Autumn 1987 no. 99

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AUSTRALIAN IEFT BRIEFINGS 2 REVIEW 99 Joh's March on Canberra?; After the Wages Case; The Philippines Revisited. AUTUMN 1987

FEATURES TWS ri»n— THE u n iv e r s it t o f w o u o n g o n . „ fMBANDPUtLISHEt SCOOP! The Media Takeovers « The federal government’s changes to meaia laws led to unprecedented selling, at RED PEN PUBLICATIONS PTV. LTD. unprecedented prices. And it seems more than happy with the result. In the process, the whole 4 DIXON STREET, SYDNEY 2000 sorry affair highlighted the passivity of our media ‘watchdog1, and the remoteness of the legal processes from unions and the community at large. And it may not yet he over ... EDITORIAL COLLECTIVE KATE HARRISON

BRIAN AARONS, ERIC AARONS, DIANA AND SARAH: Images of Ourselves 13 HILDA ANDREWS, MALCOLM ANDREWS, DAVID BURCH ELL, Princess D1 was destined to be the disastrous ic on of the eighties, a paragon of androgy ny and STEVE CATT, MIKE DONALDSON, anorexia. Her treatment in the mass media highlighted the massive contradictions In the LYNDELL FAIRLEIGH. BERNADETTE public face of ideal womanhood. Sarah, meanwhile, was plumpish, down to earth, and she had a The twin images uf Diana and Sarah say a lot ahout where women have come these FOLEY, GLORIA GARTON, JANE past. last ten to fifteen years, and not a little about the future. INGLIS (SYDNEY) SHERIL BERKOVITCH, JIM CROSTHWAITE, DIANA SIMMONDS ANITRA NELSON, LOUISE CONNOR, PAVLA MILLER, KEN NORLING. STRIKING A CHORD: Rock and Politics 19 OLGA SILVER, JANNA THOMPSON (MELBOURNE) in the Eighties First there was the sixties, then there was punk. Then there was — what? What d id happen to ACCOUNTS AND DISTRIBUTION political pop, and where is the rock industry heading now? Are Live Aid and Red Wedge the heralds of a new era of commitment? DIRECT SALES: HILDA ANDREWS AND MALCOLM ANDREWS DAVID ROWE (SYDNEY) OLGA SILVER (MELBOURNE) ALL QUIET ON THE HOME FRONT? 24 NEWSAGENTS: WRAPAWAY DIST­ Contradictions of Family Life RIBUTORS, 1 CHALDER STREET, MARRICKVILLE, NSW 2204. The right has been making much of its support of ‘family values'. And, while its picture of PH: (02) 550.1622. family life may be a rather dubious one, the family does have a vital place in most people's emotional lives. How can the left come to terms with some of the positive aspects of family DESIGN AND LAYOUT relations, without capitulating to the oldest patriarchal institution of them all? REBECCA AI.BURY MARIUS FOLEY KAREN VANCE POL POT’S ALLIES: The Kampuchean Right 30 BETH GIBBINGS The KPNLF are supposed, in Washington, to be the flagbearers of Kampuchea 's' Democratic TYKSETTINC Resistance'. As such, they form a useful figleaf for support of the Khmer Rouge. But the KPNLF’s own record is hardly a pretty one. GLORIA GARTON BEN KIERNAN com TIME OUT 35

A National Character; Style Revisited. DAVID BROMLEY

CORRESPONDENCE AND ENQUIRIES LETTERS; DISCUSSION AND REPLY 40

DAVID BURCHELL REVIEWS 43 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW BOX A247, SYDNEY SOUTH Rethinking Feminism; After the Accord; The Modern Girl. SYDNEY 2000 AUSTRALIA

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wanted Joh in Canberra: later in the process, the whole arena of political month, more reputable polling debate has taken another great lurch methods reduced this figure to only 60 to the right. percent. There are two distinct aspects of the current political situation which It was one of the great symbolic have helped to create this astonishing moments of media reporting: soon political phenomenon. One we could enough it was impossible to tell call a “crisis of representation"; the whether the media was leading Joh on, other a crisis of popular appeal, or of or Joh was leading the media on. Not mass politics which follows from since the Philippines state television the first. station had formed the strategic battleground of Cory's “revolution" In early February the ABC twelve months earlier had the inter­ television program Four Corners ran a relationship of the media and mass detailed report on the Bankstown by- politics been so evocatively election in Sydney, where support for the AI.P (and, interestingly, for the represented. Some on the left chose to coalition too) ran at an historic low. interpret this in conspiratorial terms: The camera crew interviewed we were being “brainwashed" yet suburban families, groups of young again. Rather, it was a case of the people, and pensioners: the electronic media in particular, with its instinctive populist touch, coming to overwhelming message was that the Labor Party and, in fact, parties in embrace with Australia's greatest general, no longer represented its populist politician. electorate; the ties of appeal between By mid-February, Joh's campaign which, at first, the “quality" party and passive supporter had become unpreccdcntcdly slim. press had treated with amused contempt, was definitely to be taken This is hardly a uniquely seriously. The leaders of the official Australian phenomenon: indeed, it Opposition responded with escalating has been noted by social observers threats (federal National Party leader abroad for some years now. But, in the Ian Sinclair recalled Germany in Australian case, it was concealed for 1933). Then federal National M Ps met quite some time by apparently and appeared to endorse Joh's crusade undisturbed "traditional" conserv­ against {among other things) their atism during the Fraser years. The leader. Thereafter Sinclair, as if impetus has rather been the Hawke stricken by some dreadful irrational government's restless search fora role disease, was treated by the media as a as a "natural government "of the crisis, doomed man. Soon. Queensland arbitrating between the various social National MPs were coerced into actors but actively representing none. putting a unilateral end to the As we all know, this has now led to the Coalition: at the time of writing (early A I . P’s "traditional” constituencies March) control of the National Party, becoming perilously unstuck. It is by and thus of the future prospects of the no means clear any longer to the Coalition, hung in the balance. government itself, let alone its Of course, it still remains unlikely electorate, exactly what it “stands for". Job’s March on that the entire structure of the party But the official opposition has proved system will split asunder to provide itself singularly incapable of Canberra? Joh with the Prime Ministership — fashioning itself a constituency or although it is far from an constituencies on this alienated impossibility. Indeed, were Joh's ground. Where the “New* Right” in “impossible dream" to begin to take Britain articulated popular more tangible form, his popularity as a discontents around the welfare state, arly in February the Murdoch “maverick” might suffer iri and the American New Right has press was first to herald signs of consequence. But in his primary manoeuvred on the ground of the Ea drive on federal politics by objective the refashioning of the crisis of the family and traditional Queensland’s seventeen-year premier, cliijiate of politics at the conservative values with aplomb, their Australian Joh Bjelke-Petersen. One “exclusive” end of the spectrum, in the run-up to cousins have talked of market forces phone-in poll in the Sydney Telegraph the next election — he has been and the sovereign right to manage: claimed that 70 percent of Australians spectacularly successful. And, in the hardly inspiring stuff. BRIEFINGS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 3

•H ow the Sydney Morning Herald’s M oir .saw the future Joh Cabinet (March). Inio both of these historic Has amassed a potent repertoire ol genuinely articulate popualr currents, vacuums Joh has leapt as into the populist images strong-man but in extreme reactionary directions, breach. On the one hand he politician and father-figure, a have always seemed difficult to demonstrates his disdain for all of the commitment to a "traditionalist”- reconcile to our conceptions of their traditional parties — including his morality, a vivid portrayal of the class basis. Joh’s particular brand of own. He has set about single-mindedlv average taxpayer as the put-upon populism is, in addition, something breaking up the forces of “little man” (sic), and a deep reservoir rather new to this country. We have representation on which the of implicit racism. This is all the more had our populist “charismatics” before conventions of parliamentary effective precisely because it is an Jack Lang is the prime example, sovereignty are supposed to rest. He unarticulated (and thus apparently and perhaps tbeclosest but rarely in talks of the Coalition as of a passing inarticuulte) ideological appeal: Jolt's such a transparently anti-rational phantasm, or as an obstacle rather popularity lies in fact in the very guise. If the Joh phenomenon than a vehicle to mass appeal. Arid, ambiguity of his political appeals, in demonstrates anything, it is that we most strangely of all (particularly for the true populist tradition. In the same are dramatically lacking in empathy the "quality’*press), the public opinion way. Job’s notorious inability "to talk and imagination about how whai we of the fragmented parties rises with clear English” is. in itself, a part of the think of as “ideology" actually works. every blow. contradictory, unformed character of The only problem is that Joh may not On the other hand, he brushes populist rhetoric. lie down in time to become a aside the purported "responsibility” of The precise nature of populism (if convenient case study. the political slogans of the orthodox that is not a contradiction iri terms) is right. Where Howard speaks the something which has always been David Bure hell impoverished rhetoric of economic something of a aorry to the left. “rationalism” (a telling phrase), Joh Movements like fascism, which 4 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW BRIEFINGS

to dampen down working class The Wages Turmoil expectations on living standards. The effective wage cuts achieved through the commission's decision is The Conciliation and Arbitration alone) gained similar benefits, is now the latest initiative in this direction, Commission’s March national wage well and truly over. The corresponding and it is the government’s intention to decision is an attempt to further erode changes limiting government follow it with further cuts in the social the living standards of Australian involvement in the marketplace, and wage and public sector cutbacks, working people, and to weaken the interventionist support or protection, either in the May economic statement, trade union movement ideologically have been carried out with a speed and or the 1987/88 Budget, or both. For and organisationally. The decision, efficiency that the Coalition parties many workers, the commission's and the arguments used by the would have had difficulty in matching. decision means a S10 a week increase government in advocating it, represent It is for these reasons that the lo compensate for9.8 percent inflation a final and complete break with the government now commands the over 1986, and roughly 10 percent commitments given under the Accord. support of significant sections of inflation over 1987, with little prospect domestic and foreign capital, and that, of another increase until the first despite the threat of the New Right, quarter of 1988. A central feature of the Accord the traditional conservative political A significant number of unions was the agreement that both the trade parties are in disarray. have reacted sharply to the decision. union movement and the ALP in The threat of the New Right is At the Special Federal Unions government would argue in tripartite also skilfully used at the ideological Conference in November, most public consultations, and before industrial level to create continued support for sector unions rejected the proposed tribunals, that full cost of living the ALP among trade unionists and in change to the two-tiered wage system. adjustments be made to wages and the community at large, while Labor Others gave it critical, conditional salaries. proceds to reshape and refashion its This approach was in part support. policies according to an agenda It would seem impossible at this abandoned in 1985 when the generated by the right. This point in time to turn around ACTU government gained an agreement with manoeuvring also contains attempts strategy, and the ACTU Congress in the trade unions for a two percent discount of wage and salary increases. However, that agreement was not achieved without concessions to the unions in the areas of tax cuts (equivalent to the 2 percent discount), and support for superannuation claims. In 1986 the government did not even bother to negotiate an agreement with the union movement openly. Treasurer Keating baldly announced in the 1986/87 Budget statement to parliament that an additional two percent discount would be sought in the coming national wage case. Keating cited the need for wage increases to be compatible with those of our major trading partners, and for our international competitiveness to be maintained on "favourable terms with the rest of the world’1. This reshaping of wages policy is consistent with the government’s moves to deregulate the finance sector, and to expose the Australian eocnomy to all the pressures of international finance and productive capital. The era in Australia's economic development when foreign capital was given guaranteed domestic markets, and domestic capital (in partnership or BRIEFINGS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 5

September will be the first real through under-consumption and over­ Trade unions remain the opportunity to do so. This means that, production. Any attempt to reverse principal base for organised responses over the coming months, unions will this decline in living stnadards will by Australian workers in defence of have to test the new principles to the_ require a reassessment of overall trade their interests, and this role needs to be limit in an effort to achieve gains union strategy, and this needs to be reasserted in the period ahead. beyond the S10 a week mark. argued for from the shop floor to the Some unions will abide by the official level in all unions. Warwick Neittey decision, their leadership unable and/or unwilling to offer any challenge to the government or management in their members’ industries. The most contentious area After Cory’s Constitution will be the provision for increases of up to four percent under the new “restructuring and efficiency” prin­ welve months after the February ciple , or modified work value “revolution” in the Philippines, The Aquino government principle. TCory Aquino has won a continues the same policies as Marcos The new principle is designed to landslide victory in the vote on her in relying on agriculture and having no leave many workers “on the shelf’ in Constitution and, more directly, for concept of industrialisation. In the terms of wage movements unless they her presidency until 1992. She has name of dismantling the monopolies, are in strong bargaining positions or been lionised as “Time’s (Wo) Man of Marcos handed over to his family and can engage in a militant industrial the Year” and become the idol of cronies, the Aquino government is campaign with serious prospects of western politicians, the mass media proceeding with a rapid privatisation success. It is also another signal of the and of many who wish the Philippines of the economy. And the cronies’ end of the Accord, since it ties wage only well. monopolies are being sold off to fixation to industry development — Japanese and UN investors at bargain two matters dealt with separately With such near-unanimous basement rates, being offset against under the Accord. And, by limiting world-wide endorsement, one would the country’s huge overseas debt. additional increases to workers think that Cory’s task in With about 60 percent of the directly involved in technology and reconstructing the Philippines after 14 country’s exports going simply to work methods changes, it seeks to years of the most savage rape by the service that international debt, the divide workers and unions. Marcos clan and its cronies would be whole nation is caught in a modern The commission also clearly now well under way. But the Filipino form of debt slavery. Aquino’s favours enterprise level negotiations, people know differently. Unemploy­ ministers have insisted on a better in order to weaken unions'traditional ment and poverty have escalated deal, along the lines won last year by concerns to deal with the interests of greatly in the past year. Children are Mexico, for repayment of the debt, but all workers across particular sections now dying of starvation on Negros and have come up against a brick wall of of industry. infant mortality remains high. the biggest US banks. In the longer The trade union movement is The generous praise heaped on term, this subservience to without doubt in for a difficult period. Aquino by the USA has not been international capita! and the failure The dominant economic and matched by a generosity in economic even to contemplate an industrial­ ideological approach of the ACTU aid. On the contrary, the World Bank isation program will be the downfall of leadership is in line with the worst of and the International Monetary Fund the Aquino regime, and of the neo­ Australian labourist traditions. It have tightened the screws. With the colonial system. perceives the working class and trade enthusiastic support of Cory’s The Philippines is but one of the unions as being almost entirely economic ministers, handpicked many Third World nations which dependent on the developmental for their monetarism, the IMF and desperately need a new "Marshall processes of capitalism, and as World Bank have demanded and won Plan”. In the case of the Philippines, necessarily being compliant with its even further economic “liberalis­ such a multi-billion rescue plan alone demands and profit needs. This ation”. Protectionism is being can stop or substantially halt the rapid position is challenged somewhat by dismantled and today the USA and progress of the revolutionary forces. communists, socialists and others in EEC (and Australia) can dump even Such a “Marshall Plan” therefore is trade union leadership, but they are their surplus rice stocks at below-cost the logical way for imperialism to save not influential enough to reverse or prices in the Philippines. It is ironic the country from revolutionary moderate the existing trends, except in that, as protectionist barriers are change. Yet there are many factors isolated areas of the movement. raised in the advanced capitalist which impede such a rescue operation, The commission’s decision will countries against Filipino imports, above all, the danger such an example further impoverish hundreds of these same countries righteously would set elsewhere. There is also the thousands of Australians, and may demand that the Philippines lower its ever-present danger that any precipitate further economic crises trade defences. annulment of the international debt. 6 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW BRIEFINGS

or even giving substantial concessions essentially Japan. The Japanese powerful. And, as in the 'fifties and on the debt, could bring the whole economy is awash with money, yet its ’sixties, the President engages in crude house of cards crashing down. rulers are as parsimonious as ever. pork-barrelling, extravagant promises The related question of land During the Japanese Foreign and not a tittle demagogy about reform is perhaps the most immediate Minister’s recent, much-publicised democracy. one facing Aquino. The international visit to the South Pacific, the The Philippines left, after the media, and her close adviser Cardinal Australian media predicted very experience of the two-month ceasefire Sin, are unanimous in calling for real generous Japanese loans to South ana the referendum is now evaluating action on this front. After all, land Pacific island nations. In fact, Japan a year of Aquino rule and its future reform is not contradictory to gave a miserable $6 million to the evolution. The underground left capitalist development: indeed, it is South Pacific, and has shown no signs grouped in the National Democratic essential for it. Aquino would only of generosity to the Philippines. Front, and the major above-ground carry out a token land reform, with In such a situation, the Aquino left in the unions (KMU — May First substantial compensation to government remains very much within Movement) and the Peasants landlords. To finance that, her the grip of US domination. Internally, Movement (KMP), are united in economics ministers recently it is emerging as a typical pre-Marcos seeing the “principal contra­ approached the World Bank for regime, building its networks of local diction” as between the “people SUS500 million. The bank refused and bosses (many of them ex-Marcos and reaction” — with Aquino very now Aquino must go cap in hand to converts) into an electoral machine much in the camp of reaction. A the Asian Development Bank, closely linked with the privileged and minority both in the NDF and particularly in the urban-based above­ ground left, see the principal contradiction as that between fascism and the people— in which Aquino is defined as an anti-fascist. The danger of a “fascist" coup remains, although much lessened now compared with previous months. The Aquino government remains unable to control the military or prevent it from massacring and brutalising the peasantry, among whom support for the NDF is now widespread. Aquino and her army chief General Ramos are united in seeking, by all and any means, to destroy the revolutionary forces. In this they are at one with the Pentagon strategists who advocate "Low Intensity Conflict” (LIC). The LIC strategy does not mean less bodies on the ground, but it does seek to make the bodies more clearly defined as the “enemy" It means also a much more “political" war and the construction of grassroots repression, building “anti-communist” militia in each barrio and shanty town to work with the military in "weeding out” the “communists", selectively rather than by arbitrary massacres. LIC requiresa more sophisticated, politically active military which is also able to provide some "civic action” benefits to those peasants and shanty dwellers who co­ operate, and a certainty of harsh punishment if they do not. Inevitably, it is the lumpen elements, the criminals and psychotics who become the spearhead of the BRIEFINGS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 7

“anti-communist militia". Under Marcos, such gangs — the Civilian Home Defence Force (CHDF) — operated as paramilitary auxiliaries and were among the most notorious for human rights violations. They remain untouched under Aquino. But the CHDF is nota model for LIC, not least because it exists separately from the people in army barracks. Other anti-communist gangs, including the recently created Alsa Masa in Davao City, Mindanao, are criminal gangs under another name, despite their claimed success and recruitment of former New People's Army guerrillas. Critical to the success of L1C is a “democratic” facade, with a civilian president speaking the language of reform. Napoleon Duarte in El Salvador is a good example of the type of figure the US LIC strategy requires. While Aquino is not yet fully absorbed into the Duarte image, she is on the way to becoming so. The Philippines military, on the admission of Aquino’s Defence Minister lleto, is incompetent, poorly- disciplined and unsophisticated, and not a suitable instrument for apply:i.p the LIC strategy. In the provinces, it operates as a mafia, leading most criminal activities and extorting local businesses and peasants alike. If Aquino won a landslide endorsement in the referendum, it was essentially a vote for her liberal democratic trends against the military-in-place which is rightly identified as fascist. If the vote had been between the NDF and the military, then the landslide would have been for the NDF. Thus, while the popularity and still- high hopes which the masses have of Aquino undoubtedly pose a problem and worker masses continues, but the the principal source of the for the NDF, it does not lessen their challenge is to assemble their “allies” contradiction in Filipino politics. The grassroots support in the face of the among the middle forces. These NDF and the revolutionary left in the military and corrupt local bosses. T he middle forces in turn can help the Philippines as a whole represents the Aquino problem is much more acute armed struggle reach a new phase, most dynamic and sophisticated force for the NDF among the urban “middle given their access to skills which are in Asia today. Its internal democracy forces” — the professionals, the office sorely needed. is impressive, while its flexibility in workers and small business people relation to tactics combines with who, although small in proportion The NDF participation in the a firmness of principle which has to the population, wield great ceasefire was, in large part, directed to inspired many who have witnessed it. influence. It is a sign of the strength of the need to reach these middle forces, Imputations that it is the ”new Khmer the revolutionary forces that they now and was often reluctantly accepted in Rouge” are gross and even laughable. place great importance on their work the guerrilla zones for that reason among the “middle forces” almost to alone. It is equally significant that it is Denis Freney the point of preoccupation. The the left working among the middle grassroots work among the peasants forces which generally sees fascism as 8 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW F E A T lR E

SCOOP! The Media Takeovers

Kate Harrison * Communications reports have recommended changes to the ownership limits, so that they reflect the discrepancies in industry power between the owners of stations in the largest cities, and the owners of stations in smaller country areas. n the last few months the face of media ownership in The options for change which have been propposcd in Australia has changed dramatically. The Labor the past, however, always suggested lifting the ownership I government’s announcement that it was intending to limits in such a way that new limits allowed the smaller change the TV ownership limits started some unprecedented owners to increase their holdings. It was proposed by the selling of TV stations, at unprecedented prices. Minister for Communications. Michael Duffy, that smaller TV owners should be allowed to expand up to the market The current broadcasting laws limit any company to level oi the largest owners. The largest then were Packerand only owning two TV stations. Over the last ten years the Murdoch who reached 43 percent of the national TV rules have been criticised as inequitable, since they equate audience through their stations in Sydney and Melbourne. stations in Mt. Isa or Kalgoorlie with stations in Sydney or By owning more than two stations, in smaller markets, the Melbourne. smaller owners could work towards an equivalent total Since 1982, various Tribunal and Department of reach of 43 perccnt. FEATURE AUSTRALIAN LEFT jREVIEW 9

Duffy's proposal for a new ownership limit based on a when the H WT takeover began, waiting for a Federal Court ceiling of a 43 percent audience reach was clearly a policy decision on the legal question of whether Murdoch was in which was designed to allow smaller TV owners to grow in “control” of the stations or not. size and strength in the TV industry to equal the size of The Federal Court happened to deliver its decision Packer’s and Murdoch's holdings. relating to Murdoch’s control of the Channel 10 stations, Duffy’s 43 percent proposal, however, and and the effect of the corporate restructuring, in the midst of presumably the policy considerations underlying it, was his attempt to take over the Herald and Weekly Times. The swept aside in the surprising Cabinet decision to introduces Federal Court took a strong line that the purpose of the Act new, far higher ownership limit of a 75 percent audience was clearly to avoid foreign control, and that corporate reach. Under this proposal, anyone owner, formerly limited restructuring should not avoid it. They ruled that the way to two stations, could hold TV stations in every capital city, Murdoch had restructured his companies was not plus some more in the country. The final Cabinet decision necessarily an effective way of removing him from control of appears to be based on a policy of “let the biggest get the TV licences. bigger", with no other analysis or strategy underlying it. The Federal Court’s decision put the ball back in the The government justified thisderegulatory step on total Tribunat’s court, to then examine whether Murdoch in fact ownership limits by also proposing the introduction of cross remained in control of the stations, thereby breaching the media rules — prohibiting any one company from owning a foreign ownership law. TV station and a newspaper in the same area. The cross As well as raising legal problems for Murdoch’s ability media rules, however, won’t force owners to sell off existing to keep the Channel 10 stations he had formerly owned, the holdings. So Fairfax, for example, owning both ATN-7 and Federal Court decision raised some more urgent problems the Herald in Sydney, would be allowed to keep both media for his Herald and Weekly Times takeover . Since HWT going and would not be required to divest. Companies with owned both TV and radio stations, the steadily increasing such cross media holdings can retain them until they choose News Ltd. shareholding in the company again raised the to sell. prospect that a foreigner was “controlling” broadcasting The announcement of these proposed new rules began a stations. summer spree of buying and selling in the media industry. The fact that companies owning two TV stations could own more meant that the competition to expand was fierce, and the bidding would be high. The chance to buy an Australia- The final Cabinet decision appears to be wide network of stations may not occur again for years. based on a policy of ‘Let the biggest get in an early and massive billion dollar deal, the Bond corporation, which owned TV stations in Perth and bigger’, with no other analysis or strategy Brisbane, purchased Packer’s stations in Sydney and behind it. Melbourne to give it the first Australia-wide network. Bond is counting on the proposed changes getting through the parliament, despite murmurings of disquiet from the Democrats, and even the odd Liberal. The Tribunal reacted to this new potential breach of the At the same time, and probably partly in response to foreign ownership and control prohibitions by calling the new ownership rule announcement. Murdoch made his another inquiry. The timing of the inquiry was critical, since bid for the Herald and Weekly Times (HWT) the largest Murdoch’s News Ltd. was daily buying more parcels of of Australia’s media ow ners. He fought off or bought off shares in HWT. The Australian Journalists Association counter-bids, first from Holmes a'C-ourt and later from (AJA), Actors F.quity, and Free the Media argued strongly Fairfax, and now appears to have control of the media giant that the Tribunal should step in immediately and make — albeit a giant now reduced in si/e after some hasty asset orders to stop Murdoch from buying any more shares, selling. effectively preventing him from proceeding with the Murdoch's takeover of HWT ran into considerable takeover until the foreign control issue was resolved. The legal difficulties. Although there is no law stopping Tribunal adopted a far less interventionist stance, refusing foreigners from owning our newspapers, the broadcasting to stop the Murdoch group purchasing HWT shares. The laws prohibit foreigners from owning or controlling any Tribunal only disallowed the registration of any shares he Australian radio and TV stations. Murdoch was forced by had purchased. During an adjournment ofa few days within similar US laws to become an American citizen when he the inquiry, then, Murdoch's takeover of HWT was sewn up purchased TV stations there in 1985. as he reached a shareholding level of well over fifty percent. The Broadcasting Tribunal had for some time been When the Tribunal’s inquiry resumed in early looking at whether Murdoch was in brcach of the foreign February, it was clear that Murdoch already had a majority ownership laws in relation to the Channel 10 stations in of shares, bought but not registered, and that Murdoch Sydney and Melbourne, with Murdoch relying on some appeared to be in clear breach of the Act, as a foreigner then fancy corporate restructuring which tried to distance him contolling the HWT stations. While News Ltd. doggedly from control of the broadcasting companies, while still argued to the Tribunal that Murdoch was no longeron their allowing him to reap the profits. 1 he Tribunal’s extensive board, and had no authority to bind the company, the front and long running inquiry into the Channel I Os was on hold page stories each day outlining Rupert’s new deals with 10 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW FEATURE

various rivals undermined the credibility of claims that he and withdrew their opposition to the takeover. It was was not personally controlling the takeover. alleged in the daily press that M urdoch helped hand out At this point, the Tribunal could have taken strong the goods. Fairfax got HSV-7 in Melbourne, West action. It had the power to examine the evidence of Australian entrepreneur Kerry Stokes picked up ADS-7 Murdoch's personal involvement in the takeover, and to Adelaide, and a number of radio stations and smaller order that the unregistered shares be divested in order to press titles also changed hands. “cure" the breach of the law which appeared to have occurred. Such an order would have stopped Murdoch's takeover attempt dead in its tracks, and perhaps encouraged The Tribunal, however, chose not to flex more serious analysis of the then rival Fairfax bid. The Tribunal, however, chose not to flex its muscles its muscles .... and step into the takeover battle in such a spectacular way. It chose instead to adopt the approach that it was the responsibility of the HWT board to ensure that the laws The auction itself raised questions, however, as to prohibiting foreign ownership of its broadcasting stations whether the prince of print had himself been handing out the were not being breached as a result of the takeover. The jewels, before he was allowed to join the HWT board. HW I board asked the Tribunal for an adjournment of the The Tribunal, unfortunately, was not interested in inquiry so that it could meet and attempt to resolve the legal pursuing the allegations of Murdoch's involvement in the difficulties itself. Clearly, the HWT board supported assets sale, although any such involvement could have been Murdoch's bid for the company and would have been keen further evidence of a breach of the laws prohibiting foreign to avoid having the Tribunal lake any steps to block the control. takeover. The Tribunal instead decided not to intervene, and to The Tribunal gave the adjournment, and the HWT accept the auctioneering approach of the HWT board as a board, faced with the need for drastic action to resolve the lawful way to overcome the breaches of the law. O'Connor breach of the law. then called its extraordinary auction sale later, in evidence to the Senate Committee on TV of all its broadcasting stations. By selling the stations it Equalisation, referred to their approach as one of “licensee could remove the problem of foreign control, and ensure responsibility", whereby the Tribunal throws back onto the that M urdoch s takeover of the remaining print components licensees themselves the responsibility for ensuring that the of the company could proceed. Companies opposing broadcasting laws are not breached. In this case, however, it Murdoch picked up some of the jewels from the crown — could be argued that the breach existed for some weeks before the licensee took steps to resolve it, and that thesteps taken to "resolve” it in fact exacerbated the breach. A NEW LEFT PRESS?

Four half-day working sessions t h e s e e U v e n

Saturday, April 4 & Sunday, April 5 Single Issue A$7 Special Issue on the work of Agnes Heller Subscriptions: (Number 16, to be published April 1987) including Merewether Building, Sydney University (3 issues) articles by Agnes Heller. Rtchard Bernstein Individuals ASI6 Axel Honneih. Sandor Radnon, David Cooper, Is a new left newspaper and/or monthly possible in Am adeo Vigorelli and Caspar Tomas, plus articles (overseas). AS 18 on labourism in Australia by Frank Castles and (airmail): AS30 Australia today? John Murphy Institutions: A$40 Speakers include Chris Warren (AJA), Peter Browne (Aust. Society), (airmail): A$48 Diana Simmonds (the British experience), Denis Freney (Tribune), Sean Kidney (Streetwiie), Jane Inglis (Scarlet Woman). Current Issue, number 15. 1986. includes: Sessions will cover: 'Case studies from Australia and overseas Social Democracy in Australia and lessons to be learnt *what is the potential audience? *what Stuari MacIntyre Arendt's Political Theory should be the editorial viewpoint? *format and regularity Please make Ferenc Feher •finance, promotion, distribution *a final working session to cheques payable to Praxis and Poesis outline continuing discussion and organisation. Thesis Eleven C)'orgy Mark us Foucault and Adorno Send to New Left Press working sessions. C/- PO Bo* A714, Sydney Ajcel H on neth South, NSW 2000. Plus Karl-Werner Brandi on new social movements, [ ) Please keep me informed about the New Left Press working Michael Bittman on Marx and Weber and an sessions. interview with Gayatart Spivak I ] I enclose I ...... to register for the New Left Press working sessions. Send to: Thesis Eleven, (Registration fees: Full weekend: SI5 employed: SiO unemployed, full-time Previous Issue, number 14. 1986, includes Juergen Dcpi. of Sociology students, pensioners.) Habermas on Foucault and Kant, Axel Honneth on and Politics. Cascoriadis, Sean Sayers on leisure and needs, Paul NAME Phillip Institute Redding on Habermas, Lyotard .ind Wittgenstein, of Technology, L iz Gross on Derrida and Mitchell Dean on Foucault Bundoora. 3083 and modernity, plus Chilla Bulbeck and Peler Australia Beilharz on the ACTU-ALP Accoid FEATURE AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 11

The “resolution” in fact gave rise to further possible Murdoch’s sale of the Sydney and Melbourne Channel breaches, because the HWT TV stations were sold to 10 stations to Northern Star, which closely followed the companies which already owned two stations, HWT sales, backed by Westfields, again accentuates the Fairfax and Stokes, putting them both over the two station concentration of ownership. Moreover, the media changes limit. Like Bond, both companies will try to wait out their may not be over yet. Companies moving now to take breach of the two station rule until the new rules allowing advantage of the proposed seventy-five percent ownership ownership of three stations are introduced. The Tribunal limit will undoubtedly be wanting to buy as many stations as they can. as quickly as possible. The break-up of the Herald and Weekly Times, and the other changes in media ownership over the past few months, The chance to buy an Australia-wide have been spectacular, the corporate manoeuvrings network of stations may not occur again attracting vast media coverage as news stories in themselves. for years. Less coverage has been given to the long-term policy implications of the cha nges, the prospects for a vigorous and critical media under the proposed new rules, or the policy arguments against further concentrating our media will be examining the various transactions one by one in ownership. inquiries over the next few months. The new legislation may well be in place by then. Even if the new laws are not passed by then, the companies with more than two stations would be able to take advantage of the “pe riod of grace" the current Act allows them for divesting excess holdings.

• Bond: No cup, but a handy consolation.

• Murdoch: From the siege of Wapping to the ramparts o f HWT.

• Holmes a'Court: A late entry. • Fairfax: Murdoch's only serious opposition. 12 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW F E A T LIRE

The last barrier to the Murdoch takeover was removed on 3 March when the Trade Practices Commission announced that it was satisfied that the News Ltd, takeover of HWT had not increased the concentration of ownership of the print media in Australia. The commission’s decision must be seen as a blow to those arguing for a greater diversity of ownership of our press. The Trade Practices Act prohibits takeovers which wjll leave one company in a dominant position in a market as a result of I heir acquisition of a second company. Although the takeover sees News Ltd. increasing its press holdings substantially from 28 percent of the circulation capital city dailies to 58 percent, the commission argued that HWT had been a prominent press publisher before the takeover, and that News Ltd. had not been allowed simply to aggregate its own holdings with that of HWT Instead of looking at the total percentage of influential capital city circulation in the control of the one proprietor, the commission locussed on the divestitures made by the Murdoch group. The commission emphasised, in particular, the divestiture of West Australian Newspapers from the HWT group, and the sale of Murdoch's papers in Adelaide and Brisbane. They took a market by market approach, analysing the ownership changes state by state, and ignoring the total picture of an unprecedented dominance in the national market. have to pay if they lost) could be as high as $100,000. The legal process thus remains beyond the reach ofevensomeof the larger union and consumer groups. While the controls While the Hawke government has shown and mechanisms of the law appear to have worked only in its willingness to deliver the goods to the interests of the major media owners, the average newspaper reader may have cause to wonder whether the friendly media owners ... Senate may yet processes of legal protection are worth the paper they’re have its day and decide to block the new written on. At the time of going to press, the Senate Committee on rules. TV Equalisation is still hearing evidence covering many of the issues raised by the changes. The committee may well Moreover, while the commission stressed the deliver a split report, possibly even with some strong emergence of new competitors to News Ltd., the strongest of opposition to the new ownership proposals. While the the competitors. Fairfax, has only 24 percent of the total Hawke government has shown its willingness to deliver the goods to friendly media owners, and regulatory bodies like circulation compared to Murdoch's 58 percent; other supposed competitors are very small and relatively the Trade Practices Commission, the Foreign Investment insignificant press proprietors in national terms. Review Board and the Tribunal have not taken effective action, parliament, or more speficically, the Senate, may yet The Trade Practices Commission's blind eye to the have its day and decide to block the new rules. Perhaps we'll increase in press control resulting from the takeover is the then have some enjoyment watching the new media owners last link in a chain of decisions by government and statutory reshuffle again, leaving them somewhat more wary in future bodies which have facilitated the takeover. about their confidence in the government’s support. The options from here are limited. Both the Australian Consumers Association and the Australian Journalists Association took legal advice on whether the takeover *.4n earlier version of ill is article m published in contravened the Trade Practices Act, and received a QC's Communications Update, the newsletter of the Media and advice that a breach had occurred. The groups applied for Com mimical ions Council. and received - legal aid from the Legal Aid Commission of NSW to challenge the legality of the takeover. Although willing to take the risk of having to pay costs of some tens of KATE HARRISON worksal the Public Interest Advocacy Centre thousands of dollars, the two groups were forced to drop in Sydney. the challenge when informed that the costs of the legal teams which would be ranged against them (and which they might .AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 13 DIANA AND SARAH: Images of Ourselves

Diana Simmonds undiluted years of Mrs. Thatcher and was in need of a lolly to take away the nasty taste. The“fairytale” princess, as she was inevitably dubbed, was made n Today’s People the title of this to order. Particularly for Fleet Street. epic was, inevitably perhaps, The warning signs for women I shortened to concentrate on came very early: Diana's uncle, one of Sarah and Diana, but the title is really the more toadlike Spencers of “Sarah and Diana - images of Althorp, went on national television to ourselves". And by that I mean that i personally guarantee her virginity. see them literally as images of “us” as This astonishing statement was taken in wester women, Australian women, as, FIRST of all, an unquestioned women of the late 20th century. truth and, SECOND, a reasonable They are true representations of and unquestioned statement to make ourselves and I believe that in looking about a person. It didn’t occur to the at (hem we can see what has happened interviewer to ask how the old goat to “us” in the last ten or fifteen years. knew she was a virgin; after all, how What is happening to us now. And what we can expect to happen to us in the near future — our future. And I’d like to think — and that we should all think — about what we can and should do about it. I’d like to look over some of the events of the past six years in a kind of chronology — with some jumpcuts and flashbacks to point up where and what I believe arc significant matters for us all to consider. In 1981, Lady Diana Spencer descended, fully fledged and virgin, on the British media and public. The then successful leftwing publishing house, Pluto Press, decided they needed a light-hearted piccc about her in their next Year Book of world events. They asked me to do it. For some reason, it’s usually me who’s asked to do this kind of thing. I would never have been asked to write Hamlet. The thing to bear in mind a bout Diana is that it had to be light-hearted in order to illustrate that we weren’t taken in by the hype and weren’t selling out to the running dog lackeys of increased sales and mass popularity. At the time, you may remember, Britain had just celebrated two 14 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

DO you ensure a girl’s virginity except millions of young girls and women the rewards of virginity and chastity by physical examination. And neither across the country, the dream had and nuptial bliss despite Germaine did it occur to anyone to be outraged become reality: the frog had been Greer, Gloria Steinem and years of that the state of her hymen was a kissed and Diana had become a women's liberation. talking point and, by definition, public princess. They were all for it. Given In HER books, every good girl lived property. half the chance and they’d do it along happily ever after and that meant (I) At the time, women on the left, with Di, no worries. that she was a virgin to start with, (2) feminists, were caught in a curious Never mind that the frog that she kept it that way despite being position: to be offended by Diana’s remained a frog. crushed to the chest of the treatment by the media and to voice a He was a rather pleasant frog by huskyvoiced hero in the first six pages, protest or defence somehow was the standards of the day and and that (3) she still kept it that way transformed into a defence of the unconscionably rich too. When they despite the temptations of passion and monarchy and of privilege and married I remember that someone did various different evil-intentioned lust privileged women. Many women felt merchants until, finally, between two appalled and puzzled but nevertheless and six pages before the end, she didn’t say anything, me included. It succumbs to the rising wave of ecstasy was this line of male left thinking that For many millions of and desire and submits her will to his. held women’s issues, that is, the kinds young girls and women But this definitely does NOT mean she of things women wanted to place on across the country, the surrenders her virginity, either before the political agenda, to be distractions marriage, or before the end of the and unnecessary to the real work of dream had become reality: book. That vital epistemiological promoting the revolution. The the frog had been kissed break finally occurs in the imagination temporary paralysis and guilt it caused of readers, it does not sully Miss in women permitted the most spirited and Diana had become a Cartland's pages, nor tax her creative and imaginative leftwing attacks on princess. powers; she does have two sons and the Thatcher government to rise to the Never mind that the frog several Pekingeses, but I think she heights of the demo march chant actually got them at Harrods. “Funk Thatcher”. And also allowed remained a frog. But, seriously, these books are this entirely dreary and sexist response worth examination. There are dozens to go unchallenged. of them, and again, quite seriously, Indeed, on THE Wedding Day, you only need to read one as the plots the official alternative celebration in an estimate of his daily income as are as entirely interchangeable as that London was an outdoor festival of someing like £8,000 sterling, which I precis suggests. It would be a mistake reggae and warm beer which went always thought was probably an to dismiss them, though, and not least under the title “Funk the Wedding” underestimate. Anyway, the point is because those scores of books sell in and was closely accompanied by the that, in material terms alone, the the multi-millions. They’ve been standard "Funk Thatcher” rituals. The rewards were incalculable and, translated into nearly every language feminist magazine Spare Rib ran a probably even more important, just as except English, which Miss Cartland more carefully thought out, and Barbara Cartland had been predicting remains stubbornly and blithely worded, campaign with their best for decades in her romantic novels. unable to write — although I don’t selling “Don’t Do It Di” badges, but it Diana's fairy-floss step-grand mother suppose either she or her bank was predictable that, for many more had never stopped plugging away at manager care a fig about that. AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 15

Then again, despite, or maybe on into the actual social issues, like clearly pointed up the impossible because of, the new realism of the '80s long-term unemployment, the plight demands being made of young that we see in soap/life like East of the aged, racism, and soon. There is women. Diana was praised for her Enders and Brookside. there is still a no falsely rosy glow over Brookside desirable "slimness” and “model girl" determination, by millions of young Close or Albert Square, they do tell it figure and then made to suffer the "has women, to continue to believe in the tike it is. Di got killer anorexia slimmcrs’ Cartland-style fairytale romance Which is where the Cartland disease?” treatment. version of life. And when you consider school of escape comes in and can be The demands of polar opposites is the bastardry of daily life for the seen in the light of the second the most common dilemma for average working class girl in Britain argument against it. With the descent women: the “good” girl is the one who today, it isn’t surprising. to earth of Princess Diana, the fiction is desirable for the purposes of was made flesh. For millions of young marriage; on the other hand, the “bad” girts, she was living proof that living girl is the one the boys go for and happily ever after was something to TheyVe been translated “good” girls who stay that way strive for, and was attainable, with apparently don’t get asked out a into nearly every language effort. It has to be admitted, second time. How does a girl win? As but English, which Miss though, that East Enders is Princess time went by, Diana further Diana’s favourite TV program and she compounded the contradictions by Cartland remains stubb­ is an avid reader of Cartland novels. ornly and blithely unable to So you could say that, as the theory said to the practice, "honey, it don’t write ... signify”. Like the original Virgin The conclusion of my book Mother, Diana really has Princess Di — the National Dish, been an impossible act to There arc two arguments at work written in late 1982, was that Diana when it comes to the power of TV soap was destined to be the disastrous icon follow. and the Mills and Boon romances. of the 'SOs. I don’t think I was wrong. One says that people aren’t stupid and On the one hand, the issue of her that they know it's escapism and that virginity put women right back in the seemingly managing the impossible they’re deliberately choosing it for just centre of male ownership wrangles. and incorporatingthe images of Virgin that purpose. The second argument is The Chief of the Tribe, the King, could and Mother in the one perfect Size Ten that people identify with the soap not be seen to possess a lesser man's body. characters or the situations to be cast-off, or what would that say about Like the original Virgin Mother, found in penny-dreadful romances their collective male pride and she really has been an impossible act to and that this is dangerously standing in the eyes of the world. follow. misleading. On the other hand, her At this point 1 think it’s worth The first argument is probably appearance and the emphasis on her considering where we get our roles of true when it comes to the images of weight put pressure right back on perfect images and ideal appearance. things like Dallas and Dynasty which women once again to Look Right. To Advertising is the most pervasive and are clearly fantasy and enjoyed as most influential source of Pictures of such. East Enders and Brookside are Women. None of us can go through a the other side of the coin. There is day without seeing, subliminally or nothing glamorous about the Diana was destined to be otherwise, exactly how we are situations depicted in these two radical supposed to look. That some women soaps and they attract mail by the the disastrous icon of the know and understand the problems of truckload, most of which confirms eighties. these images doesn’t seem to help that people see their own misfortunes break their power. Not least because and problems reflected each week on many ads have now taken on the the screen. superficial trappings of feminism and By “radical soap” I mean that strive to achieve the ideal Size Ten. neatly turned them around. they've moved quite radically away For ten years, feminists had been So increasingly we have images of from what we've come to expect of TV arguing that a woman should not be apparently independent, even soap. A Country Practice and judged merely by the way she looked, aggressive, young women who, Coronation Street, for instance, have particularly when that look depended nevertheless, on careful examination, always been Lagged on the realistic side on artifice and self-inflicted torture. look, and thus indicate, just the of soap — real situations, real issues, Dieting, as a legitimate and desirable opposite. And that is: my aggression is real prime ministers, everyday life. occupation, had just begun to give way only a titillating obstacle for the Both a bit cosy though and quite to notions of healthy and sensible observer to overcome and my pout unlike the two new ones which started eating when Diarta came along and and stance actually mean I am with deliberate policies of butting head blew it all out of the window again. It available for sex and really telling the 16 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

observer of that availability; there are And it should be remembered briefest examination of those images constant subtle reminders that, as that Peter Sutcliffe was not a weird, will tell you that they are the creations ever, when girls say “no” they really freaky monster- Everyone who knew of people who don’t like women very mean “yes". him said he was an ordinary sort of much. In reality, women are human And, of course, the girls in the ads guy. Of course, it did come out that it beings who do not look like are always always always slim to the was really his wife Sonia who was the adolescent boys unless they're of the point of androgyny and definitely not catalyst for his rampage, It was really tiny percentage whose bodies can be women with breasts, hips, thighs, her fault. This may sound familiar. starved into submission — like Diana autonomy and demands. Which brings us back to images of and the archetypal girl-boy, Twiggy, Princess Diana is an advertising ourselves, and Diana and Sarah. And they’re the tiny group of women image come to life. She is also a Because they take their cues and clues who become fashion models and fashion page image come to life. That from the same sources, just like us, but impose their bodies on the rest of us. she is the mother of two children has unlike us. the results aren’t made not destroyed this. She is somehow public to millions of people. In the This image entirely denies full above the sweat and toil of human main, public imagery of women is breasts, swelling hips, soft flesh, undertakings — like sex for instance. created, as I’ve said, by men. The motherhood and thus, by association. The furore that erupted when pictures of her, heavily pregnant and in a bikini, were splashed across the tabloids was actually not much to do with bad taste and an invasion of privacy (who on Fleet Street has ever cared a hoot for taste and privacy!) but was actually all about the horridly revealed evidence of her womanliness and impending motherhood. Any pregnant woman will know how people, men in particular, shy away from the great big fruitful belly. It is an awesome and fearful thing. In 1977, Dame Edna Everagesaid to a reporter from the British Gay News that she felt the only difference between him and her was that although they both came from the same place originally, he was terrified 23 I 1.1 LY I9K/* of ever getting anywhere near it again. This is neither a flippant nor a homophobic statement. It sums up the actual state of mind of many gay (and heterosexual) men and it is rarely, if ever, acknowledged. One of the problems for feminist activists in the '70s, and for lesbian feminists, was, I think, that although we all knew and privately talked about the fact of gay hostility to women (and frequently, downright hatred of women) it was never taken up as an issue in any way for fear of appearing to be anti-gay in a social climate where such a possibility would be immediately seized upon by those who were anti-gay. Consequently, those gay men who are woman-haters have somehow always been granted the right to be that way. And heterosexual men have never had to think about it anyway, it really has always been their birthright. AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 17

the hidden horrors that go with them: in feminist thinking, is not the point at editors of women’s magazines menstrua] blood for instance, and the issue. It is one of semantics, and I think scuttling for the archives to dust off the thing that the ABC will tell you is the is one more symptom of the swing to images of the ’50s, which was the last most shocking, disgusting and vile backlash, albeit unwitting and time women looked remotely like the word in the English language, the cunt. unconscious, real thing. Remote is probably the The fact that “cunt" is still the most The next major pointer in the word, though, because gut-crushing derogatory and most viciously used onward march of reaction was, and is, girdles, mandatory 19-inch waists, swear word in our society is Sarah Ferguson. But along the way we cantilevered padded bras, pencil skirts significant. can see all the signs, some larger and and winklepicker stiletto-heeled shoes Feminist has also become almost others less obvious, but all there for immediately cancelled out any truly a swear word. It’s definitely the observant to pick up. At first, threatening feminity. unfashionable right now, a bit like Sarah Ferguson looked like being a Like Diana, only a few years wearing flares. better bet for women than the before, Sarah had to endure endless Backlash, prefigured by the rise and impossible dreamgirl, the Princess of public discussions of how to improve rise of Ronald Reagan, Margaret Wales. For a start she was labelled the way she looked — not dissimilar to Thatcher and the New Right, has been accessible and ordinary by her how millions of young western women upon us for some time and is growing nickname, Fergie. Nothing remote or are treated by this society, except that in strength. Feminism has always had glamorous there. That in itself is her ordeal involved thousands of tons to contend with the "bra-burning actually a clue as to how she has been of newsprint and hours of television women’s libber” or “smelly screeching cut down and remade by the press. punditry. So, although at first it lezzos” phraseology of the daily press. looked like Sarah was going to go her Derision Theology is a traditional own way, be her own woman, thumb method of preventing any new idea her nose at the image makers, kick up being taken seriously and is very As the papers were keen to her heels at popular opinion and so on, effective. Unfortunately, the left isn’t tell us, Sarah had a big it was perhaps inevitable that we too good at it — “Funk Thatcher’’ is would open the papers one morning to ^roof of that. Then there’s the inside bum, a bosom, ample find ... The Sarah Ferguson Diet. You attack, unwitting or otherwise, which thighs, was a bit of a too can be like Fergie and trim away is invariably the most difficult to fend those unwanted inches. off. The most damaging knock at plumpo and — ye gods — feminism that has occurred in recent she had a past. Unwanted by whom? She had years is also symptomatic of the obviously been happy with her inches. reactionary times. Andrew had obviously been happy About three years ago, Chatto & Diana has actually taken the line with them too. So who didn't want her Windus published a collection of of possible attainment, that is, where inches? At the same time; Linda women poets which was subtitled an ordinary woman strives for the Koslowski was undergoing trial by “post-feminist”. i think it was the first unreal images of fashion/tv/ movies, camera when she revealed a dimpled time that term was used. It has since Diana has taken the boundaries of bum in Crocodile Dundee. It seems become common currency. Whatever possibility right into fantasy land. She that cellulite — whatever that is — is it was supposed to mean, it has been is indistinguishable from Sue Ellen the most offensive bodily taken to mean that feminism is now Ewing or Krystle Carrington, except characteristic a woman can display in over. Official. Feminists have said so that she’s almost 30 years younger. public. 1 don’t know any man who themselves. In other words, “post Sarah brought all that right back prefers the skeletal androgyne to a feminism” has been taken quite to earth again. As the papers were keen woman who looks womanly (with literally as “after feminism”. At the to tel! us, she had a big bum, a bosom, breasts, thighs, hips, bum, curves, time it created a whole rash of ample thighs, was a bit of a plumpo cellulite and all). Whenever there is a instances where writers and and — ye gods — she had a past. magazine survey of ordinary Joes they broadcasters spoke of “now that the A past is Fleet Street’s all say they like a cuddly womanly aims of feminism have been achieved” euphemism for a busted hymen, of woman, that women feel nice and that or “now that the most modern wave of course. They d idn’t exactly say she was the skinny minny boy-girl isn’t their feminism is over” and used as their a good-time gadabout floozy, but they id^al at all. proof and reference point the term did list all her lovers in minute detail. In other words, it’s Sarah who post feminist. And it is now pest All three of them. At 27 she could be is closer to Everywoman, not Diana, feminist and it has now irrevocably said to have given promiscuity a bad who is a constructed icon, an image. entered the language as “post- name. Nevertheless, as it turned out, So what are the forces at work feminism”. Fact, her long-gone virginity didn’t matter that compel a Sarah and millions like The original meaning is lost and is half as much as her shape and her her to starve themselves into also irrelevant now. That there was a clothes — the way she looked. These someone’s idea of acceptable change of gear, a change in public became front-paglT national concerns appearance? By starving, 1 mean attitudes, a change in society, a change in Britain, and also sent the fasion dieting. I'm continually amazed at 18 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

how easily offensive things can be hit movie like Top Gun where the jet instance. What happened to rendered neutral by using another pilot hero quite literally rides a Hollywood’s obsession with youth, word. Sellafield doesn’t sound nearly multimillion dollar phallic symbol where an actress was on the scrap-heap as life-threatening as Windscale, for the sky and wins the palpitating heart at 35? What does it say about the instance. Harvesting is a much nicer heart of an older technocrat female. dubious nature of the matriarchal description than logging, as the That it is also an archetypal buddy image, the strong woman image? We woodchip industry has quietly movie and a fair example of homo­ could think about what it means that realised. And, of course, dieting is erotica is also worth noting. You can Joan Collins and the other Dallasty socially aceptable, essential even, see the teenage boyos leaving the woman look more like drag queens whereas starving doesn’t have quite than real women — or is it the other the right sound. way round? So we come back again to the But what I think we have to come hatred and fear of woman. It is Along with the rise of the to grips with is mysogyny, which is the inescapable and it is almost impossible New Right is a resurgence major force in our society. to talk about. I feel a compulsion to That means male power. Male apologise for bringing up the topic, to in the idea that it is OK power is exclusive — women are be reasuring and actually, to not talk again to be a man. excluded. No one has ever given up about it at all. The attacker should power willingly. So presumably it has succeed in making the attacked to be taken. That’s where revolution apologetic and placatory is nothing has to come. It has long been a fact. It new in relations between men and cinema with swaggering crotches and has to be reasserted as such. It’s a women: ask anyone in a rape crisis the newly affirmed right to conquest in bloody revolution, too, it’s the world’s centre. their minds. It is really scarey. longest running undeclared civil war Feminists have for long been The menopausal middle class has and women are dying every day. branded man-haters. Some feminists, similarly acceptable New Man Millions already have. So, the real in fact many women, do hate men and imagery in The Mission and The socialist revolution is the sexual for extremely good reasons. But it Mosquito Coast. Both movies are revolution. Not the one that was does seem that, after 15 years of primarily about the male concerns of supposed to have happened in the 70s repeating like a cracked record — masculine pride, honour, strangled when everyone fucked everyone else, Feminism isn’t anti-men, it’s emotions and bonding. In The took their bedroom doors off the prowomen — that we still haven’t got Mission, the trail of doom and disaster hinges and got into non-monogamy. very far and it is high time we figured is triggered off by a plainly culpable Profound though all that might out why not. Because it is effectively femme fatale. In The M osquito Coast, have been in causing a shift of sorts, it allowing the onward march of the wife and female lead is actually actually did nothing to disturb the real reaction, just as ‘Funk Thatcher’ called “Mother” and is indeed cast in power bases and actually quite allowed sexism to be an unquestioned the role of trailing around behind her effectively provided the distraction part of mainstream left political asinine husband, picking up the pieces from the forward march that women’s response. It is also effectively while he plays cowboys with their issues have always been accused of. It’s preventing any further human lives. It is grim that these two very fatuous to suppose that the revolution progress — which is the aim I guess. expensive and prestigious movies were is going to happen as it did in 1917. The fact is that feminists are so busy chosen by Anna Maria Dell’Oso as her This isn’t Russia. The poverty of the reassuring the world that they are not films of the year and were labelled poorest members of this society is as manhaters, that the really urgent and profoundly meaningful and moving. nought compared to that of the central issue — that of woman hatred This does serve to indicate how far we Russian peasantry. Poverty in the — is hardly allowed to surface at all. have to go to get out of the mess we’re West is as nought when you consider Similarly, as 1 said earlier, the in. that of Africa or South America. mysogyny of gay men is allowed to The traditional notion of bloody flourish undisturbed. And, as so much Diana and Sarah are good revolution occurs when a slow of the public imagery of women is shorthand symbols to show us where lingering death by starvation and no created by gay men, it really is we are right now and what we have to prospect of human dignity is the only something that has to be placed in the do. We could consider the strong other alternative. centre of the personal-political images of women that are around: Which is actually where some spotlight. By women. Sooner rather Ripley in Aliens perhaps. The women are already at. /-4-j than later. All around there is evidence matriarchs of the soaps. We could that the "quiche eaters”, the “muesli think about what it means when all the eaters”, the “sensitive male”, the major women stars of the moment are DIANA SIMMONDS is a journalist on “feminist man" is in retreat because, around 40 or more and make no bones the Sydney Morning Herald, and formerly along with the rise of the New Right is about it: Sigourney Weaver, Meryl on the London magazine City Limits. a resurgence in the idea that it is OK Streep, Sharon Gless, Linda Evans, again to be a man. This means a smash Linda Grey and Joan Collins, for AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 19

• Paul Weller, Jimmy Sommerville, Sarah-Jane Morris, Billy Bragg and Junior: Slumping for the Labour Parly, STRIKING A CHORD: Rock and Politics in the Eighties

artificial product of scheming tune in. drop out". By the early David Rowe capitalists. In between is a chaotic ’seventies, things had changed. While swirl of intermediate positions which I rock ideology nominally retained its will attempt to negotiate. In this article outsider status, the demise of both ock music, tike space, is big. I will focus on three current issues in rock hippiedom and full employment Very big. It has a huge rock concerning Live Aid, tobacco led to a period of "me generation” R audience, is extremely (and other) sponsorship and Red introspection and a concentration on culturally pervasive and is serviced by Wedge’s political mobilisation of musical and technological virtuosity. a vast leisure industry. Like that other young people. Until punk camc along. Once great arena of popular culture, sport, First, however, a brief again, rock was avowedly subversive, rock has provoked controversy over background.1 Rock is a child of the shocking and overtly political. Safety the relationship between commerce ’sixties. It is the product of a meeting pins, bondage gear, swastikas, tom and culture. between the musical forms which had clothing, spiky haircuts, swearing on been developed in the Yifties with the TV, and songs of urban deprivation all Put simply, there are two sensibilities which emerged within caused a new moral panic.2 But punk polarised positions on rock. At one post-war “baby boom" youth. Rock also joined the roll of faded rock styles end of the spectrum of opinion, rock is was the generation gap, the anti-war and was replaced in public viewed as dissenting, liberatory and movement, the sex and drugs push coasciousness by fads and fashions the authentic voice of contemporary into music. Alternately, it advocated variously described as “new wave”, youth. At the other end, it is regarded direct political protest and the indirect “new romanticism" and “new pop”. as being passive, repressive and the challenge of hedonism — “turn ori. Here there was an emphasis on smart 20 AUSTRALIAN LEFT .REVIEW

clothes and “easy listening” music. It “cannot be taken seriously as a outside, and a phenomenon (Live Aid) appeared that rock had again been co­ response to the crisis of famine in which was principally a televisual opted by the industry. However, the Africa, especially in Ethiopia", while event in which the members of the live burst of idealism which accompanied W. F. Buckley in the US found the audience were screen extras rather Live Aid and some forceful cause “philanthropic in design” but than protagonists. If we compare like expressions of leftist sentiments in could not overcome his aesthetic more strictly with like, the concerts for rock music suggest aht the pendulum revulsion and his concern as to Bangladesh in 1971 set up by George is swinging back to a less apolitical, whether “the capitulation of the Harrison were regarded by the amoral and acquisitive rock. But these middle-aged suggests a cultural organisers of Live Aid as points to how signs may be only mirages or smoke­ insecurity”. On the left, Greil Marcus not to run a relief campaign. Where screens. We can properly assess them in the US characterised Live Aid as the former was well meaning but only by looking beyond conventional “an enormous orgy of self-satisfaction, poorly administered, the latter was rock hyperbole and, in the process, self-congratulation" while Australian businesslike and tightly organised. establish some of the ways in which Shaun Kenaelly argues that Live Aid George Harrison’s guru was no match rock is simultaneously a product of the was: for Bob GeldoPs millionaire rock wider society and an important promoter, Harvey Goldsmith, in influence on the shape of that society, A miserable appeal to a generalised bringing home the charity bacon. that society. “common humanity" [which] ensures that Live Aid revealed two major no difficult questions are going to be It is now almost two years since a asked. The sheer conformism of the qualities of contemporary rock global audience of around 1.5 billion sentiments shout aloud ... 3 culture. First, the sheer size of its people from over 100 countries constituency indicates that, when (almost twice the 1984 L.A. Olympics It is rather difficult to adjudicate focussed, it is a very potent social audience) watched Mick Jagger, Bob between such disparate views. force. Second, in the ’eighties, it is Dylan, Madonna, David Bowie, Paul However, if we consider Live Aid’s apparent that rock is rather more McCartney, Sting, etc. all perform on historical precedents, our perspective respectable than in previous decades behalf of Live Aid, raising over US$40 improves. Comparisons were made and is much less the voice of a million in the process for African between Live Aid and Woodstock in generation or movement than a famine relief. “Saint Bob” Geldof, the the euphoria of the moment. Yet, on fragmented soundtrack of contemp­ organiser, is now a secular Sir Bob, reflection, it is apparent just how much orary events. By way of example, it is while various documentaries and news the social climate has changed in the clear that The Who’s “My Generation” reports have shown relief getting to expressed the generalised feelings of some needy areas and struggling to ’sixties youth. In the late ’seventies, the reach others, crops regenerating after punk band Generation X sang “Your rain, and also continued famine in Most newspaper coverage Generation” as a riposte to what it saw war-ravaged northern Sudan. Aid for was unabashedly well- as the indulgence of boring old hippie Africa has been a mixture of sucess farts. After Live Aid's success in and failure — as we would expect — disposed towards Live Aid, tapping into a diverse audience with and reactions to it have been similarly with an oft-expressed a considerable age span, the varied. Responses to it tend to have appropriate song might be “Whose fallen into two categories. First, there pleasant surprise that the Generation?" is the celebration of the whole affair, egoistic rock music Yet it would be misleading to in particular, its communality and industry had done deny that overt, youth-focussed philanthropy. When a hard-nosed dissent has disappeared completely rock entrepreneur like Bill Graham something altruistic for a from the face of rock. But, again, it is describes Live Aid as the rock music change. much more systematic and hard- industry’s “finest hour. By far” and a headed than in the flower-power era razor-penned critic like Julie Burchill which is conventionally held to be the acts as a self-confessed “unpaid high point of rock’s social impact. It publicist for Mr. Geldof’, then the sixteen years that separate the two has coalesced around a recent forces in favour of Live Aid are events. While Woodstock epitomised movement in Britain called Red considerable indeed. Most newspaper hippiedom — love, peace and drugs in Wedge, although it must be coverage was unabashedly well a large paddock in New York State — acknowledged that there are some disposed towards Live Aid, with an Live Aid reflected post-hippie obvious local predecessors — Rock often expressed pleasant surprise that pragmatism, a self-contained fund­ Against Racism, for example, or the egoistic rock music industry had raising event in Philadelphia and Midnight Oil’s involvement (along done something altruistic for a change. London linked by satellite technology. with other bands) in People for Such benevolent responses were Marshall McLuhan would have Nuclear Disarmament. Red Wedge is rejected by sections of the political left relished the contrast between a distinctive, however, because it is an and right. On the right, the Australian happening (Woodstock) which organised attempt to help elect a Financial Review argued that Live Aid television reported on from the political party. This is the British AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 21

Labour Party and it follows that we way: “The Young must learn to take have to be cautious about the their politics straight, like adults, and portability of the phenomenon to not like fidgety children who must be Australia which does not, as yet, have cajoled into thinking by concerts and a radical rightwing government. Yet singalongs ... ”4 In addition to such there are obvious parallels in the criticisms is the suggestion that those conditions faced by youth in both young people who attend Red Wedge countries. High youth unemployment, events are there to see their favourite lower youth wages, work-for-the-dole rock stars and listen to music, and that schemes, tertiary fees, and so on are all the intended “message" goes through realities or pressing prospects. or past their ears. However effective Britain, with a youth unemploy­ Red Wedge may be in its aims, it is ment rate approaching 30 percent and transparently the product of the an uncompromisingly reactionary predicament of youth in contemp­ government, was ripe to produce Red orary British society. Yet do the same Wedge in late 1985. Established rock conditions pertain to Australia and artists such as Paul Weller, Billy can we expect a similar movement Bragg, Sade, the Smiths and Lloyd here? Cole and the Commotions have In one obvious respect banded together with the express circumstances differ in Asutralia purpose of ousting Thatcherism and where the memory of a (conventional installing a Labour government in rather than radical) conservative Britain. The campaign was mounted government still remains and a Labor ihrough a series of concerts rather government has won the last two than through conventional rallies, elections. However, the current with literature discreetly distributed economic crisis arid the shift to the and occasional encouragement from right of the Labor government is the stage in the form of “throwaway” fashioning a comparable slate of comments or politically informed affairs. And the arguments used by songs, such as Billy Bragg’s “Between Bob Geldof: Popular hero? Red Wedge to support Labour in the Wars" or Style Council’s “Walls Britain are the same as those applied Come Tumbling Down”. The members of the Labour Party. by many young people to the emphasis is on the punk era notion of Now that some information has Australian Labor Party — they’re the '■serious tun”, but with a clearer been provided about Red Wedge, we best of a bad bunch. Yet it is doubtful purpose — a Labour victory in the may attempt to draw some whether such a movement would be next election. conclusions about its emergence. whether such a movement here would The relationship between Red There is, first, the question of what be avowedly socialistic like Red Wedge and the British Labour Party is kind of phenomenon it is. Like Live Wedge, given the exaggerated stigma a little ambiguous. The black soul Aid, it has critics on both left and attached to the term in Australia.5 This singer Junior Giscombe describes Red right. Nick Robinson of the Young is not to argue that intense political Wedge as being “for, but not of, the Conservatives sees Red Wedge as “just debates do not arise here in association Labour Party”. Initial funds came an attempt by Neil Kinnock to present with rock music. The current dispute from the Labour Party and Labour the Labour Party Youth Section over tobacco sponsorship of rock gigs office facilities have been used, but without the influence of Militant is testimony to rock’s political Red Wedge hopes to become which dominates the l.PYS". This is potential. financially autonomous. They are not a surprising position, coming as it In the middle ofl 985, the tobacco “mutually friendly societies” but Red does from a representative of the party industry (in the shape of Philip Morris' Wedge is anxious not to be seen as that Red Wedge has sworn to eject “Peter Jackson” brand) made a simply an arm of the Labour Party from office. major move into Australian rock. The and, in particular, PR for its leader But there has also been criticism Sydney-based Peter Jackson Rock Neil Kinnock. Rather, it sees itself as a from the “hard” left. X. Moore of the Circuit functioned as an exercise in broad alliance which is favourable but Socialist Workers Party and the market testing, with the ultimate aim not beholden to the Labour Party, Redskins band has argued that, while of having a national rock gig network seeking influence by retaining the Red Wedge has been effective in bearing the logo “ The Peter Jacicson right to be critical. The tension mobilising musicians “it’s hamstrung Rock Circuit Presents ... " Currently, between disciplined party politics and to uncritical support of Neil Kinnock; names such as Electric Pandas, the free-wheeling youth pressure group it can’t rock the boat, it can’t criticise”, Allniters, the Party Boys, the Saints, politics is apparent, for example, in while Julie Burchill has argued that Machinations and Boom Crash Opera Red Wedge’s uneasiness about the popular music is_incapable of being have followed that of Peter Jackson. rooting out of Trotskyite Militant effective in any orthodox political The tobacco company undertakes to 22 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

few years now, white Marlboro invested to buy goodwill through about this development is that it took (another Philip Morris brand) has association. This kind of the tobacco companies in Australia so sponsored acts overseas. With arch- underwrite the cost of publicity, long to stumble onto the idea. After corporate competitor Amatil (Benson promotion and advertising of selected all, Pepsi Cola have been doing it fora and Hedges) vying for the familair rock gigs in return for a brand-name rationalisation of the entertainment sport and high art outlets, the rock check on posters which prominently industry is commonplace, and it is not music audience is an appealing target feature open cigarette packets inviting really a major jump from the group. All that disposable income and (wordlessly) the consumer to taste and multinational corporate record pleasure-seeking should amount to a try- companies such as RCA, CBS, and good return on the $100,000 or so Perhaps the only surprising thing EMI (who have signed up most of the prominent Australian rock bands) to the other conglomerates who are looking for a piece of the youth market action. The tobacco companies, with their restricted advertising opportunities, are particularly keen to spread brand awareness through new channels. These manoeuvres have not, however, gone unchallenged. It is symptomatic of rock in the 'eighties that for every move by big business to colonise it there is resistance to such intrusion. Tobacco sponsorship of gigs was criticised in full-page advertisements by bands such as Hoodoo Gurus, Hunters and Collectors, and Midnight Oil who cried “ Hands off!”, while organisations such as the Australian College of Physicians, and individuals like Gordon Chater, Dick Smith and Lisa Forrest exclaimed “Hands up!"A rival circuit was set up by Quit for Life, promoting “The Big Gigs” by bands such as Spy v Spy who, in turn, thank Quit for Life for giving us freedom of choice of where and how we want to play. However, the financial insecurity common to many rock bands blurs the apparently stark choice between circuits. For example. Verity Truman of Redgum, a signatory to the “Hands off!" letter opposing tobacco sponsorship, has written of the "agency/ live venue scam" which “puts bands in the invidious position of choosing not where to work, but whether or not to work at all”. Also, Vince Lovegrove, the manager of another signatory. The Divinyls, further highlights the complexity of the issue by pointing out that they “do not support, in any way whatsoever, the Right to Life Organisation [sic] nor any lobby movement to remove the Peter Jackson Company from any form of sponsorship of the rock • Billy Bragg: hamming it up for Red Wedge. industry".6 This latter response, with AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 23

its confusing encouragement of (who, because of the sponsorship, has prevented the almost total corporate sponsorship and weren’t) has rather undermined the capitulation evidenced by, for simultaneous tirade against enthusiastically promoted image of a example, modern sport.8 “attempted corporate monopolistic strong, unified Australian rock Rock, then, is constrained by the sponsorship which dictates who will industry. The real conflicts and same forces which operate pervasively perform where”, is representative of problems confronted by rock bands in culture and society, and is itself part the predicament of mid-eighties rock. cannot be erased easily, however slick of a wider leisure complex. Yet it The need to take care of business leads the PR machine. cannot be simply reduced to its to tensions between idealism and Is there any general lesson we can money-making activities. Rock is pragmatism, autonomy and learn from the previous discussion of always likely to throw up a punk dependence, obscurity and ambition. three instances where rock and society culture or a Red Wedge which There is no space outside of a narrow interact in such salient fashion? Of challenges rationalised entertainment. range of market choices in which to course, it could be objected that they For, while many rock movements shelter. In the Darwinian world of are atypical examples, that rock is either begin or end in an orgy of contemporary rock, there are many more commonly about making music cynical commercialism, their uses and more bands than smokers who Quit and making money, but not meanings can never be easily confined for Life. necessarily in that order. Yet, to take or predicted. this line would also be unrealistic — it is clear that rock is a complex and dynamic cultural phenomenon. REFERENCES Currently, names such as Indeed, it is through its inconsistencies Electric Pandas, the contradictions and rapid shifts that we can gain a more profound and 1. For an authoritative account of rock’s Allniters, the Party Boys, development , sec Simon Frith, Sound Effects, exhaustive understanding of rock in 1981, New York: Parthenon. the Saints, Machinations society.7 1 began this article by pointing to 2. See Dick Hebdige, Subculture: The Meaning and Boom Crash Opera o f Style, 1979, London: Methuen and Dave two radically different evaluations of l-aing. One Chord Wonders, 1985, Milton have followed that of Peter rock which view it as either subversive Keynes: Open University Press. Jackson. or supportive of capitalism. This split 3. “The Children’s (sic) Crusade”, The may also be represented slightly Australian Financial Review, Tuesday, July 16, differently as the position that rock 1985;’’1 Confess", Nation Review, September 6, Corporate sponsorship also made has considerable impact on society, 1985. Quoted in Samuel Freedman “Our considerable inroads into rock culture which is opposed to the assertion Woodstock — Just as Good”, The Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday, July 27, 1985; with the Australian Made tour over that rock essentially reflects rather Arena, 71. 1985, p, 19. the recent New Year period. The than affects society. Difficult multinational Mobil Oil Australia theoretical questions are raised in such 4. Quoted in “ Revolt Into Style", New Musical Express, January IS, 1986. Quoted in “Rock Limited, Ansett and the ANZ banking disputes, but we may suggest that rock Gets Political in Thatcher^ Grim Britain", The group sponsored the Australia-wide and society have a reflexive and multi­ National Times, March 7 -1 3 , 1986. tour by acts like INXS and Jimmy layered relationship. Live Aid, for 5. One Australian working for Red Wedge says Barnes. The essentially commercial example, would not have been in The National Times article: "In Australia if nature of their involvement was necessary if there were not massive you had the word 'socialist'attached tea group carefully camouflaged through the global disparities in wealth, yet the like this, it would go down the tube.” shrewd utilisation of a community rock culture which galvanised action is Ci. Letters to The National Times, June 27 - July program and the exploitation of itself a product of the post-war 3. 1986 and June 13 - 19, 1986, Australian nationalism. Thus, Mobil’s Western affluence which substantially 7. Sec also David Kowe, “Rock Against the “Streetbeat” road safety campaign rested on global inequality. Clock; Independent Cultural Production", which was heavily promoted during Similarly, Red Wedge is only Social Alternatives 4 (4) 1985; “Rock Culture: the tour gave to their involvement a intelligible as a response to The Dialectics of Life and Death”, Australian “charitable” quality which recalled the Thatcherism, but the rock music Journal o f Cultural Studies 3 (2) 1985; “ Rock Today: From Love-Ins to Live Aid”, Australia t altruism of Live Aid. This was rock industry which produced it is, in many Quarterly 38 (1), 1987 (forthcoming). for the common good — which also ways, a model of acquisitive coincided, happily, with the raising of capitalism, to the extent that 8. See Geoff Lawrencc and David Rowe (eds) Power Play: Essays in the Sociology o f corporate profiles with the young. Conservative Party Chairman Australian Sport, 1986, Sydney: Hale and The full-blown nationalism which Norman Tebbit presented last year’s I remonger. characterised the tour also operatd to British Phonographic Industry cloak the substantial un-Australian Awards. Furthermore, it is the cut­ contribution to Australian Made, throat nature of the rock music DAVID ROWE teaches media and while the half million dollar loss and industry which has facilitated the entry cultural studies at Newcastle CAE. the squabbling between INXS (who of the tobacco companies, but it is also were on the bus) and Midnight Oil rock’s resilient social conscience that 24 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW ALL QUIET ON THE HOME FRONT? The Contradictions of Family Life

Rebecca Albury

he New Right’s economic and industrial policies have attracted Tfar more attention in the Australian media than their social and family policies. Lower taxes will, however, require lower state expenditure on social welfare programs. The burden of the “reduced” state expenditure on welfare will fall on people with lower incomes. Women, Aboriginal people, recent migrants, people with disabilities, and what can be called multiple minority groups, will be hardest hit as the “family” is asked to replace the state as the chief source of welfare. Following the example of conservative governments overseas. Australian politicians have begun to use the slogan “community care” as the code for welfare cuts. The family is the institution that has absorbed the shocks of these cuts as real wages fall, the social wage is cut and unemployment continues at a high level. In December 1986, the Liberal Party announced its family policy with loud concern for single-income, two- parent families. The Nationals have always promoted themselves as the party of family and nation. Joh Bjelke- Petersen combines a patriarchal style with sentimental appeals to the value of the family for the nation. Labor has been quick to assert family values, especially in NSW where Premier Unsworth hopes that a return to the values of the 1950s will solve a multitude of social problems. He remembers them as family-centrcd; others remember other aspects of the AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 25

'50s — racism, the cold war, the save the family and thus civilisation as invisibility and isolation of women, we know it. Traditional left illegal abortion, hard-to-get (particularly marxist) theory and contraception, the repression of activism have accepted the same homosexuals, and the general division of life into the separate suppression of non-conformity. The spheres of public and private as the left needs to mount a coherent bourgeois liberalism that it opposes. challenge to the sentimental appeal to When socialists attacked the the family which is being used to economic and public politics of justify a range of service cuts. capitalism they pulled back from an The debate about the social role equally strong challenge to the power of the family is an old one, given new relations of sex and age in private life. focus by the feminist analysis of the In Australia, the call to “save the oppression of women. Their challenge family” is not yet as shrill as in the to the sexual division of labour in the United States, nor used as blatantly to household as the “cornerstone of cut social services as in the United society" was viewed by many as an Kingdom, but it exists. Both Labor attack on the collectivist values of and non-Labor politicians and parties family life and as a support for the assert the importance of the family in worst excesses of economic ways that are socially conservative. individualism in the market. Since few The sexual division of labour in straight or lesbian, are not to exercise social critics seem to imagine that the “ideal” family makes the power that freedom with their bodies. production relations can be changed, relations in ordinary families seem * The family is in the realm of private they fear that changes in family “natural” and hence outside the realm life yet the state intervenes regularly to relations will destroy the values of of political struggle. Yet as closer look maintain a particular family form. personal loyalty, mutual sharing, at the reality of family life reveals Ideologues of the family have spontaneous emotion and nurturance. many contradictions, not only used the positive values expressed in Despite the changing material between the ideal and the lived the first half of these contradictions to conditions of family life — married experience, but between the ideal and enforce the power relations revealed women in the workforce, fathers the conditions which are supposed to by the second half, At the same time, assuming some domestic responsib­ make it possible. It is through an they use a variety of social controls, ilities, reliable fertility control, exploration of the contradictions that including repressive morality, to deny increasing divorce rates — the left has the power of the family as an the existence of any contradiction at not developed an analysis with ideological weapon in class struggle is all. Activists and writers within the left sufficient power to challenge the call to most clearly revealed. Further and sexual liberation movements have consideration of the contradictions tended to emphasise the negative half can form the basis of the analysis of the statements and ignore the needed to confront the call to “save the positive half. Meanwhile, whoever is family” with an acceptable range of in government tries to assert the values ways to live that support human of the first half while developing relationships without supporting policies to cope with the worst abuses capitalist or patriarchal power of the second half. relations. One problem with the There are at least six separate development of policies to deal with contradictions which combine in families is the lack of a precise various ways in individual lives. definition of “family”. It is used in * The “ideal” family is assumed to be political speeches more for emotional the goal or experience of everyone, but effect than with a specific meaning this is demonstrably not the case. (Indeed, the very vagueness of * The family is the site of both the definition is the reason for the strength protection and the oppression of of “family” as a symbol.) It can be used individuals. to represent a range of desirable and * Private life is supposed to enhance positive human experiences. It also individuality, but it is structured to represents a set of social relationships produce conformity. based on biology which seem to locate * Parenthood is both fulfilling and an individual in society, to form the limiting. foundation of personal identity. It is a * In liberal democratic states all concept that is both abstract and citizens are free, but male concrete, “the” family and “my” homosexuals and women, whether family. In these various contradictions 26 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

the meaning of the concept slips untenable. For a variety of reasons, piece of popular “wisdom” these days between those two poles of meaning. few women, even those with young accounts for the high rate of marriage The inability of individuals to live the children, remain totally outside the breakdown as a result of the inability ideal is blamed on the individuals by paid workforce for a significant of young married couples to manage the right and on the ideal by the left. amount of time. the financial obligations implied by Both are partially correct, both are Part-time and casual work fulfil the model of family life that depends wrong. needs for money and adult company on mate breadwinning and female Individuals do not live up to the and, at the same time, the demand that emotional support. It seems as if the ideal because they cannot; lived family life be conducted as if women _ oppressive demands of the model are experience is not abstract, but are at home the entire time. Such work contrary to the conditions necessary particular, continually reconstructed also maintains the other important for the protection of individuals. by individual desire; social structures aspect of the prevailing ideology of the The expression of individuality in that order relations of race, class and family — it allows the woman to make private life is the repeated message of gender; accidents of health and illness; less money than the man. The woman advertising. The exclusion of personal ties of love and duty. The and children then remain financially government or other outside forces ideal, while impossible, is nevertheless dependent on the man, and he can use from the family home is a compelling a widely recognised expression of the the greater financial contribution to demand of the political right. The human desire for intimacy, reliable justify a lesser contribution to experience of sexuality produces the support, a sense of belonging in the domestic labour. tension between demands for privacy and individual self-expression and the expectations of conformity to a recognised social pattern more acutely than most other aspects of human life. Sexuality is held out as the most individual expression of the self by a variety of popular commentators in diverse media. Still, the practices that can be loosely categorised as procreative heterosexuality remain the basis for the model of acceptable sexuality. Married or committed, adult, child-rearing, monogamous, male-female couples engage in sexual activity with the goal of male ejaculation with his penis enclosed in her (preferably orgasmic) vagina. While few outside the socially conservative part of the political right require all of these characteristics for acceptable sex, elements remain in the thinking of many people. Consider the writing about AIDS and other STDs world, the opportunity for power and In the mother-at-home-father-at~ that suggests monogamy as the only control in some aspect of life, the work model of family life, women and reliable form of “safe sex” and implies possibility of reciprocal relationships. men are held together by the that illness is in some way deserved. Political rhetoric depends on the way apparently complementary roles they Think of the failure of imagination of meaning can slip from one level to play. The woman provides the those who wonder how lesbians “do another, but political analysis should pleasant environment for the children it”. Then there is the repeated advice not. and man. It is her skill at mothering which suggests that young people in In contrast to tne alienation of which produces well-socialised, hard­ the mid-teens are always “too industrial production relations, the working citizens. The model does not vulnerable" for intercourse, that family has long been recognised as a include the needs of the mother for abortion is “selfish”, that oral or reliable support for individual people, adult companionship and ongoing manual sex is either foreplay (before but with different effects on women emotional support. While men are not the "real thing”), or to “finish her off” and men. The Family as a haven from expected to either provide that after the man's orgasm. the harsher aspects of the workforce support for women or to relinquish While the definitions of for men relies on the domestic labour their needs for the companionship of acceptablc sexual practices narrow the ol women. The increased visibility of other adults when they become range of possible forms of self women in the paid workforce is fathers, they are under considerable expression, so does the social making this division of labour pressure to be “good providers”. One organisation of daily life. A couple ■ AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 27

living in a small suburban house with is the one who conforms to the certify the necessity of the operation. young children or an ageing parent has particulars of the current variation on The practice is somewhat different. little time or privacy for extended the basic model, thus limiting further Contraceptives cannot be openly sexual exploration. Teenagers living the lives of people caring for advertised in most states. This seems with their parents are often unable to dependent children. to be changing with the rehabilitation have their sexual experiences at home Some limitations of parenthood of the condom as a public health in their own beds; they may not have are immediately clear — less time and measure. (Spermicides also seem to their own rooms, so even money for personal use, a day offer some protection against sexually masturbation may be limited. The patterned by the needs of the child — transmitted diseases — maybe they patterns of work and transport to and most people accept them as part of will be rehabilitated, too!). Poor work further reduce an individual's parenting. But other limitations fall women are still pressured to undergo opportunity (and energy) for sexual unequally on women and men. The sterilisation, regardless of their desire activities. Personal happiness and self ideology of motherhood seems to for children. discovery are held out as the rewards require maternal, not parental, This repression of women is of private, as opposed to public, life responsibility for every action of the justified by the moral right on the but the conditions of personal child from toilet training to drug use. grounds that it saves the family. It experience are often socially rather Women often feel they must accept the “saves” the family by compulsion, by than individually determined. role of social police imposed by some reinforcing male authority over experts; it may also be the only way women, whether by husbands, fathers, they can exercise social power. Fathers or the male-dominated medical may find that their duty to provide profession. In recent years, the Right The left has not developed financial support is in conflict with the to Life Movement has used the notion an analysis with sufficient risks involved in changing their of democratic rights to argue for the power to challenge the call working conditions, whether by preservation of every foetus with little changing jobs or by taking industrial regard for the consequences for the to save the family and thus action. Women in paid work face pregnant woman. It is instructive to civilisation as we know it... similar conflicts and the continued observe the politics which continue to burden imposed by the ideology of deny women possession of their motherhood. bodies. Given the current organisation of In addition, political activity, economic and political activity, there particularly radical activity, becomes are few opportunities for adults to be more difficult for women and men Individuals do not live up responsible for the supervision of an when they have children. Not only are exciting project. Being a parent is a there child care and transport to the ideal because they project which seems open to all. There problems, but the popular notions of cannot: lived experience is is real plealsure in watching a child “good parenthood" work against grow; the growth is testimony to the active political participation. The not abstract, but partic­ success of the parent in providing for mother is not so likely to be leading ular, continuously recon­ the needs of the child. Many experts demonstrations for abortion services structed by individual have seized on these pleasures and on or gay rights; the charge of “bad the uncertainty of many parents about mother” could follow. The father desire. the needs of children to set up models might be able to spend several nights a for “proper” parenting. It is not only week at meetings; it is less likely that the moral right which provides these she could. Far too many people on the Homosexual men are likewise models; the state and assorted welfare left share aspects of this definition of denied the right to determine their and health experts are deeply parenthood that precludes radical sexual practices in most states of implicated in the social structuring of political activism, and far to few Australia. The moral right argues that parenthood. develop analyses or campaigns that legalised homosexuality is also. a The f oundations of these various address ttie experience of aaults as threat to the family. The family would models are the same, though those of mothers and fathers as well as seem to be a very fragile “cornerstone” progressive welfare workers usually workers. if it is put at risk when some men do admit of more variations. The basis is One of the basic tenets of liberal not form reproductive sexual a father at work and a mother at home, democracy is that the individual partnerships. The AIDS scare has an individual family home, a possesses his body in the same way he served to justify attacks on gay men in collection of consumer durables in possesses property. The use of “he” is the name of “public health” as well as each house, and the sacrifice of certain intentional because women do not “morality". The melodramatic parental dreams and ambitions for the have possession of their bodies under representations of the “threat" locate sake of the children. The model then any legal code in Australia. Abortion gay men outisde of families, but takes on a moral imperative with the is a crime except_ in South Australia capable of infecting them. This denies suggestion that the only “good"parent where, by law, two doctors must the obvious fact that men who 28 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

participate in homosexual acts are resistance because of the supposed recognised social inequalities between sons and brothers and may also be privacy of the family. Dramatic cases men and women. Even as some of the husbands and fathers. The location of of child abuse which seem isolated and issues have been addressed the more the "threat” outside the family allows deviant are front-page news for a few radical potential of the slogan has been the ideal of family life to remain days while years of lesser abuse diluted. unexamined. continues unnoticed. The right, both old and new, is In dramatic cases, state intervention certain that the family has important can be used to separate parents and ... an overt political rights and duties: personal care of children, but services that might infants and children, sex education of reduce the intensity of relations practice that fits between young people, care for disabled between parents and children before the level of abstraction in people, protection of women, among the need forsuch total intervention are which individual pain other things. The more liberal vision subject to funding cuts. Child care, of the family sees it as a place for casual care for disabled children, disappears, and the level of individual expression and supportive homecare, community health services, gossip that traffics in that care. Meanwhile, the government housing and public transport are pain. policies reveal an interest in enforcing among the array of underfunded a particular family form through the services. The ideology of the ideal, distribution of welfare benefits. capable and caring family is behind the Social Security officers spend a assumption that these services can be At the same time, there has been a lot of time checking on recipients’ provided by families or bought in the tendency to reduce "personal politics" domestic arrangements, not just their private sector during timesof financial to a form of dogmatic and sometimes financial status. Do two old age stringency. sectarian “alternative lifestyles”. The pensioners of the opposite sex live There is no declared family policy everyday life of compromises and together and each receive a "single” in Australia, but a vision of the family tensions lived by most people on the pension? Does a supporting mother does inform government policy and left has disappeared from analysis have a regular male lover? Is an practices. In this vision, individuals except in the agonised sharing of unemployed woman married? The are responsible for the health and confidences and the whisper of policies which provide answers to welfare of themselves and their constant gossip. The continuing these questions do not recognise the dependents. It will be difficult to development of a fragile network of principle of financial independence for mount an effective challenge to support among those who do not live women, and thus support the ideology policies that attribute poverty and ill- "ideal” family lives is overlooked and of female dependence in a maleheaded health to moral failure because those thus underestimated. The links of that family. Homosexuals pose a problem most in need will not have the network, ties of love and duty, have because there is no ideology to say who resources to organise a political been formed during a shared past of in a realtionship should be dependent campaign either. A political focus on political and social activity. and who should pay. the structural relations in society They are chosen social which lead to personal problems often relationships, not accidental means that the immediate needs of biological ones. Of course, they are individuals become secondary in overburdened with the vocabulary of There has been a tendency campaigns to change the social idealised family relationships: the to reduce "personal politics’ structure. “sisterhood” of the women’s to a form of dogmatic and During the late '60s and early 70s, movement; the “brotherhood" of the the Women’s Liberation Movement labour movement; the notion of family sometimes sectarian used the slogan "the personal is in shared households. There does not ‘alternative lifestyles’. political” to develop a politics that seem to be another vocabulary for opened the power relations of personal expressing close, reliable friendship, life to public scrutiny. Feminist but the analogy with kinship poses The regulation of relations between activists used what they discovered some problems in its unconscious parents and children is similarly about their personal but common reversion to the assertion of the informed by familial ideology. It is experiences to challenge the social ideological family in the new assumed that parents financially structure. A range of issues have been relationships. support children. Young girls can be taken up by mainstream political A range of human needs and institutionalised for being “at risk”, “in parties as a result of that analysis — desires is expressed in domestic life. moral danger” or “uncontrollable" rape, domestic violence, women’s The knowledge of a political analysis (sexually active), but welfare workers health and sexual harassment, for of domestic social relations does not sometimes resist intervening in cases example. Many politicians and policy­ eliminate those emotional needs and of incest because it might “break up makers have redefined the issues into desires any more than an analysis of the family”. Campaigns against individual failures or bad actions the exploitations of capitalism docs domestic violence still encounter instead of the logical outcome of not eliminate material needs. It will be AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 29

hard work to develop a politics that mutually offer support, promote welfare sector. The idea that domestic seeks to meet emotional as well as public education and sometimes life is separate from economic life must materia] needs, but also recognises the engage in overt political activity. be challenged and politics changed in a diversity of those needs. It may take a Professional helpers too often have way that develops that challenge. re-examination of the notion of their own agendas and are unable to A different vocabulary, more “material” to include, or at least not provide for the immediate needs of self-revelation, arid political groupings automatically exclude, emotions. group members as well as someone based on shared personal experiences Certainly, it will mean the who has similar experiences. In seem like an inadequate basis for a new development of an overt political self-help groups, meeting the politics that recognises the problems practice that fits between the level of emotional needs of members is a that most people face in their lives. I abstraction in which individual pain central aim. The d anger is, of course, agree that they are small steps, but disappears, and the level of gossip that that this can be co-opted by cost- important. A new vocabulary itself traffics in that pain. saving bureaucrats or political will help us break away from the One tool that already exists for opportunists in the name of agenda set by the right by changing the this politics is the process of “privatisation” or “deinstitut­ terms of the debate. Self-revelation consciousness-raising in which people ionalisation”. Whether formal or will demonstrate the diverse and recount their persona! lives in an informal, such groups help to contradictory ways we live our lives. attempt to understand similarities and empower peopple in the times of crisis Groups based on shared experience differences of experience. Obviously, when family members and will contribute to a new political there is the danger that the exercise institutional helpers fail, and so are agenda that meets people’s needs will not be transformed into political worth the political risks. without imposing a uniform and action. The act of self-revelation, The Unsworth vision of ‘fifties impossible moral ideal. The personal however, may be the only way to values cannot remain intact; too much is still political. discover the issues for further action. is at stake. That vision is also the other Before group discussions, many side of the New Right’s economic program. Individuals, families and REBECCA ALBURY teaches sociology women felt alone and isolated by their al Wollongong University. experiences of rape, domestic households cannot bear the burden of violence, sexual harassment, abortion welfare cuts, nor can the voluntary and hatred of their bodies. The articulation of similar experiences and feelings by many women transformed individual pain into some of the central campaigns of the Women’s Liberation Movement. Self-revelation itself will be more difficult today than it was fifteen years ago because it has become so identified with various “personal growth” programs and a disavowal of politics. Yet, some level of self-revelation will be necessary to counter the conservative politics based on an “ideal” biological family. It will be necessary to refute the insulting and oppressive assumption that everyone shares the same goals and experiences regardlessof class, ethnic origin, gender, age or health. It will also be necessary to demonstrate that politics is shaped by, and transforms, personal experience. Most importantly, self-revelation will be necessary to examine the contradictions of personal life as a step towards their resolution. Another potential tool for the development of a left politics of the personal is the self-help group. There are many groups, especially around health problems, in which members 30 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW POL POT S ALLIES: The Right in Kampuchea

Ben Kiernan who murdered or starved to death over “ Coalition Government of a million people when they ruled Democratic Kampuchea”, which from Kampuchea from 1975 to 1979. exile still represents the country in the United Nations, The other two ast December, in the midst of the factions, Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge and “Iran-Contra Affair”, the US the followers of Prince Sihanouk, are L Congressional Research Service fairly well known. Most people have “INSIDE KAMPUCHEA: And revealed that Washington has given probably never heard of the KPNLF, Getting out Alive” read the headline in the ousted Pol Pot forces of but they had been briefly in the news. “Democratic Kampuchea” (or DK, Rupert Murdoch's Australian. The otherwise known as the Khmer chief-of-staff of the Darwin Northern In April 1985, as the campaign to Rouge) a massive $85 million in aid Territory News, David Nason, had once again provide US arms aid to since their overthrow by Vietnamese just managed to escape with slight anti-communist forces in Indochina troops in 1979. This secret aid to Pol wounds after attempting to enter gathered momentum, the Washington Pot had always been vigorously denied Vietnamese-occupied Kampuchea Post categorised the Khmer People’s by US officials. They preferred to from Thailand with a patrol of armed National Liberation Front as emphasise their support for a small rebels. “reasonably democratic”. The next rightwing group which they hoped The rebels were troops of the month, the Post published a plea for would provide a fig-leaf of Khmer People’s National Liberation military aid to the KPNLF by respectability for an anti-Vietnamese Front (KPNLF), one of the three Congressman Stephen J. Solarz. This strategy based on the Khmer Rouge, factions allied in the anti-Vietnamese was entitled “Help the Democratic AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 31

Resistance”. In the Atlantic magazine, speaking American under contract to troops if they did not hand over Stephen J. Morris claimed that, with the US State Department to gather Khmer orphans about to be sent for the Sihanoukists, the KPNLF forces information along the Thai- resettlement in third countries. The "are the only ones that represent Kampuchean border. Heder favoured Westerners were told to pressure the nontotalitarian Cambodian sending US arms aid to the KPNLF, orphans to join Son Sann’s forces on nationalism”. According to Morris, although by late 1981 he was still not the border instead. they are “the authentic representatives very optimistic about its prospects. He According to Grunewald, civilian of Cambodia", and even “the heroic wrote; refugees were still being held hostage survivors of the Cambodian The KPNLF's potential as a popular holocaust”.1 The last label apparently alternative to the [PRK, or Heng Samrin] applies, in Morris’ mind, only to these regime and the Khmer Rouge is, however, allies of the perpetrators of that still limited. Its social base and social The western aid that holocaust. In this context it is appeal is oriented towards the old poured into the Thai- obviously worth examining the functionary/intelligentsia class of democratic credentials of the KPNLF, Kampuchea, a social group that was small Kampuchean border in late which was founded in 1979 by the and weak even before 1975, was then 1979 and 1980 was largely onetime Kampuchean Prime Minister, physically decimated under the Khmer appropriated ... by the Son Sann. Rouge in 1975-78, and has been further In late 1979, William Shawcrosss, thinned out by refugee flight since 1979. Khmer Rouge and the Although it professes a number of Jimmy Carter and many others liberaldemocratic ideals, in the border KPNLF. accused the Vietnamese of committing camps under KPNLF control there is not “subtle genocide" by allegedly starving even the pretense of democratic political the Kampuchean people to death. As practice. Camp residents are instead ruled in KPNLF border camps, “by force if Shawcross has since admitted, by a kind of bureaucratic-military necessary”. In one case, a young however, “there is, fortunately, no dictatorship which they complain is pregnant woman planning to go on to evidence that large numbers of people arbitrary, corrupt and beset with nepotism Khao-I-Dang holding centre (10 miles did starve to death” under the new and cronyism ... If more arms were inside Thailand) was arrested and Vietnamese-installed People's available to it, the KPNLF could with little beaten up until she miscarried, then Republic of Kampuchea (PRK) difficulty further expand its armed forces, jailed in the KPNLF prison at Nong perhaps even double or triple them, but Chan and eventually forced to marry a government led by Heng Samrin.J But without a broadening of its social base and in areas of continuing Pol Pot control, improvement in its political practice, it KPNLF soldier. The prison thousands did perish; it was from these could not achieve continuous popular conditions were extremely primitive, frontier areas that skeletal refugees expansion.4 especially for Vietnamese refugees crossed the Thai border to be filmed by held by the KPNLF. Vietnamese Western television crews. One year later, a Khmer-speaking refugee women were regularly raped, What is much less well-known is French agronomist, Francois one woman up to thirteen times on her that many people were starved to Grunewald, who had spent 17 months first day of detention. The Red Cross death in areas under the working among the refugees on the were “horrified” at the conditions in administration of the newly-formed Thai-Kampuchean border, concluded KPNLF prisons; it took three months KPNLF. Like the other anti- that the KPNLF still had “no popular of pressure from Amnesty Vietnamese forces the KPNLF were base" and that it would “never International in 1982justtogetatoilet fighting to control populations, and mobilise the mass of Cambodian installed for the women prisoners. But they held at least 6,000 Khmer civilians peasants behind it”. (However, it had otherwise, Grunewald concluded, hostage near the Thai border. Because managed to enlist a number of Thai ‘noone decided to put pressure on the the KPNLF could not feed these regular troops, who fought, disguised KPNLF, even though given its people but would not allow them to go as KPNLF forces, in operations dependence on humanitarian aid, that elsewherej nearly 4,000 hostages died against the Vietnamese inside would be easy ... ” of starvation in late I979.3 Kampuchea, according to “certain In October 1982. a KPNLF The Western aid that poured into highly-placed sources in Son Sann’s “regimental commander** was the Thai-Kampuchean border in late general staff’, Grunewald reported.) assassinated in an internecine purge. 1979 and 1980 was largely As for the “political practice” of According to the Far Eastern appropriated (as it continues to be the KPNLF, it had not improved Economic Review (5 November 1982), today) by the Khmer Rouge and by the much since Heder had voiced his he was shot “in the civilian sector of KPNLF, and with Thai help the latter doubts the year before. Grunewald the KPNLF’s Ban Sa-Ngae camp ... gradually took control of a number of recorded instances of KPNLF when shooting erupted from the civilian refugee camps. Over this gangsterism, diversion of aid, and compound of the front’s cadretraining twoyear period, the Westerner best corruption scandals. In 1982, school”. This led to the resignation of placed to observe and analyse the to moreover, foreign aid workers in the KPNLF’s chief-of-staff, Dien Delv observe and analyse the KPNLF was Sakeo camp in Thailand were who accepted “ultimate responsibil­ probably Stephen R. Heder, a Khmer­ threatened with death by KPNLF ity” for the murder. Observers noted 32 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

that Del had disapproved of the visited the Thai-Kampuchean border. victim’s money-making ventures, He met a former prisoner of the Heng including a video cafe in a border Samrin regime who had fled there camp, where pornographic films were alter three months in jail in screened three times a day. Kampuchea. “He said he had not been In May 1983, the KPNLFsetupa beaten or tortured in prison, but on guerrilla training school for about arrival at the border was beaten up 1,200 recruits from the refugee camps. and robbed by the KPNLF”. Vickery They do not seem to have been very continued, to note that “persistent willing recruits, for several hundred reports of violations” of human rights defected within weeks. The total PNLF areas “have been current in number of escapees from the school the press and known to workers in the soon reached 600. As Paul Quinn- refugee camps for years”. At Dangruk Judge of the Far Eastern Economic camp, Vietnamese refugees Review reported (13 October 1983): complained of “rape, robbery and harassment” by KPNLF troops in early 1985. An American researcher at Deserters who were picked up by KPNLF the border informed Vickery of two authorities are said to have received fairly rough treatment. An order posted in some other cases of alleged KPNLF KPN LF camps later reportedly said the atrocities. heads of captured deserters had been shaved and marked. The deserters had also In one instance a PRK spy disguised as a • The "reasonably democratic" been banished from KPNLF camps, the monk was summarily executed, and in KPNLF, order said. another a defector offering information about a forthcoming Vietnamese attack was killed when his prediction was off by parliamentary government is generally two days.6 In September 1983, a Western much weaker than that of the civilians doctor completed his tour of duty at in the Front’s leadership ... ”)7 Nong Samet, a border camp run by the Since it lost control of all its But the KPNLFin any case could KPNLF, with a population of as many camps in the late 1984 Vietnamese/ be swept aside by their Khmer Rouge as 50,000 refugees. The doctor wrote in PRK offensive along the Thai border, allies even more easily than the Lon his report to the board of his the KPNLF army has largely kept Nol Regime was — with genocidal international aid agency: away from Kampuchea. Its forces results. A Bangkok newspaper have regrouped near Khao-I-Dang reported inearly 1985 that the KPNLF (and Sihanoukists) had agreed to Adolescent men with machine guns now refugee holding centre in Thailand, roam the camp openly ... The wife of our and stage regular night raids in which share ammunition, logistical supplies hospital administrator in her ninth month at least ten refugees were killed in the and intelligence information with Pol of pregnancy experienced her first labor first quarter of 1985. At one point, up Pot’s Khmer Rouge forces. Since then, pains. Stepping outside her hut, she was to one-third of the KJiao-l-Dang co-operation between the KPNLFand shot in the head and died fifty yards from population were sheltering around the the Khmer Rouge has increased our hospital. The administrator, fearing camp hospital each night to protect greatly^ as the experience of journalist for his life and the lives of his eight themselves from KPNLF raids. David Nason showed. He was actually children, decided to escape the border for rescued from Kampuchea by Pol Pot There is really no evidence which third country resettlement. The gangster guerrillas who had to come to the aid who controls escape from the border would lead to the belief that KPNLF of the beleaguered KPNLF. demanded that the twenty-year-old rule of Kampuchea would be any more daughter be left in the camp and that the “democratic” than the PRK currently In this same period, the US began administrator take in her place the is, and it would possibly be a good deal to call the KPNLF “the democratic gangster’s own daughter who would take worse in human rights terms, A resistance” and to overtly fund its the abandoned daughter's name ... KPNLF government would no doubt military requirements. The prime ... The border is inherently an anarchy that bear considerable resemblance to the mover behind the idea, Congressman will be dominated by warlords and Lon Nol military dictatorship Stephen J, Solarz, claimed in The gangsters an epiphenomenon: a (1970-75) with which nearly all its Washington Post (7 May ! 985): constituency not of political allegiance [to leading cadres and officers were the “Coalition Government of Democratic closely associated. (According to Kampuchea"] but of dependency on relief With additional supplies and support, the rice.5 Heder, “the 10 top political-military non-communist forces could substantially figures in the Front have their roots in increase the number of their men under the professional officer corps of the arms and thus intensify the pressure on In late 1984 another K hm er­ Sihanouk and Lon Nol armed forces Vietnam ... to withdraw its troops as part speaking American, Michael Vickery, ... Their historical commitment to of a political settlement. AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 33

One would not know from Solarz’ Sihanoukists also lost their twelve operating a maximum distance of 40 statement that only three months camps to the Vietnamese). The group km from the border” with Thailand. beforehand, Hanoi had, in fact, fell into disarray, its activities now On 10 July, the Far Eastern Economic offered to withdraw, in return for the largely restricted to refugee centres in Review reported that the KPNLF“for exclusion of Pol Pot and the disarming Thailand, months has been incapble of of his followers. It is precisely Son According to Western sources, presenting coherent battlefield Sann, Norodom Sihanouk, Pol Pot the KPNLF is “demoralised and reports". and their supporters who are refusing disorganised”, and there are reports of One reason, apart from military to discuss such a settlement.® Solarz “sizeable desertions". Its plans to activity, was the serious split in the even claims that the USA has “two switch to guerrilla warfare inside KPNLF leadership. In September overriding objectives in Cambodia ... Kampuchea “could take much longer 1985, Son Sann sacked two members to secure the withdrawal of Vietnam than expected". Further, according to of his military command. However, (and) to prevent the return of the Rodney Tasker of the Far Eastern they were supported by two others, Khmer Rouge". Though Hanoi is now Economic Review: Dien Del and Sak Sutsakhan. In proposing and the non-communists December, Sutsakhan struck back, The KPNLF also suffers from the lack of a are opposing just this, Solarz claims clear chain of military command and the staging a mini-coup against Son Sann that “both these objectives require a scarcity of staff officers with a working in KPNLF headquarters, in the name stronger non-communist resistance knowledge of how to prosecute a real of a military clique called the movement", i.e. stronger opponents of guerrilla war. “Provisional Central Committee for the alleged “overriding objectives’’ of Salvation” (PCCS). Washington! One can be forgiven for Sutsakhan represents the career thinking that what really requires a officers corps whose “historical stronger non-communist movement is commitment to parliamentary the reassertion of US influence over government", as Heder puts it, “is Indochina, and that the word generally much weaker than that of the “democratic" applied to the KPNLF is civilians” like Son Sann. really code for “pro-American" — or Nevertheless, Sutsakhan’s PCCS at least reasonably so ... sub-faction received firm Thai When Vietnamese forces backing. Bangkok officials began to approached the perimeter of the channel Western and Chinese money KPNLF base at Ampil in early 1984, and weaponry destined for the Michael Richardson of the Melbourne KPNLF solely to the PCCS, which Age probably expressed the prevailing gradually wore down Son Sann’s view among Western observers when supporters and assumed control of he wrote: their last refugee strongholds. Meanwhile, Dien Del gave up fighting Ampil is the military headquarters of the and became a Buddhist monk.12 Front and its loss would be a grave blow to After several months in which the the morale and standing of the Prince Sihanouk categorised his large “Site 2” refugee camp, with a noncommunist guerrillas. KPNLF ally’s military capacity as population of 120,000, had been “zero”.10 divided between the rival KPNLF Later that year, Richardson again Even a KPNLF soldier in the groupings, Thailand barred Son Sann wrote: group’s headquarters told The and his son Son Soubert from visiting Australian in mid-1985: the camp or other sections of the A ground assault against the KPNLF I don't trust anybody in Kampuchea ... headquarters at Ampil is expected soon Kampuchean border. Sann thus lost Most villages wc come across are inclined and will be a crucial test of the group's control over his last K PNLF units and towards the Heng Samrin regime. In each ability to withstand sustained military refugee supporters.13 village there is at least one Heng Samrin pressure.9 Recently, a highly-placed agent... We never stay long in villages, and KPNLF official said that Thai military The Far Eastern Economic Review we never enter (hem at night. It’s too dangerous.1* personnel always accompany KPNLF reported on 17 January 1985 that patrols into Kampuchea. Thai- Ampil’s defenders had “proved no David Nason’s recent experiences speaking relief workers in Site 2 say match for the onslaught”, and that with the KPNLF appear to that KPNLF troops there call these most KPNLF troops had retreated corroborate this latter statement. Thai officers wanna, or “chief”. Son into Thailand within a day. But on Though the KPNLF had once Sann has been powerless to prevent Richardson’s criteria, the KPNLFhad claimed to be Fielding an army of over Thai control of his army, although the failed “a crucial test” and suffered a 20,000, in early 1986 diplomatic PCCS has suffered even more grave blow to its morale and standing. sources put total KPNLF and extensive desertions in 1986. while The last of the eight KPNLF bases Sihanoukist strength inside civilian refugees have fled Site 2 by the soon fell (while the Khmer Rouge and Kampuchea at “500 guerrillas hundreds. 34 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW

On a visit to Site 2 in January troops from Cambodia be coupled with 1. Washington Post, 7 April and 7 May 1985. 1986. Chanthou Boua and I spoke cessation of Chinese arms supplies to the Atlantic Monthly. January 1985, p. 82; ABC privately with six low-ranking Khmer resistance by proposing to station Radio, “Correspondents' Report", 24 March KPNLF members in a section of the an international peace-keeping force 1985; New York Times, 6 January 1985. along Cambodia’s land and sea borders. camp controlled by the PCCS. We 2. See. for instance, William Shawcross, “The The sea border is being specified to assure End of Cambodia”. Mew York Review o f Books, asked if their overall goal was to have Vietnam and China would not be able to Sihanouk and Son Sann return to 24 January 1980 Also Shawcrpss. The Quality continue the supplies once the land routes o f Mercy: Cambodia. Holocaust and Modern power in Kampuchea. The reply was Conscience, London. Deutsch, 19X4, p 206; p hesitant but revealing: "We dare not A retired prime minister 370 say ... ” Even privately-expressed 3. Report by Roland-Pierre Parmgaux in U support for Son Sann, the nominal and a part-time prince are Monde. 21 December 1979 leader of the KPNLF, was considered the thinnest possible facade 4 Statement by Stephen R Heder before the US dangerous in this stronghold of the Congress, Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific faction’s military. of respectability for Pol Affairs, 2! October 1981. pp. 6-7. In this same section of Site 2. at least Pot’s Khmer Rouge. 5, "Samct Field Evaluation", II September 18 people died in the first half of 1986 1983, 7 pp., at pp. I, 4, 5, in violent incidents involving armed from Thailand have been closed in the 6 MichacI Vickery, "The Lawyers Committee wake of a successful settlement. KPNLF troops. Another dozen for International Human Rights. Kampuchea civilian refugees had mysteriously However, within two weeks, China Mission. November 1984. Preliminary disappeared. and the four “ Democratic Summary of Findings and Conclusions; A Finally, the Far Eastern Kampuchea’’ factions had over-ruled Critique", 17 pp. at pp. 10, 14, Economic Review reported on 28 this initiative. The June ASEAN 7. Stephen R. Heder. “KPNLF Ciuerrilla August 1986 that “Son Sann has told meeting, it appears, did not even Strategy Yields Mixed Results", Indochina ASEAN officials that he will take no discuss it. The irony is that even the Issues, no. 45, April 1984, p 2. further part in the political work of the KPNLF’s main supporter in the USA, 8. Ben Kiernan, “Peace Clouds Gather Over Democratic Kampuchea coalition Stephen J. Solarz, accepts that a Kampuchea", Inside Asia (242 Pentonviile government until problems dividing continuing Vietnamese occupation is Road, London), no. 3. May-June 1985. See also Ben Kiernan, "How Australia is Helping factions in the resistance group are preferable to a Khmer Rouge return to Kampuchea". Asian Bureau Australia resolved”. The “CGDK President”, power, while the KPNLF leaderships Newsletter no. 79, April-June 1985 Norodom Sihanouk, extraordinarily themselves claim the opposite.13 9. MichacI Richardson, Melbourne Age. 24 referred to this report but did not deny Two recent developments April and 29 December 1984. it, in a tetter to the Review on 9 cncourage lingering hopes for a October. settlement. At the ASEAN meeting in 10. Far Eastern Economic Review (FEER), 14 Thus, it appears that the UN now March and 7 February 1985: FEER, 14 Manila in June, Australian Foreign February 1985; FEER. 9 May 1985, p. 30. this is recognises, as the legitimate Minister Bill Hayden called for a despite the benefit of over $4 million worth of representative of the people of tribunal to hear the case against Pol covcri CIA aid lo ihe non-communists in the Kampuchea, an exiled “government” Pot’s Khmer Rouge leadership, over 1982-84 period, and "unusually large amounts without a Prime Minister (Son Sann, of rifles and anti-tank and anti-aircraft the massacre and starvation of a wcapons“ dclivcred from Singapore in the fall of now based in Paris) or even a full-time million people during their brief rule 1984 (FEER. 25 October 1984). and "huge” President. (Sihanouk, based in from 1975 to 1979. Such action would amounts of weapons delivered from China in Pyongyang, has announced that he is help remove the main obstacles to early l985

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A National Character: Crocodile Dundee

was in a provincial working-class “That’s not a knife, this is a knife. "The in the mouth carrying with it the pub in England over Christmas, blacks run away. It’s a magical mystical power and strength of the I one which used to be my “local”. resolution to a moral panic and has man from the wilderness. The same Spurred by my presence into talk audiences laughing and cheering. power that had earlier calmed a water about Australia, the conversation Hogan, as Mick Dundee, solves buffalo with two fingers and a steady moved, not to the America’s Cup, nor lots of problems like this in the film. gaze. It is a quick, quiet and unnoticed to the Test series, nor even to the First of all, he solves the problem of punch which lays the yuppie flat. weather, but to Crocodile Dundee, the giant crocodile who lunges out of Having dealt with the irritations just released on the provincial circuits. the water, about to make a meal out of of social class, Hogan moves on to the woman reporter who has tracked race: “What tribe are you from mate?“,- Actually, I should say that the Mick Dundee down and whom he has he innocently asks of his black New conversation moved on to Paul Hogan been ogling by the edge of the water. York chauffeur. (In the outback, as Mick “Crocodile" Dundee, the He rushes out of the scrub and plunges Hogan had been a bona fide film’s hero and main character. Most the knife — that knife — into the participant at a corroboree.) In a later of the drinkers hadn’t seen the film yet beast’s head. Well, if he hadn’t been scene, this same black chauffeur but they had, through television ogling her, he wouldn’t have saved her, wrenches the boomerang-like bonnet trailers, seen that excerpt. That would he? Later, transported as the motif from the limousine and downs excerpt is the one where, in New York, ingenu to New York, the subject of a one of Hogan’s assailants with it. The Hogan and his girlfriend are 7Tme-style feature, he solves other “tribal” connection of New York confronted by three young blacks, one problems too, or at least provides blacks and Aborigines is comically of them menacingly holding a flick quick-fire solutions to a range of social confirmed for Hogan. knife. The exchange goes something complexities. Confronted by the social And from race to sexuality: in a like this: “What’s that?" asks Hogan, and class distinctions of New York Manhattan bar Hogan is chatted up by looking at the knife; “That’s a knife, yuppie lifestyle, Hogan’s response is a transvestite. Alerted by a taxi driver man”, says one of the blacks. Hogan’s either a quick debunking word or, with friend to some ambiguity, Hogan laconic response is to pull out his two- more effect in one scene with the fiance solves the problem by grabbing the foot machete-cum-croc-killer and say, of the woman reporter, a smart smack elegantly dressed character in the 36 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW TIME OUT

crotch. The (male) transvestite films like Mr. Deeds Goes to Town antagonism to Anglo- pomposity, doubles up, the occupants of the bar — (1936), Mr, Smith Goes to yuppie pretensions, the “Rodneys” of and of the cinema I was in when I saw Washington (1939) and Meet John the smart set and the quaint pastimes it — double up, too, but for different Doe (1941), In this genre, the power of of what, in an oversimplified version, reasons. simple honesty and individualism represents the British ruling class. It is, Class, race, sexuality, law and overcomes, variously, urban of course, nothing like this, but order: these are precisely the problems pretension, political corruption and Hogan’s treatment of these which "Crocodile Dundee” confronts totalitarian political philosophies. antagonisms is popular and effective, and solves, usually with a single and Such a popular hero can no longer Why. or, more importantly, how is very “masculine” gesture. And, let’s be come from rural American settings of this?|t js n0( often that I agree with fair, it's funny and successful too. The course; these have been tainted by Bernard Levin, British high Tory of film, as we know, has been immensely mass murders, chainsaws and Orange the paternalistic variety and cultural successful in Australia, in the United People. Australia, and the myths of commentator. But he, in a review of States — coming second only to the the bush and the outback now provide Crocodile Dundee in The Australian more Reaganesque Top Gun — and, both the ideal of the wilderness and an (13 February 1987), suggests that there as far as current figures show, in the increasingly popular tourist is nothing “mere” about the UK as well. It is easy to dismiss this destination. From here comes the entertainment which a film like this popularity as the effect of some bush-wise Dundee. Not a naive produces. Reviewers have tended to go overarching "capitalist ideology” — a innocent in the mode of Gary Cooper, on a bit about the film’s “mythic” deeply pessimistic theory of “mass Hogan draws on other resources and qualities, the theme of the innocent in culture"— but this really won’t do. As forms of imagery as well. the big city and so on, and, more 1 argued a couple of issues back, it is precisely in the case of Frank not enough to sit back and dismiss Campbell, about Hogan’s skill in cultural forms like this as if they were tapping an American public beset by only to the side of the “main issues” of moral panics over mugging , drug use serious politics. and sexuality. Certainly, part of the As 1 suggest above. Crocodile film’s success does indeed lie in this use Dundee is, in its own way, about class, of received genres and models for sex, race, law and order, albeit in storytelling and in the familiar comic abbreviated form. But then one of the strategies of abbreviating, puncturing keys to comedy is precisely this and resolving complex social “economy” in the presentation of problems, But I am a little worried complex situations and their about such “universal” assessments of resolution. And Hogan is certainly a this movie and would want to suggest skilful and economic comedian, that, in addition to this skilful use of deploying a wide range of comic and The “character” of Hogan is genres and themes, there is also an dramatic techniques, often only by continuous across the genres in which important and strategic area which means of a facial expression or a single he works: from film to comedy series, Hogan handles with supreme and, as word. It would be worth our while to to beer and tourism ads. This was part yet unchallenged, skill: the area of consider the question of what of the point about that conversation in “national character”. techniques we have to meet these an English pub: the “That’s not a Back to that English pub again: forms of effective comic populism. knife” scene worked especially well "He’s so Australian” was a familiar It is, of course, Hogan, as star, with Hogan in it because that is and repeated comment about Hogan, personality and quintessential precisely the “quintessentially What this means in effect is that Australian, who carries Crocodile Australian” character which he is Hogan has effectively come to Dundee which, as Frank Campbell in known for. There is a beer ad shown represent the “quintessential The Sydney Morning Herald (7 on British TV, for example, where Australian” for UK and US audiences. January 1987) rightly said, is an Hogan witnesses an angler come And this has not been by virtue of any “unpretentious Australian film”. Why, ashore and hold up with pride what, by intrinsic or natural qualities but rather then, is the film so popular? Part of the British standards, is a prize catch. through a skilful, comic and strategic answer to this is in the methods by Hogan, talking congenially to the elaboration of a preferred version of which Hogan draws on a wide range of camera, walks past the proud character — laconic, laid back, popular motifs ands genres. The fisherman, snatches the fish out of debunking, quasi-innocent and, of United States now has its various his hand and, innocently, says course, endowed with certain Rambos but it is a long while since it “Thanks for the bait mate” It is a important “masculine” qualities. has had a simple, unpretentious humour based firstly on a form of These are, of course, all familiar traits populist hero. Crocodile Dundee identification predominantly with but the questions we need to be asking carries some of the cultural heritage of the white male working class (now the about this is how do they become films made by Frank Capra in the ’30s main lager drinkers and the targetted familiar, acceptable and thereby and '40s, mostly starring Gary Cooper: market) — and a corresponding dominant? How, in the field of TIME OUT AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 37

entertainment especially, do the television and the Hollywood star popular style manages to secure, at “cultural meanings” with which the system, has never been “merely” various levels, contact and consent character of Hogan is saturated come concerned with a straight depiction of with his various audiences? If this to be made operative, circulated and interesting “types”; rather, there has latter is the case, as I suspect it is, then sustained? been an insistent concern with making it would seem that we need to take Bernard Levin is right on the Concrete, popular and acceptable an Mick Dundee. Paul Hogan and public point that entertainment is never array of character traits and. at the response more seriously than we are “mere”: from the beginning of the same time, making unacceptable other accustomed to do in our critical left nineteenth century when entertain­ qualities and inclinations. perspectives. ment first began to be consolidated as The questions we need insistently both a mass and politically strategic to ask of this process is what precisely Colin Mercer phenomenon, the notion of is it that makes up this preferred image “character” in both popular and of the national character, and what COLIN MERC ER teaches in Humanities “high” forms of culture has been qualities have been excluded? How at Griffith University in Queensland, and is enormously important as a location of far, for example, does the character of a member of the Communist Party. forms of moral and political training Hogan cue in the features of the "New and persuasion. In popular fiction, Nationalism” and to what effect? Is forms of melodrama and music hall, this character merely a manipulative the representation of character, and, construct as some seem to suggest, or more recently, of “personalities” in is it the case that Hogan’s populist and

Style Revisited

t’s not hard to understand the Party's Marxism Today to follow suit But then we should try to draw sense of bewilderment that has with its own redesign. New Socialist some distinctions. One fairly obvious I settled on a good number of has also included in its substantial list one is between “appearance", people who thought their many years of articles on fashion at least one by “pleasure”, or “style” and “fashion". in politics might have given them some the Face’s associate editor, Robert Ill say how 1 think these should be idea what the left’s political agenda Elms. The article “Ditching the distinguished in a moment. really was. Now it seems they’re Drabhies” was one of the most I’d like to think this was a wrong. Not about substantive issues facile contributions to the debate so confusion. But really I don’t think it is. (or not on the face of it); but more far. but it shows just how strong the The champions of fashion are clearer about a tone, a preoccupation. nexus between the young left (a term than I’ve given them credit for about I’m talking hereabout the curious I'd generously interpret to include my their attack. You see. if the charge was preoccupation with fashion. ALR own peers) and the arbiters of radical that the left has ignored style, the took it on board last issue, and fashion has become. response would be obvious. The Tribune has given it a run a couple of 'sixties, which is a particular target, times in the last few years. But its real Now to come clean, 1 should say was obsessed about style and clothing. home is in Britain, particularly in the that if ihe question is simply, “should But the real charge is not that the Labour Party’s A/w Socialist. There, we care about clothes, design and so ’sixties was not style conscious, but among other things, a bond seems to on; should we debate it and champion that it was drab. Worse, that it was have been forged with the pinnacle of it?", then my answer is a definite "yes". earnest — that its choice of styles was young radical sophistication the Bewildering or not, there’s something hedged around with external values magazine the Face. Those in Australia vital at stake here, as William Morris which determined what was rejected or without subscriptions or cosmopol­ could have told us. But that's not the accepted, and which implicitly set itan newsagents will have seen it only question. First, we should try to them as a new orthodoxy. briefly in (one of my favourite) ads for say why. in terms which do a good deal This, in fact, is the complaint a product which escapes me, but which more than accuse previous generations against the unconverted left that lists the world's “coolcst” items. of the left of being drab or boring — they refuse to change; that they don’t N ew Socialist has been personally and. by implication, dress because it's fun. but because the redesigned by the designer of the Face. politically. It’s no*a very good tactic. clothing represents some virtue. In In fact, it has forced the Communist But it’s also wrong. another sense, the complaint is that 38 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW TIME OUT

they are unsophisticated, precisely contest. The feminist point that our inclusive. They have to be. they're after because the codes are so laboriously relationship to our bodies can be a market. literal. profoundly subverted doesn’t go away And so, of course, we come to This is the real heart of the matter. when we also realise that the crude commodities. It may be just tokenistic The charge that the left has been drab, objection to treating bodies as to buy youi clothes second-hand, But which is often run together with this “objects" misunderstands the way we that's not ihe point. This way of point that it denied itself the use our bodies publicly. It also means making your style out of something pleasure of style is patent nonsense. that the uses of clothing which deny else subverts the market; subverts the What is not nonsense is the claim that the body (and of all things "fashion” — commodification of clothing. This is the left believed it could take charge of the reification of clothes — is the main the point. Who lakes control of the the meanings of its codes. As shown by offender) is unacceptable. richness of clothing's use its all the irresolvable debates over It’s also always remarked that sub­ richness and its significance? If whether nudity, make-up. army shirts, cultures define themselves through clothing is left, then ivr do. or overalls reproduce or subvert ruling their clothes. If we on the left consider And again, that’s why F cringe values, this is not true. social diversity a good thing, then ihat when I hear people talking about left But does this mean that there are use of clothes is good too. But I think "fashion”. I don't believe there can be no rules',’ Nothing that marks radical we miss a useful distinction. one. But thank heavens we can once style from other style in fact, from Descriptively rather than prescrip- again talk about radical style. “Fashion”.' I'd suggest that there are at tively. I’d suggest that we can mark off least three criteria; the extent to which an oppositional sub-culture from a co­ Adam Farrar it is a commodity; the way it relates to opted one by asking whether the dress bodies; and the way it marks out social style is used to include or exclude. Is groupings. our main aim to be like each other, or A DA M FARRAR is editor ofthe ACOSS Before explaining this, let me just different from the rest? journal Impact in Sydney, and a member gesture at why we should (as well as of the Communist Party. 1 his is where "fashion" comes in do) take personal style, particularly again, “Fashion” siyles are always clothing, seriously. Let's begin with a counter proposition. That is, that clothes have a "use value” what they’re really about before they’re mucked about with by the market which is to protect bodies. This is completely wrong. It’s true that they do this, sometimes (and that this can be useful). But this emphasis is profoundly blind to the real issue — bodies. It assumes that bodiesarc both given and. hence, unimportant. Neither is true. But what does this matter? Is there a politics of bodies? Well, most contemporary feminist theory thinks so, although it's too large a subject to go into here. But the other point is that, self-evidently, an enormous amount of what we do is determined by our bodies, and that we work very hard to transform our bodies to both materially and symbolically intervene in these capacities. This, in large measure, is what clothes are. Clothes are not things done to bodies, but done with bodies. All of this is rather glib. But it's also usually forgotten. But what does this mean about a left fashion? Two things, I think. If bodies are a site of political activity, then, like all such sites, there’s a AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 39

The Good, The Bad ... and The Uglies

FIRST, THE BAD NEWS. The radical right is on the march, dragging the whole political spectrum rightwards in its wake. Win or lose, both the New Right and Joh have transformed the terms of political debate. NEXT, THE GOOD NEWS. ALR, the magazine which brought you John Howard and the Reborn Right (Summer 1985), The New Right is New (Autumn 1986) and The Moral Meets the New (Summer 1986), now brings you a special subscription offer to beat the uglies blues. Subscribe now to A L R dnA you'll receive the new booklet Here Come the Uglies by Laurie Aarons for only SI extra (normal retail price $4). FILL IN THE FORM BELOW TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS ONCE-ONLY OFFER

□ YES! Please send me ALR for one year starting with the June issue (No. 100). (Note that from June ALR will be appearing bi-montlhy.) □ Send me also a copy of The Uglies, post free, for an additional price of only SI.

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Subscription rates for one year are: Individuals SI2; Concession SIO, Libraries and institutions $20. s 40 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW VIEWPOINTS

marxist tradition and the latter built on governments is the result of the and is part of the former. But even though contradictions and crisis which has beset that relationship has been and will world capitalism since 1974. continue to be problematic, centring as it There arc two basic sourccs of the crisis does around the immediate question of the in the Hawke government, leading to its relationship between marxists and the betrayal of its stated policies, and of the largely non-marxist socialist in the ALP, a working class. common threat between and through the One is the general nature of social two traditions has been an understanding democratic and welfare-state parties, as REJECTING CLASS of the efficacy and saliency of class. parties of and within capitalism, By rejecting and repudiating both the sometimes giving lip-service to socialism notions of class and tradition. Burchell by gradual reform, but always quite simply renders even more difficult opportunist, always limiting themselves to the establishing of common ground reforms which arc acceptable to and can be The articlc in the most recent issue of the between marxists outside the ALP and accommodated by capitalism, always in Australian Left Review written by the co­ non-marxist socialists within it. In an era office jettisoning the more militant ordinator, David Burchell. is one of the when we are apparently trying to build rhetoric which they have picked up in most astonishing I have read in that bridges and linkages between socialists, opposition. journal for some time. Burchell’s treatment destroying those that already exist seem to The material basis for the existence of of class, for example, can only be described me to be particularly stupid, social democracy, as well as for liberal as, at the very least, eccentric, for he views reform parties, has always been the D.W. Barker, it in general and the working class in availability of expanding profits and Turner, A.C.T. particular, as some static and “finished" increasing exploitation of workers, entity. It is, of course, nothing of the sort. initially by the expansion of imperialism Class in general is a word that implies and the robbing ofcolonies. and then more relationships between people and between AWAITING BURIAL subtly during the growth waves of recent sets of people, ands the working class, capitalism, by the manipulation of comprising as it does a particular set of productivity and inflation at the e xpense relations, is active in defining itself and the of the working class. society it inhabits. Congratulations to ALR in opening its Apart Trom the general contradiction of The changing nature of the working columns to reader participation. social democracy between its staled and class, from rural proletarian to urban May I present some opposite views to real aims, a particular contradiction has manufacturing to metropolitan service those on "The Left and the Economic consumed all such parties since 1974. The sector, for instance, the changing gender Crisis" in Briefings (ALR 97). In my view post-war long boom ended, world-wide composition of the paid sections of the the analysis in that article is completely depression overwhelmed the economy, the class, for another; and the various waves of arse-over-head. material possibility of pursuing social ethnicity through the class as a whole in yet The article attrributes what it so democratic reform programs vanished another instance, all render quite silly quaintly describes as “the current (and on no-one's prediction is likely to accusations that the working class is. or economic malaise" to ”a massive strategic return in the foreseeable future). This sees itself to be, somehow static. contradiction within the policies of the development was reflected in the political But it is in this notion of the working Hawke government" between its policy “of and personnel changes in the last year of class'perception of itself that Burchell is at sustained economic growth” which along the Whillam government, as it abandoned his most ridiculous, for it is this that is best with the Accord predated Keating, and “its all of its reform program. called “tradition”, a word that Burchell dcregulatory financial policies". If you The particular post-1974 contradiction finds wholly repugnant. As the working believe this you can forget about socialism: made the general contradiction sharper class changes itself and is changed by the all that is needed is to change the personnel and irreconcilable. The ALP had two world it at least partially defines its view of and direction of the Hawke government alternatives: to support its verbal policies, itself and its place in the scheme of things and the problems and crises of capitalism raise wages, the social wage, public also changes. A tradition is not something will melt away! spending, and taxation on high and given and fixed. It is, rather, full of 1 suggest that the real position is the total unearned incomes, backing the working diversity, variation and disagreement but, reverse of what the ALR piece states: that class and assailing the profits of the owners nonetheless, maintains a basic set of the analysis in the article is fundamentally of capital or - to back the capitalists, assumptions and guidelines about how the wrong. The world and Australian cut wages, cut social welfare, cut public world works. depression and all its attendant crises is not spending, deregulate the economy, boost What is at stake in the current debate is caused by the Hawke government elected profits, and bash the unions. A middle precisely the nature of that tradition itself. in 1983, but rather the crisis of th Hawke course is a total impossibility in a The socialist tradition pre-existed the government and all other social democrat depressed and contracting economy. VIEWPOINTS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 41

Given the fundamental nature of such a illustration of our fixation about giving light italics on a yellow groundalmost parly, the choice ihe ALP made, to betray pride of place to articles which seem to us invisible except for the most searching the working class, was inevitable. the most important. So we have in great eye. The issue, and opportunity, before us heavy black capitals THE M ORAL Dear Collective, I have stuck by ALR now is the development of real alternative MEETS THE NEW, followed by an through thick and thin, so please bear with policies, based on a true analysis of the almost equally heavily printed sub-title me! crisis of capitalism, and the launching of a Alliances on the Radical Right. The rest of struggle for the development of a the also-rans (and perhaps more likely to Win Walsham, transitional government Ar07 ’any dream attract new readers) are printed in super Sydney. about restoring the ALP. Social democracy is dead, and awaits burial. Brian T. Carey, Canberra, ACT.

STIMULATING WHICH WA Y THE LEFT?

1 am responding to your invitation in issue No. 98 to offer comments -jn that The domination of current politics by articles of faith, rarely put forward in any issue. There werequiteafewarticlesl liked the struggle for control of the conservative concrete manner. and found stimulating — a departure it political forces in Australia illustrates the This problem is part of a more seems from our usual practice of writing extent to which the left is isolated and in an general malaise whereby the left is unable only for the converted — for once we had historically weak position. to articulate a concise set of objectives, or articles on subjects in which practically to represent itself through a unifying set of everyone is interested. For instance, the The left’s concentration on single values with which people can identify. cricket season, the Chamberlain case, issues and on reactive and oppositional The sum total of a diverse range of Carmel Shiite’s on politics and pleasure, policies; the pursuit of sectional demands; issues and the articulation of a range of and Ken Coales on disarmament. and the absence of a credible and popularly often maximalist demands does not On the whole. No. 98 is easily the best supported program has created an represent socialism in any organic sense, issue of ALR that I’ve read fora very long ideological vacuum. let alone establish a socialist agenda with time — so good in fact that it changed my For example, the left has been largely any sense of strategy or priorities. mind about discontinuing my subscription silent on what economic response there In the face of the simplistic nostrums which I had decided to do after reading No. should be to the collapse in terms of trade of the New Right, the left is seen as being 97. Bui I feel impelled to speak out against and the loss of national income, except to largely negative — reacting to events, the forbidding format of the pages. We oppose ihe strategies employed by the opposing specific policies and initiatives, need to stop crowding so much print on Hawke government. Coffee-shop representing values which are not every page — a bad habit that must make Keynesianism is not a sufficient response appealing to a significant number of even the bravest heart quail whilst deciding to the widely accepted views of the federal people. The left seems unable to fashion whether To read or Not to read. Treasury and Paul Keating's the needs of its many parts into a coherent It might mean less room for an article or contemptuous dismissal of alternatives — vision and philosophy. two, but I’m on Ihe side of Lenin when he founded more on hope than logic — is The right has cleverly shifted the said “Fewer but better’’ — I forget in what depressing and monotonous in its grounds of the political debate away from context, but I’m sure he was pleading with regularity. its traditional image of social dedicated bolsheviks. Many on the left largely relied on nec conservatism and, representing powerful Now that l‘m sufficiently wound up, 1 Keynesian commentators such as the interests, to that of concern for the feel like having you on about the covers of Melbourne Age's Ken Davidson, who are material well-being of individuals and ALR. invariably uninviting. Now that you themselves now arguing fora reduction in families. That shift, and an appeal to are entrusting it to the newsagents you government expenditure in response to the selfish individualism, continues to allow should aim to make it easier for them to decline in ihe terms of trade. Conventional them to dominate the tax debate. gain sales. The cover of No. 98 is a good left positions on government intervention, Whereas socialism is undergoing a extension of government control and crisis, both in its theory and its applciation, nationalisation are now tittle more lhan the possibility for at least some

We welcome your letters for the Winter The New International Review Winter, 1987 Issue issue. As a general rule, letters should be no •Eric Lee and Alex Spinrad on “Technology and the Left" — a longer than 250 words and. preferably, refreshingly new pro-technology analysis. should be typewritten. The collective •A special interview with Ken Livingstone, former head ofthe Greater reserves the right to edit letters down to London Council and a leader of the British Labour Party Left, this length. The author's address should be •Lloyd Harrington on Walter Reuther’s socialism. included, although this will not be printed. • Moshe Matsuba on “communes and Kibbutzim in Japan”. The deadline for letters for the Winter issue To receive [his issue by airmail, send $3.00 lo: is 11 May. NIR, Box 2116, Afula, Israel. 42 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW REVIEWS ,

individuals to benefit materially under the address issues such as wealth creation, the One docs not have to be an economic strategics of the New Right means that it national interest, productivity and specific dctcrminist to recognise the critical can draw a surprising level of support, industry measures, rather than being seen importance of economic policy to the Many people believe they stand to gain as concerned with only the redistribution credibility of a socialist stance. from deregulation and cutting personal of wealth, or single issues. This is income tax, while social wage benefits are particularly so when those issues can be Socialist ideology has had a measure more difficult to identify and quantify. portrayed as having a negative impact on of popular support in previous decades because it appeared to have a scientific Moreover, while it is possible to growth and employment. By way of demonstrate that a number of leading New contrast, the work done in the basis, and because it afforded hope through collective action around basic Right figures are merely the old order in environmental movement on specific and a new guise. Bjelke-Petersen is a more feasible economic alternatives to dams and economic and industrial issues. Certainly elusive figure. logging forests in Tasmania is an there is a need for a new style of politics Apart from the professionalism of his important forward step. which seeks to extend democratic practices political machine, his own inadequacies of Media and conservative attacks on and offers the possibility of personal speech and manner, combined with his the public sector cannot, of themselves, growth and development — major current ability to articulate the concerns of many shift public perceptions about its concerns. These concepts are not inimical working people, and his image of strength performance. The attacks have been to the socialist program which has an and determination provide an empathetic effective because they have fallen on fertile economic focus as its centre-piece. figure for at least a significant minority of ground. In summary, if socialist renewal is to working people, particularly those with Too often, the left's reluctance to have a real meaning. I believe a consensus socially conservative values. address questions of the performance of must emerge around priorities for For instance, in the recent the public sector, the need for socialism through a reappraisal of Queensland elections, many voters who restructuring, resource reallocation, waste traditional left positions. had doubts about Bjelke-Petersen and inefficiency leads to arguing for “more nevertheless must have been able to enjoy of the same” in the pursuit of an apparently being part of "doing" professional pollsters abstract social goal. In the public sector, Peter Noonan and the media in the eye. the left has been irrelevant in the inevitable His supporters like to portray Bjelke- restructuring which has taken place and Petersen as a threat to Ihe existing order has been unsuccessful in influencing broad PETER NOONAN is a member of the not only to the Hawke government but public opinion about the need for an Victorian Socialist Left of the ALP. also to established interests such as the expanded public sector and an professions, the media, trade unions and interventionist role for government. pubtic servants. Frustration and anger about the failure of that “established order” to address social and economic problems, and the fact that he is a threat to those interests, may in itself generate SUBSCRIBE TO # | support from people who ironically have most to lose. Their feelings of powerless ness and alienation, particularly WOMANSPEAK V* if they feel the A I P no longer represents them, will contribute to that process. Nor is it sufficient to expect that the MAGAZINE extremism of many of the policies of the right will repel many of his potential supporters or thal the actual experience of neo-conservative governments will produce a swing back in public opinion. WOMANSPEAK is a feminist magazine in its twelfth Events in the US, UK and recently in West year of publication, produced by an all-women, Sydney- Germany testify to that. based collective of volunteers, and including only women's Unpalatable though conservative contributions. It provides information on women's policies in those countries may be, the left involvement in film, art, fiction, theatre, work and has been unable to develop credible domesticity, politics, feminist activism. alternatives. Put simply, the left is no WOMANSPEAK covers such issues as child-care, longer the engine room of the ideas which aboriginal and migrant women, rape, pornography, directly and indirectly strongly influence prostitution, education, homosexuality, law reform, social and political thought beyond its working and domestic conditions for women and nuclear ranks. energy. To recapture this role, the left must ISSUE 48, Vol 10, No 3, contains articles on Girls at engage in some free thinking and critical Risk, The New Right, Divorce in Ireland, Women in Local appraisal of its own policies. There is an Government, Short Stories, Poetry, Film & Book Reviews, urgent need to reconstruct a core set of and all our regular features. socialist values and beliefs which address SEND $6 for 4 issues (individuals) or $10 (institutions) the central concerns of working people in to: WOMANSPEAK, PO Box 103, Spit Junction, NSW their daily lives. 2088. Socialist values must therefore REVIEWS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 43

. Challenges ... and Problems

Feminist Challenges: Social and Political Theory, ed. Carol Pateman and Liz Gross (Allen and Unwin, 1986). $14.95. ■ Reviewed by Pavla Miller.

HE “Men may cook or weave or dress disciplines to look at women and at l i t i : : dolls or hunt humming birds, but if their interests — their political such activities are appropriate participation, rights as citizens, : -1 : ■ ■ occupations for men, then the whole history, work, sexuality, the bearing society, men and women alike, votes and raising of children. In the process, them as important. When the same some feminists re-read the “founding : occupations are performed by women, fathers” of western philosophy, and they are regarded as less important.” discovered that most did have things Translated into the concerns of social to say about women, and very nasty ;V theorising, this quote from Margaret things at that. In the ideal republic, Mead, used by one of the authors to Rousseau tells men “to renounce one’s introduce her chapter, eccapsulates liberty is to renounce one’s quality as a : the fundamental insight of this man, the rights and also the duties of collection of essays. humanity”. Women, in the meanwhile, “must be trained to bear the yoke from From several different the first so that they may not feel it: to perspectives, the thirteen chapters of master their own caprices and submit the book explore the impact of themselves to the will of others”. feminist theory on contemporary loday, trie potential inherent in western philosophy. liberal political the first project has been all but theory, sociology and history. exhausted. Gradually, "adding" Although the authors differ in their women and their interests to social theoretical positions, they share a map theory has revealed conceptual of the general outline of the problems which could no longer be battlefront. contained within the parent Feminists, they argue, started by disciplines; after a certain point, pointing out the absence of women feminist insights challenged the very from contemporary social theory. At foundations of western social and ■ ... /- ■ ... r first, their project involved using the political theory. At this point, the tools provided by their respective contributors to Feminist Challenges . explore two different paths. Some feminists try to reject “male-stream” social theorisingaltogetherand seek to develop a new form of feminist social understanding. Others the majority in this volume — make social theory and its categories themselves the object of feminist social inquiry. The notion of an individual, so important in western social theory, is used by several of the authors to elaborate this theme. Put simply, the world is divided into a public and a private sphere, the former comprising 44 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW REVIEWS

government, politics, and paid work, Feminist Challenges, one specific to tidiness. Theirs is no academic and dominated by men, the latter this collection of essays and one more exercise. They want to change the centred on the family and inhabited by general. In Europe, feminist theories world. And indeed, the insights women. What happens in the public such as those put forward in this book contained in this collection of essays sphere is important, has a general have been challenged by black women will help feminist theoreticians significance, is truly human. What for failing to come to grips with racism understand and describe the world in happens in the private sphere is closer and with the very real differences in the radically new ways, help them sec to animal nature, is less important and social situation of black and white through some of the ways of thinking unsuitable as a basis for deriving women in different cultures. (The and understanding that are so general principles about humanity. British journal. Feminist Review, has crippling to women. But, by the same In this scheme, humanity, been one forum for this debate.) token, the technical language in which rationality and individuality are Certainly, while some authors in this the book is w'ritten is not accessible to defined in a way which not only leaves volume are careful to specify that they the majority of women in our society. out significant female concerns, but arc dealing with a western tradition of How can radicals bridge this gap are frequently the very antithesis of social theory, others can, with some between theory and ordinary people? what it means and feels like to be a justification, be accused of woman. Indeed, for such analysis to ethnocentnsm, and none address the work, people’s bodies have to be left issues of racial and ethnic differences out of the defining characteristics of among women directly. One reason PAVLA MILLER teaches sociology in the Education Department at Melbourne individuals. In turn, since some for this is the book’s greater emphasis University, and Ls a member of the ALR aspects of rationality and citizenship on philosophy rather than on collective. are defined as the very opposite of anthropology and history. women's activities and concerns, and The second problem is more femininity is seen as something which -general. Feminist Challenges is a has to be transcended to become a theoretical book about theories and, citizen, it i> not enough for women as such, epitomises both the simply to seek equal acess to science achievements and the problems of and to political life. Sex equality is not theorising personal and political enough. Rationality and citizenship issues. The authors are interested in far themselves have to be redefined. more than writing for the sake of Within the general framework of conceptual clarity and theoretical the book, different contributors to Feminist Challenges focus on particular issues. There is a useful chapter outlining some of the tricks which make women disappear from “ma I e-stream" social theory, a chapter on the links between war and the definition of self in western philosophical tradition, and chapters examining the writings of French feminist theoreticians Julia Kristeva, Luce Irigary and Simone de Beauvoir. T here are two*major problems in FEMINISI CHALLENGES REVIEWS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 45

Then follows a section of four chapters dealing with specific policy Succeeding the aspects of the Accord’s implementat­ ion and of the Hawke years more generally. This section details those outcomes of economic policy making Accord under Labor that have most disappointed (and harmed) Labor supporters. Stilwell speaks of the degeneration of a prices and incomes policy into a wage-restraint policy; the The Accord ... and Beyond by Frank Stilwell (Pluto Press, adoption of restrictive and 1986). $11.95. Reviewed by Geoff Dow. contractionary budgetary and monetary policies; attempts by the government to introduce a regressive, indirect taxation system (and its It is easy to catalogue the failings Stilwell’s latest book, the first full limited success with tax reform since of Labor governments. It is similarly analysis of the much-debated ACTU- then); and industry policy easy to conclude that the ALP “Accord”, is that it doesn’t (manufacturing decline, the case for parliamentary process, institutional presuppose either the terms or the intervention and specific industry intervention into the economy and conclusions of its investigation. plans). reformist intentions are all bound to In ten chapters and three fail because of the stubbornness of documentary appendices, Stilwell Finally there is a series of chapters capitalist production relations. When presents a comprehensive summary of evaluating the Accord in terms of the we apply class analysis to such the development and fate of the constraints upon even well- experiences, we tend to imagine that Accord in a way which raises and intentioned interventionism, we, on the left, have a complete soberly deals with many of the issues suggesting a “more progressive" understanding of the forms and effects that, on a week by week basis since alternative and discussing possible of class conflict and that we know 1983, the left has been required to future changes in labour-capital exactly what capitalism is. confront. As an historical record of the relationships in Australia. The post-1983 Labor government key political concerns of the 1980s, the Clearly tnen, there is a structure book is invaluable: as a definitive in Australia has forced a belated here for a thorough appraisal of the recognition that labour movement coming-to-terms with theoretical and possibilities and limitations of social responses to capitalist economic crisis strategic conundrums for the labour democracy, of the political aspects of are often far from adequate. Stories of movement. 1 found it rather less capitalism in crisis and of the aspects frustration and disappointment have satisfactory. But the fault here, if that of conflict in capital accumulation in been told so many times now. is what it is, is not Stilweil’s alone. the local context. It is in drawing out especially in Anglo-Saxon countries, these underlying conceptual issues in that it is somewhat surprising the the political economy of the Labor appropriate lessons have not been government that the book contains properly learned. Evaluations of “ ... The unsatisfactory confusions and limitations. I will try to labour and social democratic explain some of them. governments which compare actual presumption that any Of considerable significance, policies with ideal socialist principles policy which aids economic given StilweH’s prominence in the are usually of very little help. So are recovery is reactionary .” political economy movement and the supercilious assessments that refuse to associated controversies, is the book’s understand that, when parties of failure to outline concisely the labour accede to political pressures perspective that political economy from the right, or from employers, or I here are, in effect, three sections. provides. Stilwell suggests that the role from economists, or from The first deals with the actual events in of political economy is to provide a reactionaries within their own ranks, the Accord's history (the April 1983 political dimension to an analysis that the resulting policy failures are effects NESC, the new forums EPAC and would otherwise be sterile and of a generalised class weakness of the ACPI, the National Taxation Summit formalistic. But he doesn’t allow us to left, and that we must all shoulder (NTS), the rise and demise of full build upon the insights into the some of the responsibility for it. indexation and with seven “competing processes of capital accumulation, Assumptions of an imagined interpretations” of the Accord strategy class struggle and political institutions “authentic” militancy similarly (focussing variously on its presumed that separate the classical and marxian produce only predictable denunciat­ ideological, managerial, socialistic, traditions of economic analysis from ions hardly requiring detailed analysis. anti-labour, sexist, corporatist or class the more modern, and inherently The great merit of Frank elements). conservative, preoccupation with 46 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW REVIEWS

issues based around the "allocation of scarce resources”. More specifically, it seems a pity 'The Political Economy that the book only implicitly presents of the Labor Government the general case for new political institutions to allow democratic control of investment and income The Accord... distribution. Stilwell is not unaware of the need to replace market mechanisms in any complex economy and Beyond with political or institutional mechanisms; but the case is not ______Frank Stilwell — presented systematically enough to indicate what the objectives of an alternative approach to capital accumulation would be. Consequent­ ly, leftist critics of economic orthodoxy are left with no counter to the unsatisfactory presumption that any policy which aids economic recovery is reactionary. We need to be reminded more often that labour movement interventions in this sphere are both legitimate and emphatically anti-capitalist. To a very considerable extent, Stilwell comes close to incorporating these imperatives into his analysis, especially in the summary of "what went wrong?" (ch.8). in a discussion of problems on the left he acknowledges that the left does nol have “the numbers" but is less ready to argue that it does not have the arguments either. Credibility problems are a two- 4 1 Pluto way street: and the reasons cited for Press our "relative weakness” don't include our inability over a long period to resolve either what the meaning of a contractionary policies o) the current relativities and the submission that socialist strategy in a capitalist society government while asserting outright import controls be linked to domestic could possibly mean, or what we to have the Accord commitments to expansion so that overall levels of should do when international crises, wage maintenance, industry policy, trade can be maintained. Despite unemployment, inflation, balance of anti-recessionary policy and economic these, I felt the absence of any serious payments problems or Treasury democracy honoured. We should be attempt to prioritise the author’s "remedies” confront us. The left's less surprised than we pretend to be arguments. There seemed to me to be weakness, it seems to me, stems more when Labor governments capitulate in too many hasty concessions to what from our own abstcntionism in the this manner. We should be less might be called "knee-jerk" leftism, sorts of debates which fed into the concerned to blame governments or even where these leave inconsistencies Accord than from the development of politicians for the stances they take in our case against the present policies. the Accord strategy itself. and be more active in creating the Stilwell’s comments on "statism". for Whatever we may think of the interventionist conditions and example, seem to imply that labour's Hawke/Keating abrogations during institutions that would allow labour a confrontations with capital must the past two years, we need to more assertive role in economic always be achieved through the offices remember that they brought to management. of government. His calls lor greater fruition plans to involve the labour The book makes dozens of sensible attention to price controls reproduce a movement in macro-economic policy- proposals for reform, for example, the serious deficiency in left argument making that were absolutely suggestion that workers could be more generally: that price control is unimagined by the Whitlam circus. involved in arbitration system impossible unless we have a prior We need to fight against the deliberations on appropriate wage understanding of exactly which REVIEWS AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW 47

industries we want to exist and how policy under Hawke has been had effective counter arguments is an downturns in economic activity are to insufficiently faithful to this project, indication of how much work there is bp handled. then we must fight to regain our still to be done. influence over it. But we need to As I indicated earlier, the problems remember that the institutions and in this book are problems for all of us. arrangements that the Accord ushered The failings of Labor governments are in are absolutely essential; the GEOPF DOW teaches in Humanities at not new (recall the Scullin and subsequent retreats from the 1983 Griffith University. Macdonald governments’responses to commitments have been disappointing recession): they reflect a general failure but not surprising. That we haven’t of the left to construct a political and economic strategy which acknowl­ edges that the reflation of a capitalist economy and the struggle to secure permanent full employment are, in themselves, profoundly radical arena projects. It is increasingly apparent that transition to socialism is something that requires high levels of economic activity and that, insofar as Number 77 1986 capital cannot guarantee what its own S ubscription R a t e s : ideologies promise, labour needs to The Art of Commitment: The Place of (Four issues a year) take on social and economic functions Noel Counihan wherein its past role has been entirely Robert Smith In Australia subordinate. This subordination After Social Democracy Institutions - $20 becomes less and less a cloak for Joseph Camilleri Individuals — $15 macro-economic performance the Nomad and Empire longer we go down the track of Bill Martin Overseas capitalist development. Therefore, we The Discourse of Labourism Individuals — A $ 18 need not only to develop alternative Peter Beilharz & Rob Watts economic strategies but to shed our Institutions —• A$30 BLF: A Struggle for all Unionists own conceptions of capitalism of the (surface mail) John Cummins misapprehension that this isn’t our Nurses' Work. Nurses’ Worth proper role. Sally McManamny Single copies - $4 The Accord gave labour an Industrial Relations: The New Management (overseas — $5.50) opportunity to usurp long-lived Offensive capitalist prerogatives; if economic Stephen Deery & Richard Mitchell Please make cheques After Reykjavik payable to Arena. John Hinkson Laughing Seriously Send to: Arena, Don’t leave ALR E d de la Torre PO Box 18, Papal Power and Liberation Theology on the Shelf! Geoff Rodoreda Nth Carlton Palestinian Nationalism Victoria 3054, Australia. ALR is now available in most John Docker newsagents in metropolitan Privatization for Policy and Profit Sydney and many in Melbourne Kent Middleton and country NSW. (Y o u 'll Communications, poetry and reviews probably find it nestling between Time and Business Review Weekly ...) If your local newsagent doesn’t stock it, tell Arena is recognized as one of the major forums in Australia for them it's about time they did. social and cultural comment. Past issues have developed analyses And don't forget to tell your in such areas as media and popular culture, intellectuals and friends that the left’s most read society, technological change, nuclear politics, feminist theory, magazine is now as close as the world economic crisis, and regional politics including South East corner shops. Asia, the Pacific and Australasia. 48 AUSTRALIAN LEFT REVIEW REVIEWS The Modern Girl The Modem Girl's Guide to Everything, by Kaz Cook (Penguin, 1986). $6.95. gtsgg^^gipi «F

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