A Very Short History of Australia

In 1770 Captain James Cook charted the east coast of Australia and claimed it for the British Crown. For many European Australians, Cook symbolises the nation’s foundation, for many Aboriginal Australians he symbolises the beginnings of an invasion. Aboriginal people arrived in Australia some 50,000 years ago and quickly occupied the length and breadth of the continent. At the time of Cook’s ‘discovery’ of Australia, Aboriginal people probably numbered 500,000 and were divided into separate nations, occupying distinct territories and speaking hundreds of different languages. 

European settlement began in 1788 when a convict colony was established at Botany Bay, the site of present-day Sydney. In the late 18th and early 19th century, further convict settlements were established along the east coast, in part, to forestall French claims. One of the first free (non-convict) settlements was the Swan River colony established in 1829, but it struggled to attract settlers and later requested convicts. South Australia was established as a free colony in 1836, employing the principles of ‘systematic colonisation’ by funding immigration through the sale of land.

By the 1830s settlement began to expand into the interior as wool became a valuable commodity and settlers sought fresh pastures to graze their sheep. This expansion also lead to a long series of frontier wars as Aboriginal people resisted European encroachment on their lands. In the 1840s gold was discovered in New South Wales and Victoria, fuelling further economic expansion and rapid population growth. The system of convict transportation now began to be wound down and by the 1850s Australian colonies were achieving self-government. By the late 19th century Australians were beginning to articulate a distinct cultural identity in their art and literature, drawing inspiration from the settler’s relationship with the unique Australian environment (this is despite the fact that Australia had one of the most urbanised populations in the world). Celebrated in stories of the pioneer and ‘bushman’, aspects of this heritage, for better of worse, still find expression in characters such as ‘Crocodile Dundee’ and Steve Irwin. 

In 1901, the six Australian colonies federated to form the Commonwealth of Australia and the Australian nation came into existence. At this time, Australia’s population was overwhelmingly Anglo-Celtic in origin, and it sought to preserve the status quo by implementing a ‘White Australia’ policy, designed to severely limit non-white immigration. While now politically independent of Great Britain, Australia maintained strong cultural, economic and strategic links to the motherland. Australians often referred to themselves as ‘Anglo-Britons’ and well into the 20th century some Australians still referred to Britain as ‘home’. When Britain entered World War I, Australia followed suit without a second thought. It did so again with the outbreak of World War II. By the end of that war however, as the British Empire waned, Australia increasingly allied itself to the United States of America.

High levels of post-war migration resulted in a rapid change in the ethnic make-up of the nation with migrants now coming not just from the United Kingdom but also from Southern Europe, especially Italy and Greece. By the end of the 1960s, the ‘White Australia’ policy was officially abandoned, and the end of the Vietnam War saw an influx of migrants from South-East Asia. The status of Aboriginal Australians also began to be re-assessed; for generations Aboriginal people had been subjected to a policy that sought to assimilate them into mainstream Australian society, but by the 1960s discriminatory policies began to be dismantled and Aboriginal rights began to be recognised. By the close of the 20th century Australia had become one of the most multi-cultural nations in the world: economically oriented toward the Asia-Pacific region, strategically tied to the United States, yet still strongly Anglo-Celtic in its institutions and outlook.

Dr. Robert Foster, Lecturer, History, University of Adelaide