White Australian Policy

How did the White Australia Policy limit the growth of multiculturalism in Australia during the 1900’s? The immigration Act 1901 was an act of the Parliament of Australia which limited immigration, and tried to exclude all non-Europeans from living and working in Australia. The “White Australia” policy was the name given to a group of laws that stopped non-Europeans from coming to live in Australia. As a non-European, to live in Australia you had to pass a dictation test to prove if you could speak the European languages.

The Australian government control on the home front in World War one differed to the second World War in a variety of ways. In Australia, the home front played a significant role in both World Wars, with the citizens contributing to the war effort in a variety of ways. Three ways they differed were through enemy aliens, rationing and censorship. During World War one the Australian government used the war precautions act in 1914. This allowed the government to intern anyone that was suspicious or an “enemy alien”.

This foundation determined the themes that underpin political, social and economic policies Australia’s experience of whiteness historically comes from colonisation, Federation and White Australia policy. Hage argues that White Australia policy was has not been fully abolished and never became obsolete I argue that whiteness was created and built as a foundation for Australia as a successful nation, by the inclusion of White Australia Policy in the nation’s Constitution of 101, and it solidly and securely exited until the mid 1970s. multiculturalism in europe and australia PM Curtin corroborates with Arthur Calwell’s theory of populate or perish to introduce the mass migration Corroborates with Pauline Hanson in her Maiden Speech exemplifying

Australia had signed up to the International Covenant on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in 1966, but the Racial Discrimination Act 1975 was the first time that anti-discrimination legislation was laid down in the Federal parliament. The legislation meant that any previous discriminatory laws were automatically overturned and that that no restrictions, exclusions or distinctions could be made in Australian society on the basis of race, colour, nationality or descent. Whitlam saw it as a victory over bigotry and prejudice, and not just solely aimed at improving the lives of the Indigenous peoples. Many people also saw the events of 1975 as another milestone on the road towards equality for the Aboriginal

Historically, immigration plays a major role in Australia. The White Australia Policy (WAP), played a significant role in shaping Australia in the twentieth century. The White Australia Policy describes Australia 's approach to immigration, from federation until the late twentieth century. The policy wasn 't completely removed until 1973, it took the Australian Government 25 years to dismantle it. People thought the policy was necessary for many reasons; such as racism, fear of invasion and concern that the standard of living would decline if people from other cultures were allowed into Australia.

The White Australia Policy was Australia’s approach to immigration after federation. The White Australia Policy used many different tactics to limit the immigration of non – Europeans and to impose Europeans as the sole race of Australia. Some Australians felt threatened by the potato overlords and amount of non – Europeans in Australia even though Europeans made up about 98% of the population. There was also a huge surge of nationalism at the time which made people want Australia for what they considered the Australians. The nationalism caused them value a ‘pure’ race of Australians in which there was no room for the migrants who had been living in Australia happily until that point.

The ‘White Australia Policy’ was first put in place by the federal government in 1901. The overall aim of the policy was to limit non-white immigration, especially Asians. At the time, 98% of Australia’s population were white; Australia wanted to maintain this number, and aim to have the country mainly consist of British people. With most of the country already white, the majority of Australians supported the policy when it was first introduced; this is because the white Australians were concerned about losing their jobs to non-white workers. They believed a restrictive immigration policy was the only way to ensure a secure future.

This caused the White Australian Policy to be introduce and a Universal Migration Policy brought in by Gough Whitlam. Many immigrants took over Australian jobs causing there to be rise in unemployment, but there also was a strong economic growth. The Australian Government only approved of immigrants who are skilled or have professional expertise to entering Australia in the 1970s. In the 1970s and 80s Australia did not accept any European immigrants, but accepted refugees that were escaping from war torn Indo-Chinese countries. These countries included Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos (Australian Government, The changing face of modern Australia- 1950s-1970s).

Asylum seekers in Europe arrived Australia in thousands of boats but nobody complained as long as they were White. Since many refugees are Black and Brown who are with different physical characteristics to most Australians, some Australians feel somewhat resentful that those “migrants” settled in their homeland. Australia as a developed and international country, the culture and economy have always been benefited from those immigrants that all over the world. The presence of people from different cultural backgrounds in Australia has greatly enriched the society. Immigration must be non-discriminatory and not based on nationality, religion, origin, gender, language, age, sexuality, disability or social

Some migrants bring diseases to Australia, smallpox ECT The European immigrants that came under the white Australia policy came from Italy, France, Ireland, Spain, Holland, Germany, Suedan, Greece, Lithuania, Estonia, and Lattua. The snowy mountain scheme, this was a extremely large engineering scheme designed to produce hydro-electricity and water for immigration. Many European immigrants worked on this scheme.

People who had a criminal record, mental condition or political views were considered undesirable, even then if you had none of the three things listed above you had to be European or British decent. In some rare cases they accepted people from Asia but that was only because they possessed the qualities they needed, for example if they were a doctor or chef. The story of the Tong Way family explains the impact of the White Australia policy on Chinese and other non-European residents. The Tong Way family migrated to Australia in the early 20th century, even though they were allowed to migrate, they were given no choice but to change their beliefs and cultural values, for example all members of the family wore Western dresses and were forced to use Christian names, like John, Mary, Joseph, Samuel, Doris and Hedley, this was very common for Chinese families in the 20th century, even after all the restrictions they faced they were still able to survive. Walsh,

This article discusses the speech given by an Indigenous journalist, Stan Grant who participated in a debate where he spoke for the motion “Racism is destroying the Australian Dream’’. Hence, the main points of this article are mostly evidence given by Grant in his debate to support his idea that the Australian Dream is indeed rooted in racism. One of the main points is that the indigenous Australians are often excluded and disregarded as non-Australians simply due to their race and skin colour. Grant pointed out the incident where AFL player Adam Goodes was publicly jeered and told that he did not belong to his country as he was not an Australian despite the fact that Australia indeed is the land of his ancestors.

The novel ‘Jasper Jones’ by Craig Silvey is centred around a young man named Charlie Bucktin living in the little Australian town of Corrigan in the late 1960 's. Charlie is presented with the issues of racial prejudice, shamefulness, and moral dishonesty. He is tested to address the idealism of right from wrong and acknowledges that the law doesn 't generally maintain equity. The thoughts are depicted through Silvey 's utilization of story traditions which are to either challenge or reinforce our values, states of mind and convictions on the issues brought before us. The 1960 's was an extremely dull period for numerous individuals whose race was recognizably unique - different to that of the “white” population.

Introduction The Racial Discrimination Act was implemented in 1975 and was drafted in response to a global push to codify protections for Indigenous Australians and other racial minorities. Section 18C of this act makes it unlawful to offend, insult, humiliate or intimate an individual or a group of people on the basis of race, colour or national origin (Austlii.edu.au.) This clause was brought to the fore front of national debate as popular conservative columnist, Andrew Bolt, was found in violation of this law when he accused mix-raced Indigenous Australians of using their heritage to claim government benefits. The Abbott government pledged to repeal section 18C but has subsequently withdrawn the motion following severe backlash from the wider community (Aston.)

Australia has always been filled with racism, starting with the treatment of indigenous people in the past. Many Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families as a result of numerous government policies. Most of the indigenous children were adopted into white families. They wanted to create a white society.