13 ways of looking at a bureaucrat
In early 2017 I wrote a series of posts – or let us call them essays – on Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Bureaucrat. I wrote it still aiming…
Tag: bureaucracy
Cultural fragmentation and the collapse of authority in Western democracies
My repost today comes from 22 April 2018, and seems relevant to the difficulties we are experiencing in our distressed republics today. I also posted something of a follow-up post…
On human frailty in governing
Today I am reposting this piece from July 2019, following the 2019 Australian election. It is newly relevant today as the American republic wrestles with how to save its crumbling…
On human frailty in governing
Once ten years ago I gave answers to one of those personal profile questionnaires that aimed to help people know more about their colleagues at work. It asked questions like…
Reflections on 2018 – 1. self-portrait at 55
The year is drawing to a close, so time to begin reflecting on what the year’s stream of images, texts and events meant to me. Where has this year left…
What I am reading… on governing and imagination
amzn.asia/0CNwQ94 from John Dunn, Breaking Democracy’s Spell
The tragedy of the modern university
Jordan Peterson has proposed the creation of an alternative to the modern university that offers free or low-cost education rooted in the true traditions of the liberal humanities, stripped of…
Bureaucratic utopianism
Bureaucracy is not meant to be Utopian. After all, is not bureaucracy the home of the conformist, the cynical realists, the domesticator of conflict, the administrator of dreams, the banality…
Cultural fragmentation and the collapse of authority in Western democracies
During the week I was discussing with a young colleague at work the preparation of a briefing. I gave them some guidance and some encouragement: the briefing did not need…
More reflections on 2017: The end of history revisited
In 2017 Francis Fukuyama published two podcasts providing a retrospective account of his essay, “The End of History” (1989) which was later published in more extended form as the book…
More reflections on 2017: persistence, terror and Das Schloss
Persistence Twelve months ago I was approaching Christmas and the end of a liberating period of long service leave. It was a period of leave that rejuvenated my writing and…
On revenge
“All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks. But in each event – in the living act, the undoubted deed – there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts…
