Big Ideas

The kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s a magical place if you’re an oil-rich sheik. Not so magical if you’re a Saudi woman wanting personal autonomy. Women can now drive and attend sporting matches , thanks to the new Crown Prince. But has anything really changed? Two Saudi dissidents talk about the cost of challenging the system.

A scientific career is based on getting published in peer reviewed academic journals. But this pressure increases the risk for scientists to employ flexible analytic and selective reporting practices. The Open Science movement calls for transparency of not just research results, but also research methods. And it begins with examining of how and what we reward in scientific work.

Writer, Andrew Stafford, talks about how the outsider ethos of rock and roll helped define him, and how it’s been the soundtrack to his life through thick and thin

We’re building more prisons and we imprison indigenous people at a much higher rate than the rest of society. Prison reformer Baz Dreisinger says it’s a similar picture around the world. Women are also now going to jail in greater numbers. What are the alternatives?

Are we losing the connection to our ‘inner self’ with the constant notifications and distractions of digital media? Is solitude needed to nourish a rich inner life?

Do you have a Maths brain? Eddie Woo, Maths teacher and Youtube sensation, believes everyone can learn Maths and it's a critical life skill in the twenty-first century.

Australia was one of the first nations to launch a satellite into orbit. Does the recent establishment of an Australian Space Agency signal a re-entry into space related activities? What are the opportunities, and the constraints?

More power is concentrated inside Canberra’s Parliamentary Triangle than anywhere else. The Constitution doesn’t mention the Prime Minister but that office is where the power is. We look at how Prime Ministerial power has changed in the 21st Century. And, over the same time period, another part of the Canberra landscape has gained a huge range of powers: the security agencies.

The industries and organisations that get what they want from government.

In part two we stay in Canberra and look at the lobbyists, the industries and organisations most effective at getting what they want from the government. We also look at the revolving door between politicians and lobbyists.

The different power players in each state. All six states are led by Premiers and have cabinets — they're the same. But they're also different. In part three, we look at the industries, groups and people who have power in each state, including mining peak bodies, radio shock-jocks, the AFL and poker machine operators.