Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kathleen McGuire, Senior Lecturer in Education (Music), National School of Education, Faculty of Education and Arts, Australian Catholic University

The iconic sound of an orchestra tuning is highly recognisable, even for those who’ve never set foot in a concert hall. Many of us first heard it while watching a Looney Tunes cartoon.

Have you ever wondered why the oboe begins the tuning? How is the starting note decided? With access to electronic tuning devices, along with advancements in materials and manufacturing enabling instruments to better sustain their pitch, is the tuning ritual still needed? What is the purpose, beyond building excitement or signalling the conductor’s entrance?

Whether or not professional orchestras’ tuning rituals are required, there is something inherently comforting about it for audiences.

Enter the oboe

The earliest orchestras, in the Baroque era, comprised a non-standard set of instruments. One combination could have been a harpsichord, a few string players (violin, viola, viola da gamba), one or more wind instruments, and perhaps even timpani.

As the number of string players grew in the orchestra, the flute replaced the quiet recorder.

The oboe brought complex, contrasting overtones, plus a limited yet stable tuning range controlled mostly by a pair of “fixed” reeds.

These factors made the oboe the practical choice as the tuning instrument in the Baroque era.

By the 1800s, the size and instrumentation were much like the modern orchestra. An order was added to the tuning ritual, with each “family” of instruments taking its turn to tune with the oboe.

When a fixed-pitch instrument, such as an organ, was included with the orchestra, the oboe would be tuned to it before the ritual began.

These tuning traditions continue today.

Constantly retuning

The tuning ritual heard by the audience is just the tip of the iceberg. Many instruments need micro-tuning adjustments throughout a performance.

Tuning can also slip, which may be caused when string or brass instruments need to use a mute. The mute lowers the volume and adds a different tonal quality, but it can also slightly alter the pitch of the instrument.

Tuning is also affected by changes in temperature or humidity as the instrument warms while being played or cools due to external changes.

Consider the weather during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Paris Olympics – it would have been challenging to keep the instruments in tune in the rain and extreme humidity.

Depending on the instrument, sometimes when the pitch slips it cannot be adjusted mid-performance.

In a recent concert I conducted at St Patrick’s Cathedral, Melbourne, the yidaki was slightly out of tune after being perfectly in tune two hours earlier in rehearsal. The difference? The yidaki’s wood was affected by a sudden drop in temperature when a thunderstorm came through mid-concert.

Pipe organs suffer the same fate at the mercy of the weather with their large, metal components.

What makes an ‘A’?

The traditional tuning note is A. This stems from the open A string being common to all orchestral string instruments.

The oboist plays a long A when instructed by the concert master – usually the lead violinist – who stands and indicates to the oboist and then to each section of the orchestra when it’s time to tune.

The string players tune their A strings, from which they can tune their other strings. In turn, other sections of the orchestra also tune to A. When the tuning ends and the instruments are silent, the orchestra is ready to perform.

This all seems straightforward, but there are variations on what an A should sound like. An audio frequency of A=440 hertz (Hz) is considered standard or “concert” pitch, although this is a fairly modern concept.

Tuning forks were invented in Europe in the early 1700s, around the same time as the emergence of orchestras. Based on tuning forks and organs remaining from the 18th and 19th centuries, such as Beethoven’s tuning fork, historians have identified concert pitches ranging from 395 to 465Hz.

Efforts to standardise concert pitch at A=440Hz arose in the 19th century, further reinforced in the 20th century.

Today, the pitch used may be decided by historically informed performance, adopting the likely tuning from when the music was composed. Giuseppe Verdi, for instance, campaigned for Italy to adopt concert pitch A=432Hz. Using the slightly lower tuning for Verdi’s Messa da Requiem is justifiable, allowing for the choir to execute extended high passages more comfortably.

In the 1960s, conductor Herbert von Karajan decided the Berlin Philharmonic sounded “brighter” when tuned to A=443–444Hz. This trend continues today for several prominent orchestras: The New York Philharmonic tunes to A=442Hz, and the Vienna Philharmonic to A=443Hz.

Changing rituals

Is the tuning ritual essential? It depends.

Earlier this year I saw Wicked. The orchestra tuned very quickly. Practicalities can trump ritual – especially on days with matinee and evening shows, each running almost three hours.

Symphony orchestras comprise mostly acoustic instruments. In contrast, modern musical theatre orchestras often include electronic instruments and a rhythm section, with synthesizers that don’t need tuning.

Compared with a large auditorium, a pit may have fewer temperature fluctuations. When needed, pit players use electronic tuning devices. Some play multiple instruments in each performance, which are tuned in advance and during the performance.

Despite contemporary advancements, the tradition of an orchestra tuning in the presence of an audience is a special, transcendent moment, unique to the live concert experience.

Kathleen McGuire has worked for organisations that have received funding from Creative Victoria (State Government of Victoria), the City of Boroondara and the City of Melbourne. She has received grants from Australian Catholic University, the University of Melbourne, and other entities in the United States.

– ref. Why is the oboe used to tune an orchestra? And other questions about tuning, answered – https://theconversation.com/why-is-the-oboe-used-to-tune-an-orchestra-and-other-questions-about-tuning-answered-238203

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Henry Maher, Lecturer in Politics, Department of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney

US President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to fire the chair of the US Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell.

Up until this week, that may have seemed like a distant and outlandish prospect. Now, we again have to take it seriously.

Powell himself certainly is – and has already begun pushing back on the front foot. Responding to the threat on Thursday, he insisted he will not resign. Further, he said any attempt by Trump to remove him was “not permitted under the law”.

Whether Trump actually attempts to follow through on his threat will provide an early litmus test of any potential authoritarian tendencies.

Powell’s dismissal would breach long-standing norms of central bank independence. If successful, such a move could have a serious impact on democracy and the separation of powers, with consequences around the world.

Read more:
Trump has vowed to be a ‘dictator’ on day one. With this day now coming, what exactly will he do?

An old quarrel

The feud between Trump and Powell is nothing new. Trump himself actually appointed Powell to the Federal Reserve governorship back in 2018. However, like many of his other appointees, Trump soon turned against Powell.

Criticising the Federal Reserve for not cutting interest rates quickly enough in 2019, Trump called Fed officials “boneheads”, accusing Powell of having “No ‘guts’, no sense, no vision!”

Beyond Trump, many economists have praised Powell’s management of monetary policy, which has successfully reduced spiralling inflation rates. President Joe Biden was sufficiently convinced to appoint Powell to a second four-year term as chair which began in 2022.

Trump, though, only stepped up his criticisms, many of which became inconsistent with his earlier position. In February this year, he was suddenly blasting Powell for even contemplating interest rate cuts.

Trump claimed baselessly that it was a political move by Powell – a lifelong Republican – to help Democrats win the presidential election.

Could Trump actually fire Powell?

Trump has repeatedly claimed he has the power to fire Powell, and that as president he should have influence over the setting of interest rates.

The relevant legislation holds that a member of the Federal Reserve board may be “removed for cause by the president”. But in this context, courts have interpreted “for cause” to refer to misconduct or impropriety. The president cannot remove the members of the board purely for policy or political reasons.

However, Trump could attempt to demote Powell from chair to an ordinary member of the Federal Reserve, and put another candidate in charge. Here, there is less of a legal precedent. Previous presidents have always assumed they did not have the power to do this.

The closest historical precedent lies in an attempt by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to fire the commissioner of the Federal Trade Commission in 1933. Here, the courts ultimately found in favour of the commissioner’s independence.

But the legal landscape has changed. It is possible that a Supreme Court sympathetic to Trump – which has previously found in favour of expanded executive presidential power – might reach different conclusions.

Inflation, inflation, inflation

If Trump does attempt to remove Powell, it will radically affect the independence of the Federal Reserve. That could seriously impact its ability to set interest rates free from direct political interference.

This would likely increase inflation in the long run. If markets believe politicians are likely to interfere in the setting of interest rates to favour their own short-term political interests, investors will expect lower interest rates in the future.

This expectation alone is sufficient to cause inflation, and a major reason why most developed countries now insulate their central banks from direct political control.

Ironically, promising to reduce inflation was a central plank of Trump’s successful election campaign. How Trump approaches Powell’s future will therefore be closely watched by markets.

Checks and balances

Trump’s view that the president should have power over both independent government agencies and interest rates reflects his widely noted “populist” approach to politics.

Populist politicians claim to embody the popular democratic will. Accordingly, they often oppose institutional checks and balances on their powers, viewing them as impediments to the democratic mandate they claim to represent.

The US political system has historically had a lot of checks and balances. The idea is to limit the amount of power any one politician or party can accrue.

The “separation of powers” – a cherished principle in the United States and beyond – seeks to spread power out across different institutions such as the judiciary, the legislature, the presidency and other independent institutions.

If Trump fires Powell, it will provide a strong indicator of how a second Trump presidency will approach the separation of powers, and suggest concerns about Trump’s future authoritarian intentions are justified.

Read more:
With Trump returning to the White House, what will happen to his court cases?

Henry Maher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Trump has threatened to fire the chair of the US Federal Reserve. That could be bad news for inflation – https://theconversation.com/trump-has-threatened-to-fire-the-chair-of-the-us-federal-reserve-that-could-be-bad-news-for-inflation-243260

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gerhard Hambusch, Associate Professor, University of Technology Sydney

The $7 billion Australian mining giant Mineral Resources (MinRes) is facing a governance crisis.

Chris Ellison, the company’s founder and managing director, faces allegations of tax evasion and using company resources for his personal benefit.

Ellison is now set to stand down as managing director in the next 12 to 18 months. He’ll also pay the company almost $9 million in penalties.

But serious questions remain about how the company got into this situation in the first place. Concerns about the way the MinRes board handled the situation have hurt the company’s standing.

So, can MinRes regain its credibility and avoid future crises? And what are the broader corporate governance issues for Australia’s business community?

A number of allegations

Recent media reporting has raised a number of allegations of unethical conduct and lack of transparency against Chris Ellison.

Ellison and some other (yet to be named) senior executives have been accused of using offshore entities to bypass Australian tax reporting. This allegedly enabled personal spending and inflated equipment sales at the expense of shareholders.

There are also allegations he and unnamed others charged the company above-market rent on properties owned by executives.

On Monday, the board updated shareholders on findings from its own investigation.

It concluded Ellison had “on occassion” used company resources for his own personal projects. A new independent committee will continue to review related party transactions involving Ellison.

The board concluded Ellison’s use of company resources hadn’t caused MinRes any material financial harm. But its findings still raise serious questions about governance oversight at the firm – and in Australia more generally.

A slew of problems

Key concerns include perceptions that:

• the board failed to act promptly
• conflicts of interest were inadequately managed
• the decision to keep Ellison on for another 12 to 18 months – despite the board describing his actions as “profoundly disappointing” – could harm the firm’s public image.

MinRes has also relied heavily on Ellison’s leadership since its founding, raising questions about succession planning.

Both the Australian Institute of Company Directors and G20/OECD Principles of Corporate Governance emphasise the importance of regularly refreshing leadership.

Long-term reliance on any single leader should be avoided.

Some may also argue the board wasn’t transparent enough when it first learned about many of the allegations back in 2022.

To regain the trust of shareholders and the public, the MinRes board will have to address all these issues and strengthen its commitment to ethical oversight.

A governance wake-up call

The crisis at MinRes offers some essential lessons for boards across Australia.

The long-term financial consequences will depend heavily on how well the board can take decisive action and stabilise investor confidence. A mishandled scandal could permanently impair the company’s valuation, especially if any further issues come to light.

However, governance failures can have ripple effects that extend beyond the companies directly involved. They can erode public trust in corporate Australia as a whole.

We’ve recently seen a range of high-profile examples, including PwC Australia’s misuse of confidential government information and the unlawful termination of 1,700 Qantas workers.

This only underscores the urgent need to repair trust in the business sector, with strong, ethical governance standards.

The role of a company board

Despite the board’s ultimate findings, questions remain about whether the governance practices were robust enough to detect and address these issues sooner.

The role of the board of any organisation is always going to be complex. Under Australian law, their overarching requirement is to:

exercise their powers and discharge their duties in good faith in the best interest of the corporation and for a proper purpose.

From the outside, the current board of MinRes appears to tick all the boxes of good governance.

It is made up of nine members, eight of whom are independent, with the remaining position held by the managing director.

There appears to be no indication the board was compromised – which may occur if board members are large shareholders or have financial interests in other companies that MinRes might deal with.

It could therefore be expected that they have been acting in the best interests of MinRes, to the best of their ability.

But did the board have the skills and ability, for example, to be aware of the use of company resources by the managing director?

Adviser to institutional investors, CGI Glass Lewis, has called for more accountability for former directors who were on the board at the time the allegations took place.

Where were the regulators?

The nation’s corporate watchdog, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), has now commenced a formal investigation. But some stakeholders might feel earlier regulatory intervention could have helped.

Ellison reportedly sought an agreement with the Australian Tax Office to keep his offshore tax arrangements confidential, potentially limiting broader regulatory awareness.

It’s too early to say what the corporate regulator will find. But there appears to be an opportunity for regulators to evaluate how they approach oversight in complex, high-stakes corporate environments.

Gerhard is a member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, CFA Institute and CFA Societies Australia.

Deborah Cotton is a member of the Australian Insititute of Company Directors and the Australian Sustainable Finance Institute.

Alessandro Spina does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What does the Mineral Resources crisis tell us about the state of corporate governance in Australia? – https://theconversation.com/what-does-the-mineral-resources-crisis-tell-us-about-the-state-of-corporate-governance-in-australia-243038

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicholas Xavier Dynon, Doctoral Candidate, Centre for Defence & Security Studies, Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa – Massey University

Facial recognition technology is becoming more widely used, but this has not been matched by wider acceptance from the public.

Controversies continue to hit the media, with both public and private sector organisations frequently outed for flawed deployments of the technology.

The New Zealand Privacy Commissioner is currently evaluating the results of retailer Foodstuff North Island’s trial of live facial recognition in its stores.

The commissioner is also considering a potential code on the use of biometrics that would govern the use of people’s unique physical characteristics to identify them.

But as facial recognition becomes more common, public acceptance of the technology is inconsistent.

Retail stores, for example, tend to attract controversy when using facial recognition technology. But there has been little resistance to the use of it in airports. And the vast majority of people have no problem unlocking their phones using their faces.

My research draws together 15 studies on the public acceptance of facial recognition technology from the United States, United Kingdom and Australia.

There has been little analysis of New Zealand attitudes to the technology. So, these studies offer a view into how it is accepted in similar countries.

What I found is that public acceptance of facial recognition technology depended on the location of the recording – and why it was being captured.

Trusting personal use

According to the global research, individuals tended to place trust in the facial recognition technology on their own smart phones.

According to a 2019 study from the US, 58.9% of people were comfortable with using facial recognition to unlock their smartphone. And a 2024 survey found 68.8% of Australians felt the same.

This is interesting because while individuals physically “operate” the technology via an app on their phone, they don’t control the app itself or the data it collects.

Acceptance is, therefore, a product of perception. When someone uses facial recognition technology on their own phone they feel in control.

Less trust in the government

Public acceptance of government use of facial recognition varied greatly depending on what it was being used for.

The more familiar people were with a particular technology, the higher their level of acceptance of it was.

People were comfortable with governments using facial recognition for identifying passengers at airport customs, for example. But they were less happy with its use in identifying voters at polling places.

When it came to its deployment by police, people generally accepted the use of facial recognition technology to identify terrorists and investigate serious crimes. But research found resistance to it being used to identify minor offences and antisocial behaviours, such as parking violations and littering.

People were also uncomfortable with the idea of it being used in court to gain a conviction in the absence of other forms of evidence.

The more ambiguous the use of the technology was, the greater the degree of discomfort around it.

Deployments such as “monitoring crowds as they walk down the street” and “day-to-day policing” lead to concerns over ubiquitous surveillance and the loss of “practical obscurity” (the idea that even in public spaces, you have the right to some level of privacy).

Wary of the private sector

As mixed as public acceptance of government facial recognition technology may be, it was generally greater than that for the private sector.

People place little trust in businesses’ ability to operate the technology responsibly.

According to a 2024 survey from New Zealand’s privacy commissioner, 49% of respondents said they were concerned or very concerned about the use of facial recognition technology in stores.

But as the acceptability data on government use demonstrated, context is key.

Retail-focused research found the public was more accepting of facial recognition technology to identify shoplifters, antisocial patrons and fraudsters than for other purposes – such as loyalty programs, advertising, payments and the tracking of customer behaviour.

In the workplace, security-related deployments attracted limited although greater acceptance than uses relating to employee location and behaviour tracking.

The need for social licence

The question of why facial recognition technology is controversial in some cases but widely accepted in others is an important one.

The absence of research into the public acceptance of facial recognition in New Zealand means there is no evidence basis upon which to establish the social licence for the technology.

There is also a limited understanding of the range of scenarios social licence might cover.

As private businesses and public organisations increasingly use facial recognition technology, it’s important to understand more about how the public feels about having their faces recorded and matched to their identity in real time.

The author is employed by Optic Security Group.

– ref. In your face: our acceptance of facial recognition technology depends on who is doing it – and where – https://theconversation.com/in-your-face-our-acceptance-of-facial-recognition-technology-depends-on-who-is-doing-it-and-where-242590

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Markus Wagner, Professor of Law and Director of the UOW Transnational Law and Policy Centre, University of Wollongong

US President-elect Donald Trump achieved a resounding victory on several fronts. He will comfortably govern with a likely majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives, with little to no opposition from Republican members of Congress.

Having reshaped the US federal judiciary, and especially the Supreme Court, to his liking in his first term, he now has the chance to cement this judicial legacy for decades.

But he is also the first sitting or former president to be criminally convicted. As with many things Trump, this is uncharted territory.

Until election day, the then-former president faced the possibility of spending decades behind bars. The two federal indictments against Trump will disappear either before or shortly after his inauguration. While Trump cannot wave a magic wand over the two cases before state courts, his chances of having to govern from prison are slim.

The federal cases

The two federal cases are the easiest for Trump to get out of. Attorney-General Merrick Garland appointed Jack Smith as special counsel for the two cases against Trump over his efforts to undermine the 2020 elections and his handling of classified documents after stepping down from the presidency in 2021.

In June and July 2023, Trump was charged with dozens of felonies over retaining classified records after he had left the White House. In an often protracted and baffling pretrial process, the judge first postponed and then dismissed the case entirely on July 15 2024. Trump appointee Judge Aileen Cannon found Smith’s appointment was unconstitutional. The decision is under appeal.

On August 1 2023, Smith charged Trump with four crimes pertaining to federal election interference in connection with events prior to and on January 6 2021. Trump’s lawyers argued he was immune from prosecution because he acted in his official capacity as president. The Supreme Court stepped in and raised the bar for prosecuting presidents.

Along ideological lines, the court decided that presidents have “absolute immunity” for their “core constitutional powers” and “presumptive immunity” for all other official acts. The case was handed back to the trial court to determine if the charges should be partly or wholly dismissed.

Shortly before the 2024 election, Trump reiterated that he “would fire [Smith] within two seconds. He’ll be one of the first things addressed”. There are no constitutional or legal barriers to a president directing the attorney-general to dismiss federal cases against a president.

It may not have to come to that. A 1973 memorandum from the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), situated within the US Justice Department, argued against the prosecution of a sitting president. Confirming its Watergate-era findings, another OLC memorandum from 2000 stated plainly:

[T]he indictment or criminal prosecution of a sitting President would unconstitutionally undermine the capacity of the executive branch to perform its constitutionally assigned functions.

Smith has already indicated he will likely wind the cases down.

The same rationale was used by former special counsel Robert S. Mueller in the 2019 investigation into Trump and his associates over the interference of Russia in the 2016 elections. In deciding not to pursue criminal charges against Trump, who was then president, the Mueller report relied on that memo.

The Georgia and New York cases

Trump has no formal power over state prosecutions once he assumes the presidency.

The Georgia case involves numerous charges, including an indictment over racketeering in connection with the 2020 elections. The case hit a snag when state prosecutor Fani Willis was accused of having a financial conflict of interest due to hiring Nathan Wade, with whom she had a relationship, as a special prosecutor in the case.

Trump and some of the other defendants tried to get Willis disqualified, a motion that was denied by Georgia courts. The decision is under appeal, with oral arguments scheduled for December 5 2024. The trial court proceedings are on hold, pending the outcome of the appeal.

Should Trump be convicted, he could appeal to a likely amenable Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles, which is appointed by the Republican state governor.

Trump was found guilty in a case concerning the falsification of business records in the so-called “hush money case” involving a former adult film star. After a six-week trial in which Trump was held in contempt of court twice, it took a unanimous Manhattan jury less than two days to hand down a guilty verdict on all 34 felony charges brought against him by the Manhattan district attorney. Trump’s lawyers were successful in delaying his sentencing hearing, which is now set for November 26 2024. His punishment could range from a fine to prison time.

Had Trump lost the 2024 election, he would have been sentenced in New York on November 26, and possibly in Georgia at a later stage, if convicted.

Now that he has prevailed, his lawyers are arguing the cases should be thrown out (a hearing has been set for November 12). If that doesn’t work, they may lean on the untested argument that the supremacy clause of the US Constitution prevents state courts from sentencing a president-elect. If judge Juan Merchan decides against Trump, he would have the chance to appeal, including all the way to the US Supreme Court.

The most likely scenario is that Merchan will apply the spirit of the OLC legal memorandum. While it technically applies only to sitting presidents and only binds federal agencies, the requirements of a president-elect make it plausible that Trump’s hearing or his punishment would be postponed at least until he steps down or his term ends in 2029.

The January 6 defendants

Trump’s victory hasn’t only given him temporary respite from criminal punishment. Given his past statements about what happened on January 6 2021, he may also agree to pardon those who have either been convicted or who still face prosecution for the storming of the Capitol. The first applications to delay sentencing until after the Trump inauguration have already been made.

This would be yet another first in US history.

Markus Wagner does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. With Trump returning to the White House, what will happen to his court cases? – https://theconversation.com/with-trump-returning-to-the-white-house-what-will-happen-to-his-court-cases-243128

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Matthew Sussex, Associate Professor (Adj), Griffith Asia Institute; and Fellow, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University

With a resounding victory in the US presidential election, Donald Trump can now claim a sweeping mandate to implement his agenda, both foreign and domestic.

Crucially, the result shows you should never bet against self-interest: either for politicians, or for American voters prepared to disregard the most flawed of all characters in the hope he will “fix” their problems.

The guardrails that constrained Trump’s first term – a hostile Senate, opponents in the Republican Party and a public service devoted to serve the nation rather than an individual – have either been swept away, or will likely soon be bent to his will.

The global implications of a confident and unfettered Trump 2.0 will depend very much on what foreign policy path he charts and whom he decides to appoint to key positions.

Among those, we then need to watch who is selected to do his bidding and who will replace them when they inevitably fall out of favour. Early lists of potential appointees include:

• Marco Rubio and Richard Grenell, who have been mentioned as potential secretary of state

• Kash Patel, mooted as CIA director

• Mike Pompeo, the former secretary of state and CIA director during Trump’s first term in office, who may end up at the Pentagon as defence secretary.

Even Mike Flynn, Trump’s first national security adviser, who resigned just 22 days into his tenure after lying about contacts with Russia’s ambassador to the US, has been mentioned in discussions about senior roles.

So, too, has the self-styled strategic policy expert Elbridge Colby, a former US Defense Department official.

Trump will demand unswerving loyalty from his appointees, while claiming all the credit for their work. But, as he ages, he is also likely to rely heavily on them to take the lead on strategic policy direction.

With that in mind, here are three possible paths a Trump administration might take on the world stage.

1) America First, with compromises

Having trumpeted his credentials as a peacemaker, it is possible Trump returns the US to a position of isolationism and exceptionalism, essentially being a friend and enemy to no one.

That could mean either withdrawing completely from NATO, or making US security assistance so conditional on transatlantic fealty that Europe is essentially captive to his whims.

It could also mean:

• drawing down support for US alliances in Asia and the Pacific

• demanding ever-higher levels of defence spending from security partners

• running a critical eye over any deal that might require the US to commit the lion’s share of resources, or reduce its own military capabilities.

Australia, for instance, will be keen to extract assurances of continued White House support for the AUKUS partnership. This involves Australia buying several nuclear-powered submarines in the early 2030s, in addition to technology sharing between the US and United Kingdom.

This deal is almost certain to be scrutinised by the Trump administration, despite strong support from Republicans in the Congress and Senate.

However, Trump would likely need to make trade-offs to achieve a more isolationist stance.

First, a grand bargain with Russia will be necessary. This is not simply because of Trump’s admiration for Vladimir Putin, but because he has promised to end the war in Ukraine swiftly.

Although Russian ultranationalists are gleefully crowing about Trump’s victory, the Biden administration is scrambling to get US$6 billion (A$9 billion) in military assistance to Kyiv before the handover over power in January. Hence, Trump can’t immediately count on Ukrainian weakness as a precursor to a peace settlement.

Second, in the medium term, it may require a bargain with China. An endless trade war based on tit-for-tat tariffs will drive inflation higher in the US and bite into Trump’s blue-collar, rural voting base.

2) A muscular pivot to Asia

Repeated calls by Trump’s national security loyalists for a confrontational approach to China, coupled to his frustration with America’s European allies, who he believes are free riding on US defence spending, may lead him to pivot to Asia instead.

However, this would entail an even deeper bargain with Moscow. It would have to not only include a deal to end the Ukraine war, but also a more holistic agreement to downscale US-Russian confrontation.

While it is by no means guaranteed Putin would be amenable to this, it would free up US resources to confront China militarily, as well as economically. Trump’s new administration will include many China hawks like Trump loyalist Colby, who have been arguing for years that Beijing poses the gravest threat to US power.

But this pathway will require a firm commitment by Trump (not his strength). It will also require more concrete US security guarantees to its allies in the Asia-Pacific region – in exchange for their commitment to not only help constrain China, but be prepared to participate in a potential conflict.

If Trump does abandon America’s NATO allies, it remains to be seen how even its closest Asian partners would regard his commitment to their security or his ability to manage crises in the region.

3) Peace through strength

A third option would be for Trump to channel former US President Ronald Reagan, seeking to restore and maintain global US primacy. America would lead, but do so pragmatically – and with allies whose interests aligned with its own.

This would be a considerable undertaking, not to mention a costly one. It would require hefty military spending, investment in research and development, re‑establishing American dominance in critical technologies, and finding alternative solutions to supply chains currently dominated by China.

It would also mean doubling down on strategic competition with Beijing, and being prepared to substantially arm proxies (and not just allies) to put pressure on China.

But even this would have limits. As Trump has repeatedly demonstrated, he regards national interests and personal ones as essentially the same thing.

A desire to give Israel a completely free hand, for instance, will have to be moderated by his extensive ties to Saudi Arabia, although Riyadh would certainly approve of Trump’s desire to crack down hard on Iran.

And how Trump deals with dictators will also come under scrutiny.

In the past, his open admiration for Putin, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un has given America’s partners pause. It has also constrained Trump from achieving his objectives.

Chaos and change

Either one of these pathways will lead to instability and tough choices for America’s partners.

Putin will likely make Trump earn any peace over Ukraine by simply refusing to negotiate until the White House puts sufficient pressure on Kyiv to capitulate. And peace on Russian terms will be fragile, entail painful Ukrainian concessions, spawn bitter insurgent campaigns and critically weaken European security.

Europe now finds itself at a crossroads. It finally has to confront the prospect of being responsible for its own security and defence against a reinvigorated Russia. It will now have to work quickly, spend far more on defence and overcome its crippling institutional inertia.

This will also accelerate the new European security order that is already taking shape, with Poland, the Baltic and Nordic states, and the UK as the main bulwarks against Russia.

In Asia and the Pacific, questions about America’s commitment to security guarantees will drive local arms races and make nuclear proliferation more likely. Countries like Japan, South Korea, Australia and the Philippines will also need to ramp up efforts to work together without the US. That will be easier for some than others.

The upshot? Trust, common values and a commitment to a stable rules-based order are what have sustained and deepened America’s security partnerships.

At the very least, Trump 2.0 will make most US allies wary for the foreseeable future. But the greatest tragedy of all would be if he proceeds with his promised campaign of revenge against internal enemies, deporting millions and using his mandate to create a Potemkin democracy.

I fervently hope that doesn’t happen. But then again, you should never bet against self-interest.

Matthew Sussex has received funding from the Australian Research Council, the Fulbright Commission, the Carnegie Foundation, the Atlantic Council and various Australian government agencies.

– ref. Grand bargain with Putin? Confrontation with China? 3 ways Trump may change America’s place in the world – https://theconversation.com/grand-bargain-with-putin-confrontation-with-china-3-ways-trump-may-change-americas-place-in-the-world-243151

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Wesley Morgan, Research Associate, Institute for Climate Risk and Response, UNSW Sydney

If you care about saving Earth from catastrophe, you might be feeling a little down about the re-election of Donald Trump as United States president. Undeniably, his return to the White House is a real setback for climate action.

Trump is a climate change denier who has promised to increase fossil fuel production and withdraw the US from the Paris climate deal, among other worrying pledges.

But beyond Trump and his circle, there remains deep concern about climate change, especially among younger people. Support for climate policy remains high in the US and around the world. And studies based on data from 60,000 people in more than 60 countries suggest individuals’ concern about climate change is widely underestimated.

So now is a good time to remember that efforts to tackle the climate crisis – both in Australia and globally – are much bigger than one man. Here are ten reasons to remain hopeful.

1. The global clean energy transition can’t be halted

The global shift to clean energy is accelerating, and Trump can’t stop it. Investment in clean energy has overtaken fossil fuels, and will be nearly double investment in coal, oil and gas in 2024. This is a historic mega-trend and will continue with or without American leadership.

2. Clean energy momentum is likely to continue in the US

Much of the Biden-era spending on clean energy industries went to Republican states and Congressional districts. New factories for batteries and electric vehicles will still go ahead under the Trump administration. After all, entrepreneur Elon Musk – who is expected to join the Trump administration – makes electric vehicles.

Some of Trump’s financial backers are receiving subsidies for clean energy manufacturing and 18 Republican Congress members have gone on record to oppose cuts to clean energy tax credits.

3. The US still wants to beat China

There is bipartisan concern in Washington about the US losing a technological edge to Beijing. China currently dominates global production of electric vehicles, batteries, wind turbines and solar panels. So internal pressure in the US to counter China’s manufacturing might will continue.

4. The federal government is not everything in the US

When Trump was last in power, he withdrew the US from some climate commitments, such as the Paris Agreement. But many state and local governments powered ahead with climate policy, and that will happen this time around, too. For example, California – the world’s fifth largest economy – plans to eliminate its greenhouse gas footprint by 2045. Even Texas, a Republican heartland, is leading a shift toward wind and solar power.

5. The US climate movement will be more energised than ever

During Trump’s first presidency, the US climate movement developed policy proposals for a “Green New Deal”. Many of these proposals were later implemented by the Biden administration. Initial reactions to Trump’s re-election suggest we can expect similar policy advocacy this time around.

6. Global climate cooperation is bigger than Trump

If Trump makes good on his promise to leave the Paris Agreement (again), he will only be leaving the room where the world’s future is being shaped. The US has walked away from global climate agreements before – for example, refusing to join the Kyoto Protocol in 2001. But other nations rallied for global action, and will do so again.

7. The rules-based global order will remain

When a nation walks away from rules that have been agreed after decades of negotiation, responsible countries must work together to bolster global cooperation. This applies to trade and security – and climate is no different.

As our Foreign Minister Penny Wong recently explained, Australia, as a middle power on the world stage, wants:

a world where disputes are resolved by engagement, negotiation and by reference to rules [and] norms […] We don’t want a world in which disputes are resolved by power alone.

8. Australian diplomacy matters

Australia is seeking to co-host the United Nations climate talks with Pacific island countries in 2026, and is emerging as the favourite. Hosting the conference, known as COP31, would be a chance for Australia to help broker a new era of international climate action, even if the US opts out under Trump.

Hosting the talks would also help cement Australia’s place in the Pacific and assist our Pacific neighbours to deal with the climate threat.

9. Australia’s clean energy shift is accelerating

About 40% of Australia’s main national electricity grid is powered by renewables and this is set to rise to 80% by 2030. Some states are surging ahead – for example, South Australia is aiming for 100% renewables by 2027.

Australians love clean energy at home, too. One in three households have rooftop solar installed, making us a world-leader in the technology’s uptake. Trump’s occupation of the Oval Office cannot stop this momentum.

10. Trump cannot change the science of climate change

The science is clear – burning coal, oil and gas fuels climate change and increases the risk of disasters that are harming communities right now. In Australia, we need look no further than the Black Summer bushfires in 2019-20 and unprecedented Lismore floods in 2022.

And the damage is happening across the globe. In October, twin hurricanes in the US – made stronger by the warming ocean – left a damage bill of more than US$100 billion. And hundreds of people died when a year’s worth of rain fell in one day in Spain last month.

On gloomy days – like, say, the election of a climate denier to the White House – it might feel humanity won’t rise to Earth’s biggest existential challenge. But there are many reasons for hope. The vast majority of us support policies to tackle climate change, and in many cases, the momentum is virtually unstoppable.

Wesley Morgan is a Climate Council fellow.

Ben Newell receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. 10 reasons why US president-elect Donald Trump can’t derail global climate action – https://theconversation.com/10-reasons-why-us-president-elect-donald-trump-cant-derail-global-climate-action-243251

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne

Republican Donald Trump won the United States presidential election by 312 electoral votes to 226 for Democrat Kamala Harris. Trump carried the seven key states of Georgia (16 electoral votes), North Carolina (16), Arizona (11), Nevada (six), Wisconsin (ten), Michigan (15) and Pennsylvania (19).

Arizona and Nevada have not yet been called for Trump, but he will win them both. Joe Biden had defeated Trump by 306 electoral votes to 232 in 2020. At this election, Trump gained Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, Wisconsin and Nevada. He won all the states he won in 2016 against Hillary Clinton, plus Nevada.

Analyst Nate Silver’s final forecast had given Trump a 20% chance to win all seven key states. The pre-election polls did not have to be very wrong for Trump to do this.

Trump leads in the national popular vote by 50.7–47.7. When The New York Times Needle was turned off early Wednesday morning US time, Trump was forecast to win the popular vote by 1.5%. There are many more votes left in Democratic strongholds like California.

This will be the first time a Republican has won the popular vote since 2004. In 2020, Biden won the popular vote against Trump by 51.3–46.8.

The New York Times said 90% of counties with nearly complete results as of Wednesday morning had swung to Trump since 2020. The swing was greatest in counties with over 25% Hispanics, with a shift since 2020 of 9.5 points towards Trump. There were similar swings to Trump in urban and suburban counties.

New York City has five boroughs. Silver said whites have just 9% of the population in the Bronx and 24% in Queens, with Hispanics having a plurality of the population in both boroughs.

In the 2012 presidential election, Republican Mitt Romney won just 8% of the vote against Democrat Barack Obama in the Bronx and 20% in Queens. There was virtually no swing to Trump in 2016 from Romney, but he has had big swings in his favour in the following two elections. Trump won 27% in the Bronx and 38% in Queens on Tuesday.

I wrote on Wednesday about a huge shift since 2016 in Trump’s favour in Florida’s Miami-Dade county, which is heavily Hispanic. Democrats can’t rely on the Hispanic vote anymore.

The Wall Street Journal said that according to exit polls, Trump won men aged 18–29 by 55–42. In 2020, Biden won this demographic by 56–41.

As no county’s population is of young men only, county-level data cannot be used to extrapolate how young men voted, and exit polls are flawed. But if this huge swing to Trump among young men is true, it probably reflects a backlash against feminism.

Congressional elections

Republicans have won the Senate by 52–45 over Democrats (including allied independents), gaining three states that Trump won easily: West Virginia, Montana and Ohio. However, Democrats have won or are leading in four of the five presidential key states that Trump won that also held Senate contests (Pennsylvania is the exception).

If the contests in Arizona, Nevada and Pennsylvania go to the current leader, Republicans will win a 53–47 Senate majority. If Democrats have a very good 2026 midterm election, they may regain Senate control. Republicans will be defending 21 of the 34 seats up for election in 2026.

In the House of Representatives, Republicans lead Democrats by 210 seats to 198 with 218 needed for a majority. If uncalled races are assigned to current leaders, Republicans currently lead by 224–211. However, some seats still have many votes left to count, and Democrats will hope to reverse some Republican leads.

Australian Essential poll gave Harris a 41–33 lead over Trump

In an Australian federal Essential poll that was conducted before the US election (October 30 to November 3) from a sample of 1,131, Harris led Trump by 41–33. This contrasts with a Resolve poll in early October that gave Harris a 52–21 lead. By 43–29, respondents thought a Trump presidency would be bad for Australia.

On Australian voting intentions, the Coalition remained ahead by 49–47 including undecided (48–46 in late October). This was despite a primary vote movement to Labor, who were up three to 31%, with the Coalition down one to 34%, the Greens steady on 12%, One Nation up two to 9%, the UAP steady at 2%, all Others down one to 8% and undecided down one to 5%.

On abortion, 41% thought it should be legal in all cases, 38% legal in most cases, 14% illegal in most cases and 7% illegal in all cases. At least 58% thought politicians should not accept access to various special events and benefits.

Interest in the Melbourne Cup horse race has recovered since last year. Now 16% (up five since November 2023) say they have high interest, 30% moderate interest (up six), 26% little interest (down one) and 26% no interest (down nine). By 52–48, respondents said they would not bet on the Cup (61–39 last year).

Morgan poll: Labor just ahead

A national Morgan poll, conducted October 21–27 from a sample of 1,687, gave Labor a 50.5–49.5 lead, a 1.5-point gain for the Coalition since the October 14–20 Morgan poll that appeared to be a pro-Labor outlier.

Primary votes were 37.5% Coalition (up one), 30% Labor (down two), 14% Greens (up 0.5), 5.5% One Nation (steady), 9% independents (steady) and 4% others (up 0.5).

The headline figure uses respondent preferences. By 2022 election preference flows, Labor led by 51.5–48.5, a 1.5-point gain for the Coalition.

Adrian Beaumont does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Further US election analysis: Hispanics and young men swung big to Trump – https://theconversation.com/further-us-election-analysis-hispanics-and-young-men-swung-big-to-trump-243142

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephanie Cowdery, Research Fellow, Carer Hub: A Centre of Excellence in Cancer Carer Research, Translation and Impact, Deakin University

Across the world, one in five people are diagnosed with cancer during their lifetime. By age 85, almost one in two Australians will be diagnosed with cancer.

When it happens to someone you care about, it can be hard to know what to say or how to help them. But providing the right support to a friend can make all the difference as they face the emotional and physical challenges of a new diagnosis and treatment.

Here are six ways to offer meaningful support to a friend who has been diagnosed with cancer.

1. Recognise and respond to emotions

When facing a cancer diagnosis and treatment, it’s normal to experience a range of emotions including fear, anger, grief and sadness. Your friend’s moods may fluctuate. It is also common for feelings to change over time, for example your friend’s anxiety may decrease, but they may feel more depressed.

Some friends may want to share details while others will prefer privacy. Always ask permission to raise sensitive topics (such as changes in physical appearance or their thoughts regarding fears and anxiety) and don’t make assumptions. It’s OK to tell them you feel awkward, as this acknowledges the challenging situation they are facing.

When they feel comfortable to talk, follow their lead. Your support and willingness to listen without judgement can provide great comfort. You don’t have to have the answers. Simply acknowledging what has been said, providing your full attention and being present for them will be a great help.

2. Understand their diagnosis and treatment

Understanding your friend’s diagnosis and what they’ll go through when being treated may be helpful.

Being informed can reduce your own worry. It may also help you to listen better and reduce the amount of explaining your friend has to do, especially when they’re tired or overwhelmed.

Explore reputable sources such as the Cancer Council website for accurate information, so you can have meaningful conversations. But keep in mind your friend has a trusted medical team to offer personalised and accurate advice.

3. Check in regularly

Cancer treatment can be isolating, so regular check-ins, texts, calls or visits can help your friend feel less alone.

Having a normal conversation and sharing a joke can be very welcome. But everyone copes with cancer differently. Be patient and flexible in your support – some days will be harder for them than others.

Remembering key dates – such as the next round of chemotherapy – can help your friend feel supported. Celebrating milestones, including the end of treatment or anniversary dates, may boost morale and remind your friend of positive moments in their cancer journey.

Always ask if it’s a good time to visit, as your friend’s immune system may be compromised by their cancer or treatments such as chemotherapy or radiotherapy. If you’re feeling unwell, it’s best to postpone visits – but they may still appreciate a call or text.

4. Offer practical support

Sometimes the best way to show your care is through practical support. There may be different ways to offer help, and what your friend needs might change at the beginning, during and after treatment.

For example, you could offer to pick up prescriptions, drive them to appointments so they have transport and company to debrief, or wait with them at appointments.

Meals will always be welcome. However it’s important to remember cancer and its treatments may affect taste, smell and appetite, as well as your friend’s ability to eat enough or absorb nutrients. You may want to check first if there are particular foods they like. Good nutrition can help boost their strength while dealing with the side effects of treatment.

There may also be family responsibilities you can help with, for example, babysitting kids, grocery shopping or taking care of pets.

5. Explore supports together

Studies have shown mindfulness practices can be an effective way for people to manage anxiety associated with a cancer diagnosis and its treatment.

If this is something your friend is interested in, it may be enjoyable to explore classes (either online or in-person) together.

You may also be able to help your friend connect with organisations that provide emotional and practical help, such as the Cancer Council’s support line, which offers free, confidential information and support for anyone affected by cancer, including family, friends and carers.

Peer support groups can also reduce your friend’s feelings of isolation and foster shared understanding and empathy with people who’ve gone through a similar experience. GPs can help with referrals to support programs.

6. Stick with them

Be committed. Many people feel isolated after their treatment. This may be because regular appointments have reduced or stopped – which can feel like losing a safety net – or because their relationships with others have changed.

Your friend may also experience emotions such as worry, lack of confidence and uncertainty as they adjust to a new way of living after their treatment has ended. This will be an important time to support your friend.

But don’t forget: looking after yourself is important too. Making sure you eat well, sleep, exercise and have emotional support will help steady you through what may be a challenging time for you, as well as the friend you love.

Our research team is developing new programs and resources to support carers of people who live with cancer. While it can be a challenging experience, it can also be immensely rewarding, and your small acts of kindness can make a big difference.

Dr Stephanie Cowdery is the appointed Research Fellow (Cancer Care Centre) for The Cancer Carer Hub funded by the Victorian Department of Health.

Anna Ugalde receives funding from national competitive funding bodies including Victorian Cancer Agency, MRFF, NHMRC and Department of Health and Aged Care.

Trish Livingston receives funding from competitive external granting bodies, including NHMRC, MRFF and Cancer Australia. The Cancer Carer Hub is funded by the Victorian Department of Health.

Victoria White receives funding from national competitive external granting organisations including MRFF and NHMRC, Victorian Department of Health, Breast Cancer Network Australia and Cancer Council Victoria.

– ref. Your friend has been diagnosed with cancer. Here are 6 things you can do to support them – https://theconversation.com/your-friend-has-been-diagnosed-with-cancer-here-are-6-things-you-can-do-to-support-them-239844

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hayley O’Neill, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Health Sciences and Medicine, Bond University

Globally, one in eight people are living with obesity. This is an issue because excess fat increases the risk of type 2 diabetes, heart disease and certain cancers.

Modifying your diet is important for managing obesity and preventing weight gain. This might include reducing your calorie intake, changing your eating patterns and prioritising healthy food.

But is one formula for weight loss more likely to result in success than another? Our new research compared three weight-loss methods, to see if one delivered more weight loss than the others:

• altering calorie distribution – eating more calories earlier rather than later in the day
• eating fewer meals
• intermittent fasting.

We analysed data from 29 clinical trials involving almost 2,500 people.

We found that over 12 weeks or more, the three methods resulted in similar weight loss: 1.4–1.8kg.

So if you do want to lose weight, choose a method that works best for you and your lifestyle.

Eating earlier in the day

When our metabolism isn’t functioning properly, our body can’t respond to the hormone insulin properly. This can lead to weight gain, fatigue and can increase the risk of a number of chronic diseases such as diabetes.

Eating later in the day – with a heavy dinner and late-night snacking – seems to lead to worse metabolic function. This means the body becomes less efficient at converting food into energy, managing blood sugar and regulating fat storage.

In contrast, consuming calories earlier in the day appears to improve metabolic function.

However, this might not be the case for everyone. Some people naturally have an evening “chronotype”, meaning they wake up and stay up later.

People with this chronotype appear to have less success losing weight, no matter the method. This is due to a combination of factors including genes, an increased likelihood to have a poorer diet overall and higher levels of hunger hormones.

Eating fewer meals

Skipping breakfast is common, but does it hinder weight loss? Or is a larger breakfast and smaller dinner ideal?

While frequent meals may reduce disease risk, recent studies suggest that compared to eating one to two meals a day, eating six times a day might increase weight loss success.

However, this doesn’t reflect the broader research, which tends to show consuming fewer meals can lead to greater weight loss. Our research suggests three meals a day is better than six. The easiest way to do this is by cutting out snacks and keeping breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Most studies compare three versus six meals, with limited evidence on whether two meals is better than three.

However, front-loading your calories (consuming most of your calories between breakfast and lunch) appears to be better for weight loss and may also help reduce hunger across the day. But more studies with a longer duration are needed.

Fasting, or time-restricted eating

Many of us eat over a period of more than 14 hours a day.

Eating late at night can throw off your body’s natural rhythm and alter how your organs function. Over time, this can increase your risk of type 2 diabetes and other chronic diseases, particularly among shift workers.

Time-restricted eating, a form of intermittent fasting, means eating all your calories within a six- to ten-hour window during the day when you’re most active. It’s not about changing what or how much you eat, but when you eat it.

Animal studies suggest time-restricted eating can lead to weight loss and improved metabolism. But the evidence in humans is still limited, especially about the long-term benefits.

It’s also unclear if the benefits of time-restricted eating are due to the timing itself or because people are eating less overall. When we looked at studies where participants ate freely (with no intentional calorie limits) but followed an eight-hour daily eating window, they naturally consumed about 200 fewer calories per day.

What will work for you?

In the past, clinicians have thought about weight loss and avoiding weight gain as a simile equation of calories in and out. But factors such as how we distribute our calories across the day, how often we eat and whether we eat late at night may also impact our metabolism, weight and health.

There are no easy ways to lose weight. So choose a method, or combination of methods, that suits you best. You might consider

• aiming to eat in an eight-hour window
• consuming your calories earlier, by focusing on breakfast and lunch
• opting for three meals a day, instead of six.

The average adult gains 0.4 to 0.7 kg per year. Improving the quality of your diet is important to prevent this weight gain and the strategies above might also help.

Finally, there’s still a lot we don’t know about these eating patterns. Many existing studies are short-term, with small sample sizes and varied methods, making it hard to make direct comparisons.

More research is underway, including well-controlled trials with larger samples, diverse populations and consistent methods. So hopefully future research will help us better understand how altering our eating patterns can result in better health.

Alongside her academic role, Hayley O’Neill works as a wellness consultant.

Loai Albarqouni receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council and Heart Foundation.

– ref. Fasting, eating earlier in the day or eating fewer meals – what works best for weight loss? – https://theconversation.com/fasting-eating-earlier-in-the-day-or-eating-fewer-meals-what-works-best-for-weight-loss-242028

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Peter Newton, Emeritus Professor in Sustainable Urbanism, Centre for Urban Transitions, Swinburne University of Technology

The way we organise our cities and regions creates problems everywhere. We’re facing difficult and polluting drives to work, a lack of affordable housing, and urban designs that lead to car dependency and are bad for our health.

For example, poor levels of walkability are associated with higher rates of obesity, hypertension and cardiovascular disease. Parks and greenery are associated with better mental and cognitive health.

Australian cities sprawl. Many suburbs are hard to get to by public transport or cycling and walking.

Our sprawling cities use a lot of land per person. Their resource use and carbon footprints are massive. They also produce huge amounts of waste.

To resolve such issues, government planners should think beyond our capital cities. Australia needs to develop strategies that connect these capitals with surrounding regional cities to create “megacity regions”.

It’s a settlement model that could work better than our big cities do now, making urban growth more sustainable. The emergence of hybrid work, fast internet and high-speed rail favours this form of settlement.

What are megacity regions?

A megacity region, according to the OECD, is a network of urban areas linked to a capital city by home-to-work commuting. Megacity regions connect these urban centres more efficiently to make them more sustainable and productive.

An early example is the Bos-Wash corridor (including Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington DC) in North America that emerged around the mid-20th century. Megacity regions are now common across Europe (for example, Germany’s Rhine-Ruhr region including Dortmund, Essen, Duesseldorf and Cologne, and the Netherlands’ Randstad region including Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam and Utrecht). The Taiheiyō Belt in Japan (including Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka, Hiroshima and Fukuoka) is one of many Asian examples.

How ready is Australia for megacity regions?

The 2019 CSIRO Australian National Outlook explored the question “What will Australia be like economically, socially and environmentally in 2060?” Its modelling showed “stronger regions” created major benefits across transport, health, education, jobs and housing. One scenario involved 16 million people living in regional Australia by 2060, with 10 million in regional cities.

CSIRO concluded that “investing in the growth of regional satellite cities with strong connectivity to those capitals” creates many opportunities. This growth would benefit the regions while easing pressures on the capitals.

In recent years, the New South Wales government has developed ideas for Sydney to grow into a Six Cities Region from Newcastle to Wollongong.

The Committee for Melbourne has called for an Australian East Coast Megaregion to boost economic growth and attract foreign investment.

In 2023, the Victorian government indicated a statewide strategy, Plan Victoria, would replace Plan Melbourne.

However, without robust regionalisation policies, Melbourne and Sydney are likely to become sprawling megacities of ten million people or more this century. This will add to the strain on transport, infrastructure and housing.

What makes change possible?

Cities and their central business districts are important for their agglomeration effects – the accumulated benefits of concentrated social and economic activity. But this also often leads to social, economic and environmental problems.

Integrating regional cities into the economic life of their capital cities can reduce some of these problems. It can also produce many benefits, including new and more efficient industries, enhanced communication networks and stronger labour markets.

Settlement systems have evolved throughout history. Walking cities became rail-oriented cities, which became car-based cities. All these models in their day supported a daily return commute averaging one hour (Marchetti’s constant).

Our research explores how new technologies and work practices can enable a fourth transition to the megacity region. The drivers of this change include ubiquitous fast internet, hybrid work and high-speed rail.

Ubiquitous fast internet

NBN broadband data from 2012 to 2021 showed little difference between Melbourne and Victorian regional cities in the uptake of typical residential internet connections. There was a major difference for higher-speed business connections.

Major capital cities continue to act as engines of bandwidth-hungry, information economy industries in Australia. They have more high-skilled workers and higher uptake of fast internet.

Overall, the data reflected that regional cities in Victoria mostly house “population-serving” rather than “producer-services” industries. Fast internet can open up job opportunities, but is not by itself enough to decentralise knowledge industries.

Hybrid work

Working both from home and in the office has become established since COVID. Hybrid work improves sustainability, mostly by reducing car use and road congestion.

Today, only 18% of Australian knowledge workers work “only in the office”.

Not having to go into work every day means knowledge workers can live further from their workplace. This changes the employment landscape in regional centres. Many information economy jobs can be done in non-metropolitan locations where housing costs less.

High-speed rail

Fast rail systems have long been debated in Australia, with various options proposed.

Victoria introduced “faster” regional rail in 2005-06. The populations of urban centres served by these lines have since grown faster than “off-line” ones.

The gap in job growth rates between on-line and off-line centres was greater for producer services than people-serving jobs. The latter are tied more closely to demand from local residents.

Designated growth areas on the outer fringes of Melbourne had much higher population and employment growth rates, indicating that current transport polices have supported urban sprawl. High-speed rail can help urban growth to “leap over” outer suburbs to the regional cities.

What could high-speed rail lead to? In England, the advent of high-speed rail (speeds of more than 200km/hr) resulted in notably higher population growth in on‑line local area districts compared to off-line. The on-line districts, across the board, experienced a stronger shift towards information and knowledge-based industries than off-line ones. Some even outperformed outer metropolitan London districts.

Why is this important now?

Both federal and Victorian governments are preparing strategic plans to guide long-term urban development. Both have issued discussion documents for public feedback.

These documents are long on planning principles but short on mission-scale programs capable of transformative change. This sort of change is now the focus of long-term planning internationally. Land-use planning of megacity regions needs to feature strongly in Australian urbanisation plans too.

We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to achieve urban development at a scale and in a form that can transform Australia’s settlement system.

Magnus Moglia receives funding from iMOVE Australia Cooperative Research Centre, Transport for New South Wales, Queensland Department of Transport and Main Roads, Victorian Department of Transport and Planning, Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts, Sydney Water, Sustainability Victoria, AHURI, Cotton Research and Development Corporation, and ACIAR. He is chair for Regen Melbourne’s Research Council. He was on the steering committee for Committee for Melbourne’s Melbourne 4.0 project. As a CSIRO staff member, he advised the Australian National Outlook 2 project.

James Whitten, Peter Newton, and Stephen Glackin do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How our regions can help make Australia’s growing cities more sustainable – https://theconversation.com/how-our-regions-can-help-make-australias-growing-cities-more-sustainable-240330

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nicholas Ross Smith, Senior Research Fellow, National Centre for Research on Europe, University of Canterbury

Over the past decade, the idea of an important geopolitical space called the “Indo-Pacific” has become integral to the grand strategising of countries inside and outside this vast geographical area.

The term is not new, however. Australia – one of a few truly Indo-Pacific countries – used it during the 1970s to paint an optimistic vision of a future in which it was interlinked economically and politically with its neighbours in the Indian and Pacific oceans.

However, since Japan (under the leadership of Shinzo Abe) first used the term in 2007 as a way of conceptualising relations with India in the context of “broader Asia”, the Indo-Pacific has evolved significantly.

And with the advent of the AUKUS security pact in 2021, it is now common to refer to the Indo-Pacific as either a region or super-region. But this oversimplifies what is, in fact, a far more complex geopolitical reality.

What is a region?

A region is best thought of as a geographically enclosed complex. According to political scientist David Lake, regions are “so interrelated in terms of their security that actions by any one member, and significant security-related developments inside any member, have a major impact on others”.

The problem with thinking of the Indo-Pacific as a region or super-region is that at its widest definition – stretching from the east coast of Africa to the west coast of South America – it comprises more than half the geographic space of the surface of the Earth.

Simply put, the Indo-Pacific is too large to meaningfully conceive of as a region or even a super-region.

Furthermore, although many states have adopted an Indo-Pacific outlook in their strategising, they typically (save for greater powers) still think of their national security in a strict regional sense.

So, the Indo-Pacific as a geopolitical space looks vastly different in Washington DC than it does in Jakarta, Wellington, Tokyo or Manila (to choose but a few).

This is not to say the Indo-Pacific concept should be ignored. It represents an important development in international security. The fact is it has experienced the greatest geopolitical shift over the past decade or so – and this is likely to continue for the foreseeable future.

The China factor

If not a region or super-region, then, what is the Indo-Pacific?

It is perhaps better thought of in terms of what international relations experts Barry Buzan and Ole Waever call “macrosecuritisation”: the identification of an “existential threat” to something deemed precious and worth protecting which demands an immediate and, if necessary, extraordinary collective response to protect it.

This was given a major boost in 2017 when the United States – still by far the most powerful global actor – formally adopted the Indo-Pacific concept at the centre of its strategic thinking.

In the process, it identified China as a clear strategic competitor. This decision had immediate real-world implications.

Firstly, it helped resuscitate the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) involving the US, Australia, India and Japan after nearly a decade of impasse.

Secondly, after Joe Biden ran for president on an “America must lead again” foreign policy platform, it led to the formation of AUKUS in 2021 and the launch of the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity in 2022.

Geopolitical complexity

Importantly, not only the US is involved in this macrosecuritisation. Australia, India, Japan and, more recently, the United Kingdom and European Union (and particular member states, such as France) are all involved.

Together they are pushing an Indo-Pacific concept that is built on the identification of the rules-based international order as being under existential threat due to China’s rise and perceived assertiveness.

The framing of China as a “threat” rather than an “opportunity” – which dominated the previous “Asia-Pacific” construct – means a radically different perspective in the countries adopting Indo-Pacific outlooks.

This clearly matters greatly to regional geopolitics. But it still does not mean the Indo-Pacific has to be seen as a region or super-region.

Rather, the concept is distorting the geopolitics of different regions – especially East Asia, South-east Asia, South Asia and the South Pacific.

These remain genuine regions with their own unique security dynamics. But the Indo-Pacific idea is enveloping them and shifting the dynamics in a more pessimistic and paranoid direction.

A ‘New Cold War’

There is now a concerning habit of treating the Indo-Pacific as a coherent unitary geopolitical space rather than a constellation of different regions.

This lends credence to the simplistic analogy of the Indo-Pacific becoming the ground zero of a “New Cold War”. And it ignores the perspectives of the smaller countries that find themselves being sucked into this growing contest.

Seeing the Indo-Pacific for what it really is – not a natural geographical phenomenon but a construct – is an important step towards developing more coherent and nuanced policies that adequately capture the geopolitical complexity of the Indo-Pacific constellation.

But this runs contrary to the macrosecuritisation process already in place.

There are many reasons why the current situation in the Indo-Pacific is nothing like the original Cold War. But the securitisation process is simplifying the geopolitics, at least in perception, into something reminiscent of it. The ramifications could be devastating.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The Indo-Pacific is an idea more than a region – and it’s pushing politics in a ‘pessimistic and paranoid’ direction – https://theconversation.com/the-indo-pacific-is-an-idea-more-than-a-region-and-its-pushing-politics-in-a-pessimistic-and-paranoid-direction-243130

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Early Wednesday evening, Queensland Nationals senator Matt Canavan raced down the Parliament House stairs to collect a bag of McDonald’s from an Uber. To celebrate Trump’s victory, he called out as he ran.

If any Labor people were eating McDonald’s, it would have been for comfort food as they contemplated difficult times.

Donald Trump’s triumphant return to the White House is mostly bad news for Anthony Albanese and his government, already facing a challenging 2025 election year.

Let’s be clear: officials are reassuring themselves Trump’s ascendancy won’t shake the fundamentals of the Australian-American alliance. That is driven by long-term mutual interests, which remain through the thick-and-thin of political turbulence in one or other country.

But the Trump administration will be complicated for the prime minister to handle.

Meanwhile, Labor won’t miss a few election messages from the result, despite the big differences between the two countries (especially our compulsory voting system). High cost of living was a political killer, as was people feeling worse off than before. Trump’s much repeated question, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” resonated. Voters were sour and distrustful; alienated men are becoming a hard constituency for a party of the left.

Trump relates to other leaders in a very personal way. US watcher Bruce Wolpe, speaking ahead of the result, warned a Trump-Albanese relationship would be “rocky at the start”. Trump would be briefed on past Albanese comments. (These include Albanese saying, in 2017, Trump “scares the shit out of me”.) Also, “If Trump looks at the agenda of the Albanese government, it is a mirror image of Joe Biden’s domestic policy agenda adjusted for realities in both countries”.

Two former prime ministers, Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison, successfully dealt with President Trump Mark 1. Morrison was a natural fit and Trump feted him. Turnbull mixed an appeal to their common transactional business backgrounds, with some straight-out bullying ( the latter to persuade Trump to abide by an existing deal on refugees).

During those years Australia also had the advantage of having as ambassador Joe Hockey, who had a close relationship with the Trump White House.

The path for Albanese to establish a personal relationship with Trump is unclear.

One early test may be the Trump administration’s attitude to current ambassador Kevin Rudd. When, earlier this year, Rudd’s past scathing critique was put to him. Trump said, “if he’s at all hostile, he will not be there long”.

Rudd won’t be “at all hostile”. He’s been working assiduously to foster relations with the Trump camp. The government is determined to keep him in place, hoping the Trump team will let bygones be bygones.

Rudd’s office on Thursday issued this rather extraordinary statement:

“In his previous role as the head of an independent US-based think tank, Mr Rudd was a regular commentator on American politics.

“Out of respect for the office of President of the United States, and following the election of President Trump, Ambassador Rudd has now removed these past commentaries from his personal website and social media channels. This has been done to eliminate the possibility of such comments being misconstrued as reflecting his positions as Ambassador and, by extension, the views of the Australian Government.

“Ambassador Rudd looks forward to working with President Trump and his team to continue strengthening the US-Australia alliance.”

Another, more substantial test of the Trump-Albanese government relationship is likely to be the tariff regime Trump has foreshadowed. Previously under Trump, Australia was able to negotiate exemptions from tariffs for its steel and aluminium. Australia will lobby hard for special consideration again.

When Trump turns his eyes to the United States’ allies, there is a general expectation the AUKUS pact will be safe. It is long term, with support from both sides of Congress; there is no US interest in disturbing it – indeed the US is doing well financially out of it.

Former head of the defence department and one-time ambassador to the US Dennis Richardson, points out the Trump presidency will end several years before the Americans are due to hand over the first of the Virginia Class submarines to Australia.

While there’ll be general pressure on allies to boost their defence budgets, Richardson says Australia is already spending 2% of GDP and is committed to increasing it.

In economic terms, like other countries Australia will be affected by whatever fallout the Trump program brings for the international economy. But predicting exactly what will happen is near impossible, as Reserve Bank Governor Michele Bullock made clear on Thursday when questioned by a testy Greens senator Nick McKim, who wanted precision.

“Our initial feeling is that if he does some of what he’s said, maybe it doesn’t have a lot of implications. If he’s more extreme, maybe it does,” Bullock told an Senate estimates committee hearing.

Assistant governor Christopher Kent explained further, “One of the big effects [of Trump’s stated tariff policy] is on China. But you can’t imagine the Chinese will do nothing. […] There can be offsetting things and we don’t know.”

Independent economist Chris Richardson sees the “vibe” of uncertainty as a defining feature of the future with Trump. The volatility of his presidency will affect the decisions of nations, business, even families, he says.

At all levels, “there will be good reason to be a bit more careful with your decisions in a Trump world.” As businesses and individuals become more risk averse, ultimately the cost is a loss of returns, Richardson says.

That’s likely to be the case in one major policy area of particular importance to Australia: climate change. Trump’s flagged he would want to take the US out of the Paris agreement once again. His presidency could throw international efforts to contain global warming into disarray. Climate change Minister Chris Bowen has already been coy about whether he will announced Australia’s 2035 emissions reduction target in February, as required. Now the timetable, and the ambition of the target, will come further into question.

Asked on Thursday whether he’d commit to announcing a 2035 target before the election, Albanese said “we’re focused on our 2030 target”.

Albanese had a phone call with the president-elect on Thursday morning. “We talked about the importance of the Alliance, and the strength of the Australia-US relationship in security, AUKUS, trade and investment. I look forward to working together in the interests of both our countries,” the prime minister said later on social media.

Albanese told reporters: “President Trump has run a campaign based on change and he’s made it clear he’s going to do things differently – so we shouldn’t be surprised as things change.” The prime minister is in no position to say so, but probably Trump still “scares the shit” out of him.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Grattan on Friday: Donald Trump’s win will make 2025 even more challenging for Anthony Albanese – https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-donald-trumps-win-will-make-2025-even-more-challenging-for-anthony-albanese-243141

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus says the government plans to publish the secret section of the Robodebt royal commission report, although it is not clear when it will do so.

Dreyfus said in a Thursday statement this would be done for transparency and accountability “at the first appropriate opportunity”.

The timing will depend on advice from the “eminent person” who is to review the National Anti-Corruption Commission’s decision not to investigate six people referred to it by the royal commission. The six, among others, are named in the secret section.

The royal commission recommended this section not be released with the rest of the report to avoid prejudicing any civil action or criminal prosecution.

“With civil and criminal matters largely complete, the government had planned to table the additional chapter in the House of Representatives in the current sitting week,” Dreyfus said.

But then last week the Inspector of the NACC said the NACC’s decision not to investigate the six should be reopened, after finding Commissioner Paul Brereton, who heads the organisation, had not properly recused himself from the decision-making process. Brereton excused himself because of his acquaintance with one of the six, but was still heavily involved in the process, according to the Inspector.

The Inspector said an eminent person should be appointed by the NACC to look again at whether an investigation should be undertaken.

“The government will now seek advice from the NACC decision maker, once appointed, on whether the tabling of the confidential additional chapter would prejudice any current or future decision of the NACC, ” Dreyfus said.

There has been strong pressure, including from within the government, for the secret section to be put out.

Meanwhile Brereton’s conduct will be examined at a public hearing later this month of the parliament committee with oversight of the NACC.

There have been calls for Brereton’s resignation, with critics saying this is needed to preserve the reputation of the NACC, which has only been in operation a little over a year.

The deputy chair of the parliamentary committee, Independent MP Helen Haines. told The Conversation’s politics podcast that the NACC had had a “disappointing start” with the Robodebt incident and the findings by the Inspector.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Government to publish secret section of Robodebt report, but timing is uncertain – https://theconversation.com/government-to-publish-secret-section-of-robodebt-report-but-timing-is-uncertain-240444

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Evangeline Mantzioris, Program Director of Nutrition and Food Sciences, Accredited Practising Dietitian, University of South Australia

Matcha has experienced a surge in popularity in recent months, leading to reports of global shortages and price increases.

If you haven’t been caught up in the craze, matcha is a powdered version of green tea. On a cafe menu you might see a hot or iced matcha latte, or even a matcha-flavoured cake or pastry. A quick google brings up countless recipes incorporating matcha, both sweet and savoury.

Retailers and cafe owners have suggested the main reasons for matcha’s popularity include its “instagrammable” looks and its purported health benefits.

But what are the health benefits of matcha? Here’s what the evidence says.

First, what is matcha?

Matcha is a finely ground powder of green tea leaves, which come from the plant Camellia sinensis. This is the same plant used to make green and black tea. However, the production process differentiates matcha from green and black tea.

For matcha, the tea plant is grown in shade. Once the leaves are harvested, they’re steamed and dried and the stems are removed. Then the leaves are carefully ground at controlled temperatures to form the powder.

The production process for green tea is simpler. The leaves are picked from the unshaded plants, heated and then dried. We then steep the dried leaves in hot water to get tea (whereas with matcha the whole leaf is consumed).

With black tea, after the leaves are picked they’re exposed to air, which leads to oxidation. This makes the leaves black and gives the tea a different flavour.

A source of phytonutrients

Phytonutrients are chemical compounds found in plants which have a range of benefits for human health. Matcha contains several.

Chlorophyll gives plants such as Camellia sinensis their green colour. There’s some evidence chlorophyll may have health benefits – including anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer and anti-obesity effects – due to its antioxidant properties. Antioxidants neutralise free radicals, which are unstable molecules that harm our cells.

Theanine has been shown to improve sleep and reduce stress and anxiety. The only other known dietary source of theanine is mushrooms.

Caffeine is a phytonutrient we know well. Aside from increasing alertness, caffeine has also demonstrated antioxidant effects and some protection against a range of chronic and neurodegenerative diseases. However, too much caffeine can have negative side effects.

Interestingly, shading the plants while growing appears to change the nutritional composition of the leaf and may lead to higher levels of these phytonutrients in matcha compared to green tea.

Another compound worth mentioning is called catechins, of which there are several different types. Matcha powder similarly has more catechins than green tea. They are strong antioxidants, which have been shown to have protective effects against bacteria, viruses, allergies, inflammation and cancer. Catechins are also found in apples, blueberries and strawberries.

What are the actual health benefits?

So we know matcha contains a variety of phytonutrients, but does this translate to noticeable health benefits?

A review published in 2023 identified only five experimental studies that have given matcha to people. These studies gave participants about 2–4g of matcha per day (equivalent to 1–2 teaspoons of matcha powder), compared to a placebo, as either a capsule, in tea or in foods. Matcha decreased stress and anxiety, and improved memory and cognitive function. There was no effect on mood.

A more recent study showed 2g of matcha in older people aged 60 to 85 improved sleep quality. However, in younger people aged 27 to 64 in another study, matcha had little effect on sleep.

A study in people with obesity found no difference in the weight loss observed between the matcha group and the control group. This study did not randomise participants, and people knew which group they had been placed in.

It could be hypothesised that given you consume all of the leaf, and given levels of some phytonutrients may be higher due to the growing conditions, matcha may have more nutritional benefits than green tea. But to my knowledge there has been no direct comparison of health outcomes from green tea compared to matcha.

There’s lots of evidence for green tea

While to date a limited number of studies have looked at matcha, and none compared matcha and green tea, there’s quite a bit of research on the health benefits of drinking green tea.

A systematic review of 21 studies on green tea has shown similar benefits to matcha for improvements in memory, plus evidence for mood improvement.

There’s also evidence green tea provides other health benefits. Systematic reviews have shown green tea leads to weight loss in people with obesity, lower levels of certain types of cholesterol, and reduced blood pressure. Green tea may also lower the risk of certain types of cancer.

So, if you can’t get your hands on matcha at the moment, drinking green tea may be a good way to get your caffeine hit.

Although the evidence on green tea provides us with some hints about the health benefits of matcha, we can’t be certain they would be the same. Nonetheless, if your local coffee shop has a good supply of matcha, there’s nothing to suggest you shouldn’t keep enjoying matcha drinks.

However, it may be best to leave the matcha croissant or cronut for special occasions. When matcha is added to foods with high levels of added sugar, salt and saturated fat, any health benefits that could be attributed to the matcha may be negated.

Evangeline Mantzioris is affiliated with Alliance for Research in Nutrition, Exercise and Activity (ARENA) at the University of South Australia. Evangeline Mantzioris has received funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, and has been appointed to the National Health and Medical Research Council Dietary Guideline Expert Committee.

– ref. Matcha is having a moment. What are the health benefits of this green tea drink? – https://theconversation.com/matcha-is-having-a-moment-what-are-the-health-benefits-of-this-green-tea-drink-242775

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Susan Stone, Credit Union SA Chair of Economics, University of South Australia

For months, experts and commentators have been weighing up what the possible return of Donald Trump might mean for financial markets and the global economy.

Now, at least, they have a bit more certainty. Trump has decisively won the 2024 US presidential election. He’ll be officially inaugurated as the country’s 47th president in January.

The incoming administration has already flagged its economic agenda: lowering taxes, raising tariffs, withdrawing from key agreements and moving away from the rules-based global trade order. These measures could have profound impacts.

A large increase in US public debt and investment could keep global interest rates stuck higher for longer. Steep tariffs could disrupt global value chains and hamper China’s economic growth.

A further withdrawal of US leadership from global matters could lead to a decline in international trade and a significant weakening of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Other countries – including Australia – won’t be able to look away and simply hope for the best. For better or worse, the world must now adapt to the return of Trump.

Read more:
Trump has vowed to be a ‘dictator’ on day one. With this day now coming, what exactly will he do?

Hey, big spender

The Trump campaign has promised to cut US taxes across the board, including by lowering the federal corporate tax rate to just 15% (currently, it’s 21%).

Such tax cuts – alongside a range of new spending proposals – don’t come cheap. It has recently been estimated that Trump’s tax and spending plan could increase total US debt by US$7.75 trillion (A$11.8 trillion).

While that number might be hard to wrap your head around, it basically means the US government will be borrowing a lot more money in the future. That will drive up borrowing costs for other borrowers, such as the Australian government.

While Australia has recently enjoyed budget surpluses, this is unlikely to continue. This means the government will need to start borrowing around the time Trump’s policies start to put upward pressure on interest rates, likely later in 2025, making it more expensive for Australia to borrow and raising the cost of repayments.

An important customer

A bigger concern for Australia, though, is Trump’s pledge to impose tariffs of 10–20% on all imports to the US. Imports from China have been singled out for much more severe treatment, set to face tariffs of 60% or more.

While the US accounts for only 5% of Australian exports, it still ranks as Australia’s fifth-largest export market.

Breaking it down by what we export to the US paints a more alarming picture. The Australian government has long sought to diversify its economy and exports, moving away from relying heavily on commodities such as iron ore and wheat.

The US imports relatively small amounts of our commodities, but it’s a different story for much of our advanced manufacturing sector. If we look specifically at many high technology products, the US is a major customer.

Within Australia’s exports, more than 40% of high-tech engines, 50% of aircraft and space parts and almost 60% of machine tools are sent to the US.

On top of this, the US is Australia’s second-largest services export market, accounting for more than 10% of the total services trade. And it is not just outright services exports that matter.

Goods that are traded internationally (toys, laptops, refrigerators, and so on) are produced with services inputs, such as software, engineering or transport services.

If Australia wants to become a bigger player in the advanced goods and services market, it needs to be an effective global competitor. Any increase in barriers to the US market will hamper this goal.

Making the world protectionist again

If Trump raises tariffs on all imports to the US, other countries will almost certainly follow suit. They may also impose new tariffs on trade with countries other than the US.

The global impacts of the tariffs, such as rising shipping costs, increased volatility in the US dollar, and a general increase in uncertainty and risk, will almost certainly flow on to Australia.

Trade is a major part of the Australian economy, accounting for as much as 45% of GDP. That means when the costs of doing business internationally grow, it can seriously impact Australian businesses and consumers.

When Trump raised tariffs on China in 2018, ocean container shipping market rates spiked by more than 70%.

Global shipping is already under pressure due to ongoing conflicts in Europe and the Middle East. For a country as far away from major markets as Australia, higher shipping costs put our goods at a significant price disadvantage.

Australia will also need to watch the impact of Trump’s policies on China, still our largest two-way trading partner.

Large tariffs on China could slow its growth, in turn slowing its imports of Australian exports such as iron ore.

Less trade leadership from the US

A Republican majority in Congress could also raise the spectre of a US withdrawal from the WTO, which oversees the rules-based global trading system.

Coupled with the impacts we’ve already discussed, that could create deep divides in the global trading system, undoing years of hard-earned global agreements for freer trade.

For a small, open economy like Australia, this could mean an increase in prices of everything – from cars through to business services.

It could also make it harder for countries to settle their differences if the US continues to block new appointments to the WTO’s Appellate Body – the body that hears appeals in disputes brought by WTO Members.

On the positive side, retaliatory tariffs on US products may mean market opportunities for Australian goods that compete directly with US goods, such as wheat and education services. Whether this would be enough to offset the potential disorder of a Trump trade agenda remains to be seen.

Read more:
A Donald Trump presidency is bad for climate action, but Australia should get on with the job

Susan Stone does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Trump’s economic vision is no longer a ‘maybe’. Here’s what it might mean for Australia and the world – https://theconversation.com/trumps-economic-vision-is-no-longer-a-maybe-heres-what-it-might-mean-for-australia-and-the-world-243024

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendan Clifford, Senior Research Fellow, National Centre for Clinical Research on Emerging Drugs, UNSW Sydney

You’re gearing up for the music festival season and considering your options – which artists you’re keen to see, who’s going, what outfits you need, how you’ll get there and perhaps what substances you’re planning to take.

You’ve heard about ketamine, have thought about trying it, or maybe have dabbled with it a few times. You might have mates who’ve tried it or use it regularly.

In fact, data released today suggests use of ketamine in Australia is at an all-time high.

Here are five things you need to know about ketamine (and other substances) to help keep you and your mates safe this party season.

What is ketamine?

Ketamine was developed in the 1960s and is widely used as an anaesthetic for humans and in veterinary medicine. More recently, low-dose ketamine has been used medically to manage pain and as an antidepressant. A growing number of clinical trials are examining whether it may be a useful addition to psychotherapy for substance use disorders and mental health conditions.

Ketamine is used recreationally, known as K, special K, vitamin K, kit kat or ket. It’s commonly sold as a white powder that is snorted, producing stimulant and hallucinogenic effects.

Taking too high a dose can produce uncomfortable and distressing effects known as a “K-hole”. This is when people feel disconnected from their body and environment, experiencing a dream-like state (known as dissociation).

Other effects include nausea, vomiting and in some cases, seizures. Ketamine can irritate the lining of the bladder, with one study showing about one in four people who had used ketamine recreationally had experienced urinary symptoms, such as burning or stinging.

Why is ketamine use so high?

Ketamine is steadily becoming the drug of choice for many people in the party scene.

Australia’s 2022-23 National Drug Strategy Household Survey estimated 300,000 people in the general community had used ketamine in the previous 12 months. This is roughly three times seen in 2016, and coming close to the estimated 400,000 people using MDMA.

Results from around Australia released today show rates of ketamine excreted into wastewater were at an all-time high, in both capital cities and regional areas.

It’s unclear why ketamine use is rising. Perhaps it’s because it’s slightly cheaper than other drugs, such as cocaine. Perhaps ketamine’s dissociative effects have “party drug” appeal to those interested in altered states of consciousness. It may also be perceived as safer and more acceptable because of growing medical use.

Is it ketamine or something else?

In Australia, the purity of ketamine is highly variable. What you buy is likely to be cut with other substances, so it’s difficult to know what you’re getting and how it’s going to affect you.

Ketamine analogues are substances that have similar chemical structures to ketamine but produce different effects. A number of these analogues have been found during drug checking (also known as pill testing). These include CanKet and tiletamine (a veterinary tranquiliser).

These analogues may come on slower (so people may be tempted to take more). Their effects can also last longer than regular ketamine.

You may also have heard about “pink cocaine”, one of several drugs said to be linked to the recent death of former One Direction singer Liam Payne. Pink cocaine is generally a mix of ketamine and MDMA rather than cocaine. It’s also known as tusi.

Worryingly, strong opioid drugs called nitazines have also been detected in ketamine in Australia. They’ve also been detected in cocaine and MDMA.

Can ketamine lead to dependence?

Regular use of ketamine can lead to psychological dependence, where people feel a strong urge to use even though they may have begun to experience harmful effects.

Though numbers are relatively low, an increasing number of young people in the United Kingdom are seeking treatment for their ketamine use. In addition to damage to the liver and brain, chronic (long-term) use of ketamine can result in damage to the bladder, which can require surgery.

Avoid using ketamine regularly, and seek professional help early if you think you need help with your use.

How to stay safe

1. Get your drugs checked

In Australia, drug-checking services are available in some areas. These non-judgemental, friendly services can test your drug while you wait, giving you important information on what’s in it (or not in it). You can then decide what you want to do with it.

You can either go to a fixed site such as CanTest in the Australian Capital Territory or CheQpoint in Queensland before the festival to test your drugs. Some festivals or events have these services on site, including this year’s schoolies on Queensland’s Gold Coast.

You can also look out for local drug alerts (for ketamine and other drugs on the market) issued by websites such as our own – TheKnow.org.au.

2. Start low, go slow

If you’re planning to take ketamine (or any other drug), start with a small amount to begin with to allow yourself to feel the effects before taking any more. Wait a few hours before re-dosing.

3. Avoid mixing your drugs

Avoid using ketamine with other substances as they can interact and increase your risk of harm. Alcohol and ketamine can cause nausea and vomiting at low doses, and more serious effects such as stroke and cardiac arrest at higher doses.

If mixed with ketamine, depressants such as GHB, opioids and benzodiazepines (for example Valium) can cause loss of consciousness, difficulty breathing and in some cases, death.

4. Let your mates know

If you’re planning to take ketamine, use it around people you feel safe with. Let others know what you have taken, and if possible, have a friend with you who is not using. Seek help if you are concerned about the effects of the drug.

Music festivals often have supportive teams of people with experience taking drugs (such as DanceWize). These peers can give you advice about safer partying and drug use.

5. Be prepared

As ketamine may contain opioids, everyone should be prepared to recognise the signs of an opioid overdose – altered or lack of consciousness, slow or laboured breathing.

Naloxone can reverse an opioid overdose, and is provided free and without a prescription through certain pharmacies in Australia.

If this article raises issues for you or someone you know, call the Alcohol and Other Drugs Information Service 24 hours a day, seven days a week on 1800 250 015. In an emergency in Australia, call 000.

Brendan Clifford has received research funding from the Australian government Department of Health and Aged Care, the National Health and Medical Research Council, New South Wales Health and St Vincent’s Health Australia.

Kathryn Fletcher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Ketamine use is at an all-time high. 5 things to know ahead of festival season – https://theconversation.com/ketamine-use-is-at-an-all-time-high-5-things-to-know-ahead-of-festival-season-241667

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christian Downie, Associate Professor, Australian National University

Donald Trump’s triumph over Kamala Harris in the US presidential election matters for many reasons, but especially climate change.

No presidential candidate in US history has presented such a threat to global efforts to cut carbon pollution as Trump does.

After all, Trump regularly refers to climate change as a “hoax” and a “scam”, even as his home state of Florida is battered by more frequent and severe hurricanes.

So what will a Trump presidency mean for climate policy, including in Australia? Buckle up, it’s not pretty.

Pulling out of Paris and the UN climate treaty

Let’s start with international relations.

Trump is likely to pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement, the landmark international climate pact negotiated in 2015 during the Obama administration. Trump withdrew the US from the deal when he was last in the White House.

More concerningly, Trump may go further this time and attempt to withdraw the US from the international treaty that underpins the deal – the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. This would cast the US further outside the global push to reduce dangerous greenhouse gas emissions, and make it harder for a subsequent president to rejoin the effort. Joining a treaty requires a two-thirds Senate majority, and legal experts are divided on whether Trump could exit a treaty without the same mandate.

Australia is bidding to host the UN climate negotiations in 2026, the so-called COP31. If it succeeds, it will have to steer the challenging negotiations without the diplomatic heft of our closest ally.

And with the US no longer working towards climate action, Australia will need to establish new alliances with governments in Europe and Asia and strengthen existing ones. For example, the new Labour government in the United Kingdom has already proposed a Global Clean Power Alliance, which Australia is no doubt considering.

Bumping up greenhouse gas emissions

The US is the second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, after China. If it doesn’t cut pollution, humanity’s climate goals will be further out of reach – and with it the chances of preserving a habitable planet this century and beyond.

In 2100, when children alive today are the same age as Trump is now, the loss of the Great Barrier Reef will be the least of their worries. They will be contending with more frequent and intense heatwaves, longer bushfire seasons, flooding and sea-level rise.

Trump has promised a complete repeal of President Joe Biden’s flagship climate legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act. That law passed in 2022 and has been a boon for clean energy. It has already provided billions of dollars in tax credits for solar panels, wind turbines and batteries, among other technologies.

But it remains to be seen whether Trump will follow through on the threat. Some Republicans support the Inflation Reduction Act, especially those whose states have benefited from the jobs and investment. In fact, more than three-quarters of clean energy investments announced by the Biden administration are in Republican districts, such new solar manufacturing in South Carolina.

It is no surprise, then, that Republican lawmakers have already written to the leadership opposing the repeal of the climate bill. But given that Republicans have just flipped the Senate, and at the time of writing the House remains up for grabs, the repeal remains a live possibility.

Winding back environmental protection

Under Trump, the US Environmental Protection Agency will be gutted, along with many other government agencies.

Trump has committed to removing all manner of environmental regulations in his first days in office. This includes reopening oil drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

That could be just the beginning. During the campaign he reportedly offered oil and gas executives the chance to rewrite climate and energy policy in return for US$1 billion (A$1.5 billion) in political donations – in one of the most brazen attempts to sell policy to the highest bidder.

Australia must remain on track

There will be a temptation for some political leaders here to advocate that Australia walk away from action on climate change, by pointing to Trump’s policies and claiming Australia should follow suit.

That would be a mistake. Not just because it will make another horror bushfire season more likely, or commit towns such as Lismore in New South Wales to further floods. But because it would forego the significant economic opportunities Australia can capture from a clean energy future.

The Australian government should double down on the Future Made in Australia agenda, which seeks to do just that, for example by extending production tax credits to additional clean energy industries, and boosting public finance for new renewable projects, much as the Inflation Reduction Act in the US does.

Of course, Australia should also tackle the billions doled out in subsidies to coal and gas each year, which the US failed to do under both the Biden and Trump presidencies.

Australian government officials should also work to strengthen relationships with US states working towards climate action – both with progressive states such as California, but also with Republican states that benefit from clean energy investments.

The US election result does not change the basic facts: Australia remains a lucky country when it comes to clean energy. We have abundant solar, wind and hydro power, not to mention a skilled workforce and deep expertise in large energy projects.

What’s needed now are durable climate policies that support long-term investment and build the industries of the future, such as green iron for steel production.

Australia may have lost a major ally in the climate fight. But that should only make us more determined to work with others around the world. Our largest trading partners are in Asia, and future demand for our clean energy exports will come from our region as well.

With smart policies at home and strategic engagement abroad, Australia will remain well placed to advance a clean energy transition.

Christian Downie receives funding from the Australian Research Council

– ref. A Donald Trump presidency is bad for climate action, but Australia should get on with the job – https://theconversation.com/a-donald-trump-presidency-is-bad-for-climate-action-but-australia-should-get-on-with-the-job-242779

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rachel Williamson, Senior Tutor in English, University of Canterbury

Following the global success of down-under comedies What We Do in the Shadows and Flight of the Conchords, Antipodean humour has quickly become associated with the deadpan and self-deprecating. Natalie Bailey’s 2024 directorial debut Audrey is a welcome – albeit more barbed and prickly – addition to the genre.

Tightly paced, with an excellent script by Lou Sanz, Audrey is clearly influenced by PJ Hogan’s 1994 hit Muriel’s Wedding. Like that Australian classic, Audrey revels in the absurd. It pokes fun at domesticity and family life, while simultaneously acknowledging them as a source of profound disappointment for many women.

The film stars marvellous Kiwi actor/writer/director/producer Jackie van Beek as Ronnie Lipsick, a washed-up TV actress and self-proclaimed mother of the year. Once mildly famous herself (“I had a two-episode arc on Neighbours”), Ronnie’s life now revolves around cultivating the acting career of her “very, very special” eldest daughter Audrey (Josephine Blazier).

This comes at the detriment of her mopey handyman husband Cormack (Jeremy Lindsay Taylor) and sharp, sarcastic younger daughter Norah (Hannah Diviney). Norah, who has cerebral palsy and uses a wheelchair, is reliant on a largely unreliable family.

The first 20 minutes establish the titular Audrey as bratty, spiteful and selfish. She blackmails her father after catching him in flagrante with a sex toy, capitalises on her sister’s disability, and self-righteously proclaims she’s going to Nepal with her equally awful musician boyfriend “to do something amazing with our white privilege”.

So perhaps it’s unsurprising that when Audrey faceplants off the roof of the family home during a teenage sulk, and falls into a coma, the Lipsicks find their lives taking a turn for the better.

With Audrey out of the picture, Ronnie assumes her daughter’s place in a teenage acting masterclass. Cormack gets his mojo back while working for a boutique film studio specialising in “niche marital aids for Christian couples”. Even Norah benefits, as her parents now have more time for her and more money for her to pursue wheelchair fencing.

Although played for laughs, like all good black comedies, the unexpected plot point raises morally ambiguous questions. In this instance, the questions are about modern motherhood, family life and regret.

The high expectations of motherhood

Sociologist Sharon Hays famously said contemporary motherhood is governed by an “ideology of intensive mothering” that requires women to be self-sacrificing and all-in. Intensive mothering is expensive, time-consuming and usually framed as straight, white and middle-class.

The film parodically displays many of the familiar hallmarks of modern motherhood. It opens with Ronnie kitted out in high-end active wear, juggling housework with her home acting coach business, which she began after giving up her career to prioritise Audrey’s.

At first glance, Ronnie might be mistaken for the fetishised “yummy mummy” or the neoliberal “mumtrepreneur”. But van Beek’s slightly desperate and manic performance quickly subverts these expectations.

Rather than propping up an idealised version of motherhood, the film joins the ranks of other “mom-com” shows that mine maternal failure for comic relief. This is becoming an increasingly common trope in popular culture, wherein mothers’ dissatisfaction, disappointments and failings are often reduced to laughs.

Audrey, however, resists this via its use of a much darker comedic tone that encourages us to linger on these taboo topics.

Maternal regret

The removal of the spoiled daughter throws the parents’ pressures into sharp relief. This is underscored by an exuberant montage cutting between a comatose Audrey and her surviving family members joyously living their best lives. A guilty Ronnie asks Cormack: “Isn’t it nice, just you, me and Norah? Isn’t that bad?”

While maternal regret is a taboo topic, popular productions such as HBO’s series Big Little Lies and Netflix’s film The Lost Daughter have helped normalise this previously unspoken phenomenon. Despite obvious differences in tone and form, Audrey also provocatively asks whether life might be better without one’s children around.

It’s no spoiler to reveal Audrey eventually wakes. From here, the film leans into familiar horror tropes, pitting the monstrous mother head-to-head with her sadistic, evil child. There’s a poisoned lemon tree, dead birds and psychedelic intercuts of stage actors wearing animal heads.

The increasingly surreal ending refuses a moral resolution. This suits the film perfectly. The alternative would compromise the film’s deliciously dark humour and risk silencing the shocking possibility that a mother might not just regret having children, but might actually be worse off as a result.

While Audrey may be too much for some viewers, others will no doubt welcome it as an important addition to the spate of texts featuring regretful mothers – served up with a distinctly Antipodean flavour.

Audrey is in cinemas from November 7.

Rachel Williamson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Would you be better off without your kids? Audrey is a cheeky, darkly humorous film that explores maternal regret – https://theconversation.com/would-you-be-better-off-without-your-kids-audrey-is-a-cheeky-darkly-humorous-film-that-explores-maternal-regret-242780

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Shortis, Adjunct Senior Fellow, School of Global, Urban and Social Studies, RMIT University

On the Saturday before Election Day, I travelled from Washington DC to Charlotte, North Carolina, to attend one of Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris’ last campaign rallies.

It was extraordinary how many women were in the crowd – young Black women in particular. There were also older, suburban, white women who looked like they could have been Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren’s sister or cousin.

There were many men, who were just as enthusiastic. But they were far outnumbered by the women.

Harris was warm and charismatic, and the women in the crowd had such a huge reaction to her. They saved their biggest cheers for her lines about reproductive rights – North Carolina has very strict abortion restrictions, which are affecting women across the state.

Overall, though, I got a sense of cautious optimism from the crowd. There was absolutely no complacency. People were very nervous and anxious about the impending election against Donald Trump, especially since North Carolina was one of the seven key battleground states. You could sense a kind of distrust in the broader American electorate.

Cynical decision-making and misogyny

One of the focal points of Harris’ campaign was her outreach to women voters. She made this election about freedom for women to make decisions about their own bodies and reproductive health.

And while this message did resonate with many women – in particular younger women – it didn’t with others. According to exit polls by the Associated Press, 47% of women over the age of 45 voted for Trump, as well as 43% of women aged 18-44. More than half of white women overall also voted for Trump (53%).

Exit polls by CNN also found that while Harris did better than Hillary Clinton in 2016 with white women with college degrees, white women without degrees overwhelmingly supported Trump.

This says a lot about the decisions that some women made in the election. It seems possible that what Trump was able to do was give these women enough wiggle room to reconcile what might seem to be otherwise irreconcilable. For instance, they could perhaps believe that Trump wouldn’t actually implement a national abortion ban, simply because he has said he would not. Or they may simply believe that Trump’s policies wouldn’t necessarily apply to them.

I think this led to some potentially cynical decision-making among voters, much as there was in 2016.

And as expected, Harris also did worse than Trump among men. At least some of this – alongside the voting patterns of white women – comes down to structural racism and misogyny and the toxic mix of the two. Trump’s entire campaign was structured around appealing to men and mobilising them to vote, in particular younger men.

There was clearly a level of discomfort among men with the idea of a woman president. And there’ll be a lot of recriminations about Harris’ inability to appeal to those men, even though she had an entire event devoted to “white dudes” and put forth an economic plan specifically for Black men.

I think she did run an effective campaign overall, judging it on the basis of campaign tactics, but the underlying structures and divisions of American politics were hard to overcome. Trump didn’t create these divisions, but he exploits them like no one else can.

This is also partly because the Democrats – even Harris’ campaign – seemed either unwilling or unable to really address these structural divisions, economic inequality and their own role in the greatly changed economy in the US, dating back to the decisions of the Clinton administration in the 1990s.

Where to now for the Democrats?

Harris also had to walk this impossible line in attempting to be the “change candidate” while not disavowing the Biden administration.

There’s been a lot of attention in the US media today about a moment in early October on The View, a popular talk show, in which Harris was asked what she would have done differently than Biden over the last four years, if given the chance. And she said nothing came to mind.

It’s entirely possible the Democrats will take the wrong lesson out of this campaign. There are recriminations already coming from the right of the party that Harris had moved too far to the left and should have spent more time trying to appeal to Republican voters in states like Pennsylvania.

But I think you could make the opposite argument – that the Democrats failed to listen to their base in places like Michigan, where there was so much anger for the Biden administration’s support for Israel in its war on Gaza. In the Democratic primaries earlier this year, for instance, some 100,000 people in Michigan voted “uncommitted” instead of for Biden.

And when you consider the fact that Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian representative in Congress, was re-elected with a huge majority in Michigan, as was Representative Ilhan Omar in Minnesota, this suggests Harris’ campaign did not mobilise the base in the way that it needed to. They didn’t listen to what the base was telling them.

The Democrats need to look now at offering real structural economic change that addresses inequality and a reassessment of the US role in the world.

They can’t underestimate the appeal of Trump’s line about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, for instance – that this wouldn’t have happened under a Trump presidency. Many Americans are exhausted with American-led wars or American involvement in wars overseas – and I think that’s another thing the Harris campaign and Biden administration were either unable or unwilling to hear that.

Emma Shortis is Director of the International and Security Affairs program at The Australia Institute, an independent think tank.

– ref. Why did white women and the Democratic base abandon Kamala Harris? My view from the campaign trail – https://theconversation.com/why-did-white-women-and-the-democratic-base-abandon-kamala-harris-my-view-from-the-campaign-trail-243136

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luis Gómez Romero, Senior Lecturer in Human Rights, Constitutional Law and Legal Theory, University of Wollongong

Voters from Latino (immigrants from Latin America and their descendants) and Hispanic (people whose heritage is from Spanish-speaking countries) backgrounds contributed significantly to Donald Trump’s resounding victory over Kamala Harris in the US presidential election.

Overall, Trump increased his share of the Latino vote to 45% nationwide, up substantially from 32% in his 2020 loss to Joe Biden.

About 53% of the voters in this group supported Harris, down from the estimated 60% who voted for Biden in 2020. The shift is an outstanding political feat for the Republican candidate, especially considering Trump’s uneasy and frequently antagonistic relationship with Latino and Hispanic communities.

So why did so many Latino and Hispanic voters back Trump?

Nightmares and dreams

It might seem illogical that Trump strengthened his backing among Latino and Hispanic voters, given his anti-immigrant rhetoric and policies, his threat to enact mass deportations of illegal immigrants, and his frequently blatant racist remarks.

Politics, however, is not a realm of pure reason. Emotion and narrative play a role, too.

Trump’s surge among Latino and Hispanic voters can be traced back to nightmares and dreams never far from voters’ minds.

Many of these voters left the nightmare of poverty behind in their countries of origin. Their dreams are rooted in traditional (mainly masculine) stories about prosperity in the “land of the free”.

‘Love’, insults and slander

Trump has boasted about how much he “loves” Latinos and Hispanics. His actions, however, mostly disprove his words.

When Trump launched his first presidential campaign in 2015, he called Mexicans “rapists” who were “bringing drugs” and “crime” into the US.

He claimed this problem was “coming from all over South and Latin America”.

He also promised to build “a great, great wall” on the US southern border, for which Mexico was meant to pay, to stop undocumented immigrants.

In the third and last 2016 presidential debate, he labelled Latino and Hispanic men, without any nuance or evidence, as “bad hombres” who constantly smuggle drugs into the US.

During his first term in office, the Trump administration then implemented policies that specifically hurt Latino and Hispanic communities.

These included a “zero tolerance” illegal immigration approach, which separated parents from their children.

In November 2023, he argued this served as an effective deterrent, foreshadowing that this policy may return if he was re-elected.

In his 2024 campaign, Trump claimed immigrants were “poisoning the blood” of the US.

He again vowed to crack down on immigration, promising mass deportations of some 11 million undocumented people.

At a Trump rally a week ago, comedian Tony Hinchcliffe then likened Puerto Rico to a “floating island of garbage.” Trump told ABC News he had not heard the remark and stopped short of denouncing it.

The rainbow of Latino and Hispanic pluralism

Why would Latino and Hispanic voters support a candidate who so candidly has shown his contempt for them?

A recent Siena poll for the New York Times provides some clues.

Over 40% among these Latino and Hispanic voters supported both Trump’s pledge to continue building a wall along the Mexico border and his deportation plans.

About 63% said they do not “feel like he is talking about me” when Trump discusses immigration.

Latino and Hispanic voters are frequently clustered as a distinct ethnic and cultural group in US political surveys.

They are contrasted, for example, against “white”, “Black” or “Asian” voters.

Latinos and Hispanics, however, are diverse in national origin, class, ethnic and gender characteristics. They are not a monolith, but rather a rainbow.

There were 62.5 million Latinos and Hispanics living in the US in 2021, about 19% of the total population.

An estimated 36.2 million were eligible to vote this year, representing 15% of potential voters.

Latinos and Hispanics also make up a large share of voters in swing states such as Nevada, Arizona and Pennsylvania.

Their wide variety of backgrounds, however, underscores why grouping them as a uniform bloc is flawed.

In 2021, the five largest populations in the US by national origin were:

• Mexicans (37.2 million)
• Puerto Ricans (5.8 million)
• Salvadorans (2.5 million)
• Dominicans (2.4 million)
• Cubans (2.4 million).

The experience of immigration and life in the US is different for each of these groups. Their response to the political campaigns would also be different.

The myth of ‘Comrade Kamala’

It’s too early to say for sure what drove voter patterns in each community. But we can venture a few hypotheses.

Trump, for example, falsely portrayed Harris as a committed communist, such as in this post on X (which garnered over 81 million views):

For Latino immigrants coming from countries under authoritarian regimes, such as Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua, this messaging recalls memories of the situation they fled.

“I will deliver the best future for Puerto Ricans and Hispanic Americans. Kamala will deliver you poverty and crime,” Trump told his supporters at a recent rally.

Playing on the fears of a “communist” system under Harris was likely a successful strategy. The leftist regimes in many Latinos’ countries of origin are seen as a threat to their economic security.

Kamala, ‘evil woman’

Gender also played a major role in Trump’s victory. Trump appealed to young men, who fear women’s gains in equality. Latino and Hispanic men were no exception.

A viral campaign video showed Trump dancing to the famous salsa theme “Juliana”. The lyrics were modified though, simply describing Harris as “mala” (evil).

A September NBC poll showed a vast gender gap between Trump and Harris voters. While women backed the Democrats 58% to 37%, men supported Republicans 52% to 40%.

This played out specifically among Latinos in the election, too. According to exit polls by the Associated Press, 47% of Latino men supported Trump in the election, compared to 38% of Latino women.

Trump tapped into ideals of masculinity and hierarchy that, while not exclusive to Latino and Hispanic men, uphold the promise of a return to traditional gender models.

Many men are angry about losing their former privileges. They expressed their nostalgia for stereotypical male traits (and corresponding female submission) in the polls.

Luis Gómez Romero does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why did so many Latino and Hispanic voters help return Donald Trump to power? – https://theconversation.com/why-did-so-many-latino-and-hispanic-voters-help-return-donald-trump-to-power-243048