Whitlam Institute
0
STb270214_0019.jpg

Copy of Scott's original design

The Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University is a public policy institute inspired by one of Australia’s most respected Prime Ministers, Gough Whitlam. It is guided by the ‘three great aims’ of the 1972 Whitlam Program: to promote equality; to involve all Australians in the decision-making processes of our land; & to liberate their talents & uplift their horizons.

 
“I do not for a moment believe that we should set limits on what we can achieve together, for our country, our people, our future.”
— Gough Whitlam, 13 November 1972
 
 
Gough-Whitlam-in-front-of-Australian-flag-colour

The Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University is a dynamic public policy institute that commemorates, and is inspired by, the life and work of the Hon Gough Whitlam AC QC.

It pursues the causes he championed and is guided by the principles upon which Gough Whitlam's parliamentary career and years of service to the people of Australia were founded.

 
globe-photo-showing-Australia.jpg

Public Policy & Research Work 

Female-Orphan-School-at-Western-Sydney-University.jpg

Culture & Heritage

primary-school-children-doing-civics-education.jpg

Civics Education Programs

Gough-Whitlam-Prime-Minister-collection-passport.jpg

Prime Ministerial Collection

 
 

What's happening at the Whitlam Institute? 

Join the conversation - we hold events and exhibitions throughout the year that explore and expand on our work at the Whitlam Institute.

 
Events
Promiscuous Provenance | Art by Anna Glynn
Aug 11
Promiscuous Provenance | Art by Anna Glynn

Promiscuous Provenance encourages a re-examination of our relationship with our colonial past. Artist Anna Glynn is drawn to the work of the early colonial artists, whose depictions of Australian flora and fauna did not represent the landscape as it really was but instead drew on European forms and animals. This is both beguiling and symbolic; is our identity as Australians built on a strange hybrid history, a ‘Promiscuous Provenance’? Using a range of different media, Anna Glynn populates her own antipodean world with strange hybrid manifestations to invoke curiosity and wonder.

 
Events
Run For Your Life: Former NSW Premier and Foreign Minister Bob Carr in conversation with Whitlam Institute Chair the Hon. John Faulkner
Sep 5
Run For Your Life: Former NSW Premier and Foreign Minister Bob Carr in conversation with Whitlam Institute Chair the Hon. John Faulkner

The Whitlam Institute is pleased to announce an exciting upcoming event Run For Your Life: Former NSW Premier and Foreign Minister Bob Carr in conversation with Whitlam Institute Chair the Hon. John Faulkner.

As part of the memoir-launch, Carr and Faulkner will offer audiences personal insight into the Whitlam legacy and in particular the impact Gough Whitlam had on one of Labor’s most long-serving and formidable leaders.

“In writing this memoir I found—without planning it—that the figure of Edward Gough Whitlam kept walking on stage. As orator and debater and advocate and educator the Whitlam example doesn’t fade. It grows stronger.”

– Bob Carr, launching his new memoir Run For Your Life.

 

Latest Research and Publications

Guided by the legacy of Gough Whitlam, the Whitlam Institute works to ignite debate, strengthen discussion and enrich policy development in Australia.

 
 

Featured Publication

Featured Publication
Whitlam Oration: The Information That Democracy Needs
Whitlam Oration: The Information That Democracy Needs

In his Oration, Bret Walker SC spoke to “the need to require our elected representatives and especially their executive delegates in the Ministry and Cabinet, to allow us sufficient information to check them, test them, and remind them of their representative capacity…this irreducible need for information about government is not to be seen through an individualist prism: it is not a personal right, but rather an imperative of a representative, parliamentary democracy.”

Read More →

Latest Research

Featured
Media Statements
Media Statement from The Whitlam Institute
Media Statements

Whitlam’s courageous and monumental final shift away from the White Australia Policy has, and will continue to, go down in Australian history as fundamental building block of the national identity and national unity we share today. There is no going back.

Media Statements
Gough Whitlam Oration, Parliamentary Democracy
Whitlam Oration: The Information That Democracy Needs
Gough Whitlam Oration, Parliamentary Democracy

In his Oration, Bret Walker SC spoke to “the need to require our elected representatives and especially their executive delegates in the Ministry and Cabinet, to allow us sufficient information to check them, test them, and remind them of their representative capacity…this irreducible need for information about government is not to be seen through an individualist prism: it is not a personal right, but rather an imperative of a representative, parliamentary democracy.”

Gough Whitlam Oration, Parliamentary Democracy
Indigenous Self Determination - A One Day Symposium at the Whitlam Institute

The Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University and Nura Gili, UNSW Sydney hosted a one-day Symposium in February 2018. Read some of the papers and presentations, including a rallying speech by the Hon. Linda Burney MP, here.

 
 
Female-Orphan-School-Parramatta-volunteer.png

Support Us

There are many ways to support and contribute to the work of the Whitlam Institute, and help to continue the work of Gough Whitlam.  Donate to help us increase our impact on Australian democracy, or read and share our publications, visit us and participate in events, volunteer in our historic home, the Female Orphan School.