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Stewart Sweeney

Stewart Sweeney

Pearls and Irritations

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Australia needs a capability state

Australia needs a capability state

Australia has immense natural, financial and scientific wealth, but has failed to turn enough of it into productive industries, skills and long-term...

20.07.2026 20

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Productivity is the symptom. Rentier capitalism is the disease

Productivity is the symptom. Rentier capitalism is the disease

Australia’s unfinished economic reform goal should be to make Australian capitalism work better by directing capital towards productive enterprise...

14.07.2026 10

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The new geography of migration is reshaping economic success

The world’s geography of migration is changing, and with it our understanding of economic development, national success and the role of public...

08.07.2026 20

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

After the heartbreak, what the penalty kick teaches us about courage

After the Socceroos’ World Cup heartbreak, the penalty kick offers a brutal lesson in pressure, failure and courage – especially when an...

06.07.2026 20

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The four missed moments: when social democracy failed to change course

The Sanders, Corbyn, Ardern and Shorten moments were missed chances to renew social democracy through structural reform, leaving genuine economic...

29.06.2026 20

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Power without power: Is Farrellism Labor’s solution or its problem?

Labor’s challenge is not simply to defeat One Nation or win the next election, but to move beyond a centrist settlement that has become skilled at...

23.06.2026 20

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Fifty years of ABC Classic and a nation still listening

ABC Classic’s fiftieth anniversary gives this year’s Classic 100 added resonance, celebrating not only great music but a shared cultural ritual...

10.06.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Australia keeps feeding a housing system that cannot deliver

Australia’s housing crisis reflects not just a shortage of homes but the structural limits of a system that relies overwhelmingly on private...

19.05.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The two-party system is breaking under the weight of capitalism

Election results in Britain and Australia point to a deeper crisis in the two-party system, as economic power drifts further beyond the reach of...

11.05.2026 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The King’s speech: hereditary power comes to rescue democracy

King Charles’ address to the US Congress highlighted the tension between democratic ideals and inherited power, revealing deeper strains in the...

01.05.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

America owes itself and that is the problem

The US debt debate often focuses on foreign creditors, but the real issue lies within America’s own political and economic system. The standard...

27.04.2026 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

NDIS and the moment Labor blinked

24.04.2026 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

AUKUS and the sunk cost trap beneath the surface

As warfare shifts decisively toward autonomous and distributed systems, Australia’s massive investment in nuclear submarines risks locking in a...

20.04.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Tax reform isn’t enough – Australia needs an economic reset

Tax reform is necessary, but on its own it cannot fix an economy shaped by housing speculation, resource dependence and weak productivity. Michael...

29.03.2026 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Allegra Spender reopens the tax debate – but the real divide is wealth, not generations

Australia’s tax debate often frames reform as a struggle between younger and older generations. But the real divide lies between wage earners and...

15.03.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Thirty years on, the Howard legacy still defines our limits

John Howard marks 30 years since the Coalition’s 1996 victory with a familiar story of stability and economic management. But the deeper legacy is...

03.03.2026 80

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

When both sides chant 'lower tax', the country pays in division

As the Coalition reasserts “lower tax” as political identity and Labor rushes to deny the high-tax label, Australian politics is losing the...

16.02.2026 70

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The moral animal in a world of power

05.02.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Australia looks like a winner – but we’re losing where it counts

21.01.2026 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Choosing hope in an uncertain world

19.12.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The next century will be shaped by resistance, not inevitability

14.12.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The real winners of Australia’s under-16s social media ban

11.12.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The great failure of the property industry

30.11.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

When evidence stops leading policy-making

28.11.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Australia’s science crisis reveals a century of structural failure

20.11.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

From Whitlam to AUKUS: Sovereignty silenced

19.11.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

As baby boomer era nears end, this is their legacy

19.11.2025 40

The New Daily

Stewart Sweeney

The last Boomer

17.11.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

'A national humiliation': Australia at bottom of new renewables ranking

16.11.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Game, set and match to the property industry – unless we change everything

30.10.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

From proletariat to boxetariat: The new working class

24.10.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

War without end, peace without justice

16.10.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Trump’s war for peace: How the Nobel became his battlefield

14.10.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Quantico’s verdict: The silence that stripped Trump bare

02.10.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Labor has a narrow window to effect change

28.09.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The world in 2050 is already here

28.09.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Gas is not a climate policy

26.09.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Why the planet now needs China

19.09.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Starmer’s collapse and the rebirth of a movement

17.09.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

The retreat of social democracy and the rise of the hard right

11.09.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Still talkin’ ’bout My Generation

22.08.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Bringing government back – but not all the way

05.08.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Will Labor take Australia further from the global core?

23.07.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

From Trinity Tower to a true student district: Adelaide must choose its future

A planned student accommodation tower on North Tce exemplifies what Adelaide is becoming under the Malinauskas government: a property developer...

19.07.2025 30

InDaily

Stewart Sweeney

Slaying the juggernauts

18.07.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Even Ken Henry’s best ideas can’t fix a system addicted to growth

17.07.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Boomers bashing again: Change the rules

08.07.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Labor’s Left majority: A defining moment

30.06.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Not yet born: America at the crossroads

18.06.2025 40

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney

Australia's dependence on the US does not end with Trump

15.06.2025 30

Pearls and Irritations

Stewart Sweeney