P&I is digging deeper into issues and, thanks to new partnerships, bringing you perspectives from leading thinkers both in our daily feed and in curated series about important topics.
I saw Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz speak at ANU back when I worked there in the early 2010s. A hugely engaging speaker, he held the sell-out crowd – many of us non-economists – in the palm of his hand.
But what I remember most is his arrival. The officials had cleared a few VIP car parks out front of Llewellyn Hall, for diplomats and other high-ups. When a battered 4-cylinder puttered through the cordon, security tried to shoo it away, until they realised the car contained the guest speaker. He was being delivered by his mate – Bruce Chapman – who had sorted the visit.
It was very Stiglitz – one of the loudest global voices for equality – arriving in the humblest vehicle.
We feature a piece from Stiglitz today: an assessment of the staggering scope of the damage being wrought by Donald Trump – ‘From war to stagflation’. It comes to us courtesy of colleagues at Project Syndicate, the world’s opinion page. Set up in the 1990s, PS features accessible articles from leaders in all areas of human endeavour and publishes across 156 countries, with a strong public-good ethos and a healthy number of women writers. We are the only Australian media outlet with access: a big thanks to Damen Dowse from PS for agreeing to work with us.
We will bring readers Project Syndicate authors a few times a week, when the material is right, to broaden our outlook on the world. Later this week, we will run a piece from Mariana Mazzucato, professor at University College London and Founding Director of its Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. She argues that a new economics is needed for the 21st century.
Other initiatives this year include an increased number of more prominent series. We started over recent weeks with the Foreign Policy Rethink series. Others now include: the need to revisit a Human Rights Act for Australia and a huge project, in collaboration with board member Joe Camilleri, Reclaiming Democracy.
The aim here is that alongside our daily articles we really dig into a topic and group the articles so readers, and students, young and old, can consume them as they come out, day to day, or read them as the box set. You can see the collected articles in Foreign Policy Rethink here. For all of the series just click on the coloured tag with the series name, and the whole set will pop up. We will continue to add relevant articles to the series.
Best Bit: Rachel Maddow is almost my favourite US journalist and commentator. She has featured before, because she is really that good. Every day she brings clarity, wit and attitude to reading the ebb and flow of global events, from the belly of the beast in the US. Here she talks of just how the US regime has been failing across the board.
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If you want to see her at length, here’s all of her offerings.
Catriona Jackson is the Chief Executive and Editor of Pearls and Irritations.