DOCSLIB.ORG

A Concise History of Australia

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
A Concise History of Australia A Concise History of Australia Third Edition STUART MACINTYRE '. ..., '. ..' CAMBRIDGE . ::: UNIVERSITY PRESS CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, Sao Paulo, Delhi Cambridge University Press 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780FI5I6082. © Stuart Macintyre 2.009 First published 1999 Second edition 2.004 Reprinted 2.005, 2006, 2008 Third edition 2009 Cover design by David Thomas Design Typeset by Aptara Printed in China by Printplus A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library National Library of Australia Cataloguing in Publication data Macintyre, Stuart, 1947- A concise history of Australia I Stuart Macintyre 3'd ed. 9780FI5I6082 (hbk.) 9780521735933 (pbk.). Includes index. Bibliography Aboriginal Australians - History. Republicanism - Australia. Australia - History. Australia - Politics and government. Australia - Environmental conditions IL) 994 "1 t 1.'1'/I (3) 978-0-';-'21-51608-2. hardback 30:. C])f 11 /3 O/ IIBN ISBN 978-0-521-73593-3 paperback Reproduction and communication for educational purposes The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of ",bib,4/; one chapter or 10% of the pages of this work, whichever is the greater, .i:I' 0".... ' to be reproduced and/or communicated by any educational institution 1! "'? .. for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution fI (or the body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to 'i Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act. � For details of the CAL licence for educational institutions contact: Copyright Agency Limited Level 15, 2.33 Castlereagh Street Sydney NSW 2.000 Telephone: (02) 9394 7600 Facsimile: (02) 9394 7601 ju- )'7&0 E-mail: [email protected] Reproduction and communication for other purposes Except as permitted under the Act (for example a fair dealing for the purposes of study, research, criticism or review) no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, communicated or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior written permission. All inquiries should be made to the publisher at the address above. Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Information regarding prices, travel tio timetahle� and other fa�tual}nf�rm� n given in :?is w rk are correct at . , . ? 10 What next? 'Historical events, like mountain ranges, can best be surveyed as a whole by an observer who is placed at a good distance from them.' So wrote an early professor of history (the chair I occupy is named after him) in the closing pages of his concise history of Australia. Ernest Scott wrote those words more than ninety years ago and the idea of the historian as an observer of events has since fallen into disrepute. The historian is now inside the history, inex­ tricably caught up in a continuous making and remaking of the past. History once served as an authoritative guide to decision­ making. The great nineteenth-century literary historians produced compelling accounts of the forces that had shaped their civilisa­ tion; through these lessons in statecraft and morality, they provided contemporaries with the capacity and the confidence to anticipate their destiny. That idea of the historian as guide or prophet has also lapsed. Futurology is the province of the economist, the environ­ mental or information scientist; whatever the future holds, it will be utterly different from what has gone before. Scott applied his caveat to the final fifteen years of his narrative. For him, the first years of the Commonwealth period constituted a 'closer range' of ephemeral change, but then his history of Australia spanned only five centuries. Completed in the year that his com­ patriots returned on imperial service to scramble up the slopes of Gallipoli, it began 'with a blank space on the map' at the dawn of European discovery and ended 'with a new name on the map, that What next? of Anzac'. Australian history now stretches over many millennia. In this dramatically extended past the last two hundred or so years of European habitation might well be regarded as too close to discern its essential features. The colonisation that began in I788 could be seen, at greater distance, as no more than a temporary interruption in the longer history of Australia. Two thousand years ago Britain was itself colonised. After voy­ ages of discovery, reconnaissance and trade, a Roman army took possession. Initially the invasion met with little resistance, but as the newcomers extended their presence they put down revolts by the local tribes and sent back the trophies of those they conquered. They built towns, settled ex-soldiers on the land, imposed their law, language and customs, built walls to keep out alien incursions, exploited the natural resources to create export industries, provided troops for imperial service. As new powers arose in the region, the emperor Constantine came to shore up the island's defences, but eventually the imperial capac­ ity declined and the province was left to defend itself. The indigenous people had blended many of the ways of colonisers with their own traditions, and waves of new arrivals also assimilated aspects of the Roman legacy. The Roman colony itself lasted for more than four hundred years. Its traces are still apparent in historic sites and place­ names, but are just one slice of the island's multi-layered past. Rome bequeathed a framework of government and law, but that too has repeatedly been remade. Will the British colonisation of Australia be sustained so long? Will it too be overlaid by the languages and practices of other peoples? The relationship between the settlers and the indigenous peo­ ples remains uncertain. From the beginning it caused unease. The proclamation of sovereignty, the seizure of land and the violent con­ frontations this caused always troubled some colonists. All attempts to ease their conscience, whether by protection, reservation, conver­ sion or assimilation of the Aboriginals, failed. The relationship is more important than ever because its terms have changed. It used to be said that whenever the English thought they had found an answer to the Irish question, the Irish would alter the question. Eventually it became apparent that the problem had to be turned around: for the Irish, it was the English question. A Concise History of Australia In Australia the altered relationship between coloniser and colonised became apparent in Aboriginal demands for self­ determination. The Commonwealth's land rights legislation in 1976 appeared to answer that call, but in fact the transfer of land to Aboriginal ownership during the later 1970S and 1980s was ham­ pered by State governments and largely confined to the desert and savannah regions of the centre and the north. Land rights in theory and rhetoric broke with the old assumptions by transferring title as a matter of indigenous entitlement. Land rights in practice were similar to the setting aside of reserves during the nineteenth cen­ tury - a benevolent act by a sovereign colonist. In much the same way the pursuit of reconciliation, made possible by the generosity of Aboriginal participants, depended in the end on the willingness of non-Aboriginal Australians to acknowledge past wrongs that could never be undone. One commentator described the efforts of those involved in the reconciliation process as providing 'therapy for whites'. The Mabo judgement of 1992 shattered this humanitarian frame­ work. By their decision the judges of the High Court shifted the basis of Aboriginal policy from the operation of statutory law, where parliament authorised the restitution of Aboriginal land, to the very foundations of the Australian legal system. The court did not over­ turn the sovereignty of the government that had been established in 1788 but recognised the existence in common law of Aboriginal property rights that preceded the European settlement and con­ tinued past it. The subsequent Wik judgement confirmed thatthese rights could coexist with other property rights. The Commonwealth has since legislated to confine the effect of the judicial decisions but their implications have yet to be fully worked out and their import is irrevocable. The colonisers are confronted with the fact that they share the land with the colonised. The disappointing outcomes of Aboriginal self-determination have only compounded this unfinished business. Aboriginal claimants established land rights over large portions of northern Australia, but the land had little commercial value to those who yielded it up and did not create wealth for its new owners. Abo­ riginals living in remote regions found it hard to establish eco­ nomic independence, and the consequences of dependence on state What next? welfare proved debilitating. Nor were the outcomes for those living in the south markedly better: they too were less likely to complete school and obtain a qualification, more likely to suffer hardship, poor health and early death. There is no longer agreement among Indigenous leaders of the way forward, no longer the same moral certainty. A lasting reconciliation remains elusive. Australia, in name and substance, is a product of the European supremacy that began five hundred years ago and ended in the second half of the last century. In Asia and Africa the process of decolonisation saw the expulsion or withdrawal of the imperial powers and the creation of new states. The Europeans departed. In the colonies of settlement where independent nation-states had already emerged there was no departure but it became necessary to rework the relationship between the settlers and the indigenous people.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Australian Historians and Historiography in the Courtroom
    AUSTRALIAN HISTORIANS AND HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE COURTROOM T ANYA JOSEV* This article examines the fascinating, yet often controversial, use of historians’ work and research in the courtroom. In recent times, there has been what might be described as a healthy scepticism from some Australian lawyers and historians as to the respective efficacy and value of their counterparts’ disciplinary practices in fact-finding. This article examines some of the similarities and differences in those disciplinary practices in the context of the courts’ engagement with both historians (as expert witnesses) and historiography (as works capable of citation in support of historical facts). The article begins by examining, on a statistical basis, the recent judicial treatment of historians as expert witnesses in the federal courts. It then moves to an examination of the High Court’s treatment of general works of Australian history in aid of the Court making observations about the past. The article argues that the judicial citation of historical works has taken on heightened significance in the post-Mabo and ‘history wars’ eras. It concludes that lasting changes to public and political discourse in Australia in the last 30 years — namely, the effect of the political stratagems that form the ‘culture wars’ — have arguably led to the citation of generalist Australian historiography being stymied in the apex court. CONTENTS I Introduction ............................................................................................................ 1070 II The Historian
    [Show full text]
  • 5.5 X 10 Long Title .P65
    Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-51608-2 - A Concise History of Australia, Third Edition Stuart Macintyre Index More information INDEX Abbott, Tony, 275 and European diseases, 5, 19, 32 Abeles, Peter, 203 and European invasion, 13 Aboriginal Affairs, Department of, and federation, 145 239 flag, 289 Aboriginal people, 10, 188–90, Freedom Ride, 236 303–5 government policy on, 227–9, Arrernte people, 9 267, 298 art, 14, 289 Gurindji people, 227, 236 and Arthur Phillip, 31 Kamilaroi people, 62 assimilation, 189, 227–9 Kulin people, 67 Batjala people, 69 Kwiambal people, 62 Black Line, 61, 63–6 land rights, 67, 239, 267, 287, and Christianity, 49 288, 304 conflict with European settlers, language groups, 14 39, 49, 55, 56, 59–61, 65 life expectancy, 287 and the Constitution, 231, Link-Up agencies, 229 236 massacres, 60–5, 91, 105, 107 Coranderrk settlement, 106 Native Institution, 49 culture, 3, 13–15, 189, 289 Nglulungbara people, 69 Day of Protest and Mourning, in northern Australia, 105 17, 188 Northern Territory intervention, Dharuk people, 38 298 Djankawa story, 9 Nyungar people, 62 Dreamtime (Dreaming), 9, 14, pastoral workers, 105, 227, 236 16 political movement, 261 elimination of, 106, 146 population, 61, 145, 286 employment, 105, 287 protection of, 65, 105–8, 146 environmental management, 14 reconciliation, 267, 287, 289, Eora people, 14, 39 298 © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-51608-2 - A Concise History of Australia, Third Edition Stuart Macintyre Index More
    [Show full text]
  • THE HISTORY WARS CONTINUED? Professor Stuart Macintyre Dean, Faculty of Arts, University of Melbourne
    3y ! -ANU-TOYOTA PUB LI C LECTURE SERIES THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY THIRD ANNUAL LECTURE presented by THE ANU ARCHIVES PROGRAM R FRIENDS OF THE NOEL BUTLIN ARCHIVES CENTRE THE HISTORY WARS CONTINUED? Professor Stuart Macintyre Dean, Faculty of Arts, University of Melbourne Wednesday 3 November 2004, 6pm Coombs Lecture Theatre, Building 9, Fellows Road, ANU This lecture is free and open to the public. Enquiries: 6125 2219 THE LECTURE A war is raging in historical circles. Divisions about how to interpret Australian history and the pol iticisation of the topic -seen in the vilification of Manning Clark as a 'Soviet spy', the Windschuttle/Reynolds dispute on Aboriginal history, and controversy over the National Museum - have split the profession. But the struggle seen in the 'History Wars' involves not only ideology and politics, but also how historians practise their profession. The use of evidence discovered and uncovered in the archives is at the heart of some of the key controversies in the History Wars. Research and interpretation are both essential to the historian's work and defending them to the public at large has become part of the historian's role in today's Australia. In this lecture, Professor Macintyre will draw on his experience of the History Wars and reflect on their implications for the present and future of historical scholarship in Australia. THE LECTURER Professor Stuart Macintyre has been Ernest Scott Professor of History at the University of Melbourne since 1990 and Dean of the Faculty of Arts since 1999 and has published widely on British and Australian history.
    [Show full text]
  • Biographies and Autobiographies of Historians, Edited by Doug Munro and John G
    11 Country and Kin Calling? Keith Hancock, the National Dictionary Collaboration, and the Promotion of Life Writing in Australia1 Melanie Nolan Australian historians and ego-histoire In his international comparison of history, historians and autobiography in 2005, Jeremy D. Popkin concluded that Australian historians were early to, and enthusiastic about, the ego-histoire movement or the ‘setting down [of] one’s own story’. Australians anticipated Pierre Nora’s collection of essays, Essais d’ego-histoire, which was published in 1987.2 They had already founded ‘a series of autobiographical lectures in 1984’, which resulted in a number of publications, and Australian historians’ memoirs thereafter appeared at a rate of more than one a year.3 When he considered Australian 1 I thank Ann Curthoys and the editors for their comments on an earlier draft. 2 Pierre Nora ed., Essais d’ego-histoire (Paris: Gallimard, 1987), 7. 3 Jeremy D. Popkin, History, Historians, & Autobiography (Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 2005), 74. In ‘Ego-histoire Down Under: Australian Historian-Autobiographers’, Australian Historical Studies, 38:129 (2007), 110, doi.org/10.1080/10314610708601234, Popkin dates the Australian memoir bulge from 1982 when collective projects including ‘a volume of professional women’s narratives, The Half-Open Door, which appeared in 1982, and the four volumes of essays starting with the Victorian History Institute’s 1984 forum in which R.M. Crawford, Manning Clark and Geoffrey Blainey participated’. Patricia Grimshaw and Lynne
    [Show full text]
  • Different Historical Cases Is a Valuable Supplement to the Book. There Is
    Book Reviews Book Reviews different historical cases is a valuable The Fuss That Never Ended: Some of the criticism is tacitly supplement to the book. There is also The Life and Work of Geoffrey acknowledged as philosophical a subject index. Blainey difference. However, annoyingly, The book demonstrates that Edited by Deborah much of it becomes a critique of inflation is a man-made phenomenon Gare, Geoffrey Bolton, Blainey’s value as a historian for and therefore can be undone by Stuart Macintyre and the heinous crime of failing to human action. Politicians and Tom Stannage appreciate the centrality of each central bankers, who claim to be Melbourne University Press, writer’s historical specialty to the overwhelmed by some supernatural 2003, 236 pp, $39.95 telling of the Australian story. What power and are helpless in the face of ISBN 0522 85034 0 seems to escape these historians is inflation, only reveal that they lack that, while the topics to which they the will to create that most precious n 1994, a book of essays about have devoted such study may have of social assets: sound money. Ione of Australia’s two most famous merit, it is not compulsory that they For the benefit of the general and influential historians appeared. be given a central place in everybody reader, formal models are kept to Edited by Carl Bridge, Manning else’s work. a minimum; they are, moreover, Clark: Essays On His Place in History The great irony is, of course, that asterixed and can be skipped without is an excellent collection of well- Blainey’s writings have covered a far losing the thread of the argument.
    [Show full text]
  • A Concise History of Australia
    A Concise History of Australia Third Edition STUART MACINTYRE '. ..., '. ..' CAMBRIDGE . ::: UNIVERSITY PRESS CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, Sao Paulo, Delhi Cambridge University Press 477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780FI5I6082. © Stuart Macintyre 2.009 First published 1999 Second edition 2.004 Reprinted 2.005, 2006, 2008 Third edition 2009 Cover design by David Thomas Design Typeset by Aptara Printed in China by Printplus A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library National Library of Australia Cataloguing in Publication data Macintyre, Stuart, 1947- A concise history of Australia I Stuart Macintyre 3'd ed. 9780FI5I6082 (hbk.) 9780521735933 (pbk.). Includes index. Bibliography Aboriginal Australians - History. Republicanism - Australia. Australia - History. Australia - Politics and government. Australia - Environmental conditions IL) 994 "1 t 1.'1'/I (3) 978-0-';-'21-51608-2. hardback 30:. C])f 11 /3 O/ IIBN ISBN 978-0-521-73593-3 paperback Reproduction and communication for educational purposes The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of ",bib,4/; one chapter or 10% of the pages of this work, whichever is the greater, .i:I' 0".... ' to be reproduced and/or communicated by any educational institution 1! "'? .. for its educational purposes provided that the
    [Show full text]
  • 2 Nation and Assimilation: Continuity And
    2 Nation and Assimilation: Continuity and Discontinuity in Aboriginal Affairs in the 1950s Russell McGregor 'Assimilation means that eventually, as they make progress, all the aboriginal people are to live as we do.' I In this succinct formulation, Paul Hasluck, Commonwealth Minister for Territories and leading architect of assimilation policies, registered both assimilation's continuities with earlier policies and its points of novelty. As the model whom Aboriginal people were to emulate, 'we'-white Australians-would clearly remain the source oflegitimacy in political and social relationships. Yet by upholding a vision of social 'progress' and by opening the door to 'our' way oflife to all Aborigines, assimilation entailed a significant shift in the relationship between the settler nation a~d the Indigenous peoples. For the preceding hundred years and more, the dominant view was that Aborigines were innately incapable of 'progress'; that their racial constitution debarred them from ever living 'as we do'; that, indeed, they had little time to live at all, their inherent antipathy to modemity dooming them to extinction.2 Assimilation necessarily entailed a repudiation of the doomed race prognosis, a rejection, or at least dilution, of the long-held assumption of innate Aboriginal primitivity, and some faith in their capacity to become 'civilised' and thereby citizens of a modem national state. To that extent, assimilation was an optimistic doctrine. At the same time, it was profoundly pessimistic about the prospects of Aborigines maintaining existence on any terms other than by living 'as we do'. As a 1958 Commonwealth report explained, assimilation meant 'that to survive and prosper the numerically small aboriginal group, within a vastly larger white Australian group, must leam to live and work and think as the majority do'.3 According to Stuart Macintyre, 'Assimilation has been the aim of govemment policy toward Aborigines for much of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries'.
    [Show full text]
  • Dialogue 1 11
    Contents 1 President’s Report Barry McGaw 3 Dialogue Note Meredith Edwards, Murray Goot, Stuart Macintyre and Simon Marginson Challenges for the Social Sciences in Australia 4 Measuring Excellence in Australian Research Andrew Wells 11 The Poor Relation Stuart Macintyre 21 Higher Education and Global Public Goods Simon Marginson Families and the Global Financial Crisis 30 Social Sciences and the Study of Family Fortunes in the Global Financial Crisis Michael Bittman 40 Global Economic Cycles and Australian Families and Children Janet McCalman 45 The Interaction Between Household and Market Work in Economic Downturns Duncan Ironmonger 53 Examining the Social Impact of the Financial Crisis Peter Saunders 59 Family Fortunes and the Global Financial Crisis Stuart Macintyre 62 Working at the Intersections: An Early Career Research Trajectory in the Social Sciences Christy Newman 67 Reflections on Ross Garnaut’s Cunningham Lecture Don Aitkin 72 Academy News 79 Workshop Reports 107 Roundtable Reports Volume 30 1/2011 Dialogue 30, 1/2011 President’s Report he Academy has a broad membership but many Fellows Tcurrently work in universities where research productivity is under increased internal and external scrutiny. Productivity is judged largely in terms of impact, which, for the most part, is viewed narrowly in terms of impact within the research community. The prime indicator of success is publication in the journals that are most highly regarded by peers as established by ratings of reputation or, for those fields for which there are citation indices, frequency of citation. There is much talk of academics having three responsibilities, viz research, teaching and connection with the broader community.
    [Show full text]
  • Australian Historians and Historiography in the Courtroom
    AUSTRALIAN HISTORIANS AND HISTORIOGRAPHY IN THE COURTROOM T ANYA JOSEV* This article examines the fascinating, yet often controversial, use of historians’ work and research in the courtroom. In recent times, there has been what might be described as a healthy scepticism from some Australian lawyers and historians as to the respective efficacy and value of their counterparts’ disciplinary practices in fact-finding. This article examines some of the similarities and differences in those disciplinary practices in the context of the courts’ engagement with both historians (as expert witnesses) and historiography (as works capable of citation in support of historical facts). The article begins by examining, on a statistical basis, the recent judicial treatment of historians as expert witnesses in the federal courts. It then moves to an examination of the High Court’s treatment of general works of Australian history in aid of the Court making observations about the past. The article argues that the judicial citation of historical works has taken on heightened significance in the post-Mabo and ‘history wars’ eras. It concludes that lasting changes to public and political discourse in Australia in the last 30 years — namely, the effect of the political stratagems that form the ‘culture wars’ — have arguably led to the citation of generalist Australian historiography being stymied in the apex court. CONTENTS I Introduction ............................................................................................................ 1070 II The Historian
    [Show full text]
  • A Concise History of Australia: Fourth Edition Stuart Macintyre Frontmatter More Information
    Cambridge University Press 978-1-107-56243-1 - A Concise History of Australia: Fourth Edition Stuart Macintyre Frontmatter More information CAMBRIDGE CONCISE HISTORIES A Concise History of Australia fourth edition Australia is the last continent to be settled by Europeans, but it also sustains a people and a culture tens of thousands of years old. For much of the past 225 years the newcomers have sought to replace the old with the new. This book tells how they imposed themselves on the land, and describes how they brought technology, institutions and ideas to make it their own. It relates the advance from a penal colony to a prosperous free country and illustrates how, in a nation created by waves of newcomers, the search for binding traditions has long been accompanied by the feeling of rootlessness. The fourth edition incorporates the far-reaching effects of an export and investment boom in the early years of the twenty-first century that lifted Australia to unprecedented prosperity. The sale of minerals and energy enabled the economy to withstand the global financial crisis of 2007–08 but there was no agreement on how the wealth was to be managed and its benefits distributed. The book describes a continuing search for solutions to climate change, the unauthorised arrival of refugees, Indigenous disadvan- tage and generational change. Stuart Macintyre is an Emeritus Laureate Professor of the University of Melbourne. From 1999 to 2006 he was Dean of the Faculty of Arts, and he has served as president of the Australian Historical Association and the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia.
    [Show full text]
  • ANU Historical Journal II: Number 1
    In loving memory of Anne Kingston (1942–68) ANU HISTORICAL JOURNAL II NUMBER 1 Contents Editorial: A history . .. v Emily Gallagher Acknowledgements . xiii Emily Gallagher, Jessica Urwin and Madalyn Grant Memoirs Special: Remembering the ANU Historical Journal (1964–87) Beginnings—Some reflections on the ANU Historical Journal, 1964–70 . 3 Ron Fraser Old and new Australia . 15 Alastair Davidson Memories of the ANU Historical Journal . 25 Caroline Turner My brilliant apprenticeship . 31 Ian Britain The past is another truth . 35 Rosemary Auchmuty An old and agreeable companion, 1972–74 . 39 Doug Munro The wider significance of the ANU Historical Journal . 47 Jill Waterhouse Articles ‘Ours will be a tent’: The meaning and symbolism of the early Aboriginal Tent Embassy . .. 57 Tobias Campbell A new dawn: Rights for women in Louisa Lawson’s The Dawn . 73 Ingrid Mahony Cultural responses to the migration of the barn swallow in Europe . 87 Ashleigh Green Kingship, sexuality and courtly masculinity: Frederick the Great and Prussia on the cusp of modernity . 109 Bodie A Ashton Lebanon’s ‘age of apology’ for Civil War atrocities: A look at Assad Shaftari and Samir Geagea . 137 Nayree Mardirian ‘O Sin, Sin, what hast thou done!’: Aboriginal people and convicts in evangelical humanitarian discourse in the Australian colonies, 1830–50 . 157 Tandee Wang Object study—The Tombstone of Anne: A case study on multilingualism in twelfth‑century Sicily . 179 Sarah MacAllan Lectures Inaugural Professorial Lecture—Is Australian history still possible? Australia and the global eighties . 193 Frank Bongiorno Geoffrey Bolton Lecture—From bolshevism to populism: Australia in a century of global transformation .
    [Show full text]
  • Geoffrey Bolton Lecture—From Bolshevism to Populism
    Geoffrey Bolton Lecture— From bolshevism to populism: Australia in a century of global transformation1 Stuart Macintyre University of Melbourne One hundred years ago last week, an obscure Russian named Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov directed a seizure of power in the Russian capital of St Petersburg. Ulyanov was a professional revolutionary, better known as Lenin (because he had been exiled in Siberia, close to the Lena river), and was living in Switzerland in April 1917 when Germany took him back to his homeland to foment discord there. For Germany was at war with Russia and the growing strain of that conflict had brought down the tottering Tsarist regime in the previous month. Since Lenin was known to oppose the war, his arrival in Russia was calculated to weaken the efforts of the new Provisional Government to revive that country’s military effort. And so it did. With his call for an end to the war, Lenin’s Bolshevik Party (Bolshevik meaning the majority wing of the Russian Social-Democratic Workers Party) grew rapidly from some 10,000 members in March 1917 to 400,000 by November. Effective power passed during 1917 from the Provisional Government to local councils of workers, soldiers and peasants, known as soviets, which took over the running of factories, removed unpopular military officers and redistributed the landholdings of the nobility. With their 1 This is the text of the Geoffrey Bolton Lecture for 2017, which was delivered in Perth at the invitation of the State Records Office of Western Australia. I was asked to mark the centenary of the Russian Revolution and offer observations on the rise of populism 100 years later.
    [Show full text]