The purpose of this thesis is to understand why the Arab-Israeli conflict has remained irreconcilable for sixty-one years. While the details and forms of the conflict have changed over time, the central factors dividing Zionists and Arabs in the Middle East have altered little. In this thesis I examine what these factors are and why they have been so effective in frustrating every peace effort. To understand the fundamental factors which keep the dispute alive I have conducted a comparative study of the two major peace initiatives which frame it diplomatically. The first formal peace conference between Israel and her Arab adversaries took place in Lausanne in 1949. The issues of borders, Jerusalem and refugees would not be seriously engaged with again until the last peace effort to date, the Camp David talks of 2000. Through a detailed comparative analysis of both conferences I seek to understand the positions taken by the warring parties towards these issues and the broader motivating factors separating them and preventing them from achieving peace. As the most important third party and supposed ??honest broker?? in both talks, I also closely examine the behaviour and policy of the US at each case. I find that the positions taken towards each issue by Israel, on the one hand, and the Arab party, on the other, were remarkably consistent in 1949 and 2000. Israel was not fully committed to peace in either instance, while the Arabs twice refused to sign what amounted to documents of surrender. These consistent positions starkly contrasted with that of the US, which completely changed its positions in ways which, by 2000, had almost wholly aligned it with Zionist demands. I conclude that future peace will rest on the ability of each party to re-examine its past in order to produce a spirit of reconciliation. For Israel, this will mean honestly revisiting Zionism in order to confront what its triumph meant for the Palestinian inhabitants of the land. The Arabs must also seek a broader understanding of their role in the dispute and demonstrate forcefully to Israelis that they seek peace rather than retribution. Above all, if the US is to retain its role as mediator it must abandon its ??special relationship?? with Israel and return to a more genuinely?? even handed alignment with the broader international consensus on the dispute. As it stands, the US??s more or less unconditional support of Israel has the effect of leading Israelis and Palestinians ever further from peace even as an ever more empty ??peace process?? is rhetorically trumpeted abroad.

The apparent complicity of South African Jews with apartheid rule is of social scientific interest in that it is unexpected. Pronounced left-liberalism is considered to be the default position of Jewish politics in Western societies. Yet in South Africa, while a small minority of Jews were conspicuous players in left-radicalism, the vast majority of Jews seem to have complied with the discriminations and injustices of apartheid. This thesis challenges the commonplace assumption that the political records of SA Jewry under apartheid refutes the oft-noted pattern of left-liberalism among modern Jews in the Diaspora. I argue that political actions do not necessarily reflect political values, especially under authoritarian regimes. Jews may strongly subscribe to liberal values, but, as a result of pressures both extrinsic and intrinsic to their particular communities, be less able or less willing to express these values in a politically overt manner than Jews elsewhere. I suggest that, in the South African case, voting patterns and official postures obscure rather a Jewish preference for liberal values. The Jewish community in SA while unusually cohesive was, like other Diaspora communities, not monolithic. The ???united front??? presented by the Jewish community in apartheid SA disguised a predictably diverse range of political opinion. It is appropriate that our quest to understand and explain political values goes beyond that which is openly expressed and peers into the shadows of political behaviour. The point is not to morally redeem the South African community, whose record, after all, may still be found wanting. Rather, it is to recognise that hidden in the official deliberations and directives, and in the domestic dilemmas and incidental actions of SA Jews, is the material from which we may form a fuller picture of SA Jewish political values. More generally the case highlights the complexity of studying, comparing, and generalising about political behaviour.

Restorative justice is a process that is increasingly becoming valued as a method for conflict resolution within the criminal justice system toward the resolution of crime. Despite a growing enthusiasm for the aims of restorative justice, there has been some concern as to whether this process actually works in practice. This reinforces the need for careful management of restorative practices, as it is essential for safeguarding the integrity of the process. Trained facilitators usually run restorative processes such as conferencing, however, the topic of conference management has remained surprisingly underdeveloped in the research literature. The aim of this study is to examine in detail approaches to facilitation, as this is a key element of conference practice. Conference facilitation is examined in this study as an occupation, and the process of occupational socialisation is regarded as central to an understanding of facilitation practice more broadly. The research is based on Youth Justice Conferencing in New South Wales. The thesis makes use of qualitative data collected from observing 45 conferences and interviewing 60 convenors and managers. The theoretical element of this study draws on ideas from the literature on occupations and organisations. The key findings from the research show the complexity of conference practice and the strategies facilitators use to cope with the unpredictability of conferencing. Even though facilitators' primary occupational experience helped them adjust to their conferencing work it also clouded their facilitation practice in less than ideal ways. A major finding was that while facilitators all received the same training they adopted a variety of facilitation styles. A central argument of this thesis is that facilitation is a skilful accomplishment that is deeply embedded in the procedures and rituals of restorative justice that it is largely taken for granted and remains unrecognised.

Despite Australia enjoying good relations with both the United States and China at the moment, the long-term prospects are uncertain due to US-China strategic rivalry. The aim of this thesis is to examine Australia’s ability to continue strong relations with both countries over the long-term. The thesis concludes that Australia may be able to maintain good relations with the US and China in the long run despite US-China strategic rivalry. The strategic competition only increases the prospect of conflict; it does not mean a US-China conflict is bound to happen. Although the risks of a US-China military confrontation over Taiwan are real, the chances are small due to America’s continued strategic presence in the region and its military preponderance. If a Sino-US conflict were to occur, Australia would most likely side with the US despite China being economically significant to Australia. The United States is also critically important to Australia’s economic interests and, ultimately, Australia’s national security depends on its alliance with the US. Survival is the foremost goal for a state in the anarchical international system and security interests outweigh economic interests in importance in a time of crisis.

This study explores the validity of key assumptions and arguments about the nature, extent, depth, causes, and consequences of poverty that underpinned the statements and policy of the Howard Government during its decade in office. One important assumption appeared to be that an inability to afford the essentials of life plays a relatively unimportant, even negligible role in generating the low levels of human capital and school achievement exhibited by many ??poor?? parents and their children. Drawing on extensive secondary evidence from disciplines as diverse as economics, sociology, neurobiology, epidemiology and developmental psychology, the study demonstrates that these assumptions and arguments do not stand up to close empirical scrutiny. The adequacy of income support payments as a ??safety net?? from poverty, and the validity of various poverty ??lines?? are examined against the costs of obtaining the ??essentials?? that Australians believe no citizen should have to go without. This analysis reveals that the depth and prevalence of poverty in Australia is considerably more serious than has been admitted by the Howard Government and in many academic analyses. Next, the study demonstrates that the rise in so-called ??welfare dependence?? is a product of economic, rather than cultural developments; that income support ??customer?? data contradicts the claim that poverty is mostly a transitory phenomenon; and that ??work first welfare to work policies?? are not a solution to poverty, even during an economic boom. The second half of the thesis explores evidence from a variety of disciplines that suggests that the financial stress and material hardship associated with poverty have direct, indirect and cumulative impacts which commonly include compromised brain function and development and a reduced capacity for physiological and behavioural self-regulation. These consequences undermine physical and mental health, inter-personal relationships, parenting and health behaviours, learning capacities, and the development and maintenance of cognitive and non-cognitive abilities that are valued in the labour market. Contrary to the policy conclusions that flow from mis-characterisation of these consequences as symptoms of the intrinsic deficits of the poor, the multi-disciplinary evidence suggests that the real economic costs of allowing poverty to continue are likely to be higher than the costs of preventing it.

Many analysts have attempted to develop a systematic approach towards understanding the public policy framework in Thailand, and the impact of policies on Thai society and the environment. However, approaches so far have been limited in scope, and little has been done to investigate Thailand's electricity development policy approach, and its impact on society and natural resources in Thailand. This thesis contributes to filling this knowledge gap through undertaking an analysis of the development of Thailand's electricity industry power generation policy, its institutions and the policy process. It also examines the policy actors working within the process, and their roles, power and influence, factors that have shaped the distinctive characteristics of the electricity industry in Thailand today, an industry that is being confronted by increased opposition to its development from a range of community groups concerned with adverse environmental and social impacts on it. My research here uses Historical Institutionalism and Policy Network Analysis to guide the investigation. A qualitative research methodology, including the examination of documentary evidence and the interviewing of 25 key informants, was used to improve our knowledge of the policy process, and to reveal the nature of the conflicts that have emerged within the Thai policy-making bureaucracy, a bureaucracy that controls the electricity industry, and between these policy actors, the elected and military governments, and other parts of the Thai community. My research found that the development of Thailand's electricity generation policy has been complex; influenced bysocio-economic and political factors, as well as by external factors such as conditionalities imposed by foreign governments and multinational lending agencies. These factors have constrained the political institutions and political elites who play a key role in setting the rules for the restructuring of the industry. As Thailand has developed to become more democratic, the emergence of new groups of policy-makers, such as elected-politicians and civil society, has brought about a change in electricity policy direction, and in the structure of the industry. The research identified four key groups of policy actors participating in the Thai electricity policy arena, including first the 'old energy aristocrats'; officials in Electricity Generation Authority of Thailand (EGAT) who established the industry. They were followed by the officials in Energy Policy and Planning Office (EPPO) who had a more commercial orientation and who challenged the earlier ideas, leading to proposals to privatize the industry. Civic Society Organisations (CSOs) emerged in the 1970s to challenge the large energy projects proposed by the Government, those supported by elected-politicians, particularly the politicians from Thai Rak Thai Party that tried to take control of the industry for their own ends. The TRT interventing in the industry after it came to power in the 1990s. Each of these policy participants developed their own discourses to influence policy-making and public opinion. To reveal the nature of the challenges faced in developing the electricity industry in Thailand, this thesis focuses on a number of case studies of large electricity development projects, including the Nam Choan and Pak Mun Dam Projects, the Prachub Kirikhan Power Plant Projects, and the Wiang Haeng Coal Mine Development Project. My studies reveal evidence of the significant negative impacts that these projects had and continue to have, on the communities and environment adjacent to them, and on Thai society more generally. These problems emerged due to the fact that the policy institutions were, and still are, dominated by technocrats and political elites, with limited public participation in either the policy decisions made, or the policy development process. My thesis concludes that conflicts in relation to the electricity industry policy process are likely to grow in future years, and so makes a number of suggestions as to how these issues might be addressed.

The thesis develops a comprehensive account of human political ontology through the discussion of Plato, Rousseau, Lacan, Lyotard, Hugo, Conrad, Tolstoy and Nietzsche. At the heart of this account lies the dialectical struggle between an individual's need to belong and their fidelity to an intuitively recognisable, yet difficult to define good (or set of goods), that has, over the millennia, been conceptualised as, amongst other things, the form of the good, self interest, compassion, love, friendship, the event, conscience, reason and truth. Through the development of this account of human political ontology the thesis will elucidate the stakes involved in emancipatory acts, be they broad social movements or individual transformations. Its most important argument is that people almost always fail to recognise that to which they belong; the consequence of this being that they mistake the acts which function to reaffirm their belonging for acts that are indicative of their sovereign being. This phenomenon becomes particularly troubling once we recognise that the acts which function to reaffirm an individual??s belonging can depend upon the individual sacrificing both themself and others.

This research conducts a conceptual and qualitative investigation into the practices, rationales and functions of imprisonment in NSW. A specific system of imprisonment, in this case the prisons operated by the NSW Department of Corrective services, is explored in order to examine the practices, processes and justifications for incarceration. The various purposes, theories, rhetorics, practices and contradictions of the prison system in NSW and the ways in which the people who are responsible for the administration of this system make sense of its operations and its incoherencies, are central to this analysis. This research utilises a hybrid methodology involving aspects of content analysis and grounded theory. At the centre of this research are eight interviews with senior NSW Corrective Services staff. This analysis is supplemented by interview with ex-prisoners, and other people familiar with, but not working for Corrective Services. In addition a documentary analysis of both Corrective Services documents, and external literature examining NSW prison is carried out. The findings of these analyses are then explored with reference to both their internal coherency, as well as their relationship to a range of theoretical frameworks. The thesis connects abstract and philosophical questions of punishment and penalty with the logistics of running the prison system in NSW. This research found a diversity of practices, understandings and justifications of imprisonment which connected to particular cultural, social philosophical and structural trends. These included victimary discourses, the rhetoric of progress, the influence of managerialism, the faith in ???objective??? professionals, the increasing emphasis on empiricism, the conflicts between coercive practices and individual responsibility, the construction of prisoners as dangerous, and an ongoing struggle for purpose. Imprisonment in NSW was found to be characterised by discrepancies between the intentions of its administrators and pragmatics of its practice, conflicts between internal explanations of its purpose, as well as contradictions between internal Corrective Services accounts and external expectations about the roles, functions and practices of imprisonment. Theoretical perspectives explaining why these characterise imprisonment in NSW were developed. These perspective include the ???ought/is??? confusion of penal administrators, the inhumanity of humane containment, the myth of technocratic amorality, and the sedimentation of purpose.

Restorative justice is a process that is increasingly becoming valued as a method for conflict resolution within the criminal justice system toward the resolution of crime. Despite a growing enthusiasm for the aims of restorative justice, there has been some concern as to whether this process actually works in practice. This reinforces the need for careful management of restorative practices, as it is essential for safeguarding the integrity of the process. Trained facilitators usually run restorative processes such as conferencing, however, the topic of conference management has remained surprisingly underdeveloped in the research literature. The aim of this study is to examine in detail approaches to facilitation, as this is a key element of conference practice. Conference facilitation is examined in this study as an occupation, and the process of occupational socialisation is regarded as central to an understanding of facilitation practice more broadly. The research is based on Youth Justice Conferencing in New South Wales. The thesis makes use of qualitative data collected from observing 45 conferences and interviewing 60 convenors and managers. The theoretical element of this study draws on ideas from the literature on occupations and organisations. The key findings from the research show the complexity of conference practice and the strategies facilitators use to cope with the unpredictability of conferencing. Even though facilitators' primary occupational experience helped them adjust to their conferencing work it also clouded their facilitation practice in less than ideal ways. A major finding was that while facilitators all received the same training they adopted a variety of facilitation styles. A central argument of this thesis is that facilitation is a skilful accomplishment that is deeply embedded in the procedures and rituals of restorative justice that it is largely taken for granted and remains unrecognised.

This thesis examines the widespread occurrence of rape of women and girls in conflict and refugee settings. It contains many horrendous and complex case studies of rape and sexual violence. Using an intersectional framework, a range of theories is used to analyse these and in doing so the compounding effects of rape and sexual abuse in conflict and refugee situations is identified. The study uses a feminist action research methodology, involving seven complex cycles. These involve field work in Kenya and Thailand and are informed by the theoretical frameworks of post-colonial feminism, critical and anti-oppressive social work, and human rights. The study explores the silences surrounding rape and the reasons why major advances in international law and policy have had such little impact. It begins with an examination of the systematic use of rape as a strategy of war and the ways in which this is addressed in law, policy and practice. It then examines the impact and sequelae of rape on refugee women and girls. This focuses on exploring the reasons for the continued failure of the Women at Risk (WaR) Program to fulfil its potential. An extensive range of risk factors is explored. The almost complete failure of measures to protect refugee women and girls is documented. During the field work, a new research methodology which draws on community development and human rights principles is developed to ensure that the voices and agency of refugee women and girls are included. The study examines the lack of viable risk identification and response mechanisms and critiques the frequent failure to actively involve refugee women in finding and implementing solutions. It also identifies a number of political and ideological barriers, including the damaging impact of negative staff attitudes and the continued characterisation of refugee women as universally vulnerable and oppressed by their cultural contexts. In an activist approach to theory and practice, the study draws on a range of theories to understand the problems and to inform advocacy for changes in policy and practice. These include the development of new tools, law and policy informed by anti-oppressive participatory rights based approaches.