Latest Blog Posts
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WHS and the West Gate Collapse
Last week Sarah Gregson presented a paper on our behalf, based on our research into the collapse of the West Gate Bridge in Melbourne in 1970. The disaster killed 35 workers, and injured many more. Its legacy continues to this day, including the annual memorial held on 15 October and the digital commemoration on the West […]
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Thesis Eleven Special Issue: On ‘heroic fury’ and questions of method in Antonio Gramsci
I was most pleased to see our special issue of Thesis Eleven — On ‘heroic fury’ and Antonio Gramsci — published this week. Edited by Ihab Shalbak and myself, it has articles by Peter Thomas, Phil Roberts, Andreas Bieler, Adam Morton, as well as ourselves. This volume has had a long gestation and I’m particularly indebted to […]
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Queerstories: 6 July 2018
On Friday 6 July I’ll be speaking at Sydney’s Queerstories. A keen audience member, I’ll be performing this time around and telling a short story. Maeve Marsden, the host and producer, describes the event like this: It involves ‘reflections on lives well lived and battles fought, pride, prejudice, love and humour. The LGBTQI community has […]
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25th anniversary of Michael Pusey’s Economic Rationalism in Canberra
2016 marked the 25th anniversary of Michael Pusey’s seminal text of economic sociology, Economic Rationalism in Canberra. As a detailed analysis of top bureaucrats in Canberra who had adopted free market ideas and the transformation of public policymaking, Pusey’s book helped instigate a national conversation and publicised the concept of ‘economic rationalism’. It was ranked […]
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Work: Past and Present
Work: Past and Present is a monthly seminar investigating Australian and international labour history through the contemporary moment. It is a new series organised by myself, Sarah Gregson (University of New South Wales) and Frances Flanagan (United Voice/University of Sydney). The sessions will discuss issues including: worker’s struggles and organising; technology and labour; paid and […]
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Work History and the Collapse of the West Gate Bridge
This week my colleague Sarah Gregson (UNSW) and I are on the GLAMcity podcast talking about the history of work, labour under the Accord, and the memorialisation of those killed in the West Gate Bridge collapse & the Titanic disaster. You can listen to the interview here. GLAMcity is a new radio show and podcast launched […]
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Playdough Capitalism
Lessons in radical economic pedagogy. This post was first posted on the Progress in Political Economy blog, and the UTS Learning futures blog. *** When he visited Sydney a few years ago I met Bill Carroll, Professor of Sociology at the University of Victoria in Canada. We talked about teaching political economy and, in particular, how he […]
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Take a walk around your neighbourhood
Lessons in radical economic pedagogy. This post was co-authored by Keith Heggart and myself, and posted on the UTS Learning and Teaching blog and the Progress in Political Economy blog. Take a walk In the first chapter of Economics for Everyone, Jim Stanford argues that although economics is often presented as fiendishly complex, it should be a […]
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Living The Dream under The Accord (podcast)
Last week I was interviewed on the wonderful ‘Living the Dream’ podcast. We discussed the Accord, neoliberalism and the ALP Hawke-Keating government. Our focus was on recent articles by Van Badham and Wayne Swan in The Guardian, and how the ALP and unions are attempting to understand and frame the experience of the Hawke-Keating government today. I discuss […]
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Wen you laugh togetha
By Elizabeth Humphrys and Jackie Lynch. This article first appeared on Overland Journal. The AFLW (Women’s Australian Football League) has happened and we couldn’t be happier about it, even if that happiness is often expressed in joyous weeping. There’s something quaint and precious about this beginning – the huge grins on the players’ faces […]
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Transcript: Morbid symptoms presentation
The following is the text of a presentation I gave this week, as part of the Sydney Historical Research Network seminar series ‘History Now’. This week’s topic was ‘The History of Class Now’. *** If the ruling class has lost its consensus, i.e. is no longer ‘leading’ [or directive: dirigente] but only ‘dominant’, exercising coercive […]
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Will artificial intelligence destroy capitalism?
I recently took part in an episode of Think: Digital Futures, on ‘Will artificial intelligence destroy capitalism?’: There’s no doubt that artificial intelligence is going to be smarter than humans — they’re already driving cars and sorting files for us. So if no job is safe from AI, how do we make money? Will capitalism […]