Gerhard: Pre-contact Australia was home to
several hundred thousand indigenous people,
spread across the continent, speaking hundreds
of languages and dialects, trading with Makassans
from what is Indonesia today and amongst each
other, moving across the land with transition
zones between individual nations, of which
there were over 200.
At the beginning of colonization in 1788,
Anglo-Celtic civilization with all its trappings
was transposed to a new land, with little
or no recognition of its original inhabitants.
The government at the time adhered to the
doctrine of terra nullius or “empty land,”
declaring that Australia was devoid of human
inhabitants and thus belonged to no one, claiming
it all for the British Crown. Australia became
a settler society without treaty with its
indigenous people.
Early migration, apart from the penal colony,
was settlers given land to pioneer new settlement
of the colony, dominated by British subjects.
This changed with the Gold rush in the mid-19th
century, when a major influx of Chinese men
seeking their fortune on the goldfields stirred
an anti-Chinese and anti-immigration backlash.
Chinese immigrants were predominantly men
and often had close relationships with Aboriginal
people in remote Australia, something we will
talk about in episode four, when we discuss
David Trigger and Richard Martin’s research
in Northern Queensland.
Meanwhile, some Australian states tried to
limit Chinese immigration, forcing them to
disembark in neighboring states and go on
vast overland tracks to the gold fields.
At the same time, the blackbirding slave trade
around the Pacific islands brought slaves
to work on plantations like sugar palm to
Australia.
Amongst British immigrants and their descendants,
the bush ethos based on mateship on the frontier
grew in importance, as did demand for identity
of an independent nation— independent of
Great Britain, that is—which led to Federation
of Australia in 1901.
1901, the White Australia policy, a range
of policies that favored immigration from
certain European countries and limited immigration
from Asia and the Pacific, was written into
law, with requirements of language tests,
which could be given in any language to prospective
immigrants, thereby privileging some ethnicities
and discriminating against others.
In the 1910s, especially the First World War,
saw the birth of the ANZAC (Or Australian
and New Zealand Army Corps) myth or legend
at Gallipoli. At Gallipoli, a battle was lost
on the shores of modern-day Turkey, where
Australian and New Zealand troops fought together
for Great Britain but also under their own
banner that has spawned a sense of nationalism
and pride in contemporary Australia.
The 1920s saw the resumption of European migration,
especially from Southern Europe.
In the 1930s, refugees arrived, fleeing Europe
from discrimination and persecution, as well
as another impending world war.
Following the Second World War, Australia embarked on large immigration schemes to build
the nation with massive infrastructure projects.
This is underscored by the
“populate or perish” policy that demanded
for more people to settle in Australia.
Post-war immigration reinforced the vocational
stereotypes of immigrants as factory workers,
building and farm laborers.
Assisted passage schemes like the Ten Pound
Poms also increased numbers of immigration.
In this scheme, both the United Kingdom and
Australian governments offered subsidized
passage for British subjects to Australia.
The 1960s saw a swing to Eastern European
migration from countries like Poland, Yugoslavia,
and Hungary.
There was in fact a progressive swing in migration
expanding from the British white Anglo immigrant
to others willing and able to come and contribute
to the Australian nation-building project.
Another milestone is 1967 when a referendum
was successfully held to remove some of the
discriminating language and provisions in
the constitution that discriminated against
indigenous people in Australia. The referendum
started a slow process of recognition of the
shared history of domination, subjugation,
and racism, which is ongoing.
In the 1970s, the Vietnam War triggered many
Vietnamese refugees to travel by boat to safety
as so-called boat people, and many got resettled
as refugees to Australia. This marked a major
shift from European to Asian immigration.
In the 1980s, multiculturalism emerged as
a social concept, especially around the bicentennial,
the 200-year celebration of the modern Australian
nation. Advertising campaigns and festivals
celebrated the multicultural makeup of modern
Australia. This was supported by the Hawke/Keating
labor governments between 1983 and 1996, which
were broadly pro-multiculturalism.
In 1975 and 1980, the Special Broadcasting
Service radio and TV station were launched,
catering specifically to multicultural audiences.
The 1990s and 2000s saw an increase in migration
flows, especially skilled migration. However,
the mood was and remains dominated by an aversion
to people coming to Australia by irregular
means, especially by boat. Asylum seekers
have continued to make their way to Australia
to seek asylum, but recent governments have
focused not on their plight but on securing
the borders and making them impenetrable.
This sentiment is best summed up by former
Prime Minister John Howard’s now infamous
words about people coming to Australia by
boat. He said, “We will decide who comes
to this country and the circumstances in which
they come.’’ This focus on border security
persists today.
So in conclusion, we have seen a fluctuating
response to immigration, one between acceptance,
promotion, and opposition. To delve deeper
into Australian attitudes, we caught up with
anthropologist Ghassan Hage to discuss these
issues.
