Recent publications in IPA Backgrounder
Education Reform: Who Should Control the Curriculum?
Over the last 10 to 15 years, education systems across the English-speaking Western world have sought to reduce the power of centralized bureaucracies and to give schools greater autonomy.
Regulating Biotechnology: Some Questions and Answers
Forty years ago James Watson and Francis Crick discovered the molecular structure of DNA and, from the early seventies, biotechnologists progressively learned more precise ways of introducing genes into plants and animals. Although by...
Biotechnology and Food: 10,000 Years of Sowing Seeds, 100 Years of Harvesting Genes
There are two great success stories of biological technologies in the twentieth century: the taming of infectious disease by antibiotics and vaccines, and the harnessing of genetic improvement in crops, epitomized by the Green Revolution.
Reconciliation: What Does it Mean?
In the last few decades, Aborigines have won freedoms long denied to them. The paternal hands of church and state have largely been removed from their lives. They now have to build a new life out of the ruins of dispossession, and with the full...
The Easy Guide to the Republic Proposal
On 6 November 1999, the Australian people will be asked whether to amend the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Australia so as to replace our current constitutional monarchy with a republic with a President chosen by Federal Parliament.
Risk Assessment and Decision Making for Genetically Modified Foods
The introduction of genetically modified foods has been accompanied by a level of concern in Europe which was not seen in the United States. This is seen as reflecting both a different cultural appraisal of risk, sensitised by the 'mad cow'...
Who's ABC? The ABC, Staff Capture and the Obstacles to Accountability
As this IPA Backgrounder shows, the ABC provides a case study of the problems of public ownership.
ABC TV News and the 1998 Waterfront Dispute: Reporting or Barracking?
In 1998, the ABC’s coverage of the MUA/Patrick waterfront dispute—the most contentious political issue of the year—led to allegations of bias, most notably by Senator Richard Alston, the...
The End of the Overpopulation Crisis?
Over the past half century, the ‘population explosion’ has been presented as a grave threat to humanity. But as different apocalyptic predictions have failed to eventuate, the justifications have shifted,...
From Welfare State to Transfer State
The last 40 years have seen great changes in the role of government in Australian life. During that time, expenditure on government transfers— income support, health, education and welfare services—has grown...