The Abbott Government says its proposed metadata retention laws are critical to fighting crime and terrorism. But similar schemes in Europe have been wound back following legal challenges. This week the District Court of The Hague scrapped the Netherlands’ data retention law, finding that it violated fundamental European Union privacy rights. The country’s government-funded privacy...

New research shows an increasing level of discontent among western democracies, with a diminishing number of people in Australia who believe voting makes a difference. Matt O'Neil and Tim Roxburgh investigate what this growing disenchantment will mean for world politics in 2015. • Despite huge differences between countries, surveys of political attitudes around the western...