Recent discussion has led me to start on a post I’ve been meaning to do asking the question: to what extent are the major parties and their leaders responsible for the resurgence of racial and religious prejudice in Australia, as represented by Pauline Hanson and the treatment of asylum seekers.
Starting with Paul Keating, I think his opportunistic self-reinvention after 1993, as a promoter of various progressive causes in which he had previously shown almost no interest was immensely damaging to those causes, and most particularly to the idea of a tolerant, multicultural Australia. As far as I can recall, Keating’s government didn’t actually introduce any startling innovations in multicultural policy, let alone attempt to reconstruct Australia in some sort of radical fashion. Rather, Keating tied the longstanding bipartisan support for a generally positive attitude to migration and cultural plurality into his general rhetorical stance, in which anyone who opposed either radical economic reform or his cultural agenda was a troglodyte throwback to the 1950s, supporter of White Australia and so on. Although this kind of link had been made previously by people like Paul Kelly and Gerard Henderson, Keating dramatised it skilfully. The end result, however, was not to boost his popularity but to transfer his existing unpopularity (primarily due to his economic policies and general arrogance) to the causes he had suddenly espoused.
There’s an obvious sense in which Pauline Hanson was the mirror-image of (post-93) Keating, opposed to both economic reform and migration. Her appeal undoubtedly owed a lot to the feeling that people were being ignored and overridden by the ‘elites’ of which Keating was the paradigmatic representative. But she would not have got so far if it were not for the promotion and encouragement she got from John Howard. Whenever, it has appeared possible to ride a wave of prejudice in Australia, Howard has sought to do so, sometimes successfully and sometimes not. He tried and failed in the 1980s, during the wave of criticism of immigration policy led by Geoffrey Blainey and Katherine West. He tried again with Hanson, initially with some success, but ultimately with disastrous impacts on his own allies in the National Party, who have never recovered from this episode.
Finally, of course, he succeeded brilliantly with Tampa. As I’ve argued previously, the crucial element in his success was the combination of racial/religious prejudice and law and order (the asylum seekers as queue-jumpers)[1]. This enabled what would otherwise have been recognised as overt racism and plain lies (most obviously in the ‘children overboard’ incident) to be coded as appeals to decency.
I haven’t yet mentioned Kim Beazley, who was Labor leader for most of this period. As with most other issues, his contribution was precisely equal to zero. By comparison with the efforts of Keating and Howard, I suppose that’s not such a bad score
fn1. This was combined with the fortuitous impact of the Bilal Skaf rape gang in Sydney, and the initial failure of the judiciary to hand down remotely adequate sentences
John Quiggin 
I do take minor issue with this:
“Jack mentioned some results from a survey done by DIMIA. Keeping in mind the usual caution about opinion poll results, they are interesting. They apparently record an increase, from 35%(in 1996) to 65% now, of people saying migration is a positive.
Given that the overall rates of immigration haven’t changed that much from ’96 to now, how much of that change could be explained by the absence of an opposition utilising the issue of immigration to attack the government of the day?”
One thing is certain, long term arrivals are up from around 90,000 a year when Howard was elected to over 130,000 a year now. This is a substantial increase. One factor that may have affected public opinion was that family migration was the largest component of the non-humanitarian stream under the Labor Party. This was a particularly unpopular policy as it led to a significant inflow of people with poor English proficiency and job skills. It is fairly reasonable to suggest that the greater the bias towards the business and skilled component, the more popular immigration will be with Australians.
Mark Bahnisch
“Tipper, so you’re suggesting that all 1.2 billion Muslims in the world would agree with the statements made on that website? If I were to assert that all Catholics agree with some statement I found on an integrist and anti-Semitic Catholic website, would you believe me?
Basically a non sequitur statement, however if a Catholic website made threats against me and demonstrated convincingly that they could and would carry out those threats, yes I would take them seriously. However as there is no instance of that, that I know of, your argument is just a strawman.
“Aside from what you have gleaned from your website, what other steps have you taken to inform yourself about Islam? ”
Five years ago I held the naive view that all religions are equally stupid, but as long as they kept out of my face, I left them alone. Islam with its supramicist and protection racket type terror tactics, has diabused me of that belief.
“Can’t you see that you’re reproducing the prejudice that you claim Muslims hold about the West? Anyway, in answer to your request, try reading this article by Edward Said.”
Ah! Edward Said, my favourite rockin’ Dhimmi Professor
“And since Said, sadly now deceased was a Palestinian Christian reknowned for his scholarship on Western attitudes towards the Middle East (and a Professor at Columbia University in NYC) and you asked for a webpage maintained by an Islamic source, you might like to read this, and I’d recommend you continue exploring the site. ”
I did indeed. First thing I did was check out the “about this site” page .
I’m afraid we’ve got a heretic here. He tries to deal with islam as a religion only.
“I consider it essential to make a clear distinction between, on the one hand, the theology and religion of Islam and, on the other, politics and terrorism involving Muslims who sometimes swathe their local culture or regional geopolitical concerns in the cloak of Islam. Many born Muslims both overseas and among immigrant communities in the West conspicuously fail to differentiate between these.
……. Islam For Today.com strives to focus on the religion of Islam. ”
Now as any “real” muslim will tell you, Islam is a trinity, political (jihad), social (sharia) and religious
“Following up the links from this google search should also give you some relevant reading matter.”
Thanks for that . Agrees with my views perfectly.
“And as I understand it, snuh is correct about Indonesia and Malaysia not being signatories to the refugee convention. This was a real issue with the Tampa, as you may recall – the reason why the refugees on that ship didn’t want to go to an Indonesian port.”
Not the way I read things. They were saved by the Tampa from drowning, and who were required by maritime law to take them back to their last port of call i.e Singapore. The “refugees” in gratitude pirated the ship of their saviours. Typical I suppose of supremists, who are such infantile egotist, that they think their view must prevail. (except of course in the presence of the “strong horse” when they then grovel.
“The real thing I object to in your comment is your assumption that everyone in the world who is Islamic holds the same views.”
Never said all muslims hold the same view, only that “moderates” may as well not exist, for all they contribute to solving the problem of extremism. E-mail Salmon Ruskie to find out why they are so silent.
So you see I’m actually speaking for them as well when I disparage the extremists.
“With respect, this “logic” leads to prejudice. Islam is an incredibly diverse faith, just like Christianity. Aside from the differences between Sunnis and Shias, there are also innumerable other religious differences, and Islam also manifests itself differently according to ethnic and national cleavages. Incidentally, the brand of Islam favoured by Usama bin Laden – Wahabbism – is the same one supported by the Saudi royal family ”
Yeah, and the one funding the building of mosques around the world and also the fastest growing branch of Islam for the same reason.
“- those close allies of the Bush family. Part of the problem with the spread of Al-Qaeda’s ideas was the use of Saudi government funds to establish and takeover mosques in Western countries. Another example of blowback, one might argue.”
I can see you’ve been to see Mikey the Moor’s propaganda flic.
Steve,
People can, and do, manage to use all sorts of teachings in the Bible to justify whatever it is they want justified. Though they do seem to rely mostly on the Old Testament or Revelations.
find me a muslim who does not expound dangerous and fundamentalist views. incidentally, i have defined “muslim” to exclude any such muslims that you may find.
also:
Steve’s reference to the ABS data doesn’t do much to show that family reunion aspect of immigration was a particular influence. If anything, the data seems to support my general feeling, which is that on this issue, perception was more important than reality.
Steve says that family reunion was “..the largest component of the non-humanitarian stream under the Labor Party. This was a particularly unpopular policy..”
True, but it also continued to be true under the Coalition according to the data. The time when the skilled intake was closest in size to the family intake was between ’89 and ’93. After that the gap was growing with a reduction in skilled migration up until the limit of the data (’97). It would be interesting to see more recent figures which would show any substantial change to the pattern.
Skilled migration has always tended to follow the pattern of increasing in economic booms and reduction during downturns.
Family migration, in the period covered by the ABS data, tracks up and down closely matching the variation in total immigration intake. This hardly points to any significant difference in policy in that period and so doesn’t seem to explain any change in public opinion.
Steve concluded that “It is fairly reasonable to suggest that the greater the bias towards the business and skilled component, the more popular immigration will be with Australians.”
Another conclusion might be that in economic downturns, anger can be mis-directed at easy targets.
As usual, when Pr Q wades into cultural analysis, he tends to use the opportunity to fly some untested and speculative social theories. These cyber vitriols are posted off into the internet in a suspiciously fact- and link-free vials and, conveniently, mesh with his obsessive vendetta against John Howard.
Pr Q starts off inauspiciously by dumping the cultural history of the nineties into a memory hole:
Hullo? Does anyone else remember the Culture Wars or was it all a bad dream? And there were policies galore to go with them. Asian Engagement foreign policy, Multicultural society, Republican Constitution, Native Title, these sound like pretty big innovations to me.
Pr Q attributes supernatural powers to Keatings personality, when it was his Culture War policy that was bad. Lets take a wander down bad memory lane :
Reconciliation: Keating picked up the Hasluckian cue of positive action for Aboriginals and added symbolic politics, feel good marches, sorry days etc plus a qusi seperatist political agenda for indigenes, Result: Aboriginal social indices went backward. A corrupt and inefficient ATSIC was denonounced by independent Aboriginal leaders.
Asian Engagement: Keating, and his Jakarta Lobby, drew up the Indonesian Treaty was going to replace ANZUS as a regional security blanket against the PRC. Result: Treaty torn to pieces and dumped in the mass graves of East Timor (which was liberated by the cruel racist Howard and the rotten monarchist militarists in the ADF.)
Multiculturalism: Keating kept the laudable aim of a race-neutral immigration policy but tacked onto this his vision of a post-Western multicultural society (aka Beirut). Result: The ALP shifted from a class to an ethnic party as Theophanoid Lefties rorted the system for personal and political gain. People-smuggling, and associated maritime tragedies, escalate. Ethnic underclass appears in Sydney.
Feminism: Keating pursued the laudable aim of liberating women from household drudgery, breeding factory and punching bags for drunken husbands. Result: a large cohort of middle-aged educated females begin the long slide towards retirement well-stocked with Prada acessories but in a barren, desperate and dateless condition.
The fact is that it was New Left Cultural Progressivism that deformed good liberal ethical principles into bad New Left political practice.
Pr Q then has the cheek to invest Paul Keating with occult powers in an attempt to shift blame for the adverse social consequences, and political reactions, of a failed cultural policy from the New Class New Lefties to Bad King John:
Right wing debacles will never cease! In New Left political demonology eco-rats are responsible for Cultural Reaction as well as Economic Deprivation. Quick, someone call John Hewson and break his day!
In fact, Hewsons class-divisive 1993 Eco-Rat agenda was rejected for the same reason as Keatings culture-divisive 1996 Pee-Cee agenda: they enriched financial and cultural elites and ultimately failed to deliver benefits to the majority, whilst hurting some minorities.
The Cultural Lefts disparagement of Howard is delusional, starting with the paranoid theory that Howard sank the SIEV-X. The political facts speak for themselves.
If Keating was the source of hostility to Pee-Cee Multi-culti identity politics, then why did did Hanson get stronger in 1998, after Keating got beaten and discredited?
Why has Latham, a noted fan of Keating, shifted to the Right and attacked multicultural ideologies and lax rules on Border Protection?
If Australians are sectarians then why are diverse religious schools springing up everwhere? Howard funds them!
If Australians are racists then why do 2/3 of the Australian people strongly support Howards cultural line? Howard implements a (not post-) modernist social democratic civic policy!
Where are Australias neo-nationalist parties? Howards’ bulldog destroyed them!
Where is Australias racist immigration policy? Howard increased immigration NESB qty and ratio!
Where do scuttle-prone Middle Eastern refugee boast go to now? Back to the nations that Howard helped liberate!
The fact is that the Cultural Left is largely responsible for the ill-tempers that it decries. Keatings Cultural Agenda, embraced enthusiasticly by the New Class Broad Left, was a comprehensive policy failure which hurt the less advantaged people it was meant to help.
The Cultural Left needs to ask itself the hard question: is it interested in the well-being of others, esp Australian citizens, or is it more interested in narcissistic navel-gazing with the aid of a well-appointed, government funded moral vanity mirror?
Jack, can you point to some substantive multicultural policies (as opposed to policy statements, consequences of policy, Culture Wars, overheated rhetoric etc) introduced under Keating? Did he for example, change the official language status of English? Establish new institutions like SBS and HREOC? Or something else?
The only significant policy innovation I can remember is detention of asylum seekers, which does not exactly fit your case.
For the benefit of MH, Fyodor, in a previous (and lengthy) thread uncovered some ABS data showing family migration was down to around 18k a year, somewhere between 10-15% of total intake.
The data I linked to does not progress past 1997, however, I must admit that I could not find Fyodor’s latest (possibly 2001 census) figures. I don’t have any reason to believe he was fibbing on that score. Hopefully, he will rejoin this thread and link to the data he found.
There is some data showing that 1999/2000 had family migration down to 19,000.
http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/d650a8e2782a347aca256bcd00825564?OpenDocument
I’d like to see the 18,000 figure corroborated, so hopefully Fyodor will get back on line to show us where it can be found.
Elsewhere, we have more data showing that the unemployment and labour market participation rates among Family Migrants (not to mention Humanitarian visa holders) after 18 months tend to be fairly disappointing.
http://www.immi.gov.au/facts/14labour.htm
I’ve been saying this all along, and it is high time that we rationalised the immigration stream (perhaps operating on the Zero Base Budgeting principle might shake the system up a little). Howard is probably on the right track, but hasn’t gone nearly far enough.
Typo alert – that should be 19,900.
Hi guys,
Steve Edwards has good data at his source, but the one I used [apologies for not linking] is:
http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/94713ad445ff1425ca25682000192af2/27c5532c626ff114ca256ea20015c008!OpenDocument
And the number is 19K (or rather, 18,800) for 2001, not 18K. My mistake.
Pr Q,
I concede that my interchangeable usage of Keating and “the Cultural Left” is sloppy and misleading.
Keating did not formally establish a great raft of New Left Cultural institutions. That work was done in the decade prior to his ascension to High Office, with the New Lefts long march through the institutions.
Keating was a superb front-man for this Push but, as I have repeatedly stressed, the fundamental causes of Identity Politics are New Class-sociological rather than Old Partisan-political.
Fraser was even futher to the Left than Keating on most of these issues, but the New Class could never bring themselves to say a nice thing about his since his Labor Party-pooping stunt of 11-11-75.
Keating did, with decidedly mixed results, push heavily for many new Pee-Cee inititative, Gays in the Military, Asian Engagement with Indonesia, Reconciliatation with ATSIC and a near miss on the Turnbull’s Minimal Republic.
As I have repeatedly stated, Keatings main sin was to take the good humanitarian intentions of Kantian-style liberalism and turn it into an ideological rallying cry and sociological structure against his various political foes.
This did three very bad things to the AUstralian polity: exploited the easy-going attitudes in the masses, allowed rorts by the elites and enabled various social pathologies to fester amongst their clients in the “special interests” ie Jakarta Lobby, multi-culticrats, indige-crats, femo-crats, minimal Republicans, etc.
It was this crew, not some occult mass revulsion to Keatings lingering spirit, that has caused the polity to swing back to the Vital Centre on Cultural issues.
The longer the Cultural Left refuses to swallow the bitter truth of its bungled political implementations, and iniquitous policy innovations, the longer it will spend in the political wilderness unable to defend the good institutions of the Economic Left.
JS: As I have repeatedly stated, Keatings main sin was to take the good humanitarian intentions of Kantian-style liberalism and turn it into an ideological rallying cry and sociological structure against his various political foes. ”
JQ: Rather, Keating tied the longstanding bipartisan support for a generally positive attitude to migration and cultural plurality into his general rhetorical stance, in which anyone who opposed either radical economic reform or his cultural agenda was a troglodyte throwback to the 1950s, supporter of White Australia and so on. ”
If there is a difference between these formulations that requires comments many times longer than the original post, I’m not seeing it.
Has there been an increase in prejudice?
John Quiggin asks: to what extent are the major parties and their leaders responsible for the resurgence of racial and religious prejudice in Australia, as represented by Pauline Hanson and the treatment of asylum seekers. A few people in his…