The Australian Citizenship Test: Process and Rhetoric

In late 2007, Australia's relatively liberal citizenship eligibility requirements were modified, ostensibly to improve the value of citizenship by restricting access to it. A key change involved the introduction of a citizenship test. This article tracks its development and implementation. We challenge claims of overwhelming support for the test, explore the discourses around the “Australian values” being tested, and outline the process by which the legislation was enacted (during which a number of principles of parliamentary democracy were compromised). Using evidence from politicians' speeches, we argue the citizenship test served to re‐direct the Australian imagination away from a nascent “multicultural” identity, back to one redolent of the times of the “White Australia Policy”, confidently celebrating connections with an Anglo‐Saxon heritage, the European Enlightenment, and Judeo‐Christian roots. As such it was a key aspect of the 1996–2007 Howard Government's retreat from multiculturalism.     

‘Paz,progreso, justicia y honradez’: law and citizenship in Alta Verapaz during the regime of Jorge Ubico⋆

Prospects for the ‘rule of law’ in the present are shaped by historical experiences of law by elite and non‐elite groups in the past. In this article I explore changing conceptions and practices of‘rights’and‘justice’as expressed in the legal and administrative encounters between indigenous people and state officials during the regime of Jorge Ubico (1931–1944). The extension of the state's coercive and administrative apparatus to remote rural areas, new legislation and changes in public administration transformed relations between working people, coffee fmqueros and the state in Guatemala. This implied new obligations and exactions for Mayans, but also provided them with new opportunities to contest and negotiate their conditions. Indigenous people strategically engaged with the law to contest the terms of their domination by elite actors and to mediate conflicts between themselves. As state ideologies of‘moral behaviour’led to increasing regulation of the private sphere, this was particularly important in the case of conflicts over gendered rights and obligations. Although formally excluded from the category of citizens, indigenous people used the official language and discourse of citizenship to further their claims, in turn reshaping Guatemalan nation‐state.     

Australian Citizenship and the Two World Wars

This article surveys Australian citizenship: its distinctive characteristics in the first half of the twentieth century, and how these were changed by the experience of the two world wars. It argues that Australian citizenship, at the time of Federation, was racially exclusive, imperial, masculine and deeply anchored in the traditional view of the military obligation of the individual to the state. The world wars, especially the war of 1939‐45, encouraged some adjustment to these ideas, particularly in terms of the imperial link, women's status and the social rights of Australians. However, these conflicts were fought within a context of imperial loyalty and the intensity of their demands reinforced military service in defence of the nation as the primary civic virtue. The centrality of Anzac to Australian nationalism also perpetuated a gendered dimension to Australian citizenship. The world wars therefore, for all their dramatic impact on the lives of Australian families and the national political culture, did not force a major reconceptualisation of Australian citizenship.     

“Leavening British Traditions”: Integration Policy in Australia, 1962–1972

During the period 1962–72 integration replaced assimilation as official government policy in dealing with migrants in Australia. Migrants were now encouraged to incorporate themselves into the dominant Anglo‐Celtic society but also to retain elements of their own culture. The policy emerged in response to the unravelling of Britishness and the incremental dismantling of the White Australia policy as the twin pillars of Australian national identity. The “new nationalism”, which stressed a more independent and home grown Australian image, arose as a possible replacement to British race patriotism towards the end of this period. At the same time whiteness was also broken down.     

Indigenous Military Inclusion: A Settler Colonial Critique of the Regional Force Surveillance Units

In the context of this special issue's inquiry into whether it is possible to decolonise Australian international relations, this article investigates the service of Indigenous people in the Australian Defence Force (ADF). The military is a crucial site to investigate the colonial state of Australian international relations not only because it is an institution that performs key international relations practices such as war and diplomacy, but also because it defines and projects the identity of the state both domestically and internationally. In the past two decades, there has been a sustained effort to include Indigenous people in the ADF. An inclusive and multicultural defence purports to represent a post-colonial state where Indigenous and non-Indigenous people stand next to one another for the defence of their shared country. However, in Australia, Indigenous people do not enjoy the wealth of the nation equally and remain dispossessed from their land and economically disadvantaged. Using discourse analysis of publicly available materials praising Indigenous military inclusion, this article argues that the inclusion of Indigenous people in the Australian Defence Force risks further entrenching the settler colonial project.     

Legitimacy,Democracy and Rights: the Conservatism of Janet Albrechtsen

In recent years, media columnists have been instrumental in redefining Australian conservatism. One of the most prominent is Janet Albrechtsen. Using her critique of a bill of rights, this article examines how this new Australian conservatism rejects or reverses core elements of traditional conservatism. Utilitarianism exchanges the transcendent for the social. Equality and democracy replace elitism. Elites were minorities, albeit ones with leadership virtue. Now minorities of any sort threaten equality and undermine democracy. These changes reflect broader changes in society itself. In this sense, conservatism has made peace with modernity, hostility to which originally prompted its birth. Now the enemy is internationalism or postmodernity, the two often interchangeable. Albrechtsen's hostility to a bill of rights matches her rejection of international law and institutions that threaten the nation‐state and its guarantee of democracy and the rule of law.     

The Head of State Debate: A Response to Sir David Smith and Professor David Flint

In the 1990s political leaders debated a constitutional amendment that would make Australia a republic. That debate continues to the present day. Republicans believe that becoming a republic means having an Australian as head of state instead of the Queen. Constitutional Monarchists see no need for Australia to become a republic since Australia, they argue, is already an independent nation‐state. They contend that the head of state, the Governor‐General, is an Australian citizen and has been since 1965, and that the Queen of Australia is the Sovereign. The purpose of this article is to provide a republican response to recent arguments of two leading Constitutional Monarchist, Sir David Smith and Professor David Flint.     

“I feel I am at the stage now of really learning something”: Esma Banner,Post‐Second World War Migration Worker and Photographer

Australian woman Esma Banner (1910–2001) was a keen amateur photographer who worked for the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) and the International Refugee Organisation (IRO) between 1945 and 1951. While posted in Germany, Banner kept a diary, wrote over 100 letters to her family, kept official reports, took photographs and collected art and craft by Displaced Persons (DP). In particular, photography and family were important to her. She said in a letter home: “You are all always in my thoughts – every picture I take is for you”. This article primarily focuses on visual materials in Esma Banner's personal papers. Banner's collection substantially documents her professional relief work with UNRRA and the IRO, and through this, her interactions with other relief workers as well as displaced children and adults can be seen. Here Banner's photographs and albums are read alongside published materials, letters and diaries to reveal a range of political, personal and gendered understandings of post‐Second World War reconstruction work. The material also provides some insights into the experiences of forcibly displaced children and adults. Banner's photographs are used to reflect upon the place of visual and personal sources in writing histories of post‐Second World War reconstruction.     

Natural‐Born Subjects? Race and British Subjecthood in Australia

From the time of European settlement in Australia until 1948, British subjecthood was the preeminent Australian citizenship classification. "Australian citizenship" was only created as a legal category in 1948, and from then until 1984 British subjecthood continued to exist, alongside Australian citizenship, as a kind of parenthetical citizenship status. This article explores the meanings and significance of British subjecthood in Australia, and considers the reasons for its eventual demise. The article argues that the advent of formal (legal) racial equality in Australia for Indigenous people and for immigrant groups (which culminated in 1975 with the passage of the Racial Discrimination Act ), was one significant factor that helped to render obsolete the scenario whereby Australian citizens were deemed also to be British subjects.     

Taking Civil Rights Seriously

For a variety of reasons Australians possess a curious lack of understanding about the gaining of civil rights by Indigenous people. These reasons include the lack of a clear civil rights 'moment' in Australian history and the negative connotations now associated with civil rights when compared to the more radical Indigenous rights. This article explores the reasons for Australia's public amnesia about Indigenous people's acquisition of civil rights, and makes a case for repositioning this occurrence as a key time in Australian political history.     

Citizenship,Rights and Emergency Powers in Second World War Australia

In times of war or the threat of war there is a heightened tension between individual rights on the one hand and public safety and the protection of the community on the other. This situation is again facing the democracies at the present time. One aspect of the way tension between these two principles affected the citizenship status and civil rights of certain individuals in Second World War Australia is examined in this article. It focuses on Australian citizens who were deprived of their liberty and interned without trial, for periods varying from a few months to a number of years. In seeking explanations for the denial of one of the basic civil rights of a section of the Australian community, this article examines some formal constructions of nationality, and considers the implications of these constructions for citizenship and civil rights in wartime Australia. ¹ 1 Part of this paper was presented as a work‐in‐progress for the Cultural Citizenship: Challenges of Globalisation Conference at Deakin University, Melbourne, 5‐8 December, 2002. Proceedings, pp. 132‐139.
     

The Anzac Citizen: Towards a History of the RSL

This article examines the early years of the Returned Sailors’and Soldiers’Imperial League of Australia (RSSILA, later RSL). It argues that ideas of citizenship were pivotal to the world view and activism of the RSL as it sought to advance the interests and outlooks of its members. The RSL claimed that its members had served the nation and empire to such an extent that their citizenship status was enhanced, while that of those who had not served was diminished. This philosophy provided the underpinnings and justification for the RSL's campaigns for better pension rights, employment opportunities and access to land, often at the expense of those the RSL believed were of lower civic status through a lack of war service.     

Family Historiography in The White Earth

In recent years, family history research has become a popular activity for many Australians. This imperative to connect with our ancestors extends into the field of literary production. In this essay, we examine one prominent novel that reflects this movement, Andrew McGahan’s The White Earth (2004). Looking through a lens of family history and historiography, the novel asks questions about postcolonial belonging, inheritance, and the violent foundations of the nation. McGahan’s young protagonist, William, stands to inherit a vast but crumbling property on the Darling Downs in Queensland. As William discovers more about the land, he comes into contact with both his own white pastoralist ancestors, and the powerful Indigenous spirits who inhabit secret and sacred spaces in the landscape. We argue that William’s encounter with secret family histories produces the hysteria at the climax of the novel, when the repressed violence of the past returns to haunt the present. Confronted with hidden knowledge, William—and, by proxy, the reader—is called to reconsider inherited histories in light of contemporary historiographies. The move towards knowledge of the family’s origins is a realisation of the complexity of the white Australian relationship to the land and its first inhabitants.     

Post‐War Reconstruction and the New World Order: The Origins Of Gough Whitlam's Democratic Citizen*

Gough Whitlam's father was one of Australia's most significant public servants. Deputy Crown Solicitor and Crown Solicitor at a time of great constitutional and international change, Frederick Whitlam maintained an unusually advanced perspective on the use of international instruments to protect rights and to expand powers of nationhood. Gough Whitlam's war‐time experiences in the Air Force, in particular during the referendum campaign to expand Commonwealth Powers to aid post‐war reconstruction, cemented these aspects as central to his developing notions of democratic citizenship. In his 1973 Sir Robert Garran Memorial lecture, fourteen years after his father had delivered the inaugural oration, Gough Whitlam acknowledged the influence of his father as a “great public servant” committed to public service and the developing institutions of internationalism: “I am Australia's first Prime Minister with that particular background”. This paper explores “that particular background”. I have never wavered from my fundamental belief that until the national government became involved in great matters like schools and cities, this nation would never fulfil its real capabilities. ¹ 1 E.G. Whitlam, Sir Robert Garran Memorial Oration, “Australian Public Administration under a Labor Government”, Royal Australian Institute of Public Administration, 12 November 1973, < http://www.whitlam.org/collection/1973/ > accessed 31 October 2006.
     

“In the Front Line”?: Internment and Citizenship Entitlements in the Second World War

This paper analyses the experiences of Australian civilian internees of the Japanese in the Second World War and the Australian government's responses to their desires for repatriation, compensation and rehabilitation. It argues that civilian internees stood in awkward relation to understandings about sacrifice in wartime and entitlements to compensation. The dominance of the citizen‐soldier in Australian narratives of war placed civilian internees in an ambiguous position. Civilian internees had not played a direct part in battle but did have direct contact with the military enemy. They had personally suffered privation at the hands of the enemy, but were not military personnel in service of their country. Civilian internees expose the tensions around citizenship and citizenship entitlement attendant upon the elevation of war service as the ultimate sacrifice for one's country.     

Facing the Inevitable: Britain's Entry into the European Community and Australia's Policy, 1970‐72

While Australia's response to Britain's 1961‐63 bid to join the European Community has been examined in almost every possible detail, Australian policy towards Britain's 1970‐72 application has drawn very little scholarly attention. This article therefore aims to fill this gap by drawing on newly released archival material from the National Archives of Australia in Canberra and the National Archives in London. In doing so, the article examines the impact of Britain's 1971‐72 application to join the EC on Australian policy and the Anglo‐Australian relations. It argues that while far from provoking the same widespread uproar as the Macmillan government's original application in 1961, Britain's final bid had important political and economic implications for Australian foreign policy.     

“Never Look Back,Always Look Forward”: The Early Life of Nancy Power

This article examines of the life of Nancy Verna Power, an Aboriginal woman born in north-west Queensland in 1910. Nancy Power was given an exemption certificate in 1933. The certificate released her from control by the Department of Native Affairs in 1933 and led her to remain silent about her identity in the later years of her life. This article examines Nancy's early life as a domestic servant, when she was under the control of the Chief Protector, the superintendent of Purga Mission and other government administrators. Using Phillips and Bunda's principles of “storying” each author describes a period of Nancy's life with an eye to their own connection to, and ability to tell, the story. Judi Wickes, Nancy's niece, tells her story from 1910 to 1924 and from 1934 to 1950 using family records and her own memories. Katherine Ellinghaus, a non-Indigenous historian, uses the official written records created by the Queensland government to describe Nancy's life between 1930 and 1934.     

Gaining Greater Access to Western European Decision‐Makers: a Motive for Australian Membership of the OECD

In weighing Britain's decision to seek membership of the European Economic Community Australian scholars have focussed attention on its adverse impact on Anglo‐Australian and EU‐Australian relations, and the emphasis that Australia thereafter placed upon economic relations with Asia. This article identifies a consequence of Britain's decision which has largely escaped attention: the part it played in stimulating Australia's successful 1969 application for membership of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. Although Australia's interest in the increased access to West European decision‐makers that the OECD would provide dates to the latter 1940s and 1950s, the British application for membership of the EEC added particular weight to those arguing that Australia should seek OECD membership. It led to an extension of Australian activities in Western Europe which was not extinguished by the growing emphasis on relations with the Asian region.     

“Blood Brothers”. Racial Identification and the Right to Rule: the Australian Response to the Spanish‐American War

Historians have paid scant attention to Australia's enthusiastic response to the Spanish‐American war of 1898. Yet these events help us to better understand the centrality of race to Australia's national identity. Even though the Australian colonies were bound by Britain's neutrality, from Sydney to Perth Australians cheered America's decision to declare war. Many gathered outside the US consulate to offer their services as soldiers and nurses. This enthusiasm for the US cause was underpinned by an identification with fellow Anglo‐Saxons and the assumption that Filipinos and Cubans were races not yet fit for self‐government. Australians were intent on establishing their status as equal members of the governing race.     

The “Morpeth Mind” and Australian Politics 1927–1934

The publication of the Morpeth Review between 1927 and 1934 was a milestone in the evolution of an authentic public sphere for Australian political intellectuals. The Review covered several areas of political and philosophical concern, ranging ideologically from Christian socialism and idealist liberalism, through market economics, to reactionary anti‐Bolshevism, within the editorial context of a strongly idealist liberalism inspired by the Oxford liberals of the early twentieth century, and both evangelical and sacramentalist Anglican Protestantism. Ernest H. Burgmann and Roy Lee used the magazine to develop a unique form of Anglican social and political activism and other members of an identifiable group of radical clergy also contributed. A.p. Elkin's writings on Indigenous politics are of particular interest as they can be viewed simultaneously as a turning toward the novel idea of Aboriginal citizenship, and at the same time as a restatement of Darwinist biological determinism and racialism, both lit by genuine compassion and affection for Aboriginal Australians.