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Our Scholars – Current


Ronald Fujii
SRW Pat Turner Scholarship

Ronald Fujii

Torres Strait Regional Authority

Charles Darwin University

Master of Public Policy

Ronald has worked in the public service for the past 20 years, for agencies in Canberra and at the Torres Strait Regional Authority (TSRA) managing programs that deliver natural resource management across the Torres Strait Region. His most recent role at the TSRA involved working in the Governance and Leadership program managing legislative processes and policies, supporting effective regional communication, and coordinating the integration of the delivery of government services to the region.

Through the Pat Turner scholarship and Master of Public Policy program at CDU, Ronald will look for opportunities and pathways to help him gain a deeper understanding of complex policy, especially arrangements and implementation in the Northern Australian context. In addition, he will explore how policy arrangements can improve essential and critical service delivery in the Torres Strait, improving the lives of Torres Strait Islanders and Aboriginal people in the region.


Picture of Anna Fieldhouse
SRW Scholarship 2020

Anna Fieldhouse

Department of Social Services

Australian National University

PhD title: Welfare service consumers as regulators: Case studies of welfare service regulation and consumer influence in commodified welfare markets.

Through her research, Anna Fieldhouse considers the regulatory governance of welfare services and the role of civil society as intermediaries representing marginalised welfare service users. Her PhD thesis looks at regulatory governance eco-systems as a way of understanding how actors come together to drive or impede reform, how discourses move across governance spaces. Her thesis raises normative questions about whether the democratic ideals of representation and participation embedded governance sites are realised in the regulatory welfare state.

Anna's research focuses on two regulatory communities – disability and aged care in Australia. It draws evidence from civil society submissions to recent Australian Royal Commissions into the abuse and neglect to identify governance narratives and networks. Interviews with civil society leaders adds to the empirical study examining the mechanisms and processes of representation used to bring the voice of marginalised welfare service users into the regulation of critical social services. Her research takes a normative case study approach to shed light on the democratic ideals that are little challenged in non-majoritarian governance environments.

Anna has extensive experience in social policy design, including in the development of responsive regulatory systems. She holds a position as Policy Director in the Australian Government Department of Social Services (DSS). Her career has included policy and operational leadership roles in government and non-government organisations in the homelessness, domestic violence, mental health and disability sectors. Anna’s more recent focus has been on designing regulatory systems for welfare services, including developing the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) Quality and Safeguards Commission, established in 2018.

Supervisor:
Dr Ashley Schram

Owen Freestone
SRW Scholarship Graduated 2020

Dr

Owen Freestone

The Treasury

Australian National University

PhD title: Economic inequality over the life cycle in Australia.

Owen has worked in the APS since 2004. Since 2010, he has managed various teams within the Macroeconomic Group at Treasury, responsible for providing advice on the Australian and Chinese economies.

Owen’s PhD research explores the life-cycle dimension of income and consumption among Australian households, and how this is shaped by government policy. He looked to answer questions, such as the relative importance of individual differences versus other factors in explaining wage inequality in Australia, and the role that the tax-transfer system plays in cushioning workers from unexpected income changes. Owen has also published a number of research publications on economic topics like Australian household saving behaviour and structural change in the Chinese economy.

Supervisor:
Professor Robert Breunig
  • Freestone O, Daudry A, Obeyesekere A and Sedgwick M (2011) ‘The Rise in Household Saving and its Implications for the Australian Economy’. Economic Round-up, 2011, 2, The Treasury, Canberra.
  • Zhang D and Freestone, O (2013), ‘China’s unfinished state-owned enterprise reforms’. Economic Round-up, 2013, 2, The Treasury, Canberra.
  • Freestone O (2018) ‘The Drivers of Life-Cycle Wage Inequality in Australia’. Economic Record, 94( 307):424-444.
  • Freestone O (2020), Economic inequality over the life cycle in Australia [PhD Thesis], The Australian National University, Canberra.

Cathy Fussell
SRW Scholarship 2020

Cathy Fussell

Australian Public Service Commission

Australian National University

PhD title: Realising the collective value of data

Cathy joined the Australian Public Service in 2001. She has since had a broad range of policy and program roles within the health portfolio. Cathy’s recent work has focused on big data strategy and capability. She co-led the establishment of the Social Health and Welfare Analytic Unit and led Health’s cross-portfolio engagement on big data analytics projects through the Data Integration Partnership for Australia.

Cathy’s doctoral research explores how we can realise the collective value of data. Working at the intersection of theories of value and power, and public service practice, she unpacks what collective value looks like and how it can be systematically created. Drawing on Deleuze and Guattari’s assemblage theory, Cathy interrogates how we think and talk about data, develops a collective theory of value and power, and applies that theory to practice. Cathy hopes this work will support the public sector policy and data communities to design, create, and facilitate supported data assemblages that create collective value.

For more information about Cathy’s research findings see: https://crawford.anu.edu.au/people/phd/cathy-fussell

Supervisor:
Professor Helen Sullivan

Fussell, C 2022, ‘Four Data Discourses and Assemblage Forms: A Methodological Framework’, Preprint. Available at: osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/jvcqw.

Fussell, C 2023, 'Why we struggle to realise the value of data: SocArXiv. Preprint. Available at https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/u8zcx

Fussell, C 2023 'Three propositions for realising collective value'. SocArXiv. Preprint. Available at: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/3pheu

Fussell, C 2023, 'Understanding value through Deleuze and Guattari’s metaphysics and ethics'. SocArXiv. Preprint. Available at: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/kt6f8

Fussell, C 2023, 'Searching for a positive theory of power'. SocArXiv. Preprint. Available at: https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/v8qh9

Fussell, C (Forthcoming) 'What a power with looks like and why we should choose it'. SocArXiv. Preprint. 

 
The Sir Roland Wilson Foundation is a partnership between The Australian National University, Charles Darwin University and the Australian Public Service.