What do you hope for in 2021?
If, as they say, growth comes from adversity, then 2020 has been formative. Yet what exactly are the lessons that we should be sifting through this year’s trauma and anxiety to find? What should be the guiding lights as we pick up the pieces with the rare opportunity to put them back in a new configuration?
To begin to put these ephemeral things into words, AQ invited some recent contributors to respond to the simple question: What do you hope for in 2021?
Ian Chubb
Prof Ian Chubb was the Chief Scientist for Australia (2011-2016) and prior to that, was Vice-Chancellor of the Australian National University.
The lesson from 2020 that I hope will be used to improve our nation’s lot in 2021, is the value of hearing, and actually using, expertise to underpin public policy.
While I expect to be disappointed - and already we see a hand-picked group confidentially advising on the post-COVID recovery - I can still hope that the two emergencies we have experienced so far in 2020 have shown how much better it is for our leaders to listen to experts, take their advice and to take the public into their confidence.
At the beginning of 2020, a significant proportion of Australia was burning. Few will forget graphic photographs of people huddled on
