Colin Anfield Hughes (4 May 1930 – 30 June 2017) was a distinguished British-Australian academic specialising in electoral politics and government. He was Emeritus professor of political science at the

University of Queensland , mottoeng = By means of knowledge and hard work , established = , endowment = A$224.3 million , budget = A$2.1 billion , type = Public research university , chancellor = Peter Varghese , vice_chancellor = Deborah Terry , city = B ...

, and chairman of the Queensland Constitutional Review Commission (1999–2000). Hughes was born in

The Bahamas The Bahamas (), officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the West Indies in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It takes up 97% of the Lucayan Archipelago's land area and is home to ...

, where his Welsh father, John Anfield Hughes, was a school administrator, and later district commissioner of several Bahamian islands. During World War II, he moved to the United States, where he received his B.A. and M.A. degrees from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

and his PhD from the

London School of Economics , mottoeng = To understand the causes of things , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £240.8 million (2021) , budget = £391.1 millio ...

. In 1966, along with John S. Western, Hughes published a study of Australia's first ever televised policy speech on 12 November 1963, by then prime minister

Sir Robert Menzies ''Sir'' is a formal honorific address in English for men, derived from Sire in the High Middle Ages. Both are derived from the old French "Sieur" (Lord), brought to England by the French-speaking Normans, and which now exist in French only as p ...

.Hughes, C.A. & Western, J.S. (1966). Bookcover & p.1 At this time, Hughes was a Fellow in Political Science at the

Australian National University The Australian National University (ANU) is a public research university located in Canberra, the capital of Australia. Its main campus in Acton encompasses seven teaching and research colleges, in addition to several national academies and ...

. At time of the 1966 publication, he was a Professor of Political Science and Western Senior Lecturer in Political Science at the

. Their study comprised 250 voters who viewed the policy speech, examined the effect of this form of political communication, and traced its impact on the knowledge, attitudes, and opinions of this group. This was the first such detailed study undertaken in Australia, providing a testing of theories of cognitive equilibrium in relation to voting behaviour, and an examination of television's use in political communication. Hughes was the first Australian Electoral Commissioner at the

Australian Electoral Commission The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) is the independent federal agency in charge of organising, conducting and supervising federal Australian elections, by-elections and referendums. Responsibilities The AEC's main responsibility is to ...

from 1984 to 1989 (in 1984 the AEC replaced the Australian Electoral Office, which had existed since 1902).

Works

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References

External links

* * 1930 births 2017 deaths Australian public servants University of Queensland faculty Australian National University faculty Australian Electoral Commissioners Australian people of Welsh descent British emigrants to Australia Bahamian emigrants to Australia Columbia College (New York) alumni Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni {{polisci-bio-stub