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John Uhr
John Uhr is a
professor of political science in the ANU's Asia Pacific School of Economics
and Government (APSEG) where he teaches graduate courses on 'Ethics and Public
Policy' and 'Policy Advocacy'. He also teaches an honours unit in political
science ('The morality of international action') in the ANU's Faculty of Arts.
John is a graduate of the PhD program in political science at University of
Toronto. He is the author of Deliberative Democracy in Australia: the
changing place of parliament (CUP 1998); and Terms of Trust: arguments over ethics in Australian
government (UNSW Press
2005).
Uhr's research
interests in deliberative democracy relate primarily to the potential of core
constitutional institutions in regimes of representative democracy to act as
mediums of deliberative democracy. Recent research has investigated options to
strengthen the capacities of parliamentary institutions and associated core
institutions of representative government (eg, elections; referendums;
political argument and policy advocacy in the policy process) to function as
sites for effective public deliberation. Current research deals with the
routines of parliamentary opposition; and the rhetoric of public leadership.
Contemporary
democracy confers great power on a set of core constitutional officers serving
as representatives of the community: including leading representatives of the
three branches of government, namely members of parliament; government
ministers and senior public servants; judicial office-holders. The
constitutional design of democratic governance privileges this limited set of
public decision-makers. To what extent are the deliberative capacities of these
power-holders consistent with democratic theories of public deliberation? The
answer varies according to the particulars of political regimes. The following
references identify some of John Uhr's research publications dealing with these
questions, usually blending political theory and empirical analysis, frequently
using Australian evidence to highlight more general trends in democratic
practices.
Democratic
theory
Terms of
Trust: arguments over ethics in Australian government. Sydney: University of New South Wales
Press, April 2005 (see eg chapters 2&3 on theories of democratic
leadership).
'Auditory
Democracy: Separation of Powers and the Location of Listening', chapter
prepared for B Fontana, C Nederman and G Remer eds, Talking Democracy:
Historical Perspectives on Rhetoric and Democracy. (Penn State University Press, 2004), 239-270.
'Just Rhetoric?
Exploring the Language of Leadership', in P Bishop, C Connors and C Sampford
eds Management, Organisation and Ethics in the Public Sector (London: Routledge 2003), 123-144.
Deliberative Democracy in Australia:
The Changing Place of Parliament. Cambridge University Press, 1998 (see eg chapter 1 on theories of
deliberative democracy; and chapters 2-5 on theories of deliberative assemblies
or parliaments).
Democratic
practices
'The
Performance of Australian Legislatures in Protecting Rights', in J Goldsworthy,
T Campbell and A Stone eds, Protecting Rights in Australia. Ashgate 2006 (forthcoming)
'Rethinking
legislative powers' chapter in H Charlesworth, M Chiam, D Hovell and G Williams
eds, The Fluid State: international law and national legal systems. The Federation Press 2005, 18-33.
'Terra Infirma?
Parliament's uncertain role in the war on terror', UNSW Law Journal, special issue, 27/2, 2004, 1-15.
'Australia:
Integrity Assessment', in M Camerer ed Global Integrity Assessment, Center fro Public Integrity, Washington
, DC, 2004: http://www.publicintegrity.org
'Measuring
Parliaments Against the Spence Standard', in Graeme Orr, Bryan Mercurio and
George Williams, eds Realising Democracy: Electoral Law in Australia (Sydney: The Federation Press 2003), 66-79
'Reforming the
Parliament', in John Williams and Clem MacIntyre eds Peace, Order and Good
Government: State Constitutional and Parliamentary Reform. Adelaide: Wakefield Press 2003, 228-40.
Creating a
Culture of Integrity,
second publication in series 'Taking Democracy Seriously', The Commonwealth
Secretariat, London 2003.
'Political
Leadership and Rhetoric', in H G Brennan and Francis G Castles eds Australia
Reshaped: 200 years of institutional transformation. University of Cambridge Press 2002, 261-94.
'Rewriting the
Referendum Rules', in John Warhurst and Malcolm Mackerras eds Constitutional
Politics: The Republic
Referendum. University of
Queensland Press 2002, 177-199.
'Explicating the Australian Senate', Journal
of Legislative Studies,
8/3, Autumn 2002, 3-26
'Parliament and Public Deliberation:
Evaluating the Performance of Parliament'. University of New South Wales Law
Journal, vol 24, no 3,
November 2001, 708-723.
'Rules for Representation: Parliament
and the Design of the Australian Electoral System', chapter in Geoffrey Lindell
and Robert Bennett eds Parliament: The Vision in Hindsight. The Federation Press, 2001, 249-290.
'Testing Deliberative Democracy: the 1999 Australian
republic referendum', Government and Opposition (UK), 35/2, Spring 2000, 189-210.