Australian Journal of Politics and History最新文献

How did war veterans from South Vietnam resettle in Australia following the end of the Vietnam War, and how did Australia respond to military personnel who had served a former ally and became refugees in the postwar years? This article examines Australia's formal acknowledgement of South Vietnamese veterans and the controversies that arose in the Australian Parliament over this issue in 1985–1986. It draws on a wide range of archival sources and government documents in the National Archives of Australia and the National Library of Australia as well as a major national oral history collection. The archival record not only reflects on attitudes from both sides of politics towards the Vietnam War and the Vietnamese refugees that followed in the aftermath of the war but also on the ways in which Australia dealt with a significant refugee community and specifically the war veterans in that community. The oral histories reveal that Australia's recognition of the war service of South Vietnamese veterans made an important contribution to the transition of the veterans and their families to a sense of belonging in Australia and new identities as Vietnamese Australians.

Women played a key role in the founding of the Liberal Party of Australia (LPA) in 1944 and in providing its branch structure. The newly established LPA also sought to encourage women to join the party and to seek political office. This led the LPA to achieve most of the “firsts” for women in Australian politics and, for much of the 20th century, the party enjoyed more support from women than from men. A significant shift occurred in the 1980s, however, leading to its transformation from a party of choice for women to one that increasingly lost favour with them. This article is the first to trace this transformation, exploring the influence of leaders on the party's ideology and the changing prioritisation of women's issues.

Uranium mining and export was a major flashpoint for political debate in 1970's Australia. However, there has been relatively little investigation into how uranium was understood and contested before this time. This paper draws on labour movement publications and other archival sources to reveal lesser-known antecedents to the anti-uranium movement in the decades following the Second World War. Opposition to uranium did not simply erupt during the turbulent 1970s. In the early years of mining and exploration, many unions shared a “uranium fever.” Opposition to the nuclear cycle was constrained by various factors, including official secrecy and the perceived separation between “peaceful” and “militaristic” uses of uranium. Nonetheless, even at the suffocating heights of the Cold War, many workers and unions articulated strongly held concerns about the metal fuelling the atomic age. From early disputes over miners' health and safety, to widespread demonstrations against French nuclear testing, uranium was a source of significant concern, anxiety and debate. Australia's anti-uranium movement of the 1970s and 1980s is therefore placed within an overlooked historical context.

This article draws upon individual confidential case files compiled by the UN Office for Refugees (UNHCR) between 1951 and 1975 to examine its response to refugees who requested protection and to analyse policy and practice in Australia as a country of resettlement. Refugees who wrote complaining about conditions in Australia were deemed to be suffering from defects of “character.” Others faced the prospect of being removed on grounds that they posed a threat to public order. Although its mandate precluded getting involved in the internal affairs of a sovereign state, UNHCR nevertheless advocated with the Australian authorities on behalf of refugees who faced deportation. UNHCR also used the evidence of individual cases to press Australia to abandon its reservations vis-à-vis the 1951 UN Refugee Convention. By contextualising and examining the encounters between refugees, UNHCR, and Australia, this article provides an original perspective on policymaking in the international refugee regime and on modern refugeedom.