Jenny Hocking
Emeritus Professor
Monash University
Profile
Jennifer Jane Hocking, FASSA (born 28 November 1954) is a political scientist and biographer. She is the inaugural Distinguished Whitlam Fellow with the Whitlam Institute at Western Sydney University,[1] Emeritus Professor at Monash University,[2] and former Director of the National Centre for Australian Studies at Monash University. Her work is in two key areas, counter-terrorism and Australian political biography. In both areas, she explores Australian democratic practice, the relationship between the arms of government, and aspects of Australian political history. Her research into the life of former Australian prime minister Gough Whitlam uncovered significant new material on the role of High Court justice Sir Anthony Mason in the dismissal of the Whitlam government. This has been described as “a discovery of historical importance”.[3] Since 2001 Hocking has been a member of the Board of Trustees of the Lionel Murphy Foundation.[4]
In 2010 Hocking was elected a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia.[5] In 2013 she was awarded an Australian Research Council Discovery Outstanding Researcher Award (DORA) Fellowship[6] Hocking was a judge of the Walkley Awards for Best Documentary Film (2014) and for the Walkley Awards Best Book (2015).[7] From 2016 to 2021 she has been a judge of the Hazel Rowley Literary Fellowship.[8]
Emeritus Professor Hocking is also a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia.