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Retrospective

For a special “best of” season running during March–April 2026 we asked long-time Inside Story contributors to choose one of their own articles and add a 2026 postscript. Here are their selections so far, in reverse chronological order…

Retrospective Frank Bongiorno 13 March 2026 Five years later, does the future of Australian universities in the post-Covid era look any rosier?
Retrospective Glyn Davis 30 November 2025 On the death of the playwright this weekend, a brief memory Retrospective Paul Rodan 10 November 2025 Two breaches of parliamentary convention made possible the dismissal of Gough Whitlam’s government Retrospective Martha Macintyre 1 September 2025 An archaeologist makes the case for toppling statues and returning plunder Retrospective Anne-Marie Condé 13 July 2025 What really happened when boffins gathered in Canberra in 1939?
Retrospective Karen Middleton 27 June 2025 A leaked transcript of a Liberal Women’s Council meeting highlights the challenges facing Sussan Ley over women’s representation
Retrospective Marian Quartly 22 November 2024 Could the Yirrkala Petitions best be understood as an attempt at communication between nations? Retrospective Lesley Russell 16 June 2024 Labor can’t deliver better healthcare without embarking on the reforms proposed by a succession of inquiries Retrospective Patrick Mullins 16 July 2023 In probing the shortcomings of George Orwell’s biographers has Anna Funder fallen into traps of her own? Retrospective Jeremy Gans 16 June 2023 Thirty-five years and five judgements after Scott Johnson’s body was found, can we be sure justice has been served?
Retrospective Tim Rowse 17 December 2022 Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Noel Pearson’s clash over the Voice masks a more complicated picture
Retrospective Nick Haslam 17 November 2022 The stories we tell ourselves about our mental distress can have unexpected effects Retrospective Zora Simic 14 October 2022 Two new books explore the territory between polyamory’s utopian history and its practice today Retrospective Mike Steketee 5 September 2022 Long forecast, the party’s grim prospects reflect an unpopular ideological narrowing Retrospective James Walter 24 September 2021 A long process of change has reached its apogee in the prime ministership of Scott Morrison
Retrospective Robin Jeffrey 21 September 2021 How two sons of empire became leading public intellectuals
Retrospective Hamish McDonald 16 August 2021 The past meets the future in the town that inspired Nevil Shute’s bestselling novel Retrospective Kate Fullagar 8 June 2021 The awarding of the Sydney Peace Prize to the Uluru Statement from the Heart is a reminder of the challenges it raises for historians Retrospective Jane Goodall 13 June 2020 In The Beach, filmmaker Warwick Thornton turned the camera on himself Retrospective Rodney Tiffen 12 March 2020 Culture warriors capitalised on political polarisation, and then pushed it further
Retrospective Michael Gill 22 May 2019 Strategies that pander to the party “base” have been thoroughly discredited
Retrospective Matthew Ricketson 17 April 2017 The satirist inverted conventional journalistic formats to probe politics and power Retrospective Susan Lever 17 August 2016 Gwen Harwood’s letters reveal an exuberant wit and sense of the ridiculous, writes Susan Lever Retrospective Andrew Ford 16 June 2016 Composers might sometimes be envied by other artists, but music has a paradoxical limitation Retrospective Michael Jacobs 23 March 2016 How a coalition of organisations forced the hands of the world’s major polluters
Retrospective Richard Johnstone 16 October 2014 Photographer Jane Bown sought to unearth something essential and make it visible
Retrospective Iain Topliss 18 April 2013 The British illustrator’s weightless characters have moved into a world beyond books Retrospective Dean Ashenden 14 October 2012 All’s not necessarily well in the classroom – even when it happens to end well Retrospective James Panichi 16 December 2011 Must Australian politicians “work tirelessly” for their communities or face electoral oblivion? Retrospective Jill Kitson 16 May 2011 Does Jane Austen teach us how to live?