From flashbacks to testimony – reflections on the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Childhood Sexual Abuse
In September last year I delivered a paper to a conference sponsored by a major research…
Hannah Arendt and remembering thought
After listening to an episode of the On Being podcast, titled Thinking and Friendship in Dark…
Why is alcohol policy difficult?
About 10 years ago I took a job running an alcohol and drug policy unit in…
The hope of none
In reading Austerlitz last night, I stumbled on the passage in which the relayed memories of…
Turn and face the strange…
About a year ago I wrote a post Time might change me, but I can’t change time. It…
13 ways of looking at bureaucrat IV: in unity is death.
A man and a woman Are one. A man and a woman and a blackbird Are…
13 ways of looking at a bureaucrat: vigilance amidst stillness
Among twenty snowy mountains, The only moving thing Was the eye of the blackbird. (Wallace Stevens,…
Massacres in history
As the violence and brewing disorder of our times disturbs us, we can readily fall into…
The unravelling of empires
US and western leaders have to find better ways to satisfy their people’s demands. It looks,…
Lament
Here is a poem I wrote a couple of months ago amidst the endless stream of…