Introduction: Challenges and Opportunities for Australian society

As in other places across the world, the early 2020s in Australia have been marked by a series of major crises and social challenges. This includes the nature and extent of poverty and food insecurity, which have been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic, environmental issues such as climate change and biodiversity loss, and the continuing impacts of colonisation in Australia and institutional racism experienced by First Nations peoples. Gender-based violence and abuse remain prevalent in work places and educational institutions, while gendered inequalities such as the persistent gender pay gap, continue to be underpinned by patriarchal constructs of work and family. Finally, the political shift towards the right is notable in Australian politics, with exclusionary and discriminatory policies supporting offshore detention of asylum seekers reflect a hardening of attitudes and absence of generosity. The emergence of Far Right organisations, particularly visible in anti-lockdown and anti-vaccination protests, is also socially and politically significant. This chapter introduces these social issues and the challenges that they pose for the future of Australian society, outlining where these social issues intersect. Following this analysis, the chapter provides an overview of this book and its contents. Finally, this chapter concludes by summarising the contribution of this work to understanding and acting on the social problems which have emerged in recent times.