Global Cultural Diversity Conference Proceedings, Sydney
Opening address (continued)
But, as I said, I am certain that some of what we have done here can lead not only to the development of a culturally rich, diverse, and peaceful Australian society, but may suggest to others ways of improving harmony within and between states. This would be a fitting contribution to the current debate about the future of the United Nations and its operations, and to the International Year of Tolerance.
It is true that we count what we have done here as a great success. Nowhere is that truer than in our changing relationship with Asia. Just a generation ago, the White Australia Policy was still a reality in all but the technical detail. Australia came perilously close to marginalising itself in our region and in the world. Now, half of all our immigrants come from Asia. They are adding immeasurably to the richness of our society, to our arts, to our commerce, to the way we live our daily lives.
And their values, like the values of all those who have come here before, will help shape our culture.
This is a much more tolerant society than that which existed just a generation ago. Today, no Australian political party can hope to succeed with an immigration policy which excludes people on racial or ethnic grounds. Tolerance itself has become one of those words to which we attach a primary democratic value.
Yet it is important, at this stage of our history, to put our multicultural successes in perspective. For instance, I think it would be a mistake for this generation of Australians to persuade themselves either that the transformation is complete and completely satisfactory, or, indeed, that all the achievements have occurred since we first took on the idea the word and the policies of multiculturalism.
Under a different banner that of assimilation migrants from Europe and the Middle East were welcomed in the decades immediately after World War II and made a profound contribution to our national life and development. There are regions of Australia where in the 19th century people from Germany and Italy were more numerous and their cultures more pervasive than any from the British Isles.
Today when we talk of the enrichment of our culture by people from all the countries of the world we sometimes forget that people have been coming from all over the world to this place for 200 years; that our landscape was interpreted by painters, scientists and explorers from Germany, Switzerland, Poland and France as well as Britain and that this artistic and intellectual tradition was consolidated in the 20th century.
It seems to me we should remember that tolerance of cultural difference is ultimately a necessary condition for a successful new world country, and that those traditions of egalitarian democracy which emerged in the last half of the 19th century had the seeds of multiculturalism in them. If it is true that earlier generations of Australians traditionally took the view that where and to what rank people were born should be no measure of their character, and that in Australia everyone should begin without these handicaps, then we can see ourselves as building on a tradition.
And we can learn the lesson that the best traditions of a country, and the best instincts of a people, can be the basis of radical change. I think that is what we have learnt in Australia in the past couple of decades that societies can be changed, that an inward looking culture can be made outward looking, that what seems alien can be revealed as friendly, that where threats always seemed to lie there are now rewards and opportunities.
And I think we must also always bear in mind that the dominant cultures of our history those of the British Isles and Ireland far from being hostile to the growth of a culturally diverse society, provided in democratic institutions and ideas its essential precondition.
I make these points because it does not hurt to be reminded that our efforts are part of a much longer story, a story in which progress has been uneven. We do not know all the answers, and the story is far from over and we should not assume that the rapid strides we have made in the past two decades are a guarantee of success in the future.
There is no more profound example of the distance we still have to travel in Australia than the position of Aboriginal people in our society and their relationship with non-Aboriginal Australians. Nor, of course, is there any better example of the fact that since 1788 this continent has played host to a multicultural society.
This conference is not the place to offer a short history of the dispossession, brutality and neglect, which accompanied European settlement and which has continued in this century. Until we succeed in our ambition to affect a permanent reconciliation with indigenous Australians, our claims to have achieved a successful multicultural society will always be compromised. But we are at last determined on reconciliation a new partnership built on mutual respect, justice and equity and we have in the last two years put in place some long overdue foundations.
We have given legislative expression to a decision of the High Court of Australia that the idea of terra nullius the farcical notion that no one owned Australia prior to British settlement was indeed a lie. The High Court established that there was a Native Title to land, rooted in traditional law and custom itself, within the common law of Australia.
The legislation giving effect to this decision has survived criticism and a legal challenge. It was confirmed in the High Court just last month. And I might say what has also been confirmed is that Australians are prepared to support such a dramatic change in the law that they want to see the relationship between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians put right.
The establishment of a Native Title will not of itself redress the consequences of dispossession. In truth, of course, nothing will. But over the next ten years the Government will allocate some $1.5 billion to a permanent fund so that dispossessed indigenous communities will have the means to buy land and in so doing regain the potential for spiritual and cultural regeneration, as well as an economic base to improve their material well-being.
The final step will be the implementation of social justice measures. We now have before us two major reports which draw on extensive consultations with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and in due course we will announce the measures calculated to be most likely to redress the wrongs and raise the living standards and life opportunities of indigenous Australians.
There is no doubt that we will succeed best in this wherever we are able to give Aboriginal people the means of solving their own problems. It is equally true that we will make improvements in the quality of their lives, including their health, and raise morale and self esteem wherever we can deliver the means of their retaining contact with traditional culture and customs. That, after all, is the most fundamental principle of multiculturalism.
For us, the process of reconciliation is a basic test of our modern nationhood on it depends our relationship with both our past and our future. On it also depends a favourable measure of our achievements in the realm of cultural diversity.
But to put Australia's progress towards a successful multicultural society in perspective, to make reference to ambitions not yet fulfilled, is certainly not to discount the scale of our achievements or the pride we take in them.
The Australia I knew as a child and the Australia of today are radically different places. When we were growing up we did not and could not imagine the Sydney of 1995. And even if we had been able to visualise the city as it now is, we could not have conceived of the means by which it has been brought about. We could not have conceived of the necessary policy changes. Perhaps most importantly, we could not have conceived of the necessary changes in ourselves. That is at the heart of multiculturalism. It describes a response to the diversity that exists in Australian society. It is a policy for managing the consequences of that diversity in the interests of all.
This means a policy which guarantees rights and imposes responsibilities. The rights include those of cultural identity the right to express and share individual cultural heritage, including language and religion. The right to social justice the right of every Australian to equality of treatment and opportunity, regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, language, gender or place of birth.
The responsibilities might be summarised as follows: that the first loyalty of all Australians must be to Australia, to its interests and its future; that all Australians must accept the basic principles of Australian society, including the Constitution and the rule of law, parliamentary democracy, freedom of speech and religion, English as the national language, equality of the sexes and the right of every Australian to express his or her views and values. That is the essential balance in the multicultural equation: the promotion of individual and collective cultural rights and expression, on the one hand; and on the other, the promotion of common national interests and values. And success depends on demonstrating that each side of the equation serves the other.
In practical terms one side can be seen in Government programs to provide people who have just arrived in Australia with assistance to locate and use the various welfare services, including health, housing and income support. Or in, for instance, the Translating and Interpreting Service which, by phone or in person, assists migrants to break down the language barrier they face until they become fluent in English. Or in the Special Broadcasting Service, whose daily television and radio broadcasts in 67 languages help to maintain the threads which link so many Australians to their native culture.
These are eminently practical measures calculated to minimise the trauma which migration has always entailed and make the transition to a new life in a new culture that much easier. They do not demand or enforce an attachment to this country, they encourage it.
We take the same view on citizenship. We do not oblige new settlers to take out citizenship but we actively encourage them to, and when they do we ask them to swear an oath which expressly acknowledges the principle of tolerance on which multiculturalism depends.
The dividend of cultural diversity is largely paid in the form of a society which is both more rich and interesting and more harmonious and peaceful. In more recent times we have discovered a new dividend a productivity dividend.We have learned that cultural difference means different ways of looking at the world. In an economic environment which demands of enterprises that they use every possible advantage to be innovative and flexible this is likely to be a tangible asset.
We have learned that being among the very few countries whose people understand all but a few of the world's languages and cultures is a very considerable competitive advantage. In addition, we are discovering that our policies have provided us with the most valuable links to countries where we can do business: personal links and personal understanding between Australian enterprises and the markets they wish to enter.
We are taking steps to capitalise on these connections and the great cultural diversity of the Australian workforce through a Productive Diversity Agenda. This is perhaps the most concrete example we could adduce to show that the encouragement of cultural diversity is much more than an act of benevolence it is an act of national self-interest.
I am sure it is the hope of everyone here that over the next three days persuasive arguments will be put to show that the global interest can be served by the affirmation of cultural diversity. We certainly do not say that what has occurred in Australia should be a blueprint for the world. Cultural diversity, let alone human diversity, makes the idea of a single template absurd. Nor do we expect this conference to be a celebration of our achievements.
However, we do feel able to say that this very democratic, very open and very forward- looking country has learned a good deal about the benefits and the management of cultural diversity. We are a country emerging, I think, into a great 21st century future. We will not be a nation-state in the old sense of that term. We will be a more purposefully independent country than before, yet we will be more integrated with the world and with the Asia-Pacific region in particular than the Australians of 50 years ago, when the United Nations was created, could ever have imagined.
We like to think that we might have in our modern nationhood at least some of the elements of a 21st century model: diversity, tolerance, openness and worldliness within the boundaries of national purpose and cohesion. And perhaps as we pursue those goals we can help the world pursue them.
I have very great pleasure in opening this conference and inviting the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Dr Boutros Boutros-Ghali, to deliver the keynote address.
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