Catalyst wanted to test community attitudes about the rise of unchecked corporate influence. A poll conducted by the Australia Institute produced some alarming results, and suggests that corporate Australia has more than an image problem. 

Responses to this survey showed high levels of public distrust in corporate behaviour, and concerns about the level of influence big business exerts over our political system.  One of the strongest areas of public agreement was to the statement that workers need protection from bosses who do the wrong thing.

In 2009, US writer Barbara Ehrenreich and Bill Fletcher urged progressives to ‘rise to the occasion' after the Wall Street collapse. This sparked a forum with contributors from across the globe including leading environmentalists, socialists and progressive writers. http://www.thenation.com/article/rising-occasion

Closer to home, Catalyst Executive Director has weighed in to the debate as part of the Australian options series on ‘Reclaiming Socialism'.

The ism we need to tackle is the ‘con'

For me the starting point in a discussion about reclaiming socialism is not to think about what new and complex theories we can come up with that build on the prophesies of Marx and his disciples, but to deepen our understanding of that most successful of all movements - conservatism.

With the miners launching the mother-of-all fear campaigns and the opposition leader fanning the hysteria, it's hardly surprising that the average person understands as much about the resources super profits tax as they do about quantum physics.

Most of us are reliant on private business and media interests to present the information about this substantial reform: business and media organizations that are not elected, are not publicly accountable, and aren't under any obligation to make sure information is balanced and accurate.

At the end of its first term Rudd's style is looking more like the offspring of Howard's closed-shop politics, than the child of Hawke's consensus and Keating's bold vision.

The strength of the Hawke-Keating Labor style was that it extended the scope of government beyond its own intelligence: something that would have been useful during the roll out of the failed insulation program.

While the Rudd government leads the world in managing the global financial crisis (which is no small feat) it has continued with Howard's 'closed' style of government where policy and program work is influenced by its own political or media objectives, rather than those of the broader community.

Forty billion dollars gone; four million Australians out of pocket; fees charged for services that are never delivered. It's the biggest scam you've never heard of, and there's a very real chance you're a victim.

Indeed, according to the results of a groundbreaking research project last month, a series of questionable practices in Australia's superannuation industry are gouging close to $80,000 from the retirement savings of many average income earners.

2010, marks the fortieth anniversary of the publication of Germaine Greer’s The Female Eunuch. This important book challenged the traditional role of women in families and their treatment in schools, workplaces and in civil society generally. The book helped to provide an intellectual framework for the women’s liberation movement that was emerging at the time, but how far have Australian women come since the publication of Greer’s treatise? Have we ‘got to equal’? The task of surveying the position of women in Australian society takes us beyond our usual focus on women’s workplace and labour market participation and experience.