Burning Down the House

Reconstructing Modern Politics

Jo Dyer

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English

Monash University Publishing
15 February 2022

Politics & government; Australian Society

Series: In The National Interest

The Morrison government's moral decline happened first slowly and then all at once. We suffered through 'Sports rorts' and 'Watergate' and an MIA PM, before the dissembling response to allegations of sexual abuse at the very heart of federal politics threw into stark relief the cynicism and moral bankruptcy of a government ready to abandon any semblance of integrity to save its own skin. But at a time when the country is crying out for leadership, the Labor Party seems paralysed, so terrified it may lose votes from its opponent's perennial wedging that, on key moral questions, it has failed to make the case to win them.

Burning Down the House tells the story of how our political system went awry. Debunking the notion that we've ever had a two-party system, it examines how - with a recent dance card that has gone way beyond Labor and Liberal to encompass the Nationals, Greens, Centre Alliance and a whole host of RWNJs - Australia has now arrived at a place where a group of the most unlikely politicians contemplated the sort of Australia they wanted - responsible, humane, moral - and concluded that was not the Australia reflected in our current toxic politics. Into the breach has stepped a range of independents beholden to no-one but themselves and their electorates, ordinary Australians determined to burn it all down and build something new.

By: Jo Dyer
Imprint: Monash University Publishing
Country of Publication: Australia
Dimensions: Height: 175mm, Width: 111mm, Spine: 1mm
Weight: 1g
ISBN: 9781922633002
ISBN 10: 1922633003
Series: In The National Interest
Pages: 96
Publication Date: 15 February 2022
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Jo Dyer is a literary curator and producer of theatre and film. Most recently Director of Adelaide Writers' Week, Jo has held leadership roles at national cultural institutions such as Sydney Writers' Festival, Sydney Theatre Company and Bangarra Dance Theatre. Her freelance productions have been staged at venues that include the Sydney Opera House, Brooklyn Academy of Music, the National Centre for the Performing Arts in Mumbai, and the legendary Tropicana hotel in Las Vegas, and her films have won awards and screened worldwide, notably at the Berlin International Film Festival. In 2021, Jo was unexpectedly thrust into the national spotlight when she became an advocate for her deceased friend Kate, after Kate's accusations of rape against then attorney-general Christian Porter were posthumously made public.