Hiding in Plain Sight: 'Associated Entities' and Australian Democracy. Associated Entities (AEs) are organisations that are formally linked to political parties. This project aims to examine how AEs interact with Australian democracy by investigating their impact on elections, the law, and party system dynamics. This project expects to generate new knowledge about the impact of these nearly 200 key political actors, with a particular focus on how they are able to elude significant scrutiny of th ....Hiding in Plain Sight: 'Associated Entities' and Australian Democracy. Associated Entities (AEs) are organisations that are formally linked to political parties. This project aims to examine how AEs interact with Australian democracy by investigating their impact on elections, the law, and party system dynamics. This project expects to generate new knowledge about the impact of these nearly 200 key political actors, with a particular focus on how they are able to elude significant scrutiny of their activities. Expected outcomes include a new typology of AEs, a new financial index to measure their impact, and proposals to improve their regulation. The key benefits generated include: a strengthened campaign finance regime, and enhanced transparency and integrity to Australia's democracy.Read moreRead less
An Empirical Study of Agenda Setting in the High Court of Australia. This project aims to undertake the first comprehensive study of institutional and individual factors that facilitate and constrain access to judicial power via the High Court’s agenda setting process, special leave. Using quantitative methods, the project expects to generate new and advanced knowledge about the High Court’s role as the gatekeeper of judicial power. Expected outcomes include foundational knowledge on the nature ....An Empirical Study of Agenda Setting in the High Court of Australia. This project aims to undertake the first comprehensive study of institutional and individual factors that facilitate and constrain access to judicial power via the High Court’s agenda setting process, special leave. Using quantitative methods, the project expects to generate new and advanced knowledge about the High Court’s role as the gatekeeper of judicial power. Expected outcomes include foundational knowledge on the nature and scope of access to judicial power in Australia via policy reports, scholarly articles and datasets. This should provide significant benefits such as important insights on the impact and influence of justices, litigants, lawyers, and governments on High Court’s decisions to grant or deny special leave to appeal.Read moreRead less
Women’s NGOs and gender sensitive policy change in Iran. This project aims to investigate how Iranian women’s non-governmental organisations (NGOs) work to influence gender sensitive policy change in the Islamic Republic of Iran. This project will generate new knowledge on the causal mechanisms behind NGO-driven policy change in Iran, leading to a theory of change on NGOs and gender sensitive policy change in Islamic political systems more broadly. The expected outcomes will enhance scholarly un ....Women’s NGOs and gender sensitive policy change in Iran. This project aims to investigate how Iranian women’s non-governmental organisations (NGOs) work to influence gender sensitive policy change in the Islamic Republic of Iran. This project will generate new knowledge on the causal mechanisms behind NGO-driven policy change in Iran, leading to a theory of change on NGOs and gender sensitive policy change in Islamic political systems more broadly. The expected outcomes will enhance scholarly understanding of Iranian civil society, and build the capacity of the Australian government to foster ties and invest in successful strategies for progress with Iran.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE160100603
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$337,000.00
Summary
Understanding the Causes of Political Trust through Survey Experiments. This project intends to improve our understanding of the drivers of political trust and point to ways that political trust could be improved. Despite the importance of political trust to the functioning of democratic systems, we have no experimental data on what the causes of political trust are, and political trust has been said to have reached crisis levels in many democracies. By integrating existing survey data with expe ....Understanding the Causes of Political Trust through Survey Experiments. This project intends to improve our understanding of the drivers of political trust and point to ways that political trust could be improved. Despite the importance of political trust to the functioning of democratic systems, we have no experimental data on what the causes of political trust are, and political trust has been said to have reached crisis levels in many democracies. By integrating existing survey data with experiments in five established democracies, this project aims to identify the causes of political trust and how these differ by country. Understanding political trust and how it can be improved may provide input to successful policies to deal with challenges such as ageing populations and environmental change.Read moreRead less
The political dynamics of Deng Xiaoping's leadership of China, 1979-1992. This project examines a crucial stage in the transformation of China from a backward socio-economic situation to a dynamic economic and political power. Deng Xiaoping was the most significant figure in this transformation, but the political dynamics of his leadership are imperfectly understood. This study will correct those misunderstandings.
Civilisationist Mobilisation, Digital Technologies and Social Cohesion. Civilisational populist rulers polarise societies mainly along religious lines. They also interfere with their emigrants, mobilising supporters against other expatriates. This project aims to advance knowledge of authoritarian states' transnational influence on social cohesion and inter-group conflict. By studying Islamist and Hindutva civilisationist mobilisations, their reach into their emigrants via digital technologies, ....Civilisationist Mobilisation, Digital Technologies and Social Cohesion. Civilisational populist rulers polarise societies mainly along religious lines. They also interfere with their emigrants, mobilising supporters against other expatriates. This project aims to advance knowledge of authoritarian states' transnational influence on social cohesion and inter-group conflict. By studying Islamist and Hindutva civilisationist mobilisations, their reach into their emigrants via digital technologies, and their impact on Turkish and Indian groups in Australia, the project aims to assist policy makers and community groups by generating conceptual frameworks, benchmarking data, and recommendations for making policies to deal with this phenomenon's negative effects and for developing intervention strategiesRead moreRead less
Internationalisation and Democracy. This project aims to advance knowledge of how internationalisation affects the quality of democratic representation in established democracies such as Australia, the US and the UK. It expects to generate new insights into how internationalisation expands or limits the scope for democratic accountability, responsiveness and responsibility. It plans to develop and test new theories with comparative analyses that focus on economic, social and environmental polici ....Internationalisation and Democracy. This project aims to advance knowledge of how internationalisation affects the quality of democratic representation in established democracies such as Australia, the US and the UK. It expects to generate new insights into how internationalisation expands or limits the scope for democratic accountability, responsiveness and responsibility. It plans to develop and test new theories with comparative analyses that focus on economic, social and environmental policies. Expected outcomes include improved measures of internationalisation, and insights into the opportunities and challenges it poses for democratic representation. The project should provide significant benefits by countering misconceptions in current academic and public debates.Read moreRead less
Policy agendas in the Australian Commonwealth Government. Who leads the agenda: the government; the public or the media? Is legislation 'normal business' or a response to crisis? Does changing the government really change much? By systematically analysing legislation, the media and public opinion over a forty year period this project can answer these questions more thoroughly than ever before.
Mapping & Harnessing Public Mistrust: Constitutional Values Survey 2023-27. Declining public trust is well recognised as a problem of democratic government, including in Australia. However solutions are more elusive, confounded by the reality that mistrust and distrust play not just negative, but positive roles in our existing political and constitutional traditions. This project aims to be the first to comprehensively map the positive values of mistrust in citizen political attitudes and experi ....Mapping & Harnessing Public Mistrust: Constitutional Values Survey 2023-27. Declining public trust is well recognised as a problem of democratic government, including in Australia. However solutions are more elusive, confounded by the reality that mistrust and distrust play not just negative, but positive roles in our existing political and constitutional traditions. This project aims to be the first to comprehensively map the positive values of mistrust in citizen political attitudes and experience, building on previous Constitutional Values Surveys (2008-21) to test new measures of the content of trust including a first-ever longitudinal study of changing trust over time. The results will inform concrete solutions to three key policy reform dilemmas, providing better answers for sustaining public trust overall.
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Promissory Democratic Representation: Campaign Promises in Australia. This project aims to investigate the extent to which campaign promises made by politicians are kept or broken. It intends to conduct new research on Australian politics while advancing an established international research program. This project expects to generate and disseminate new knowledge that is urgently needed due to declining levels of trust among citizens in politicians. The expected outcomes include new theory and in ....Promissory Democratic Representation: Campaign Promises in Australia. This project aims to investigate the extent to which campaign promises made by politicians are kept or broken. It intends to conduct new research on Australian politics while advancing an established international research program. This project expects to generate and disseminate new knowledge that is urgently needed due to declining levels of trust among citizens in politicians. The expected outcomes include new theory and internationally comparative evidence on which campaign promises are kept and broken. This should provide significant benefits, such as greater public awareness of actual levels of promise keeping. It should also benefit policymakers who use campaign promises to anticipate and prepare government policies.Read moreRead less