National Anti-Racism Partnership and Strategy: Submission
Dr Peter Gale
Associate Professor Research: David Unaipon College of Indigenous Education and Research
Division of Education, Arts and Social Sciences
City West Campus, University of South Australia
70 North Terrace, Adelaide SA 5000
Objective 1: Create awareness of racism and how it affects individuals and the broader
community
Objective 2: Identify, promote and build good practice initiatives to prevent and reduce
racism
Objective 3: Empower communities and individuals to take action to prevent and reduce
racism and seek redress when it occurs
This submission seeks to address the three objectives through both engaging with current debates
on racism and anti-racism, and to provide a research based submission for addressing racism in
contemporary Australia.
Defining Racism
In recent years inherent ‘racial’ assumptions of inferiority and superiority have given way to new
more subtle forms of racism founded on symbolic national boundaries of inclusion and exclusion
within contemporary popular nationalism.i Contemporary racism places an emphasis on what is
seen as a threat to national culture and in the Australian context, the Australian way of life. The
shift in towards racism that becomes closely aligned with popular nationalism engages with
symbolic language that defines who does and who does not belong with related public debates on
different forms of immigration and immigration policy that has developed in ways that seeks to
avoid direct reference to racialist discourse. Such racism places an emphasis on the presence of
those who are seen as ‘aliens’ and how this presence is assumed to be a threat to the nation and
national identity. The notion of ‘new racism’ was first employed in 1981 to describe the emergence
of ‘racial’ discourse during the 1970s. Such expressions of ‘new racism’ were embedded within a
discourse of popular nationalism that became a feature of liberal nation states in Europe and North
America.ii
However, public debates on immigration and security in the media in Australia since 2001 has
been part of a shift in language towards the formation of exclusive symbolic national boundaries.
This shift in discourse placed the emphasis on cultural difference, masking explicit reference to
physical characteristics and denying racism. Within this ‘racial discourse’, immigrants, especially
those categorised as coming to Australia from Asia or Africa, or a different culture, language or
religion to what is identified as ‘Australian’ culture, are not labelled as being racially inferior, but
are commonly seen as a threat to national identity and culture. News media, particularly,
newspapers have played a crucial role in the emergence of the new language of ‘race’ and nation.
Anxieties over world order and the increasing heterogeneity of Euro-American societies have also
contributed towards a perceived crisis in ‘national security’.
Anti-racism
Research based analysis of media representations of asylum seekers and refugees indicates that
while the notion of ‘race’ is fraught with difficulties, nonetheless representations of ‘race’ continue
to be pervasive in the media. The concept of ‘race’ also remains central to debates on issues such
as immigration and national identity in news reporting. Recent research on common
representations of refugees and asylum seekers indicates that there is a close relationship between
the imaginings of national identity and political debates on immigration and multiculturalism in
contemporary Australia. For example, what can be concluded from research on media reporting on
refugees is that there is a perpetuation of fear as immigration, and particularly refugees and asylum
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seekers, are represented as different and a threat to the Australian ‘way of life’, or employment of
Australians and material conditions in contemporary Australia.iii
Addressing Racism
All levels of government in Australia have a significant role in creating and maintaining the
imagined community of insiders and outsiders and this is closely associated with defining what is
represented as ‘Australian’. Similarly, media organisations also have a significant role in the
provision of information that has a direct impact on how particular groups are perceived within the
wider community, including refugees and asylums seekers.
This submission would recommend that there are four significant ways in which both Governments
and the media can contribute to challenging and addressing racism that is founded on popular
perceptions of particular groups within the community, and representations of Australian culture
and expressions of popular nationalism.
Firstly, all levels of education play a significant role in the relationship between nationalism and
racism and the inclusion of history from a global perspective in all levels of the curriculum that
incorporates diverse perspectives would contribute significantly to addressing racism.
Secondly, an enhanced language and culture curriculum options at all levels of education would
contribute significantly towards challenging the more exclusive forms of popular nationalism
within the community.
Thirdly, including an increased number of tertiary education level courses on Asian and African
studies within tertiary educational institutions would also address the high level of perceived threat
and fear in public debates on immigration and multiculturalism.
Fourthly, that a review and associated recommendations into the level and form of self-regulation
of the media in relations to issues of reporting on immigration and multiculturalism could
contribute to a more inclusive level of reporting and representation of particular groups within the
media, including refugees and asylums seekers.
For further discussion on defining racism see Hall, S. (1992) ‘New Ethnicities’, in ‘Race’,
Culture and Difference, ed. A. Rattansi. London, Sage Publications, in association with Open
University Press: 252-9.
ii
For discussion on the first use of the term new racism see Barker, M. (1981) The New Racism:
Conservatives and the Ideology of the Tribe, London, Junction Books.
iii
For further discussion on racism and the media see Gale, P. (2004) Refugee Crisis and Fear:
Populist Politics and Media Discourse, Journal of Sociology, December, vol 40, no. 4, pp 321-340.
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