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Grattan Institute logo
Status: activeType: 🔬 researchCountry: Australia Website: grattan.edu.au
Status active
Type 🔬 research
Country Australia
Website grattan.edu.au
Contact info@grattan.edu.au
+61 3 9035 9881
RSS feed grattan.edu.au/feed
Concepts Democracy Constitutional Democracy Accountability Sink Radical Transparency
Last activity 2026-08-15 dod
Expanded page: real logo wordmark extracted from site header SVG (previous logo: was just the favicon), founding funding detail, CEO succession timeline (Daley to Wood to Sathanapally), corrected publication titles/links, added Electoral Reform Act critique with direct quote, linked Susan McKinnon Foundation as a funder

Grattan Institute

The Grattan Institute is a Melbourne-based public policy think tank covering a broad range of policy areas including energy, housing, education, health, and governance. It is independent of government, political parties, and industry.

History

Grattan was incorporated in November 2008 as a joint venture between government and business: $15 million endowments each from the Federal and Victorian governments, plus $4 million from BHP Billiton and $1 million from the National Australia Bank.1 John Daley served as founding CEO from January 2009 until his retirement in July 2020;2 Danielle Wood succeeded him,3 then left in late 2023 to chair the federal Productivity Commission. Dr Aruna Sathanapally — previously Executive Director, Macroeconomy at NSW Treasury — became CEO in February 2024.4

Grattan's own site now states it "receive[s] no ongoing government funding," relying instead on its endowment plus support from philanthropic and corporate donors5 — among them, per Wikipedia's account of the institute's history, the Susan McKinnon Foundation, also tracked in this landscape.6

Grattan has a dedicated democracy and governance program, directed by CEO Dr Aruna Sathanapally (also Economic Prosperity and Democracy Program Director) with Kate Griffiths as Chief of Staff and Democracy Deputy Program Director.7 Their work covers electoral integrity, campaign finance, parliamentary reform, trust in government, and public appointments — and doesn't shy away from criticising reforms governments themselves have negotiated: Grattan's own assessment of the Electoral Reform Act 2025 calls its $90 million party spending cap "too high" and its $800,000 per-seat cap "too low, advantaging incumbents over new entrants."8

Key democracy publications

See also

  1. "Funding", Grattan Institute — "Grattan began with a $15 million endowment from each of the Federal and Victorian Governments. In addition, BHP Billiton provided $4 million and the National Australia Bank $1 million." ↩

  2. "Appointment of Danielle Wood as new CEO of Grattan Institute", Grattan Institute, 10 December 2019 — "Grattan Institute’s inaugural CEO, Prof John Daley, will be stepping down in July 2020." ↩

  3. "Appointment of Danielle Wood as new CEO of Grattan Institute", Grattan Institute, 10 December 2019.  ↩

  4. "Grattan Institute appoints new CEO", Grattan Institute, 8 January 2024.  ↩

  5. "About Us", Grattan Institute — "We receive no ongoing government funding and reject commissioned work to ensure this independence." ↩

  6. "Grattan Institute", Wikipedia — "Grattan receives money from its endowment supporters and affiliates, which include Susan McKinnon Foundation, Scanlon Foundation, The Myer Foundation". Not independently confirmed against a Grattan-published supporter list carrying a date. ↩

  7. "Democracy and public integrity", Grattan Institute — lists Aruna Sathanapally as "CEO and Economic Prosperity and Democracy Program Director" and Kate Griffiths as "Chief of Staff and Democracy Deputy Program Director." ↩

  8. "Improving Australia's democracy", Grattan Institute, 25 September 2025 — "The total cap of $90 million for electoral expenditure by a political party is too high. And the per-seat cap of $800,000 is too low, advantaging incumbents over new entrants." ↩

History