Dead Right

This updated and expanded edition of Richard Denniss's bestselling Quarterly Essay gives a template for understanding the next federal election; discusses how and why the right of politics has continued to splinter; focuses on why energy and climate policy is such a problem for conservative politics; and looks in more detail at what could come after neoliberalism.

How did the banks run wild for so long? Why are so many aged-care residents malnourished? And when did arms manufacturers start sponsoring the Australian War Memorial? In Dead Right, Richard Denniss explores what neoliberalism has done to Australia. For decades, we have been led to believe that the private sector does everything better, that governments can?t afford to provide the high-quality services they once did, but that security and prosperity for all are just around the corner. In fact, Australians are now less equal, millions of workers have no sick leave or paid holidays, and housing is unaffordable for many.

Deregulation, privatisation and trickle-down economics have, we are told, delivered us twenty-seven years of growth ... but to what end? Denniss looks at ways to renew our democracy and discusses everything from the fragmenting Coalition to an idea of the national interest that goes beyond economics.

This is a sparkling book of ideas, the perfect scene-setter for the upcoming federal election.

About the Author

Richard Denniss is the author of Econobabble and Curing Affluenza, and co-author of Affluenza. He is chief economist at the Australia Institute. He writes for the Monthly, the Canberra Times and the Australian Financial Review.