Adam Hannah
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adamjhannah.bsky.social
Adam Hannah
@adamjhannah.bsky.social
130 followers 270 following 70 posts
Public policy guy at University of Queensland. Health + welfare. Ideas + (non)knowledge.
https://about.uq.edu.au/experts/33712
https://scholar.google.com.au/citations?user=LsTWMqUAAAAJ&hl=en
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Adam Hannah
policysociety.bsky.social
Why should we care about (a specific form of) #MalignPolicymaking - #IllegalAction by the state❓

@adamjhannah.bsky.social & Linda Botterill study the #Robodebt scandal in #Australia & discuss how the government avoided Parliamentary and media oversight👇

doi.org/10.1093/pols...
November 12, 2025 at 10:49 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
jbau.bsky.social
This whole section really.
Finally: AI cannot do your job, but an AI salesman can 100% convince your boss to fire you and replace you with an AI that can't do your job, and when the bubble bursts, the money-hemorrhaging "foundation models" will be shut off and we'll lose the AI that can't do your job, and you will be long gone, retrained or retired or "discouraged" and out of the labor market, and no one will do your job. AI is the asbestos we are shoveling into the walls of our society and our descendants will be digging it out for generations:
September 28, 2025 at 10:59 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
Hypocrisy perhaps, given I used to teach US politics for a living but: you do not have to pay attention to this stuff and most people would better off ignoring 99% of what goes on there. Australian media‘s obsessive coverage, especially the ABC, does everyone a disservice.
leroylynch.bsky.social Leroy @leroylynch.bsky.social · Sep 21
The curdling of #WestWingSyndrome in Australian media is shown by the fact most (all?) of the main news sites are giving coverage with a live link on the home page to that funeral in the USA of the guy that most Australians could not have named weeks ago.
leroylynch.bsky.social Leroy @leroylynch.bsky.social · Jul 9
#WestWingSyndrome
1: tendency in non US political class to misguided fascination with US Politics
2: bad attempts to use US political practices in other countries
3: belief in Green Lantern theory of magical powers of a Presidential oratory and a belief other leaders could imitate it (obsolete)
September 21, 2025 at 11:57 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
📘New article on the Robodebt case focusing on legal advice. The short version: with pressure to automate and AI-ify everything, legal protections are critical. We cannot assume policymakers and administrators will act in good faith and legal advice should be a "brake" with real force.
policysociety.bsky.social Policy and Society @policysociety.bsky.social · Sep 5
Early View ✉️

This article seeks to understand how the Australian Government came to implement a scheme - Robodebt - that was in clear violation of social security law, focusing specifically on the role of legal advice.

Read more: academic.oup.com/policyandsoc...
September 11, 2025 at 2:22 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
willpooley.bsky.social
call for no more papers
August 20, 2025 at 8:58 AM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
We need to address the real drag on Australia’s productivity: too many people wasting time talking about productivity.
August 19, 2025 at 8:29 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
devawo.bsky.social
I just like to post these data from time to time to puncture the mythological aura of mid 20th c protests. They were less popular than pretty much any 21st c mass action & people criticizing them used the same lines. Protest is about people coming together, shaping narratives, & building power.
Polling data from Harris & Associates 1966. Q: Do you approve of what Freedom Riders are Doing? 22% approve 61%disapprove18%no opinion.
June 14, 2025 at 7:02 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
Highly recommend this new article from Daniel and Maria Maley – fascinating use of FOI requests to see if agencies have learned anything from Robodebt.
June 9, 2025 at 12:50 AM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
And here is the third article in our upcoming Robodebt SI, by my wonderful new colleague Sarah Ball. Sarah highlights a "culture of technical rationality" that has hollowed out expertise and ethical capacity in the APS and contributed to the "administrative evil" of Robodebt

doi.org/10.1080/1036...
May 22, 2025 at 11:20 PM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
hdicko.bsky.social
Just out from me and @annekavanagh.bsky.social - The government wants to contain NDIS growth. But ineligible people with disability also need support theconversation.com/the-governme...
The government wants to contain NDIS growth. But ineligible people with disability also need support
As the government seeks to moderate growth of the scheme budget, some NDIS participants are finding they are no longer eligible for the scheme.
theconversation.com
May 20, 2025 at 5:34 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
liamhogan.id.au
I bloğued: Accomplishments

orangejuiceandryvita.com/234/accompli... #blog
Accomplishments | Orange Juice & Ryvita
The teals have an accomplishment-based ideology
orangejuiceandryvita.com
May 15, 2025 at 1:09 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
liamhogan.id.au
It would absolutely be Australian media all over if the first we heard of a major regional war between nuclear powers in the subcontinent was a bunch of Australian cricketers getting killed in it
May 10, 2025 at 7:29 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
nicholasbromfi1.bsky.social
🚨 What can be learned at the intersection of crisis management & administrative burdens? is out now and open access! 🚨

Written with the v much missed @gemcarey.bsky.social.

For folks researching crisis management, admin burden, disability & the NDIS.

Short 🧵 with link 👇
What Can Be Learned at the Intersection of Crisis Management and Administrative Burdens? Evidence From a Systematic Review of the Governance of Australia’s National Disability Insurance Scheme During COVID-19 by Nicholas Bromfield and Gemma Carey in Social Policy and Administration The abstract for the paper, reading: 'Crisis management is a field that evaluates and solves crisis and disaster responses. Whilst the effectiveness of the ideal-type parameters of crisis management and administration has been well examined, crisis responses create administrative burdens, particularly for marginalised groups, that must be navigated. This paper brings together the administrative burden and crisis response literature, presenting a systematic review of research into Australia's National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) during COVID-19 to answer: What burdens emerged during the COVID-19 response for people with a disability? Why did these burdens arise? Were they potentially avoidable? And who was harmed by these burdens? We find that NDIS workers and participants experienced considerable administrative burdens during the implementation of the Australian pandemic response and co-produced the limited successes found in NDIS COVID-19 measures. Consequently, we argue that a crisis equity agenda should anticipate multiplied burdens for marginalised populations, plan to mitigate them and prioritise and assist the most disadvantaged in navigating stressed policy systems during a crisis response.'
April 27, 2025 at 11:59 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
New article (open access): Linda Botterill and I try to make sense of the strategically ignorant behaviour of senior leaders during Robodebt fiasco. This is part of an upcoming special issue co-edited by Sarah Ball and myself on the administrative and social harms of the scheme.
Ignoring harm, saving face: non-knowledge, senior public servants and the Robodebt scheme
Policy-making is well-known to be characterised by the boundedly rational and selective use of knowledge. However, the decision-making and knowledge manipulation which characterised the Robodebt sc...
www.tandfonline.com
May 7, 2025 at 3:58 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
iwriteok.bsky.social
vaccines are maybe the coolest thing we ever figured out. they are more impressive by a wide margin than the moon landing. We have never done anything better with our capacity for genius
May 3, 2025 at 12:12 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
drjennings.bsky.social
Online radicalisation of elites is a significant and yet poorly understood aspect of contemporary politics.
donmoyn.bsky.social Don Moynihan @donmoyn.bsky.social · Apr 28
Holy shit, when Richard Hanania is not far enough right for you. Would love to hear what US Senators and prominent bloggers doing appearances with Andreessen think.
The tone was jesting, but “Marc radicalized over time,” Hanania recalled. Hanania said he found himself increasingly alienated from the group and the shift toward partisan pro-Trump politics, and he came to see the chat he’d established as a “vehicle for groupthink.” (A friend of Andreessen’s said it was Hanania, not Andreessen, who had shifted his politics.) The group continues without him. Hanania argued with the other members “about whether it’s a good idea to buy into Trump’s election denial stuff. I’d say, ‘That’s not true and that actually matters.’ I got the sense these guys didn’t want to hear it,” he said. “There’s an idea that you don’t criticize, because what really matters is defeating the left.” He left the group in June of 2023.
April 28, 2025 at 10:18 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
cambup-polsci.cambridge.org
New Cambridge Element 'Bad Public Policy: Malignity, Volatility and the Inherent Vices of Policymaking' by @howlettm.bsky.social, Ching Leong & @timlegrand.bsky.social out now.

Read #OpenAccess here - cup.org/44g9MFT

#cambridgeelements #politics
Front cover of Cambridge Element 'Bad Public Policy: Malignity, Volatility and the Inherent Vices of Policymaking' by Howlett, Leong & Legrand.
April 7, 2025 at 11:00 AM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
thomas26july.bsky.social
For those keeping track we now have 1 post presidency W for Obama
April 5, 2025 at 8:36 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
Time to start shifting international conferences away from the US. There’s plenty of other places with hotels and auditoriums.
March 19, 2025 at 8:51 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
Reciprocal tariffs, do it Albo. A can of American soda should cost like $12.
March 11, 2025 at 8:42 PM
Reposted by Adam Hannah
ryanlcooper.com
1 more point on literacy: it's a disaster that the inner workings of the US government are incredibly complicated and illogical (filibuster, reconciliation, Electoral College, etc). parliaments work better bc dipshits can pick a party that sounds good and see that legibly translated into outcomes
February 27, 2025 at 8:12 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
Losing track of my second gen iPod is one of my biggest (device) regrets. We had perfection and threw it all away for streaming.
jamellebouie.net jamelle @jamellebouie.net · Feb 25
had a thought that if apple were to release a traditional ipod it would sell like hotcakes
February 26, 2025 at 1:47 AM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
The FT continues to be the anglosphere’s only good newspaper
sky.skymarchini.net Sky Marchini @sky.skymarchini.net · Feb 13
the FT is the only one really reporting in any meaningful way that these guys are all nazis
excerpt from an FT column Among all these vectors, one of the weirdest and most disturbing developments is the rise of the “neo-reactionary movement” (NRx), also called Dark Enlightenment. The name alone is spooky and intriguing. NRx is an ideology founded by the British philosopher Nick Land and the American software developer Curtis Yarvin (who was recently interviewed in the New York Times). The philosophy argues that democracy inherently leads to social decline, because of the development of deep state bureaucracies that are unable to control oligarchic forces, and that societies should be run like corporations, with a kind of CEO Monarch in charge. As Yarvin has said, “If Americans want to change their government, they need to get rid of dictator phobia . . . One way of dealing with that is . . . hire two executives and make sure they work together and there is really no other solution . . . ” Are Trump and Musk those people? Some think so. Between Trump’s 19th century-style tax, tariff and territorial-seizure threats, and Musk’s attempted takeover of the plumbing of the federal government (see my column today on why his Treasury meddling, which has been temporarily thwarted by a federal judge in the US, is so worrisome), it feels like there is a kind of self-coup happening in America right now. And some people I’ve spoken to in both political and technology circles feel that it’s been driven by the Dark Enlightenment crowd, which includes many of the people — from Peter Thiel to Marc Andreessen to Musk himself — who stand to benefit most from it. As Alex Karp, the CEO of Palantir (which has seen its stock price surge off the back of a raft of expected government contracts) said recently: “This is a revolution . . . some people will get their heads cut off.”
February 13, 2025 at 10:30 PM
adamjhannah.bsky.social
Been noticing this also. Coverage from traditional news is often "look isn't this interesting!" no matter the topic. The best coverage, coming from non-traditional news or independent blogs, gives clear description what is happening, who is doing it, what the implications are. E.g:
February 6, 2025 at 12:06 AM