Australian Political Lives Chronicling Political Careers and Administrative Histories

Australian Political Lives Chronicling political careers and administrative histories Australian Political Lives Chronicling political careers and administrative histories Tracey Arklay, John Nethercote and John Wanna, editors Published by ANU E Press The Australian National University Canberra ACT 0200, Australia Email: [email protected] Web: http://epress.anu.edu.au National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry Nethercote, J. R. (John Raymond). Australian political lives : chronicling political careers and administrative histories Bibliography Includes index ISBN 1 920942 73 4 (pbk.) ISBN 1 920942 74 2 (online) 1. Politicians - Australia - Biography - History and criticism. 2. Campaign biography - Australia. I. Wanna, John. II. Arklay, Tracy. III. Title. 808.066320092 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. Cover design by John Butcher Printed by University Printing Services, ANU Funding for this monograph series has been provided by the Australia and New Zealand School of Government Research Program. This edition © 2006 ANU E Press John Wanna, Series Editor Professor John Wanna is the Sir John Bunting Chair of Public Administration at the Research School of Social Sciences at The Australian National University. He is the director of research for the Australian and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG). He is also a joint appointment with the Department of Politics and Public Policy at Griffith University and a principal researcher with two research centres: the Governance and Public Policy Research Centre and the nationally-funded Key Centre in Ethics, Law, Justice and Governance at Griffith University. Professor Wanna has produced around 17 books including two national text books on policy and public management. He has produced a number of research-based studies on budgeting and financial management including: Budgetary Management and Control (1990); Managing Public Expenditure (2000), From Accounting to Accountability (2001) and, most recently, Controlling Public Expenditure (2003). He has just completed a study of state level leadership covering all the state and territory leaders — entitled Yes Premier: Labor leadership in Australia’s states and territories — and has edited a book on Westminster Legacies in Asia and the Pacific —Westminster Legacies: Democracy and responsible government in Asia and the Pacific. He was a chief investigator in a major Australian Research Council funded study of the Future of Governance in Australia (1999-2001) involving Griffith and the ANU. His research interests include Australian and comparative politics, public expenditure and budgeting, and government-business relations. He also writes on Australian politics in newspapers such as The Australian, Courier- Mail and Canberra Times and has been a regular state political commentator on ABC radio and TV. Table of Contents List of Contributors ix Preface xi The Art of Australian Political Biography Geoffrey Bolton 1 Political Biography: Its Contribution to Political Science Tracey Arklay 13 Recording Non-Labor Politics Through Biography Judith Brett 25 The `Life Myth', `Short Lives' and Dealing with Live Subjects in Political Biography James Walter 29 Public Lives, Private Lives: the Fundamental Dilemma in Political Biography Nicholas Brown 35 Expanding The Repertoire: Theory, Method and Language in Political Biography R. A. W. Rhodes 43 John Curtin: Taking his Childhood Seriously David Day 51 Ministers, Prime Ministers, Mandarins: Politics as a Job Patrick Weller 55 Biography and the Rehabilitation of the Subject: The Case of John Gorton Ian Hancock 61 Aboriginality and Impersonality: Three Australian Indigenous Administrative Memoirs Tim Rowse 65 Writing Political Biography Rae Wear 73 Jessie Street and the New Political Biography Lenore Coltheart 77 Conjuring Fascinating Stories: the Case of Sir Arthur Tange Peter Edwards 81 Anonymous in Life, Anonymous in Death: Memoirs and Biographies of Administrators John Nethercote 87 The Personal Writings of Politicians Neal Blewett 91 Writing Political Autobiographies John Button 97 Political Biographies and Administrative Memoirs: Some Concluding Comments Philip A. Selth 101 References 115 Index 129 vii List of Contributors Tracey Arklay is a doctoral student at Griffith University, Queensland, and is writing a biography of Sir Arthur Fadden. She recently worked as a research assistant on the History of the Queensland Parliament 1957-89 project. Neal Blewett, AC, was Professor of Political Theory, Flinders University, South Australia from 1974-77, member of the House of Representatives from 1977-94, minister in the Hawke-Keating governments from1983-93, and Australian High Commissioner in London from 1994-98. He is the author of A Cabinet Diary (1999). Geoffrey Bolton, AO, Chancellor, Murdoch University, WA, has held chairs in history at Murdoch, London, Queensland and Edith Cowan universities. Author of biographies of Sir Richard Boyer (1967) and Sir Edmund Barton (2000), he is now writing a biography of Sir Paul Hasluck. Judith Brett, Professor of Politics, Latrobe University, Victoria. She is the author of Australian Liberals and the Moral Middle Class: From Alfred Deakin to John Howard (2003) and Robert Menzies© Forgotten People (2002). Her edited book, Political Lives, was published in 1997. Nicholas Brown is Senior Research Fellow at the Australian Dictionary of Biography, located in the Research School of Social Sciences at The Australian National University. He is the author of Richard Downing: Economics, advocacy and social reform in Australia (2001). John Button was Labor Senator for Victoria from1974-93, Leader of the Government in the Senate from 1983-93 and Minister for Industry from 1983-93. He is the author of As It Happened (1998). Lenore Coltheart taught political history in Australian universities for 25 years before retiring to Canberra in 1997. She prepared a revised edition of Jessie Street's autobiography, Jessie Street: A revised autobiography (2004) and is currently writing a biography of Jesse Street. David Day is a Research Fellow in the School of Historical and European Studies at Latrobe University, Victoria. He has written biographies of Curtin, John Curtin: A life (1999) and Chifley (2002). Peter Edwards, AM, is a Visiting Professor at the University of New South Wales, Australian Defence Force Academy, Canberra. His biography of Sir Arthur Tange, Arthur Tange: Last of the mandarins, was published in 2006. Ian Hancock is a Visiting Fellow at the Australian Dictionary of Biography, at The Australian National University. His book, John Gorton: He did it his way, was published in 2002. ix Australian Political Lives John Nethercote is the Consulting Editor of the Australian Journal of Public Administration. He has written obituaries of several senior Commonwealth officials, including Sir Frederick Wheeler, Dr H. C. Coombs, Dr Peter Wilenski, Sir John Bunting and Sir Allen Brown. Rod (R.A.W.) Rhodes is Professor of Political Science and Head of Program in the Political Science Program, Research School of Social Sciences, The Australian National University. He is author, with Mark Bevir, of Governance Stories (2005) and Interpreting British Governance (2003). And, with Patrick Weller, The Changing World of Top Officials: Mandarins or valets? (2001). Tim Rowse is Professor of History in the Research School of Social Sciences, The Australian National University. He wrote Obliged to be Difficult (2000) and Nugget Coombs: A reforming life (2002). Philip Selth is Executive Director of the New South Wales Bar Association. He was formerly a senior executive in the Commonwealth, State and Territory sectors, and is an avid reader of political biographies. James Walter is Professor of Political Science in the School of Political and Social Inquiry at Monash University, Victoria. He has published widely on Australian politics, history, biography and culture. Among his books are The Leader: A political biography of Gough Whitlam (1980) and The Ministers' Minders: Personal advisers in national government (1986). Rae Wear is a Senior Lecturer in Political Science at the University of Queensland. She wrote Johannes Bjelke-Petersen: the Lord's Premier, published in 2002. She is Associate Editor of the Australian Journal of Politics and History and previously taught at the University of Southern Queensland. Patrick Weller, AO, is Professor and Director of the Centre for Governance and Public Policy at Griffith University, Queensland. He is the author of Don©t Tell the Prime Minister (2002), Australia©s Mandarins: The frank and the fearless (2001), Malcolm Fraser PM (1989) and Dodging Raindrops (1999). x Preface Political biography is a window to a previous world of political practice. From this window, we see politics through the eyes and experiences of an individual subject. We follow their actions and inactions, see their behaviour, experience their world from afar. Often we are treated to insider stories Ð their observations, reflections, understandings, and motivations. We read events from their vantage point or interpretations. Biography is the celebration of the personalised account. Many biographies and autobiographies have been written about or by leading figures in government and politics. In particular, the last decade of the twentieth century Ð as the

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