Category Archives: Politics – international

Trump and the new world (dis)order

Posted on June 16, 2017 by David Walker

What are the effects of having a US president who is diminished in stature and yet not facing imminent job loss? I try to think this through in my latest column for The CEO Magazine. One likely result: less stability … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics - international | Leave a comment

Weekend competition: Why (oh why?) aren’t the Liberal Democrats doing better?

Posted on May 20, 2017 by Nicholas Gruen

There’s a lot I don’t understand. We don’t have enough space of a proper survey but let me give you an example. Pistachios taste better than hazelnuts. Much better. And yet hazelnut ice cream and gelato are much much yummier than their pistachio … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Economics and public policy, Employment, Politics - international | 16 Comments

Trump: the system is working

Posted on March 16, 2017 by David Walker

If you’re at all like me, you see and hear a bunch of people complaining that with the election of Donald Trump to the US presidency, the world has gone mad and anything could happen. The New York Times today published … Continue reading →

Posted in Politics - international | 9 Comments

Can we attract good political leaders? Hint – yes

Posted on February 18, 2017 by Nicholas Gruen

Can a democracy attract competent leaders, while attaining broad representation? Economic models suggest that free-riding incentives and lower opportunity costs give the less competent a comparative advantage at entering political life. Moreover, if elites have more human capital, selecting on … Continue reading →

Posted in Political theory, Politics - international, Politics - national | 5 Comments

On the Origins and Consequences of Racism

Posted on February 13, 2017 by Nicholas Gruen

We use a novel method to measure racism at both the individual and the country level. We show that our measure of racism has a strong negative and significant impact on economic development, quality of institutions and education. We then … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Economics and public policy, Philosophy, Political theory, Politics - international | 3 Comments

Dispatch no. 2 from the epistemic swamp

Posted on October 30, 2016 by Nicholas Gruen

I’ve just posted the first version of the introduction to this post on the first dispatch from the epistemic swamp, but I thought I’d open up the discussion again on a new thread. The tweet above surely highlights different ideas of truth and authenticity. Of course, … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Political theory, Politics - international | Leave a comment

Investor-State Dispute Settlement

Posted on October 25, 2016 by Nicholas Gruen

I gave a talk at the Lowy Institute last Wednesday to which I initially gave a long-winded title “Intellectual Property- Economics, Diplomacy and Australia’s strategic interests” but managed to get more cut-through under the pressure of Twitters 140 character limit “DFAT goes AWOL on IP”. … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics and public policy, Intellectual Property, Law, Political theory, Politics - international | Leave a comment