Sydney eScholarship
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Equity first: mapping who gets what is essential to re‐designing the NDIS
No full textRecent media commentary on the operation of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) has focused on costs, fraud, and preventing dubious provider practices. This discussion obscures the broader importance of the NDIS for overcoming the entrenched disadvantages that prevent people with disability fully participating in Australian society
Policy Autonomy – Reality or Fiction? From Bretton Woods to the Banana Republic
No full textThe thesis argues that macroeconomic policy autonomy is a post-Second World War construct
based on both the Bretton Woods system and macroeconomics becoming a cohesive tool of
economic management. Under the Bretton Woods system policy autonomy was ‘assumed’ through
multilateral support. Following the end of the Bretton Woods system policy autonomy
changed to becoming an ‘aspiration’ as multilateralism gave way to unilateralism, demanding
political-economic action by individual states to achieve it. The thesis defines policy autonomy using
Tinbergen’s lines of policy resistance, that include boundary conditions and defence lines, that is
synthesised into ‘boundary lines’. One side of the boundary line are non-elected actors and
exogenous forces and events that create resistance or limit policy autonomy. The opposite side is the home to elected actors and is the endogenous zone of government action (policymaking) and internal
tensions (priorities and competing ideologies). Government can re-set boundary lines to extend the
scope of policy autonomy where they have permission from non-elected actors. The key issue is that
permission, boundary lines and consequently policy autonomy are not static, they are in a constant
state of flux due to changing exogenous forces and events, and endogenous actions and tensions.
The thesis examines the changing Australian political-economic context from 1947 to 1986 to
illustrate how policy autonomy was impacted over that period; it was not a constant and required
either proactive or reactive political-economic management to be maintained. The events of 1983
that led to the float of the Australian dollar and liberalisation of the currency and financial markets are
examined in depth to draw out the role of endogenous action in the process of gaining permission,
re-setting boundary lines and restoring policy autonomy, after it had been undermined following the
end of Bretton Woods and the economic turmoil during the decade that followed
Counter-Terrorism in Pakistan: A Case of Vested Interest
No full textThe current counter-terrorism framework of Pakistan is guided by the National Action Plan (NAP) of 2014. This thesis argues that the implementation of the NAP has been subjugated to the vested interest of a powerful segment of Pakistan’s political system, i.e. its military establishment. It critiques the overwhelming role of Pakistan’s military leadership or, as commonly referred to in Pakistani parlance, ‘the Establishment’ in manoeuvring politics and manipulating state institutions. The Establishment is shown to remain invested in maintaining its position as the guardian of Pakistan’s national security. This allows the Establishment to use Pakistan’s counter-terrorism framework to expand its influence over neighbouring countries by deploying proxy militants.
Scholars have widely discussed the Establishment’s counter-terrorism preferences in fighting or co-opting various terrorist groups present in Pakistan. This thesis goes beyond that and critically analyses the multi-pronged legal and policy elements of the NAP that are formally authorised by civil institutions. Through a socio-historical and legal examination of the Establishment’s powerful influence over civilian policy and decision makers, it finds that Pakistan’s executive, legislature and judiciary continue to support, or withhold their substantive opposition to, the Establishment’s domineering control of the NAP. The thesis also examines the Establishment’s promotion of religious narratives under the NAP to gain legitimacy and curb criticism against its national security policies. Through its co-option of religious groups with political ambitions, the Establishment is shown to enlist their support for its political interventions and maintain relations with religious militant organisations. It is argued that, ultimately, the Establishment’s management of the NAP results in a chaotic counter-terrorism framework for Pakistan undermining public interest of safety, national cohesion and internal stability
Secure and Usable Decentralized Storage
No full textRecent advancements in the Dynamic-Committee Proactive Secret Sharing (DPSS) protocol have introduced mechanisms for periodically refreshing shares and dynamically changing the parties holding them. DPSS is particularly relevant in modern applications such as blockchain systems, where committees are responsible for managing confidential information, and decentralised storage networks, where participant involvement is inherently dynamic. Despite its potential, DPSS faces significant challenges, particularly its high communication complexity of O(n3ℓ + λn3) when refreshing data, which becomes a bottleneck when dealing with large-scale data. In this work, we address these challenges by introducing the concept of Dynamic-Committee Proactive Information Dispersal (DPID), a novel approach that can be viewed as a relaxed version of DPSS without the confidentiality requirement. We provide a formal model for DPID and construct practical schemes that achieve substantially reduced communication complexity to O(ℓ + λn2). To bridge the gap between DPID and DPSS, we also present a general framework for compiling DPID into DPSS, preserving efficiency while reintroducing confidentiality. By integrating our DPID construction, we achieve the first DPSS scheme that is optimised for large-scale data, offering dramatically lower communication overhead. We validate the efficiency and scalability of our approach through comprehensive experiments, which demonstrate clear improvements over state-of-the-art methods. Our work not only advances the theoretical understanding of proactive information dispersal but also provides a practical foundation for deploying DPSS in real-world system
Freedom as a Farce: or, Who Gets to be Free?
No full textThis essay argues that “academic freedom” is a fantasy, one that inherently contradicts the ethical principles of safety, social harmony, and multiculturalism. Academic freedom—the right to “engage in intellectual inquiry”, to “express […] opinions and beliefs”, and to “contribute to public debate” in relation to “academic activities”—rests upon monocultural Western assumptions of epistemology, knowledge production, and rhetorical discourse. These assumptions are rooted in oppression, and we cannot promote social harmony under such conditions.Scholarships & Prizes Office. University of Sydne
Three Essays on Political Economy in Finance
No full textThis thesis comprises three empirical studies at the intersection of political economy and corporate finance, exploring how political access, public demand, and trade policy shape corporate behavior and governance. The first study investigates the strategic value of firms' political campaign contributions through director appointments. Former U.S. Congress members are three times more likely to join the boards of their campaign contributors, especially when they are well-positioned to benefit the firm. Recipient legislators receive higher board compensation, exhibit greater engagement, and help firms obtain more government contracts, face less regulatory scrutiny, and achieve stronger growth.
The second study examines how persistent demand shocks influence CEO compensation and firm outcomes. Using Census-based increases in U.S. government spending, we find that contractors facing greater procurement opportunities adopt more convex pay structures to align managerial incentives with shareholder interests. These effects are strongest in well-governed firms and reverse during demand contractions. Enhanced risk-taking incentives promote investment and performance improvements.
The third study analyzes 25 major trade reforms across 17 countries since 1990 to assess the valuation impact of tariff cuts. Firm value increases following import tariff reductions, particularly in emerging markets and countries with strong competition laws. The effect operates through cost efficiency from cheaper imported inputs and stronger managerial discipline, evidenced by heightened CEO turnover–performance and pay–performance sensitivities
Microscopic Bus Performance Analysis Using Real-time Data in Greater Sydney
No full textTraditional methods of measuring bus performance rely on manual surveys of arrival and departure times, which are costly and inefficient. With GPS-equipped buses, real-time updates on vehicle locations and stop arrivals can now be collected more efficiently. The General Transit Feed Specification (GTFS) provides a structured format for managing this data. Using GTFS-Realtime feeds from public transport authorities, bus performance can be evaluated at high resolutions.
Despite its potential, the adoption of GTFS-Realtime has been limited by challenges such as non-human-readable formats and complex data cleaning requirements. This thesis develops a data pipeline to overcome these barriers, transforming 25 months of GTFS-Realtime Trip Updates data in Sydney, Australia.
The first study applies panel regression models to assess how traffic signals, priority measures, and cross-traffic turns (left turns in right-hand drive countries) affect marginal delays across stop-to-stop segments. Variables include traffic volumes, precipitation, and COVID-19 restrictions. Findings show that bus-taxi and bus-HOV lanes reduce delays and improve reliability, while traffic signals and cross-traffic turns significantly increase delays.
The second study focuses on bus cross-traffic turns using both Trip Update and Vehicle Position data. Statistical and trajectory analyses show that cross-traffic turns increase delay and variability while reducing operational speed. Cross-validation supports the accuracy of this microscopic approach.
To address these issues, the final study introduces the bus cross-traffic turn priority box—a bus queue jump lane that enhances bus speed and reliability without reducing road capacity or green time for other vehicles. This thesis demonstrates the value of GTFS-Realtime data for microscopic bus performance analysis and offers actionable strategies to improve urban bus operations
Exploring The Garden: A reflection on the development of a contemporary writing practice, the ‘Hero’s Journey’, and hope
No full textThis thesis explores questions of creative practice and writerly engagement, questioning the application of 'The Hero's Journey', or 'monomyth', within a contemporary writing practice. It focuses on how the model might be employed, challenged, or altered to inform discussion of ‘grand challenges’, particularly within the scope of literary and/or speculative fiction, and how creative works in this space might contribute to ongoing social discourses as ‘knowledge artefacts’.
The research methodology includes interviews with working writers as case studies,textual research, and reflection on/the production of a new novel (or knowledge artefact), 'The Garden'
Diverse habits, disrupted context and random behaviour in transit demand
No full textPublic transport systems are central to urban mobility, providing access to jobs, education, and social activities for millions of residents. While conventional models assume rational decision-making, growing evidence shows that travel behaviour is shaped by habits, disruptions, and randomness, creating variability in demand. This thesis examines behavioural variation in public transport use, focusing on heterogeneity, disruption, and randomness.
Habits are analysed as the foundation of travel behaviour, defined by frequency, consistency, and persistence. Using these dimensions, the study develops metrics for system-level habituality, including the number and intensity of habits, their prevalence in journeys, and the share of habitual travellers. Disruptions—systemic, such as the introduction of light rail, and personal, such as residential relocation—reveal how routines are modified. Remaining unexplained variability is treated as randomness, capturing the unpredictable component of demand.
The research uses 8.5 years of smartcard data from Canberra’s MyWay system (2016–2024), enabling detailed analysis of how travel routines form, persist, and change. A persistency index is introduced to infer home locations and detect relocation. Results show that habitual travellers form a stable core of transit demand, underpinning predictability. Relocation highlights sensitivity to personal disruption, while the light rail reshaped demand across specific cohorts and geographies. Irregular users also contribute substantially to overall demand, underscoring the need for systems that remain attractive to infrequent riders.
By foregrounding heterogeneity, disruption, and randomness, this thesis offers a more nuanced understanding of transit demand. It emphasises maintaining reliable services for habitual users while recognising the potential of disruptions to shift behaviour. The findings support the design of more resilient, inclusive, and user-centred transport systems
Toward Scalable and Generalisable Garment Simulation with Graph Neural Networks
No full textRealistic garment simulation is essential for applications such as film production, video games and fashion design. While physics-based methods remain dominant for their accuracy and generality, they rely on costly numerical optimisation at each timestep, limiting their use in real-time settings.
Recent advances in data-driven methods offer faster alternatives. Early pose-driven approaches map body poses to garment motion through neural networks but generalise poorly, as they depend on specific garment meshes. In contrast, Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) predict per-vertex dynamics by modelling local vertex interactions, improving both simulation quality and generalisation across garment topologies.
However, GNN-based simulators face two key challenges. First, accurate per-vertex prediction requires large receptive fields, often necessitating multiple message passing rounds that reduce computational efficiency. Second, these models struggle to generalise across unseen mesh resolutions, limiting their robustness in diverse scenarios.
This thesis addresses both challenges through two studies. The first introduces Laplacian-Smoothed Dual Message Passing (LSDMP) and Geodesic Self-Attention (GSA) to efficiently enlarge the receptive field. LSDMP enhances short-range propagation via Laplacian smoothing, while GSA captures global context through self-attention. Together, these modules improve accuracy and scalability without deep message passing.
The second study addresses resolution sensitivity through adaptive message passing that adjusts propagation depth to mesh density, combined with resolution-aware scaling to preserve consistent physical behaviour across resolutions.
Extensive experiments show that both methods outperform state-of-the-art GNN-based simulators in efficiency, quality, and generalisation. Collectively, these studies advance the practicality and robustness of GNN-based garment simulation, paving the way for real-time and cross-resolution applications