a disservice. He wasn't elected for the colour of his skin; he was elected because he offered the hope of a wise, steady and healing leadership to a country bullied and battered in the name of patriotism, plundered and pillaged in the name of free markets, neglected and abandoned in the name of small government.’ —Kate Jennings, American Revolution ‘Kate Jennings captures perfectly the intensity of the past months, the terrible anxiety we felt, the almost pathological conviction that the Republicans would do anything, say anything, pull out all the stops, and that the Democrats would just stand there like numbskulls while the election was stolen from them once again.’ —Christina Thompson, editor of Harvard Review Kate Jennings is a poet, essayist, short-story writer and novelist. Both her novels, Snake and Moral Hazard, were New York Times Notable Books of the Year. Her work has been in contention for the Booker, IMPAC, and Los Angeles Times literary prizes. She has won the prestigious Christina Stead and Adelaide Festival prizes and been honored with the Australian Literary Society's gold medal. Born in rural New South Wales, she has lived in New York since 1979.

Author : Hugh White
Publisher : Quarterly Essay
Page : 124 pages
File Size : 45,8 Mb
Release : 2017-11-27
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781743820100

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Quarterly Essay 68 Without America by Hugh White Pdf

America is fading, and China will soon be the dominant power in our region. What does this mean for Australia’s future? In this controversial and urgent essay, Hugh White shows that the contest between America and China is classic power politics of the harshest kind. He argues that we are heading for an unprecedented future, one without an English-speaking great and powerful friend to keep us secure and protect our interests. White sketches what the new Asia will look like, and how China could use its power. He also examines what has happened to the United States globally, under both Barack Obama and Donald Trump – a series of setbacks which Trump’s bluster on North Korea cannot disguise. White notes that we have got into the habit of seeing the world through Washington’s eyes, and argues that unless this changes, we will fail to navigate the biggest shift in Australia’s international circumstances since European settlement. The signs of failure are already clear, as we risk sliding straight from complacency to panic. ‘For almost a decade now, the world’s two most powerful countries have been competing. America has been trying to remain East Asia’s primary power, and China has been trying to replace it. How the contest will proceed – whether peacefully or violently, quickly or slowly – is still uncertain, but the most likely outcome is now becoming clear. America will lose, and China will win.’ —Hugh White, Without America ‘This important essay clarifies China’s brinkmanship in Asia and confronts the hard facts of what it means for Australia’ —Fiona Capp, The Sydney Morning Herald ‘In ... Without America: Australia in the New Asia, Hugh White has given us possibly his best piece of writing, and on a subject of the first importance.’ —Weekend Australian ‘Just when the foreign-policy orthodoxy seemed to be catching up with him, White [has] upend[ed] it again.’ —The Interpreter

Author : Stephen G. Kurtz,James H. Hutson
Publisher : UNC Press Books
Page : 333 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2013-06-01
Category : History
ISBN : 9780807839942

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Essays on the American Revolution by Stephen G. Kurtz,James H. Hutson Pdf

These eight original essays by a group of America's most distinguished scholars include the following themes: the meaning and significance of the Revolution; the long-term, underlying causes of the war; violence and the Revolution; the military conflict; politics in the Continental Congress; the role of religion in the Revolution; and the effect of the war on the social order. This is the product of the celebrated Symposium on the American Revolution held in 1971 by the institute. Originally published 1973. A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

Author : Anonim
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
Page : 414 pages
File Size : 50,6 Mb
Release : 200?
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 9781458742421

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The best australian essays by Anonim Pdf

Author : Robyn Davidson
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
Page : 554 pages
File Size : 48,8 Mb
Release : 2010
Category : Australian essays
ISBN : 9781458742285

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The Best Australian Essays by Robyn Davidson Pdf

This year's Best Australian Essays ranges far and wide. There are portraits of Michael Jackson, Samuel Beckett, the kookaburra, Julia Gillard and Charles Darwin. There are dazzling pieces on commerce and cricket, extinction and translation, perfume and politics. There are journeys through landscapes scorched and recovering, and reflections on turning points both public and deeply personal. For Robyn Davidson, the best essays 'put oneself and the world to the test.' Here is a collection of pieces that do just that - and also entertain, inspire and provoke. Contributors include: David Sedaris, Tim Flannery, Tim Winton, Annabel Crabb, Chloe Hooper, David Marr, Drusilla Modjeska, JM Coetzee, Noel Pearson, Robert Dessaix and more.

Author : Robyn Davidson
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
Page : 326 pages
File Size : 44,9 Mb
Release : 2009-11-06
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 9781458742391

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The Best Australian Essays 2009 by Robyn Davidson Pdf

This year's Best Australian Essays ranges far and wide. There are portraits of Michael Jackson, Samuel Beckett, the kookaburra, Julia Gillard and Charles Darwin. There are dazzling pieces on commerce and cricket, extinction and translation, perfume and politics. There are journeys through landscapes scorched and recovering, and reflections on turning points both public and deeply personal. For Robyn Davidson, the best essays 'put oneself and the world to the test.' Here is a collection of pieces that do just that - and also entertain, inspire and provoke.

Author : Laura Tingle
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 171 pages
File Size : 41,6 Mb
Release : 2018-09-17
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781743820599

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Quarterly Essay 71 Follow the Leader by Laura Tingle Pdf

What is true political leadership, and how do we get it? What qualities should we wish for in our leaders? And why is it killing season for prime ministers? In this wise and timely essay, Laura Tingle argues that democratic leaders build a consensus for change, rather than bludgeon the system or turn politics into a popularity contest. They mobilise and guide, more than impose a vision. Tingle offers acute portraits – profiles in courage and cunning – of leaders ranging from Merkel and Howard to Macron and Obama. She discusses the rise of the strongman, including Donald Trump, for whom there is no map, only sentiment and power. And she analyses what has gone wrong with politics in Australia, arguing that successful leaders know what they want to do, and create the space and time to do it. After the Liberal Party’s recent episode of political madness, where does this leave the nation’s new prime minister, Scott Morrison? “The Liberal Party has been ripped apart and our polity is the worse off for having one of its major political parties rendered largely ungovernable ... Malcolm Turnbull’s fate came down to a series of judgements made not just by him, but by his colleagues, who spent much of his prime ministership failing to follow the leader and also failing in their own collective responsibility for leadership.” —Laura Tingle, Follow the Leader

Author : Hugh White
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 110 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2010-08-30
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781921825668

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Quarterly Essay 39 Power Shift by Hugh White Pdf

In Power Shift, Hugh White considers Australia’s future between Beijing and Washington. As the power balance shifts, and China’s infl uence grows, what might this mean for our nation? Throughout our history, we have counted fi rst on British then on American primacy in Asia. Now the rise of China as an economic powerhouse challenges US dominance and raises questions for Australia that go well beyond diplomacy and trade – questions about our place in the world, our loyalties and our long-term security. Will China replace the US as regional leader? If so, we will be dealing with an undemocratic and vastly more powerful nation. Will China wield its power differently from the US? If so, should we continue to support America and so divide Asia between our biggest ally and our biggest trading partner? How to defi ne the national interest in the Asian century? This visionary essay considers the shape of the world to come and the implications for Australia as it seeks to carve out a place in the new world order. “This year China overtook Japan to become the world’s second-biggest economy. It is already bigger, relative to the US, than the Soviet Union ever was during the Cold War. A Chinese challenge to American power in Asia is no longer a future possibility but a current reality. Few issues are more important to Australia’s future than how this plays out. You would not know it to listen to our leaders.” —Hugh White, Power Shift

Author : Judith Brett
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 98 pages
File Size : 46,7 Mb
Release : 2011-06-01
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781921870323

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Quarterly Essay 42 Fair Share by Judith Brett Pdf

Once the country believed itself to be the true face of Australia: sunburnt men and capable women raising crops and children, enduring isolation and a fickle environment, carrying the nation on their sturdy backs. For almost 200 years after white settlement began, city Australia needed the country: to feed it, to earn its export income, to fill the empty land, to provide it with distinctive images of the nation being built in the great south land. But Australia no longer rides on the sheep’s back, and since the 1980s, when “economic rationalism” became the new creed, the country has felt abandoned, its contribution to the nation dismissed, its historic purpose forgotten. In Fair Share, Judith Brett argues that our federation was built on the idea of a big country and a fair share, no matter where one lived. We also looked to the bush for our legends and we still look to it for our food. These are not things we can just abandon. In late 2010, with the country independents deciding who would form federal government, it seemed that rural and regional Australia’s time had come again. But, as Murray-Darling water reform shows, the politics of dependence are complicated. The question remains: what will be the fate of the country in an era of user-pays, water cutbacks, climate change, droughts and flooding rains? What are the prospects for a new compact between country and city in Australia in the twenty-first century? ‘Once the problems of the country were problems for the country as a whole. But then government stepped back ... The problems of the country were seen as unfortunate for those affected but not likely to have much impact on the rest of Australia. The agents of neoliberalism cut the country loose from the city and left it to fend for itself.’ Judith Brett, Fair Share ‘Brett is one of our most experienced and sober commentators on currents in the conservative/rural stream, and always deserves a hearing. Fair Share gives a clear and solid account on how we have come to focus on the Big Country as a problem.’ —The Canberra Times ‘A clear and compelling account of how the country went from being a key source of the nation’s economy, pride and sense of self, to a problem that needs to be addressed.’ —The Week ‘An unalloyed expose of the plight of those who live in the countryside.’ —Ross Fitzgerald, The Australian

Author : David Malouf
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 110 pages
File Size : 46,8 Mb
Release : 2011-03-01
Category : Self-Help
ISBN : 9781921870149

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Quarterly Essay 41 The Happy Life by David Malouf Pdf

In The Happy Life, David Malouf returns to one of the most fundamental questions and gives it a modern twist: what makes for a happy life? With grace and profundity, Malouf discusses new and old ways to talk about contentment and the self. In considering the happy life – what it is, and what makes it possible – he returns to the “highest wisdom” of the classics, looks at how, thanks to Thomas Jefferson’s way with words, happiness became a “right”, and examines joy in the flesh as depicted by Rubens and Rembrandt. In a world become ever larger and impersonal, he fi nds happiness in an unlikely place. This is an essay to savour and reflect upon by one of Australia’s greatest novelists. “How is it, when the chief sources of human unhappiness, of misery and wretchedness, have largely been removed from our lives ... that happiness still eludes so many of us? ... What is it in us, or in the world we have created, that continues to hold us back?” —David Malouf, The Happy Life

Author : David Kilcullen
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 141 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2015-05-20
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781925203264

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Quarterly Essay 58 Blood Year by David Kilcullen Pdf

Last year was a “blood year” in the Middle East – massacres and beheadings, fallen cities, collapsed and collapsing states, the unravelling of a decade of Western strategy. We saw the rise of ISIS, the splintering of government in Iraq, and foreign fighters – many from Europe, Australia and Africa – flowing into Syria at a rate ten times that during the height of the Iraq War. What went wrong? In Blood Year, David Kilcullen calls on twenty-five years’ experience to answer that question. This is a vivid, urgent account of the War on Terror by someone who helped shape its strategy, as well as witnessing its evolution on the ground. Kilcullen looks to strategy and history to make sense of the crisis. What are the roots and causes of the global jihad movement? What is ISIS? What threats does it pose to Australia? What does its rise say about the effectiveness of the War on Terror since 9/11, and what does a coherent strategy look like after a disastrous year? “As things stand in mid-2015, Western countries . . . face a larger, more unified, capable, experienced and savage enemy, in a less stable, more fragmented region. It isn’t just ISIS – al-Qaeda has emerged from its eclipse and is back in the game in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Syria and Yemen. We’re dealing with not one, but two global terrorist organisations, each with its own regional branches, plus a vastly larger radicalised population at home and a massive flow of foreign fighters.” —David Kilcullen, Blood Year Winner of the 2015 Walkley Award for best long feature writing.

Author : Anna Krien
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 146 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2012-04-01
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9781921870569

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Quarterly Essay 45 Us and Them by Anna Krien Pdf

For the first time in history, humans sit unchallenged at the top of the food chain. As we encroach on the wild and a vast wave of extinctions gathers force, how has our relationship with animals changed? In this dazzling essay, Anna Krien investigates the world we have made and the complexity of the choices we face. From pets to the live cattle trade, from apex predators to scientific experiments, Krien shows how we should – and do – treat our fellow creatures. As she delves deeper, she finds that animals can trigger primal emotions in us, which we are often unwilling to acknowledge. This is a clear-eyed meditation on humanity and animality, us and them, that brings out the importance of animals in an unforgettable way. “I am not weighing up whether our treatment of animals is just, because it isn’t. That age-old debate is a farce – deep down we all know it. The real question is, just how much of this injustice are we prepared to live with?” —Anna Krien, Us and Them

Author : James Brown
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 126 pages
File Size : 55,9 Mb
Release : 2016-06-13
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781925435016

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Quarterly Essay 62 Firing Line by James Brown Pdf

Going to war may be the gravest decision a nation and its leaders make. At the moment, Australia is at war with the Islamic State. We also live in a region that has become much more volatile, as China asserts itself and America seeks to hold the line. What is it like to go to war? How do we decide to go to war? Where might we go to war in the future? Will we get that decision right? In this vivid, urgent essay, James Brown looks to history, strategy and his own experience to explore these questions. He examines the legacy of the Iraq War and argues that it has prevented a clear view of Australia’s future conflicts. He looks at how we plug into the US war machine, now that American troops are based in Darwin. And he sheds fascinating light on the extraordinary concentration of war powers in the hands of the Prime Minister – and how this might go wrong. This powerful essay argues that we have not yet begun to think through the choices that may confront us in years ahead. ‘When you live in a country like ours, the dirty business of war is a stranger. That is the blessed legacy of a place where soldiers are rarely seen, and then only on parade. Where war means Anzac Day, and Anzac Days are all the same. There are few moments in modern Australia when you might pause to ask the most consequential of questions . . . What is it that we are willing to fight for?’ —James Brown, Firing Line ‘[James Brown] is a fine writer, clear and persuasive and capable of adroit tactical moves.’ —Weekend Australian ‘Brown’s survey of this complicated landscape yields some striking phrases and arresting moments. He is a natural and precise writer with a vivid sense of place.’ —Australian Book Review

Author : Waleed Aly
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 144 pages
File Size : 50,7 Mb
Release : 2010-03-09
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781921825361

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Quarterly Essay 37 What's Right? by Waleed Aly Pdf

Where did the Right go wrong? With the departure of George W. Bush and John Howard, conservative parties in the US and Australia entered a period of turmoil. Foreign affairs, economics, the environment – all were issues to be avoided. Most profoundly, conservatives no longer seemed to have a compelling vision of the future – and arguably still don’t. How did the Right end up in this state? How might conservatism renew itself? In this illuminating essay, Waleed Aly begins by unravelling the terms “Right” and “Left,” arguing that these have become meaningless. He contends that conservative parties have backed themselves into a corner by embracing free-market extremism, and that an illiberal social politics – including prescribing who or what is Australian – is not the answer, electorally tempting though it may be. Aly discusses what a better conservatism might look like. He predicts that the key issues of the day, such as climate change and the financial crisis, mean a reactionary brand of politics is unlikely to work because public opinion is swiftly leaving it behind. He draws on the work of conservative thinkers, past and present, to sketch the kind of conservatism that seems scarce in Australia, but which would be a welcome presence here. This is a supple, clear and original argument for political change. “Our political discourse is drenched in Left and Right because it is so deeply impoverished. These terms are the hallmark of a political conversation that is obsessed with teams and uninterested in ideas.” —Waleed Aly, What's Right?

Author : David Marr
Publisher : Black Inc.
Page : 144 pages
File Size : 46,6 Mb
Release : 2010-06-01
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9781921825378

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Quarterly Essay 38 Power Trip by David Marr Pdf

Power Trip shows the making of Kevin Rudd, prime minister. In Eumundi, where Rudd was born, David Marr investigates the formative tragedy of his life: the death of his father and what came after. He tracks the transformation of a dreamy kid into an implacably determined youth, already set on the prime ministership. He examines Rudd’s years as Wayne Goss’s right-hand man in Queensland, his relentless work in federal Opposition – from Sunrise to AWB – and finally his record as prime minister. In Rudd’s Queensland years, Marr finds strange patterns that will recur: a tendency to chaos, a mania for control and a strange mix of heady ambition and retreat. All through this dazzling and revelatory essay, Marr seeks to know what drives an extraordinarily driven man. As Power Trip concludes, he enters into a conversation with the prime minister in which much becomes clear. ‘Rudd had sold himself to the Australian people as a new kind of leader: a man of intellect and values out to reshape the future. If he isn’t that, people are asking, what is he? And who is he? ... Millions of words have been written about him since he emerged from the Labor pack half a dozen years ago, but Rudd remains hidden in full view.’ —David Marr, Power Trip ‘David Marr is not only Australia’s essayist assoluta, he is our most fearless.’— Barry Everingham, Independent Australia David Marr is the multi-award-winning author of Patrick White: A Life, Panic and The High Price of Heaven, and co- author with Marian Wilkinson of Dark Victory. He has written for the Sydney Morning Herald, the Age and the Monthly, been editor of the National Times, a reporter for Four Corners and presenter of ABC TV’s Media Watch. He is also the author of two bestselling biographical Quarterly Essays: Power Trip: The Political Journey of Kevin Rudd and Political Animal: The Making of Tony Abbott.