In the 2014 Fiji general election, 14% of elected parliamentarians were women. This percentage represents the largest proportion of women in Fiji’s parliament since independence in 1970. However, it also shows that Fiji is still a long way from parity and lags well behind the global average of 21.8% of elected parliamentarians being women (as...

The Political Issues Analysis System (PIAS) project sought to investigate how citizens in Melbourne, Australia used the Internet to seek political information about key political issues. It also sought to understand how citizens contacted their elected representative about these issues. Through workshops, case studies, and the development and testing of a prototype, the research uncovered...

‘Centralising measures’ have eroded the autonomy of local councils’ in the form of intervention in the planning and development process and absorption of responsibilities. This paper will use the case study of the Melbourne City Council (MCC) to offer scope for assessing the character of these reforms.

Introduction Many Members of Parliament (MPs) aspire to ministerial office. Kim Beazley Jr once said: ‘being a minister, that really was something special from the moment I got it’.1 Garfield Barwick was said to have arrived at the Attorney-General’s office with ‘more ideas than a dog has fleas’.2 A lack of preferment, on the other...

Despite increasing numbers of women entering federal politics, female MPs have failed to drive an agenda of social change in the Australian Parliament. This conclusion has been reached through a study of 13 male and 15 female current federal MPs, whose views were sought on their own experiences in parliament, and the way in which...