April 15, 2006
Guy Rundle writes in The Age that:
...for now, people would appear to be demanding identity. Where it came from and how is a question that demands deeper reflection, but there is no doubt that it is there. Across the western world it has arisen, in the wake of 9/11 of course, but not stemming only from that, an open demand for what was hitherto a niggling feeling, or altogether absent....Everywhere and unsurprisingly, this new-found nationalism goes hand-in-hand with a revived religiosity....Everything that many people thought was passing or had passed forever - the chauvinist belief in the inherent superiority of one's own national culture, and a similarly exclusive belief in the truth of one's own faith - is returning with a vengeance.
Rundle asks: Why would that be occurring? He answers thus:
...hidden within Australian contemplation of identity is a ticking time bomb of nothingness, futility.All national stories get to this in the end, but they have great narratives that obscure the essential sleight-of-hand that is national identity. In Australia it never really gets started. Almost before its begun, everyone has moved to the suburbs and history has stopped - the uninterrupted calm that many migrants see as essentially paradise (and others as a disaster, a void and a loss) is not the sort of thing that can be run up a flagpole with any great effect. In a supremely unphilosophical country, the existential question "what is it all for" is too close to the surface for comfort. One of the results of such a predicament is culture envy, a malaise that manifests itself here and across the world in diverse forms.
Note the slickness of ' everyone has moved to the suburbs and history has stopped', as if the suburbs do not have a history.
And that phrase 'in a supremely unphilosophical country, the existential question "what is it all for" is too close to the surface for comfort' just rolls on so easily.
Wait a mo. We cannot let that slip by. It's a sleight of hand. Australia is a deeply utilitarian country, economic utilitarianism is our public philosophy, most of our public policy debates are conducted within utilitarian terms of a Benthamite economic discourse, whilst the academics endlessly debate the merits of act and rule utilitarianism. A social democratic Australia is utilitarian through and through. Hence the purpose of the purpose of government in a liberal society is to do the greatest good for the greatest number of people. As Keith Hancock, put it in 1930, 'Australian democracy has come to look upon the state as a vast public utility, whose duty it is to provide the greatest happiness for the greatest number'. The answer to 'what's it all for' is utility, the content of which is filled differently by individuals.
Sure utilitarianism has little to say about identity, which is primarily given by nationality. But that is another story.
Rundle is expressing a common view that is voiced in this article, by Michael Evans namely:
Australian political debate, past and present, has been firmly centred on economics and the administration of prosperity for as many citizens as possible. For critics, materialism as reflected by the general anti-intellectualism of Australian public life and the alleged lack of ideas of a nation defined by suburbia is a matter of despair.
It was common perspective in the 1930s and 1950s during empire days. It suprises me that it is being recycled in 2006 from a left of centre perspective.
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I read a report (to do with Darwin IIRC) from 2003 that showed Sydney getting more religious (and conservative), certainly more than any other main city. The author said that it may be because of Sydney's immigrant inflows that it is becoming more religious and conservative. Which I thought interesting.
All Australia ever does is talk about itself - incessantly. It is just one big useless incestuous navel gazing. We have a great history of action and innovation. That should be guiding our cultural and social history. Not the ineffectual "lets talk about Australia some more".
I guess I am saying these people should write narratives from our history and the actions and events of our people rather than writing about what Australia "means". Because the latter is bs without the former.