In the age of AI and the smartphone is history a vital form of knowledge? How can the treasures of the past enrich our minds and help us to live more fully today?For our second Ramsay Event for 2025, the Ramsay Centre is pleased to prese...

Today some 30 per cent of Australia’s population was born overseas, double the proportion in the US and the UK. How has Australia managed to add so many people so quickly and still maintain social cohesion? And how might our immigration mix cha...

Trying to make sense of a world where great power rivalry, war and competition for resources are not ghosts of history but present realities?From the Middle East to Ukraine to the South China Sea, world leaders are confronted by complex crises ...

What is the key to ‘well-tempered power’? Can the rule of law be sustained by the law alone, or does it need to be blended with distinct cultural, political, social and economic forces? The Western concept of the ‘rule of law’ has not been appl...

What is Russian exceptionalism? How can we best understand the mindset of Russians and Russian President Vladimir Putin to ensure the most effective response to the war on Ukraine? Is there a path forward to ‘getting Russia right’?For ou...

What is ‘liberal education’? What distinguishes it from vocational education, and even programs of study adopted in many modern liberal arts programs? Can an education focused on ‘knowledge for its own sake’ rather than for professional pursuit...

 What does it mean for Australia that it is part of the West, but geographically remote from it? Must we choose between our geography and our traditional alliances in this multipolar age? For our second Ramsay Lecture for 2024, the...

Australia’s complex strategic landscape is situated at the crossroads between two global giants – China and the United States. To help explore the geopolitical challenges, economic considerations, and diplomatic nuances that shape Australia’s r...

For our ninth Ramsay Lecture for 2023, the Centre is delighted to present an exploration of the topic Is the West eccentric? in a recorded conversation between Centre CEO Professor Simon Haines and esteemed French philosopher Rémi Brag...

Is our past being misrepresented in our schools, cultural institutions, and the broader society; leading to the history of the West being presented as one only worthy of shame, apology, and reparations?Or are the ‘history wars’ merely a...

If the modern West is both statistically and culturally no longer Christian, who will save us now? What remains? Are we still searching for meaning in an age of unbelief?To help explore the psyche of the post-Christian West, the Ramsay C...

What is liberal education? How is it different from professional or practical education? What does it set out to do and how does it form us? To help uncover some of the distinctive features of liberal arts and great books programs, ...

Is our secondary education at risk of becoming second-rate? Is the curriculum too fragmented and lacking in rigour? Have we focused too much on new trends in education while neglecting a knowledge-rich approach? Can we reverse the trajectory in...

Do people in the West think differently to other populations across the globe? Are they psychologically peculiar? If so, why: and what role has this point of difference played in the rise of the industrialised world, and the recent dominance an...

How do we have “impossible conversations”? What is the basis of belief? How do we disagree fruitfully across philosophical, ideological, and religious divides? In an age of mass education, social media, and polarisation, it is more important th...

What form does Western civilisation take in modern Australia? What are our unique considerations on being part of the West? How has Western civilisation shaped our past and present, and how will it influence our future?  Listen to ...

In this lecture, the world’s foremost living translator of Chinese literature, Emeritus Professor John Minford, explores four great works in the Chinese tradition that he believes best reveal the ancient lineaments and undercurrents still runni...

What must Australia do to counter the rising military presence of China on Australia’s doorstep? How can it best position itself to meet its security challenges through to 2033 and beyond?In August 2022, Australian Prime Minister...

In the sixth Ramsay Lecture for 2022 US author and cultural critic Mary Eberstadt expands on the central thesis of her 2013 title, How the West Really Lost God, arguing that the decline in Western churchgoing is more attributable to th...

What is the effect of reading a whole curriculum of ‘Great Books’? Can prolonged exposure to such texts radically alter the course of a life? Can they speak to people from all cultural and socio-economic backgrounds? In the sixth Ramsay Lecture...

In the fifth Ramsay Lecture for 2022, former NSW Premier and Foreign Minister, and one of Australia’s most well-read public figures, and an author himself, Professor the Hon Bob Carr delivers a cogent and illuminating lecture on how politics an...

 In the first in-person Ramsay Lecture for 2022, former Commissioner of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission, the Hon Dr Gary Johns, grants us an in-depth view into the current state of the Australian charity sector. &nb...

In the third Ramsay Lecture for 2022, one of Australia’s leading public intellectuals and our most distinguished independent literary critical voice, Peter Craven, poses and answers the question – Classics and why we must keep them alive.

In the second Ramsay Lecture for 2022, Walkley Award winner and distinguished China commentator Rowan Callick OBE offers unique insight into the Chinese Communist Party (CPP) and argues that the Party’s actions are subsuming China’s great cultu...

In the first Ramsay Lecture for 2022, world-famous historian, author and broadcaster Professor Bettany Hughes OBE, takes us on a journey piecing together the story of Venus and Aphrodite throughout the ages. In this exclusive lectu...