Would Australian politicians contemplate a strategy for human survival?

By Bob Douglas

In our latest blog post, Emeritus Professor Bob Douglas asks why governments around the world are avoiding the constellation of threats to the survival of humans on the planet?

At least 10 mega-threats to human continuation on our planet have been looming for decades. In Australia, our efforts to confront even one of these threats – climate change – have been half-hearted, to say the least.

The others are being largely ignored by most people, and certainly by our political leaders. Time is desperately short, but Australia could lead the world if we could somehow make human survival a centrepiece of national policy. And there is every reason why we should.

Australia21 is an independent, not-for-profit think tank. We promote fair, sustainable and inclusive public policy through evidence-based research.

We bring together experts, decision makers, business people, academics and ordinary Australians to tackle real-world ‘wicked’ problems — complicated social,  health, economic, environmental and national security dilemmas that defy simple solutions. We focus on the issues, not the politics.