I was in Sydney for six weeks as this issue, Volume 20 Issue 2, had to be readied for publication. As this editorial was being composed, I wrote the following to one of the most respected Editors of the journal, namely, Clifford Shearing, a front-ranking scholar in our field, ‘Diversity, discipline on the street, lack of squalor, and what I would call a bustling orderliness in the city impressed me immensely. My wife and I never felt unsafe wherever we had been in the city: shopping centers, places of entertainment, parks and so on.’

As always, Clifford wrote back promptly, “Your experience of Sydney was not unlike my experience of Disney World, with my daughter, in the mid-1980s. What I experienced was precisely your surprising ‘bustling orderliness.’ Clifford adds, several years ago, I visited my daughter who had been living in Sydney. We borrowed a car and decided because our time was short we would park wherever we could find parking – be it legal or illegal. Every single time we parked illegally, someone would come up to us and say, “Illegal park mate, you cannot park there’. This, for me, is the essence of Australian ‘mateship’. Its friendship, but with a collective good that is promoted through it. There is a ‘blotchiness,’ but it is underlaid with a deep respect for compliance. My answer to your puzzle, as you know, is ‘policing’ (nodal policing) not ‘police.’ Moreover, this is something that Australian police, for all their conventionality, I think understand. They understand, Jean-Paul Brodeur’s ‘Web of Policing’ (Personal Correspondence, January 2019).

I wrote to another Editor of the journal, a Founding Editor, Tim Prenzler, with my impression of Sydney, ‘Years ago, as a teenager,’ Tim (Personal Communication, January 2019) said, he was ‘amazed by the city. The skyscrapers seemed to blend perfectly with the brilliant blue harbor and leafy green belts. The place had a genuine buzz. The ferries, zoo, and beaches were all very exciting. Moreover, the opera house and bridge were stunning’. Tim pointed out that ‘one of the most striking features has been the near absence of homeless people and disorder on the street.’