Pressure groups and protest∗

This paper builds on the work of Michael Lipsky concerning protest groups. I argue that his analysis can be applied to ‘relatively resourceless’ pressure groups in general, and that these groups need to work through the target's ‘reference publics’ in order to pursue their aims. This creates an impetus towards particular styles of action designed to attract media coverage. There are, however, certain aspects of this process which make it extremely precarious for the group itself, because it must lose a good deal of control over the process of influence.     

Isabella Bird Bishop (1831–1904) and Her Travels in Persia and Kurdistan in 1890

Isabella Bird Bishop was one of the remarkable Victorian women who traveled independently in both Persia and the neighboring countries of the Ottoman Empire. She came to Persia as a very experienced and respected travel writer who had journeyed alone and adventurously in the Americas, Australia, Japan and Malaya. Her travels in Persia in 1890 were possibly the hardest and most challenging of her life. She meticulously observed, recorded and finally published all that she saw—the terrain, meetings with the Qajar court, Bakhtiari and Kurdish tribal chiefs and the families, and the daily life and customs of the people.     

Progress and Populism in Tongan Politics∗

Media fascination with and misrepresentation of Tongan politics continues, but there is better reason than usual for taking a close look at 2005. The government had suffered a series of reverses and embarrassments in the previous few years, including the dismissal of five ministers. Public controversy had arisen over attempts to control the media, over royalty's business interests, and finally over the price of electricity. These matters were bound to be exploited in the 2005 election, but the manner in which that happened was unexpected because of the new roles in politics for an old radical and one of the dismissed ministers. Moreover, the government had announced a minor but significant reform involving popular representation in cabinet. The general election of March 2005 confirmed the grip that critics of the government have on popular politics but the events of the next few months showed the government's run of bad luck continuing, so much so that it suffered a serious loss of respect. The government has had to make concessions unprecedented in constitutional times.     

Consensus and conflict among Australia's leaders∗

This paper reports and analyses survey data on the opinions of 353 top position‐holders in business, trade unions, federal and state politics, the Commonwealth Public Service, mass media, national voluntary associations, and major universities and research institutes during the latter half of 1975. Patterns of elite responses to 15 issue sets aggregating 46 separate opinion items are examined. The main focus is on the extent and configuration of elite conflict and consensus over economic policy, foreign and defence policy, industrial relations, social issues, and institutional structure. In general, substantial conflict between left‐of‐centre and right‐of‐centre elites in all major issue areas, save possibly that of social issues, is found. However, the extent of this conflict varies as between specific policies, over which it is relatively small, and the legitimacy or desirability of various group actions and major policy innovations, over which it is quite large. Whether conflict during 1975 was sufficiently great to threaten the fundamental unity of Australian elites is discussed.     

Patterns and Laughter in Euripides’ Helen ∗

An examination of Euripides’ use of traditional stories in composing two remarkably similar plays of his, IT and Helena. In the first he draws on that of Troas and Hypsipyle, in the second on that of Odysseus’ return to Penelope. I suggest that the two plays, along with the now fragmentary Andromeda, formed a single trilogy, produced in 412 BC, just after the Athenian defeat at Syracuse, which seems to have influenced the mood of the two surviving plays.