"It was always something of a puzzle to observers of Australia to explain the high standing of working men and the prevalence of their values in the culture. The easy answer was to say the middle-class was numerically weak. But in a capitalist society their values should be predominant whatever their numbers. So was it that they lacked the will to rule? I have suggested here that convict origins help to explain this puzzle. The bourgeoisie, sharing the shame of the nation, looked for respectability through White Australia and military prowess, and the forms these took had a strong proletarian cast; the working man was elevated by one and was the most notable embodiment of the other."
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ColumnistsAcademics from AustraliaHistorians from AustraliaPeople from AdelaidePolitical commentators from Australia
Original Language: English
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Sources
"An Oddity from the Start", The Monthly, July 2008.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Hirst
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John Hirst
John Bradley Hirst FASSA (9 July 1942 – 3 February 2016) was an Australian historian, academic and commentator.
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