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The election of four One Nation Senators at the 2016 Australian Federal election has been seen as part of a world--wide rise of populist movements that criticizes main stream politics and rejects pluralism, putting forward single concepts of "the people", that the movements claim to represent. While it is clear that Australian voters, like voters elsewhere, have been seeking alternatives to the major parties, it is less clear that the preferred alternatives fit this populist framework. Australia provides a good case study as the Australian electoral system makes it relatively easy for independents and minor parties to be elected to Parliament. This paper examines all independents and minor party candidates successfully elected in 2016 and at previous Australian Federal elections to determine whether the alternatives to the main stream parties elected since 1945 fit anti-pluralist populist models. It is concluded that, with the exception of the One Nation Party, most of the independents and minor party candidates elected to the Australian Federal Parliament have not fitted such models. However many of those elected do present a challenge to the electoral claims of the major parties. The article concludes by considering the implications of these findings for representative democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes the political style and practice of the Australian National Council of Women (ANCW) as it developed up to 1975. The historical significance of this lies in the fact that, during the first three quarters of the last century, the ANCW was effectively the peak body representing the great majority of women's groups in this country: groups whose activities focused on politics, religion, morality, health, education, the media, philanthropy and also peace, women's economic and political rights, child welfare and legal reform. The Council spoke on behalf of these constituents to all levels of government, and internationally through the International Council of Women. It generally did not represent women associated with trade unions and the Australian Labor Party, and the politically active women amongst its leaders tended to be members of the Liberal Party. The conduct of the Council avoided party politics; its leaders co-operated with trade unionists on issues of women's rights such as equal pay, and worked as willingly with Labor governments as with non-Labor ones. An assessment of the effectiveness of the Council's political activities is therefore an assessment of the political practice and achievements of mainstream Australian feminism before the advent of radical feminism in the 1970s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the Australian Greens' first two decades of existence, electoral support for the party grew, and it was rewarded with ever-increasing numbers of its representatives occupying seats in Australian parliaments. The bases of electoral support for the Australian Greens are analysed, and its prospects in a two-party dominant system are considered. While the Australian Greens may never transcend small party status, the nature and source of its electoral support, combined with certain features of the institutional setting, provide it with a basis for a relatively enduring institutional and electoral presence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite a steady erosion of the major parties' share of the vote in Australia, minor parties have been unable to attract more than 15 per cent of the vote. Employing a variation of Katz and Mair's cartel party thesis, this paper argues that the major parties have an advantage in defining and limiting power sharing arrangements and setting and reacting to the policy agenda. They can act together to deny a third-party oxygen, or can deflect criticism of controversial policies onto the third party. A critical appraisal of seven cases of government formation involving the Australian Greens and Australian Democrats, along with two case studies of legislative negotiation shows that the electoral backlash is often borne by the minor parties. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The presidentialisation debate centres on the question of whether contemporary political leaders in parliamentary systems are more powerful than their predecessors. This article applies the presidentialisation thesis of Poguntke and Webb (2005) to the period in which Kevin Rudd led the federal parliamentary Labor Party in Australia. Their model identifies three distinct faces of presidentialisation: the executive face, the party face and the electoral face. This article argues that the evidence of presidentialisation under Rudd's leadership is mixed. The most compelling evidence is reflected in how Rudd interacted with the Labor Party, rather than his interaction with the executive or impact on voting behaviour. 关于总统化的辩论集中于当前国会的政治领袖是否比他们的前任更有权力。本文将普刚克和韦博（2005）的总统化理论应用于陆克文领导澳大利亚联邦议会工党的时期。他们二人总结了总统化的三个方面：行政面、党派面、选举面。本文指出，陆克文领导时期总统化的证据含混不清。最有说服力的证据倒是反映在陆克文与工党而不是与政府的互动或对选举行为的影响上。 [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This research note replicates Leigh's (2008) analysis of pork-barrelling in Australian politics and tests the validity of his findings using geographic techniques. Distributive politics is integral to nearly all theories of legislative politics because it is fundamental to the connection between legislators and constituents, and can be used to facilitate coalition-building. This note addresses an aspect of pork-barrelling that has been overlooked in most previous scholarship. It argues that distributive politics is, at its core, a geographic, constituency-centred process. It is therefore essential to reconsider the conventional models and take geography into account in both substantive and statistical terms. To that end, we replicate several of Leigh's results using a relatively new technique, Geographically Weighted Regression, and reveal substantial spatial heterogeneity in the coefficients. Our findings highlight the importance of political geography and have important implications for studies of legislative politics and elections. 本文重复了李（2008）对澳大利亚政治分肥拨款的分析，用地理学技术检测了其发现有效性。分配政治内在于几乎所有的立法政治理论，因为它是立法者与选民之间联系的基础，有利于联盟的构建。本文探讨了分肥拨款被以往学术研究所忽略的一个方面。作者认为，分配政治其核心是一个地理的、以选区为中心的过程。因此有必要重新检讨固有的模式，切实而且从统计的意义上采纳地理的视角。我们使用了一种相对新近的技术，即地理加权回归分析来重复李的几个成果，发现空间同质系数很高。我们的发现突出了政治地理的重要性，对于立法政治以及选举的研究有参考意义。 [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The defeat of the Australian government's attempts to outlaw communism in 1950 and 1951 was a significant victory for the protection of civil liberties. Yet for the Australian Council for Civil Liberties, which had fought a long battle against the measures, the result was not greeted with a sense of triumph. The campaign to avert draconian powers exposed a Council struggling to adapt to the Cold War, and revealed tensions in the Council's belief in democratic institutions and the popular opinion that underpinned them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Legislation introduced by Prime Minister Robert Menzies to ban the Communist Party of Australia in 1950 has been studied in great detail, but there has been little discussion about why Menzies considered that an outright ban was the best way to thwart the Communist Party. Australia did not, for example, follow the American example of public show trials, denunciations and informants, characteristics of the phenomenon known as McCarthyism. This article explores the decision to reject the American model by focusing on legislation that the Liberal Party drafted in 1948, but never introduced. It also details the internal division of the Liberal Party over communism and the conflicted nature of Menzies’ own views. As a consequence, Australia did not introduce the equivalent of the anti-communist state apparatus of the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Despite the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change and its implications, there is considerably less certainty or strength of belief among the general public in some industrialised countries. One explanation for the lack of consensus is the partisan nature of political debate about climate change. A survey of Australian politicians demonstrates that political party affiliation and ideology have a powerful influence on climate change beliefs. Politicians from Labor and Green parties (centre-left and progressive parties) exhibited beliefs that were more consistent with scientific consensus about climate change than non-aligned or conservative leaders. Moreover, political ideology (left–right) emerged as the most important predictor of politicians’ climate change beliefs. These findings highlight the role of political partisanship and ideology in undermining consensus around climate change and suggest the need to build consensus through constructing climate change messages that appeal to closely held values and which advance the discussion of solutions along non-partisan lines. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper seeks to enter the current debate over the future of the South Australian Legislative Council by critiquing recent reform proposals and then outlining some modest suggestions for reform. The paper contends that a number of recent reform proposals are explicitly partisan and seek to enlarge the role of large parties and majority government. On the contrary others would ban political parties. The paper contends that whilst the Legislative Council exhibits many of the characteristics of an effective and useful upper house, reform of four areas would enable its review function to be improved. These areas include: the size of the Council; the term lengths of members; the method for resolving deadlocks; and the method for replacing retiring members. The paper then critically examines the proposal to ban political parties; and argues instead that instituting the Robson Rotation system would promote freedom of association and freedom of choice by voters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the relationship between the growing dominance of career politicians in the Australian federal legislature and models of party organisation. Using data on MPs in the Australian federal parliament, this study maps changes in models of party organisation to the occupational profiles of MPs between 1949 and 2007. The findings show a correspondence between the phenomenon of cartelisation and the appearance of legislators whose previous occupation was in the political sphere. The authors suggest that there is a relationship between different modes of party organisation and both the supply of candidates and the demand-side factors influencing party selectors. The paper concludes that theories of recruitment should include a greater emphasis on models of party organisation to explain better the uniformity of recruitment outcomes across advanced democracies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Recent elections in the English-speaking world have thrown up results that were both unpredictable and history-making. In particular, the advent of multi-party and minority government in Britain and Australia, neither of which have proportional representation, raises questions about the capacity of major parties to remain dominant, and the place of minor parties and independents in the future. Here we argue that while the idiosyncrasies of the Australian political system have fostered the rise of independents in ways we are unlikely to see elsewhere, other features of the post-election negotiation process in the wake of the 2010 Australian election highlight the adaptive and innovative potential of major parties seeking office, and the resilience of smaller parties or independents seeking policy and votes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An article discussing the political preferences of Australian voters based on economic and postmaterialist values is presented. The author uses the example of the 2009 by-election for the Australian legislative seat of Higgins to examine an axis system created by scholars David Charnock and Peter Ellis, which measures the positions of Australian political parties, such as the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the Liberal/Nationals (Coalition,) by synthesizing data collected by the Australian Election Study (AES.) An analysis of the data, including voter turnout trends and ideological factors, is also included

In this article I discuss the likelihood of the Australian Greens being able to develop into a party that plays an equivalent 'third party' role in the Senate similar to that played by the Australian Democrats for most of their existence. My conclusion, based on attitudes underlying voting behaviour, is that they cannot afford to behave contrary to their position as part of a left-wing bloc without jeopardising a substantial part of their voter base. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the political scenario in Australia. Platforms of the political parties; Impact of an August 2001 crisis involving Afghan asylum-seekers in Australia; Results of the state elections in March 2002.

The article responds to the article "The Presidentialisation of Australian Politics? Kevin Rudd's Leadership of the Australian Labor Party" by Glenn Kefford in the same issue. It is said that personalization and the roles of prime ministers are key aspects in the possible presidentialization of Australia's parliamentary system. Other topics include the relation of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to party politics, comparison of Australian politics to U.S. politics, and policy processes under presidential systems.