Catherine Hastings
Biographic Data
| ID | 4239305 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Catherine Hastings |
| GIVEN NAMES | Catherine |
| FAMILY NAME | Hastings |
| SIGNATURE | HASTINGS C |
| AFFILIATIONS | Macquarie University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-5486-8118 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 27 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 20 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1898 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Artificial Intelligence and Access to Justice at the ‘Shop Front’: The Potential and Limitations of Meeting Legal Need Through Technology
In Australia, governments fund Community Legal Centres (CLCs) as part of the legal assistance sector (LAS) to meet the ‘legal needs’ of people experiencing disadvantage who cannot afford private legal services. Persistent unmet demand for CLCs is well‐documented. As artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly used in private legal practice to increase productivity and profits, some parts of the LAS are also exploring AI use cases. This article a…
Thinking like a critical realist: Getting Through the Portal
Intersectionality of gender and age (‘gender*age’): A critical realist approach to explaining older women’s increased homelessness
Older single women in Australia are increasingly experiencing homelessness. Age and gender seem inherently related to single older women’s housing crises, but no attempt has been made to account for the causes of their homelessness through an intersectional lens. This article develops a complex and contingent causal explanation of the structures and mechanisms implicated in growing homelessness for this group. We demonstrate an original use of cr…
Why do some disadvantaged Australian families become homeless? Resources, disadvantage, housing and welfare
Homeless families include children whose experiences of homelessness and extreme poverty can have long-term negative impacts over the life course. This paper proposes a resource-orientated causal explanation of the mechanisms of family homelessness in Australia. Given the critical role of poverty in housing insecurity, the model explains why some families living in extreme poverty and disadvantage become homeless and others do not. The research i…
Precarity Before and During the Pandemic: International Student Employment and Personal Finances in Australia
There is mounting evidence of increased international student financial and work precarity over the last decade in Australia. Yet, there has been a little scholarly analysis of which students are most affected by precarity and its sources. Drawing on two surveys of international students in Australia's two largest cities, conducted before and during the pandemic, we investigate the financial and work vulnerabilities of international students. We …
Putting philosophy to work: Developing the conceptual architecture of research projects
Research necessarily entails the close interrelation of concepts and arguments, including solutions to a range of meta-questions, whether acknowledged explicitly or not. Despite this, few detailed accounts currently exist that support researchers to develop their complex conceptual architectures, especially in critical realist spheres. Indeed, many published accounts often omit much of this ‘messiness’ that sits behind, yet is foundational to, re…
Accumulating Financial Vulnerability, Not Financial Security: Social Reproduction and Older Women’s Homelessness
In rich-economy countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand women are increasingly experiencing first-time homelessness in older age. Focusing on the specific case of Australia, this article develops a theoretical critical realist causal account of how a gendered role in care and social reproduction has increased contemporary homelessness risk by constraining women’s capacity to build financial security. We show how gen…
Crowded house: Accommodation precarity and self-reported academic performance of international students
This article draws on two surveys of international students in Sydney and Melbourne, undertaken in 2019 and during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns. Using the concept of bounded agency, we identify how the challenges of living in one of the world’s most expensive rental housing markets impact students’ perceptions of their academic attainment. We find housing insecurity, unaffordability and condition, amplified by financial stress, contribute signific…
International students struggling in the private rental sector in Australia prior to and during the pandemic
International students have emerged as a major cohort within Australia’s post-secondary education sector. Despite contributing substantially to the economy and community, they are expected to make their own way in Australia’s expensive private rental market. Drawing on two surveys—one conducted prior to Covid-19 and one fielded during the pandemic—as well as forty semi-structured in-depth interviews, the article examines strategies adopted by stu…
International students on the edge: The precarious impacts of financial stress
International students are an important global cohort of 'noncitizens' whose experiences are central concerns for urban sociologists and migration scholars. Drawing on survey fieldwork conducted among international students in the private rental sector in Sydney and Melbourne during 2019, this article provides new knowledge about the hardships experienced by international students who report financial stress. Using a modified scale developed by t…
Loneliness within the Home among International Students in the Private Rental Sector in Sydney and Melbourne
We draw on 45 in-depth interviews and a large-scale survey we conducted, to examine loneliness among international students in Sydney and Melbourne within their accommodation. We discuss three features which increase the possibility of loneliness – the physical layout and use of the space; the social composition of fellow tenants, and power differentials between tenants. The interviews indicated that the lack of a congenial common area, having to…
The loneliness of a long-distance critical realist student: The story of a doctoral writing group
As doctoral students from New Zealand and Australia, advised by supervision teams with a diversity of critical realist experience from limited to none, we came independently to the 2018 Critical Realism conference – primed to seek increased understanding, confidence, motivation, and reassurance. We certainly found these things from the pre-conference, presentations, and individuals within the critical realist community. We also found each other, …
Explaining Government Policy Inaction on International Student Housing in Australia: The Perspectives of Stakeholders
How Do Poor Families in Australia Avoid Homelessness? An fsQCA Analysis
Families experiencing homelessness are an increasing phenomenon in Australia. However, the question of why some families living in poverty and disadvantage become homeless and others do not is not well explained in the literature. Using fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA), this paper investigates how recent “shock” or crisis events, poor health and financial stress interact with social capital and emotional well-being to affect hou…
Homelessness and critical realism: A search for richer explanations
Homelessness is an increasingly prevalent social problem with devastating consequences. Yet homelessness causality literature is characterised by confusion due to a diversity of homelessness definitions, research approaches, understandings of causality and welfare state contexts. To bring some clarity, homelessness literature is first categorised as having risk factor, pathways, subjective or theoretically orientated research approaches—each of w…
A critical realist methodology in empirical research: Foundations, Process, and Payoffs
This article describes and evaluates the application of an explicitly critical realist methodology to a quantitative doctoral research project on the causes of family homelessness in Australia. It is offered as an example of a critical realist approach to empirical research, in the hope that it will provide ideas and motivation to other scholars seeking a critical realist foundation to their research practice. The paper demonstrates the role of c…
The Australian Experience of Municipal Amalgamation: Asking the Citizenry and Exploring the Implications
Debate over municipal amalgamations in Australian continues to dominate local government reform agendas, with the putative need to achieve economies of scale and scope consistently set against anti‐amalgamation arguments designed to preserve extant communities. Following from an examination of recent episodes of consolidation in Australia, this paper reports on citizens' attitudes to amalgamation garnered from a national survey of 2,006 individua…
The Federal Census: Critical Essays by Members of the American Economic Association
New York State Library: Legislation, No. 9: Legislation by States in 1897
Cases on American Constitutional Law.Carl Evans Boyd
A critical realist methodology in empirical research: Foundations, Process, and Payoffs
This article describes and evaluates the application of an explicitly critical realist methodology to a quantitative doctoral research project on the causes of family homelessness in Australia. It is offered as an example of a critical realist approach to empirical research, in the hope that it will provide ideas and motivation to other scholars seeking a critical realist foundation to their research practice. The paper demonstrates the role of c…
The Australian Experience of Municipal Amalgamation: Asking the Citizenry and Exploring the Implications
Debate over municipal amalgamations in Australian continues to dominate local government reform agendas, with the putative need to achieve economies of scale and scope consistently set against anti‐amalgamation arguments designed to preserve extant communities. Following from an examination of recent episodes of consolidation in Australia, this paper reports on citizens' attitudes to amalgamation garnered from a national survey of 2,006 individua…
Homelessness and critical realism: A search for richer explanations
Homelessness is an increasingly prevalent social problem with devastating consequences. Yet homelessness causality literature is characterised by confusion due to a diversity of homelessness definitions, research approaches, understandings of causality and welfare state contexts. To bring some clarity, homelessness literature is first categorised as having risk factor, pathways, subjective or theoretically orientated research approaches—each of w…
Accumulating Financial Vulnerability, Not Financial Security: Social Reproduction and Older Women’s Homelessness
In rich-economy countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand women are increasingly experiencing first-time homelessness in older age. Focusing on the specific case of Australia, this article develops a theoretical critical realist causal account of how a gendered role in care and social reproduction has increased contemporary homelessness risk by constraining women’s capacity to build financial security. We show how gen…
International students struggling in the private rental sector in Australia prior to and during the pandemic
International students have emerged as a major cohort within Australia’s post-secondary education sector. Despite contributing substantially to the economy and community, they are expected to make their own way in Australia’s expensive private rental market. Drawing on two surveys—one conducted prior to Covid-19 and one fielded during the pandemic—as well as forty semi-structured in-depth interviews, the article examines strategies adopted by stu…
Thinking like a critical realist: Getting Through the Portal
Crowded house: Accommodation precarity and self-reported academic performance of international students
This article draws on two surveys of international students in Sydney and Melbourne, undertaken in 2019 and during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns. Using the concept of bounded agency, we identify how the challenges of living in one of the world’s most expensive rental housing markets impact students’ perceptions of their academic attainment. We find housing insecurity, unaffordability and condition, amplified by financial stress, contribute signific…
International students on the edge: The precarious impacts of financial stress
International students are an important global cohort of 'noncitizens' whose experiences are central concerns for urban sociologists and migration scholars. Drawing on survey fieldwork conducted among international students in the private rental sector in Sydney and Melbourne during 2019, this article provides new knowledge about the hardships experienced by international students who report financial stress. Using a modified scale developed by t…
How Do Poor Families in Australia Avoid Homelessness? An fsQCA Analysis
Families experiencing homelessness are an increasing phenomenon in Australia. However, the question of why some families living in poverty and disadvantage become homeless and others do not is not well explained in the literature. Using fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA), this paper investigates how recent “shock” or crisis events, poor health and financial stress interact with social capital and emotional well-being to affect hou…
New York State Library: Legislation, No. 9: Legislation by States in 1897
Cases on American Constitutional Law.Carl Evans Boyd
The Federal Census: Critical Essays by Members of the American Economic Association
The Australian Experience of Municipal Amalgamation: Asking the Citizenry and Exploring the Implications
Debate over municipal amalgamations in Australian continues to dominate local government reform agendas, with the putative need to achieve economies of scale and scope consistently set against anti‐amalgamation arguments designed to preserve extant communities. Following from an examination of recent episodes of consolidation in Australia, this paper reports on citizens' attitudes to amalgamation garnered from a national survey of 2,006 individua…
How Do Poor Families in Australia Avoid Homelessness? An fsQCA Analysis
Families experiencing homelessness are an increasing phenomenon in Australia. However, the question of why some families living in poverty and disadvantage become homeless and others do not is not well explained in the literature. Using fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA), this paper investigates how recent “shock” or crisis events, poor health and financial stress interact with social capital and emotional well-being to affect hou…
Homelessness and critical realism: A search for richer explanations
Homelessness is an increasingly prevalent social problem with devastating consequences. Yet homelessness causality literature is characterised by confusion due to a diversity of homelessness definitions, research approaches, understandings of causality and welfare state contexts. To bring some clarity, homelessness literature is first categorised as having risk factor, pathways, subjective or theoretically orientated research approaches—each of w…
A critical realist methodology in empirical research: Foundations, Process, and Payoffs
This article describes and evaluates the application of an explicitly critical realist methodology to a quantitative doctoral research project on the causes of family homelessness in Australia. It is offered as an example of a critical realist approach to empirical research, in the hope that it will provide ideas and motivation to other scholars seeking a critical realist foundation to their research practice. The paper demonstrates the role of c…
Loneliness within the Home among International Students in the Private Rental Sector in Sydney and Melbourne
We draw on 45 in-depth interviews and a large-scale survey we conducted, to examine loneliness among international students in Sydney and Melbourne within their accommodation. We discuss three features which increase the possibility of loneliness – the physical layout and use of the space; the social composition of fellow tenants, and power differentials between tenants. The interviews indicated that the lack of a congenial common area, having to…
The loneliness of a long-distance critical realist student: The story of a doctoral writing group
As doctoral students from New Zealand and Australia, advised by supervision teams with a diversity of critical realist experience from limited to none, we came independently to the 2018 Critical Realism conference – primed to seek increased understanding, confidence, motivation, and reassurance. We certainly found these things from the pre-conference, presentations, and individuals within the critical realist community. We also found each other, …
Explaining Government Policy Inaction on International Student Housing in Australia: The Perspectives of Stakeholders
Precarity Before and During the Pandemic: International Student Employment and Personal Finances in Australia
There is mounting evidence of increased international student financial and work precarity over the last decade in Australia. Yet, there has been a little scholarly analysis of which students are most affected by precarity and its sources. Drawing on two surveys of international students in Australia's two largest cities, conducted before and during the pandemic, we investigate the financial and work vulnerabilities of international students. We …
Putting philosophy to work: Developing the conceptual architecture of research projects
Research necessarily entails the close interrelation of concepts and arguments, including solutions to a range of meta-questions, whether acknowledged explicitly or not. Despite this, few detailed accounts currently exist that support researchers to develop their complex conceptual architectures, especially in critical realist spheres. Indeed, many published accounts often omit much of this ‘messiness’ that sits behind, yet is foundational to, re…
Accumulating Financial Vulnerability, Not Financial Security: Social Reproduction and Older Women’s Homelessness
In rich-economy countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand women are increasingly experiencing first-time homelessness in older age. Focusing on the specific case of Australia, this article develops a theoretical critical realist causal account of how a gendered role in care and social reproduction has increased contemporary homelessness risk by constraining women’s capacity to build financial security. We show how gen…
Crowded house: Accommodation precarity and self-reported academic performance of international students
This article draws on two surveys of international students in Sydney and Melbourne, undertaken in 2019 and during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns. Using the concept of bounded agency, we identify how the challenges of living in one of the world’s most expensive rental housing markets impact students’ perceptions of their academic attainment. We find housing insecurity, unaffordability and condition, amplified by financial stress, contribute signific…
International students struggling in the private rental sector in Australia prior to and during the pandemic
International students have emerged as a major cohort within Australia’s post-secondary education sector. Despite contributing substantially to the economy and community, they are expected to make their own way in Australia’s expensive private rental market. Drawing on two surveys—one conducted prior to Covid-19 and one fielded during the pandemic—as well as forty semi-structured in-depth interviews, the article examines strategies adopted by stu…
International students on the edge: The precarious impacts of financial stress
International students are an important global cohort of 'noncitizens' whose experiences are central concerns for urban sociologists and migration scholars. Drawing on survey fieldwork conducted among international students in the private rental sector in Sydney and Melbourne during 2019, this article provides new knowledge about the hardships experienced by international students who report financial stress. Using a modified scale developed by t…
Intersectionality of gender and age (‘gender*age’): A critical realist approach to explaining older women’s increased homelessness
Older single women in Australia are increasingly experiencing homelessness. Age and gender seem inherently related to single older women’s housing crises, but no attempt has been made to account for the causes of their homelessness through an intersectional lens. This article develops a complex and contingent causal explanation of the structures and mechanisms implicated in growing homelessness for this group. We demonstrate an original use of cr…
Why do some disadvantaged Australian families become homeless? Resources, disadvantage, housing and welfare
Homeless families include children whose experiences of homelessness and extreme poverty can have long-term negative impacts over the life course. This paper proposes a resource-orientated causal explanation of the mechanisms of family homelessness in Australia. Given the critical role of poverty in housing insecurity, the model explains why some families living in extreme poverty and disadvantage become homeless and others do not. The research i…
Thinking like a critical realist: Getting Through the Portal
Artificial Intelligence and Access to Justice at the ‘Shop Front’: The Potential and Limitations of Meeting Legal Need Through Technology
In Australia, governments fund Community Legal Centres (CLCs) as part of the legal assistance sector (LAS) to meet the ‘legal needs’ of people experiencing disadvantage who cannot afford private legal services. Persistent unmet demand for CLCs is well‐documented. As artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly used in private legal practice to increase productivity and profits, some parts of the LAS are also exploring AI use cases. This article a…
Sociology (15 works) · Political science (14 works) · Economics (10 works) · Psychology (9 works) · Economic growth (8 works) · Computer Science (6 works) · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism (6 works) · Social science (6 works) · Epistemology (5 works) · Homelessness and Social Issues (5 works)