Paul Strangio

For most of the twenty-first century, Australia's national politics has been characterised by tumult and disruption: seven prime ministers; stagnation in key policy areas; dwindling support for the established parties; insurgencies on the left and right flanks; and declining public trust in government and the democratic system itself.The flux is occurring in the context of a global democratic winter, exemplified...

The prime ministership is indisputably the most closely observed and keenly contested office in Australia. How did it grow to become the pivot of national political power? Settling the Office chronicles the development of the prime ministership from its rudimentary early days following Federation through to the powerful, institutionalised prime-ministerial leadership of the postwar era.

The prime ministership remains the main prize in Australian politics, but it is a precarious one. Leadership turnover in recent years has seen more prime ministers rise and fall than at any time since the decade after federation. What explains this volatility? The Pivot of Power is the second volume in a unique blend of collective biography and institutional history...