Xenophobia

• According to this narrative, Putin has sturdily held back waves of foreign and domestic adversaries, and simultaneously restored Russia to greatness.
• Russia has become a nation under the thrall of Putin’s singular idea, instead of a healthy contest between competing ones.
• He has progressively sickened Russian society, creating a toxic culture that celebrates xenophobia, nativism and violence.

Putin’s ascent

• Putin’s political ascent began once he took over as head of the Russian Security Council in March 1999, long seen as a likely pathway to executive leadership.
• He then assumed Russia’s prime ministership, and, soon after, its presidency as an increasingly infirm Boris Yeltsin sought to anoint a successor.
• A struggle for order and stability has been a consistent leitmotif in how Putin has portrayed himself.
• He amended Russia’s tax code, replacing an arcane system of loopholes and tax breaks with flat rates to boost compliance.

Putin’s economic miracle?

• Inflation fell and the economy grew by around 7% a year, although real wages declined.
• While the economy suffered a recession as a result of the global financial crisis in 2008, growth was swiftly restored.
• Annual household income rose to an estimated US$10,000 per capita in 2013, but by 2022 had contracted to only $7,900.
• Wealth is unevenly distributed, concentrated in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and in Russia’s regions it’s highly centred on local elites.

Kleptocrats, meet autocrats

• Despite fanfare about clearing out the oligarchs, Russia has scored consistently poorly on Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index.
• By comparison, after Putin had finished his first term as president in 2004, Russia placed 90th.
• Putin’s rule is also the story of Russia’s slide from a “managed” democracy to an autocratic regime.

Putin’s legacy: ostracism and fragility

• With respect to perceived external adversaries – NATO members and the broader West – Putin sees regime security as being synonymous with national security.
• By invading Ukraine, Putin has actually succeeded in enlarging NATO further, with Finland and Sweden joining the alliance.
• He has prompted Germany and other overdependent European states to wean themselves off Russian oil and gas.
• And he’s ensured Russia will remain a Western pariah for the foreseeable future, while bequeathing Russia’s next generation the lasting hatred of Ukrainians.

This year’s Miles Franklin shortlist takes us from Sydney’s criminal underclass in the 1930s and the quiet waters of rural Tasmania in the 1940s to shopping for design objects in contemporary Japan. Its styles range from the sparse, economical prose of the experimental novella to an intricately plotted page-turner. And the six shortlisted writers include a debut novelist and a Miles Franklin veteran; just one is male-identifying.

Iris by Fiona Kelly McGregor

• McGregor is the most experienced writer on the shortlist: Iris is her eighth book and her accolades include a Steele Rudd Award and an Age Book of the Year (Indelible Ink).
• McGregor knows Sydney well – especially its convoluted history of colonialism, repression and disobedience.
• Her inspired decision to fictionalise the real-life Iris Webber (1906-1953) was no doubt influenced by the extraordinary archives of the Sydney Police photographs (1912-1948).
• Read more:
  In Iris, Fiona Kelly McGregor recreates the criminal underworld of Depression-era Sydney

Cold Enough for Snow by Jessica Au

• Jessica Au’s debut was much anticipated: its manuscript won the inaugural international $US100,000 The Novel Prize, trumping 1500 entries.
• It’s a credit to Au that she lets the reader sit with this at the conclusion: nothing feels artificially resolved.
• Read more:
  The responsibilities of being: Jessica Au's precise, poetic meditation on mothers and daughters

Limberlost by Robbie Arnott

• Robbie Arnott is the only one of these authors to have been shortlisted for the Miles Franklin before – for his second novel, The Rain Heron (2020), which won The Age Book of the Year award.
• Arnott is also the only male-identifying author on this shortlist and masculinity is a central theme.
• Read more:
  Robbie Arnott's eco-fiction uses myth and metaphor to depict a wounded world

Hopeless Kingdom by Kgshak Akec

• Kgshak Akec, a creative writing student at Deakin University, is the youngest writer on this shortlist, at 26.
• Akec’s debut is inspired by her family’s migration from South Sudan to Australia via Egypt, during the early 2000s.
• The book brims with authentic, memorable characters and relationships between family and friends that are complex and subtly complicated.

The Lovers by Yumna Kassab

• This novella’s limited dramatic narrative scale permits the author a sophisticated attention to the poetics of representation: perhaps the book’s key achievement.
• Amir and Jamila, the lovers of the title, unite almost exclusively at nighttime.
• She artfully employs stories within stories: tiny parables that frame or commentate on the larger story of the lovers and their fate.
• Read more:
  Colonial and nationalist myths are recast in Yumna Kassab's Australiana

Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens by Shankari Chandran

• Chai Time at Cinnamon Gardens is mostly set in a Western Sydney nursing home, run by and for a Sri Lankan Tamil community.
• Shankari Chandran says the novel was inspired and informed by regular visits to her grandmother.
• “As she was walking, she’d be talking, and telling us stories about her life, of her childhood, of her marriage, her migration.” Chandran is a mid-career author whose achievements are gradually accumulating.

• There are also continuing allegations of racist abuse in Spanish football.
• Spain of course is not the only country where football is plagued by racism.

Legal sanctions

• Yet La Liga, which has now reportedly lodged ten complaints against fans, regarding racism experienced by Vinícius Júnior, cannot impose sanctions itself.
• But very few such administrative sanctions are proposed and fewer still are actually imposed.
• According to the Commission against Violence and Racism in Sports, in 2021-22, administrative sanctions were proposed for 1,608 spectators and 59 clubs.
• This latter figure represents a considerable increase from 2018-19, when only three sanctions linked to racism and xenophobia were proposed.

Denial of racism

• Anti-racism charity SOS Racismo has shown racism to be present in all areas of Spanish life.
• To deal with racism within football, Spain could look for inspiration from initiatives including the Europe-wide Fare network and the Feyenoord is for All campaign in the Netherlands.
• Legal sanctions are not preventing racism in football.
• And racism is not limited to pitches and stadiums.

• There are also continuing allegations of racist abuse in Spanish football.
• Spain of course is not the only country where football is plagued by racism.

Legal sanctions

• Yet La Liga, which has now reportedly lodged ten complaints against fans, regarding racism experienced by Vinícius Júnior, cannot impose sanctions itself.
• It is up to the Spanish Commission against Violence, Racism, Xenophobia and Intolerance in Sports to propose administrative sanctions and the Spanish Football Federation to then impose any.
• According to the Commission against Violence and Racism in Sports, in 2021-22, administrative sanctions were proposed for 1,608 spectators and 59 clubs.
• This latter figure represents a considerable increase from 2018-19, when only three sanctions linked to racism and xenophobia were proposed.

Denial of racism

• Anti-racism charity SOS Racismo has shown racism to be present in all areas of Spanish life.
• To deal with racism within football, Spain could look for inspiration from initiatives including the European Commission’s Fight Against Racism campaign in collaboration with Uefa and the Feyenoord is for All campaign in the Netherlands.
• Legal sanctions are not preventing racism in football.
• And racism is not limited to pitches and stadiums.