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Helen Hughes
Born(1928-10-01)1 October 1928
Prague, Czechoslovakia
Died15 June 2013(2013-06-15) (aged 84)
Sydney, New South Wales
AwardsDistinguished Fellow, Economic Society of Australia (2004)
Centenary Medal (2001)
Doctor of Letters (honoris causa) La Trobe University (1994)
Officer of the Order of Australia (1985)
Academic background
Alma materUniversity of Melbourne
London School of Economics
ThesisEffects of Technological Change on Labour in selected sections of the Iron and Steel Industries of Great Britain, the United States, and Germany, 1901 – 1939 (1954)
Academic work
InstitutionsCentre for Independent Studies (2000–13)
Australian National University (1983–93)
World Bank (1969–83)
Australian National University (1963–68)
University of Queensland (1961–62)
University of New South Wales (1959–60)
Notable studentsBill Hayden
Main interestsDevelopment Economics
Notable worksThe Australian Iron and Steel Industry, Lands of Shame

Helen Dolly Hughes AO FASSA (1 October 1928 – 15 June 2013) was an Australian economist. She was Professor Emerita at the Australian National University, Canberra, and Senior Fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies, Sydney. Hughes has been described[1] as Australia's greatest female economist.

Biography

Early life

Born Helen Gintz into a Jewish family on 1 October 1928, in Prague, Czechoslovakia, she lived until 1939 in Česká Třebová. Hughes migrated with her parents to Melbourne in 1939,[2] where she lived at North Brighton

Education

Helen attended Elsternwick Primary School and Mac.Robertson Girls' High School. She completed a BA (Hons) from the University of Melbourne in 1949, winning the Marion Boothby Exhibition in British History in 1947 and 1st Place in General History in 1948.[3] She received an MA (Hons) from Melbourne University in 1951. Her dissertation on the history of the Australian steel industry was later published as her first book. She completed her PhD at the London School of Economics in 1954.

Marriage and children

Hughes was married twice. She had two sons by her first marriage to Ian Hughes. In 1975 she married Graeme Dorrance, an economist at the International Monetary Fund, Washington, DC.[4]

Death

Hughes died in Sydney from complications following surgery on 15 June 2013.[1]

Career

Employment

In 1985 Hughes presented the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) Boyer Lectures – 'Australia in a Developing World'. In 1983 she was appointed by the Australian Foreign Minister Bill Hayden as deputy chair of the Jackson Committee, which reported on foreign aid for the Australian government. She was also a member of the Australian Government's Fitzgerald Committee on Immigration: A Commitment to Australia. Hughes was a member of the United Nations Committee for Development Planning from 1987 to 1993.[5] In 1980 Hughes appeared as a World Bank economist on a panel moderated by Robert McKenzie featuring Donald Rumsfeld, Jagdish Bhagwati, and Richard Deason (an IBEW union leader) as part of the Milton Friedman's PBS documentary Free to Choose.[6]

Hughes' later research focused on economic development problems facing the Pacific Island nations and remote Indigenous Australian communities in Australia. Her last book, Lands of Shame, was about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander 'Homelands' and reviewed demographic trends, law and order, land rights, joblessness and welfare, education, health, housing and governance, and assessed Commonwealth, State and Territory Indigenous policies. It was published by the Centre for Independent Studies.[7]

Honours

Publications

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Books

Over 40 years, Helen Hughes wrote, edited or co-authored books on employment, economic development, international trade and investment, Australian foreign policy and migration, and Australian Indigenous policy:

Book chapters and occasional papers

Journal articles

References

  1. ^ a b "Helen Hughes, Australia's greatest female economist: 1928–2013". Catallaxy Files. Retrieved 16 June 2013.
  2. ^ Damien Murphy, "Champion of social justice", Sydney Morning Herald, 21 June 2013. Reprinted as Damien Murphy, 'Helen Hughes 1 October 1928 - 15 June 2013', in James J. Fox (ed.), 2021, Life Celebrations: ANU Obituaries 2000-2021, Action ACT: Australian National University, ISBN 9780645291308.
  3. ^ "NAA: A6119, 6358". recordsearch.naa.gov.au.
  4. ^ Australian Women's Register. Retrieved 17 June 2013
  5. ^ "Helen Hughes AO". Cis.org.au. Archived from the original on 19 June 2013. Retrieved 16 June 2013.
  6. ^ Free To Choose – Media Archived 1 October 2006 at the Wayback Machine
  7. ^ Lands of Shame [SP09] – $38.00 : Zen Cart!, The Art of E-commerce Archived 29 September 2007 at the Wayback Machine
  8. ^ a b "Academy Fellow – Emeritus Professor Helen Hughes FASSA". Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  9. ^ "Professor Helen Hughes-Dorrance". Australian Honours Search Facility, Dept of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Australian Government. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  10. ^ "Professor Helen Hughes-Dorrance". Australian Honours Search Facility, Dept of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Australian Government. Retrieved 3 October 2020.
  11. ^ University of Melbourne /All Locations