Occasional Papers
Occasional Papers (OP) are short publications usually based on a lecture or presentation given at the CIS. Our annual John Bonython and Acton Lectures are part of the OP series.
Categories
In Defence of Secure Property Rights, 2nd revised edition
Secure private property rights are vital to the development of a growing, healthy Australian economy. Property rights allow owners to be free to access, use and benefit from and dispose of their property...... Read More
Conspicuous Compassion: Why sometimes it really is cruel to be kind
This book by Patrick West challenges the trend towards dramatic public displays of 'concern' which have very little to do with genuine compassion. Such displays of empathy do not change the world for the...... Read More
Rendering Unto Caesar: New Challenges for Church and State
In considering contemporary church-state relations, Gregg argues that religious communities need to reassess their role, and suggests that the future focus of faith communities in pluralist societies should...... Read More
Boys' Education - Research & Rhetoric
There is significant evidence that boys have been experiencing educational disadvantage. In this paper, Jennifer Buckingham puts forward recommendations for schools - in particular for teachers - which...... Read More
Gulliver Unbound - Can America Rule the World?
America's combination of political, military, economic and cultural predominance is without precedent, and there is nothing on the horizon that suggests the speedy demise of its hegemony. However, history...... Read More
Christian Morality and Market Capitalism: Friends or Foes?
In the 5th Annual CIS Acton Lecture on Religion & Freedom, Ian Harper explores the moral basis of market capitalism––its strengths and weaknesses––and defends the view that there is nothing...... Read More
In Defence of Secure Property Rights
Secure private property rights are vital to the development of a growing, healthy Australian economy. Property rights allow owners to be free to access, use and benefit from and dispose of their property...... Read More
A Self-Reliant Australia. Welfare Policy for the 21st century
In this paper Peter Saunders suggests that the time has come to turn back the growth of this expensive, damaging, demeaning and largely unnecessary welfare state behemoth... Read More
Islam in Pluralist Indonesia
In this, The Acton Lecture on Religion and Freedom for 2002, noted Indonesian academic Mohammad Fajrul Falaakh discusses the importance and interpretations of Shariah (Islamic law) and asks whether Islam...... Read More
Six Questions About Civility
Civility is a moral virtue and a social responsibility, contributing to the public good and the quality of life. Yet the term civility is often used without a true understanding of what it is and why it...... Read More
Has History Restarted Since September 11?
Francis Fukuyama argues that the fracture line over globalisation could turn out to be a division, not between West and the Rest, but between the United States and the Rest. He examines the differing reactions...... Read More
Understanding America
Our most urgent need is to understand America - both in terms of what it is and its impact on the world - for current US actions cannot be properly understood unless placed in the wider historical context...... Read More
The Social Foundations of a Free Society
A look at five main areas where current trends may be eroding the free society - family life, schooling, community relations, the welfare state, and the values, norms and beliefs that comprise our common...... Read More
What Governments Can't Know: The Knowledge Economy and the Market
Are governments well placed to foster the infusion of different types of complex knowledge to create new or better goods and services? The Eighteenth Annual John Bonython Lecture delivered by Lauchlan...... Read More
Dangerous Protections: How Some Ways of Protecting the Freedom of Religion May Actually Diminish Religious Freedom.
The 2001 Acton Lecture on Religion and Freedom delivered by Robert Forsyth. Sometimes efforts to achieve good can backfire, especially where government legislation is concerned. ... Read More
Trading Phobias: Governments, NGOs and Globalisation
We live in an era of unprecedented material prosperity, and yet the post-war multilateral trading system largely responsible for the creation of this wealth is under threat.... Read More
The Moral Foundations of Freedom: Lessons from the Religious Encounter with Democracy
What happens when a society loses it moral capital? Can democracy thrive in a value-neutral environment? These are just some of the questions asked by one of America’s most respected theologians and...... Read More
A Short History of Australian Liberalism
This study was written in response to what I see as the misleading nature of the studies of Australian liberalism that have been produced to date.... Read More
The End of Chaos: Global Markets and the Information Era
Governments have long pursued policies that determined the degree to which markets have been permitted to operate. But in the 1999 John Bonython Lecture, Jerry Jordan suggests that markets will, paradoxically...... Read More
Economics & Ethics: The Dispute and the Dialogue
The relationship between economists and religious thinkers is often acrimonious. In this Occasional Paper, an economist Professor Ian Harper and a theologian Dr Samuel Gregg examine some of the causes...... Read More
