If a place has its own government, parliament, as well as a unique history, culture and identity, could it one day choose to leave the country it belongs to?

This question has recently once again become a focus of British politics. On September 14, political leaders from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland held a summit and signed a joint memorandum, collectively putting forward demands for self-determination and calling for greater powers for each region to decide its own constitutional future.

These remarks may carry an element of political declaration, but the issue they reflect is not limited to the United Kingdom. When regional governments, parliaments and identities gradually take shape, where should the boundary of power between regions and the central government lie? If self-determination and independence are brought back onto the political agenda across the UK, could an Australian state one day also leave the federation?

Different Histories, Different Identities

To understand why the UK has seen this debate over independence and self-determination, it is first necessary to understand that the UK itself was not a country gradually built around a single nation and a single political centre. England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland each have different histories, cultures and political identities.

Scotland was originally an independent kingdom, with its own legal system, educational traditions and political history. It was not until 1707 that it united with England to form the Kingdom of Great Britain. Wales, meanwhile, was conquered by England and incorporated into its rule at the end of the 13th century, and its language and cultural traditions also came under pressure. Northern Ireland was also occupied by England and experienced a long history of British rule, population movements, religious divisions and political conflict.

For Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, regional identity already has deep historical and cultural roots. Political demands for autonomy or independence have, to some extent, also been built on these existing identities. Regional identity did not suddenly emerge because of political disputes in recent years, but has long existed within society.

In other words, today’s UK is a country formed through the long-term political integration of different historical communities, and these histories themselves have shaped how local societies understand identity, power and central rule. When these identities come into conflict with the power of the central government, cultural policies or national identity, existing regional identities may further develop into political demands for autonomy, self-determination, or even independence.

Devolution

This history also influenced Britain’s later political system. Beginning in the 1990s, the UK introduced “devolution”, establishing regional parliaments and governments in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and transferring some domestic powers back to the regions. Policies on education, healthcare and transport, among others, can in part be decided by local governments, while foreign affairs, defence and matters concerning the UK’s overall constitutional arrangements remain largely under the control of Westminster.

Devolution was originally intended to give regions greater autonomy, but it also made regional political identities more visible. Once regions had their own parliaments and governments and could handle many policies themselves, demands for further powers, and even political space to discuss independence, also increased. Scotland held an independence referendum in 2014. At the time, 55% of voters supported remaining in the UK, while 45% supported independence, but the issue of independence did not disappear as a result.

In recent years, nationalist parties in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have gained greater political influence, bringing this constitutional debate back into focus. The political objectives of the three regions are not exactly the same. Scotland and Wales mainly debate independence, while Northern Ireland involves Irish reunification. But all three share one common demand: that the central government should further recognise the regions’ right to determine their own constitutional futures.

The Differences Between Local Autonomy in the UK and Australia

Looking back at Australia, we can also see a similar institutional arrangement. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have their own parliaments and governments, while Australia’s states also have their own state governments and parliaments.

The key difference worth comparing is the position these regional governments occupy within the overall national system. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland have gained a certain degree of autonomy within the sovereign state of the UK through devolution. Australia’s six states, by contrast, are themselves important components of the federal system, with the powers of state governments divided and protected by the Australian Constitution. In other words, both sides have regional autonomy, but the historical and constitutional foundations that created this autonomy are different.

What makes Australia particularly distinctive is that, in addition to the federal and state levels, there are also local governments, creating three levels of government: federal, state and local. Each level is responsible for different areas of affairs, allowing political power to be distributed across different levels. For ordinary residents, issues such as education, healthcare and public transport can be handled by state governments, while local roads, planning and community services are handled by local governments. National matters such as defence, foreign affairs and immigration are handled by the federal government.

For an Australian state, moving from a federal system to a sovereign country would not simply mean expanding the powers of the state government slightly further. It would mean crossing an entire set of national-level institutional issues involving law, population, defence, foreign affairs, currency and borders.

Western Australia Once Considered Leaving Too

Compared with the UK, Australia has a shorter history. Before federation was established in 1901, the six states were originally separate British colonies, each with its own government and parliament, before later forming Australia through the federal system. Western Australia, in particular, once sought to leave the Australian Federation because of dissatisfaction with the federal system.

Western Australia was the last colony at the time to decide to join the federation. The gold rush in the late 19th century drove rapid population and economic growth, but Western Australia was geographically distant from the eastern states, and its economic structure and local interests were also different. The state had abundant mineral resources and vast areas of land. As resource development continued, Western Australia later became an important resource and export base for Australia. Iron ore, gold, natural gas and lithium remain important pillars of Western Australia’s economy today.

However, joining the federation did not eliminate the differences between Western Australia and the eastern states. In 1900, Western Australian voters voted in favour of joining the federation, but after federation was established, disputes over tariffs, resources and economic interests continued. Some Western Australians believed that Western Australia provided large amounts of resources and export revenue to the country, but federal policies did not necessarily adequately reflect local interests. As these grievances accumulated, the idea of leaving the federation regained attention in the 1920s, while the Great Depression further deepened dissatisfaction with the federal system among some Western Australians.

By 1933, this separatist sentiment finally reached the stage of a referendum. Western Australia held a referendum on April 8 on leaving the Australian Federation, with more than two-thirds of voters supporting separation. The Western Australian government subsequently sent a delegation to Britain to seek support, but the British side ultimately considered that Western Australia could not legally leave the federation without the approval of the Australian Parliament. Western Australia ultimately remained part of the Australian Federation.

Could Western Australia Become Independent Today?

Whether Western Australia could become an independent country today can be considered from four aspects: law, population, the economy, and identity.

(1) Law

To discuss whether Western Australia can leave Australia, we can first return to the establishment of the Australian Federation. Before 1901, Australia’s six states were still British colonies, each with its own government, parliament and legal system. They were not a unified country. As there was a need to handle matters such as defence, immigration and trade collectively, the colonies eventually chose to form a federation and establish Australia as a common country under the same system.

Once this federal system was established, whether a state could leave on its own was no longer simply a matter that could be decided within the state. The Australian Constitution does not specify how existing states can leave the federation. Instead, its opening provisions describe the Australian Commonwealth as “indissoluble”, meaning indivisible. In other words, the current Constitution does not provide a legal procedure for a state to independently withdraw from the federation.

If a state were to legally leave Australia, the Constitution would first have to be amended, and constitutional amendment requires a national referendum. In addition to receiving support from more than half of voters across Australia, a majority of voters in a majority of states would also have to support it. This arrangement in fact reflects the way the federation was originally established: since Australia was formed as a federation through the agreement of different colonies, changing the constitutional arrangements of the federation itself cannot be decided unilaterally by just one state.

Therefore, even if Western Australia held its own referendum and obtained majority support, a state-level vote alone would not be enough to complete secession. If Western Australia were genuinely to leave Australia, it would need not only the consent of Western Australians, but also the agreement of the entire federal political community to a change in the constitutional arrangements. Therefore, under the current system, it is not simple for an Australian state to move towards independence.

(2) Population

But assuming that this legal obstacle were genuinely resolved one day, would Western Australia have the basic conditions to become a country?

Population is one important factor. As of March 2026, Western Australia’s population was more than 3 million, while Australia’s total population was approximately 27.92 million. This in itself does not mean that it could not become a country, but the size of the population would directly affect the institutional costs it would have to bear after independence.

Functions currently handled by the federal government, including defence, foreign affairs, borders, immigration and some financial and administrative functions, would all need to be established and maintained by Western Australia itself after independence. Therefore, the real question concerning population is not simply “how many people are there?”, but whether this population size could support the institutions and public services required by a fully sovereign country.

(3) Economy

On the other hand, Western Australia does have a very strong economic foundation. According to the latest data from the Western Australian Government, Western Australia’s gross state product was approximately A$461.7 billion in 2024–25, accounting for around 17% of Australia’s economy. In the year to May 2026, Western Australia’s merchandise exports reached A$237.7 billion, accounting for 44.5% of Australia’s total merchandise exports.

But the question is how much of this economic strength could be directly converted into the capabilities of an independent country.

Western Australia’s current exports, businesses, labour market and financial system do not operate within the framework of an independent country. Large-scale resource exports require international trade arrangements, businesses would need to deal with new tax and regulatory systems, while residents would also have to deal with currency, banking, passports, borders and immigration issues that are currently handled uniformly under the federal system. Even if Western Australia retained the Australian dollar, maintained an open border with Australia, or signed a defence cooperation agreement with Australia, these arrangements would all have to be renegotiated rather than naturally continuing after independence.

(4) Identity

Beyond population and the economy, there is another factor that is more difficult to quantify: identity.

Unlike Scotland and Wales, although Western Australia has its own history, geographical environment and regional identity, this does not mean that Western Australians generally see themselves as a nation separate from Australia. Regional identity and Australian identity can coexist. Therefore, separatist demands that have emerged in Western Australia in the past may not necessarily have been based primarily on cultural or national identity. They can also be understood as dissatisfaction with the federal system, central government policies, and the distribution of interests between the states.

In other words, believing that “leaving Australia” would give Western Australia greater autonomy is different from believing that “Western Australia is a nation separate from Australia”. For a genuinely independent country, in addition to having its own government, economy and territory, there must also be sufficient political will for residents to accept a new national identity.

Western Australia today is not a place lacking the conditions for independence, but neither is it a place that could simply leave the Australian Federation after holding a single referendum. The real key would still require fundamental changes to both Australia’s constitutional system and Western Australia’s own political choices.

Three Levels of Government Provide Space Beyond Independence

Australia’s federal system actually provides a relatively important buffer.

The three-level government system has of course not eliminated conflicts between the central government and the regions, but it means that regions do not necessarily have to choose between “completely obeying the central government” and “leaving the country”. State governments already have certain legislative and policy powers. They can formulate state-level policies according to local needs, manage public services, and represent their states in negotiating fiscal and policy arrangements with the federal government.

For Western Australia or other states, this means that even if a state government believes that the distribution of resources under the federal system is unfair, it can still demand reform within the federal framework. Even if it believes that states should have greater autonomy, it can put forward demands for greater state powers. Local interests do not need to first be transformed into demands for independence in order to have political space for expression.

This is one of the important functions of a federal system: it does not require every region to be exactly the same, but within the same country, it allows different regions to retain a certain degree of autonomy.

The Australian Constitution establishes the basic framework of this system by dividing powers between the federal and state governments. The three levels of government then distribute different areas of public responsibility. This arrangement may not prevent all conflicts between the central government and the regions, but it at least provides different levels of political responses.

Therefore, if regional consciousness in an Australian state were to strengthen further in the future, the question would return to the federal system itself: can Australia’s existing federal system continue to accommodate the interests and demands of different regions, allowing regions the space to seek greater autonomy within the federal framework?

Countries Do Not Remain Unchanged, and Institutions Must Respond to Society

From a broader perspective, the UK’s experience is not only about Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. It also reflects a more universal question: the relationship between the state and society has never been fixed. Population movements, economic development, generational change, rising levels of education, and the gradual formation of regional identities can all change how society understands power, identity and autonomy. These changes do not necessarily lead directly to independence, but they may cause political arrangements that were once taken for granted to gradually come under renewed scrutiny.

This change does not exist only in the UK or federal countries. For other countries, and even centralised states such as China, how the relationship between the centre and the regions, and between the state and society, should be adjusted is also an issue that needs to be addressed. Central power can be very strong, but maintaining a stable community over the long term depends not only on laws and political institutions, but also on whether institutions can respond to the constantly changing needs of different regions and social groups.

Returning to Australia, the issue facing Western Australia today is still mainly about the distribution of power and interests within the federation, rather than the breakup of the country. But Western Australia already held a secession referendum a century ago, while self-determination debates have re-emerged in the UK today. Looking at these two histories together shows that the relationship between regions and the centre is not fixed. The integrity of a country can be established by laws and institutions, but for a community to remain together over the long term, institutions ultimately need to have the ability to respond to changes in society.

Every few years, the global education community goes through a familiar “results day”. On September 8, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released the latest round of PISA 2025 results. More than 760,000 15-year-old students from 91 countries and economies took part in the assessment, making it the largest PISA to date.

For Australia, the results do not look particularly good. Australian students recorded an average score of 509 in science, 491 in reading and 478 in mathematics. Reading fell another 7 points from 2022, while mathematics fell by about 9 points, with both reaching their lowest levels since Australia first participated in PISA. Looking further back, Australia’s reading score has fallen from 528 in 2000 to 491, while mathematics has fallen from 524 in 2003 to 478. It is therefore natural that “Australian education is continuing to decline” would become a news headline.

But another set of figures is equally true: Australia’s scores in all three subjects remain above the OECD average. In 2025, the OECD averages were 482 for science, 461 for reading and 463 for mathematics. In Australia, 82% of students reached the basic proficiency level in science, 71% reached the basic level in mathematics and 77% reached the basic level in reading, all above the OECD averages.

So what exactly does PISA tell us about Australian education: that it is “very poor”, or that it is “actually not bad”? The answer may depend on what exactly we want to prove with this report card.

International Education Comparisons at the Political Level

Today, we are accustomed to seeing “global education rankings”, but putting students from different countries on the same test paper and comparing them has only a history of several decades.

In the late 1950s, the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) began exploring the possibility of cross-national comparisons in education. In 1960, the IEA conducted a pilot study in 12 countries, testing the abilities of 13-year-old students in mathematics, reading, geography, science and other subjects. In 1964, it conducted the first International Mathematics Study, or FIMS.

The timing was not accidental. In 1957, the Soviet Union successfully launched the world’s first artificial satellite. For the United States at the time, this was not simply a setback in the space race. It was quickly understood as an education crisis. If the Soviet Union could be the first to put a satellite into space, did this mean that the United States had already fallen behind in its ability to train scientists, mathematicians and engineers?

The following year, the US Congress passed the National Defense Education Act, significantly increasing investment in mathematics, science, foreign languages and the development of talent in higher education. From then on, education became more directly connected to national security, technological competition and economic strength. Therefore, early international education comparisons cannot simply be understood as asking, “Which country’s children are smarter?” The larger question was actually whether our education systems could produce the people our countries would need in the future.

From 1980 to 1982, the IEA conducted the Second International Mathematics Study, or SIMS. In 1995, this developed into the larger Third International Mathematics and Science Study, later known as TIMSS, which has continued to this day. TIMSS still focuses on comparing students’ learning outcomes in mathematics and science, and is relatively closely aligned with the content taught in schools.

The Way We Assess Education Has Changed

In 2000, the OECD conducted PISA for the first time. Its biggest difference from TIMSS was not simply the addition of reading, but that it asked a different question.

TIMSS is closer to asking, “Have students learned the mathematics and science that schools are supposed to teach?” PISA, by contrast, deliberately does not fully follow the curriculum of any particular country. Instead, it tests whether 15-year-old students can apply what they have learned to unfamiliar and real-world situations, such as reading charts, evaluating information, solving problems and making inferences. In other words, PISA is not simply asking about the content of textbooks, but about students’ ability to apply knowledge.

This also reflects another shift behind international education comparisons. During the Cold War, countries were concerned about whether they had enough scientists to keep up with their rivals. In the era of globalisation, countries became more concerned about whether their young people could compete in a knowledge-based economy.

The scale of PISA therefore expanded rapidly. The first round involved 43 countries and economies. By 2022, there were 81, and in 2025 the number rose to 91. What began largely as an international comparison involving wealthy industrialised countries gradually became a global map of education. Once the whole world began using the same measuring stick, that measuring stick itself naturally acquired unprecedented political power.

Does Every Country Have an Education Crisis?

After PISA results are released, politicians, education organisations and the media often immediately ask: Where did we rank? Did we rise or fall?

One of the most famous examples is Germany. When the first PISA results were released in 2000, Germany’s results were below domestic expectations, creating what later became known as the “PISA shock”. This triggered years of education reform, including the development of national education standards, stronger support for disadvantaged and migrant students, and the establishment of more systematic education monitoring. This shows that PISA’s function has long gone beyond research.

A fall in rankings can be used by an opposition party to demonstrate government incompetence, by teacher organisations to demand more resources, or by a government to demonstrate that a particular reform is urgently needed.

Australia this year is a good example. The day after PISA was released, Education Minister Jason Clare had already linked the results to the government’s ongoing efforts in reading, phonics, mathematics curricula and school reform, and used improvements in England’s recent results as evidence supporting the direction of reform. This does not mean that these reforms lack a basis, but it reminds us that international rankings are never interpreted in a political vacuum.

The same Australian results can be presented as “reading and mathematics have reached historic lows”, or as “all three subjects remain above the OECD average”. Neither statement is wrong. The former emphasises the downward trend over two decades, while the latter emphasises Australia’s relative position in international comparisons.

Are East Asians Better at Taking Tests?

Whenever PISA results are released, another familiar discussion concerns East Asian education.

In 2025, the four participating Chinese regions and Singapore once again ranked near the top, while Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Macao and Hong Kong also ranked near the top in several areas. Many people therefore explain this by saying that East Asia has been influenced by Confucian culture, places greater importance on study and examinations, and that students study more, attend more tutoring and are more accustomed to high-pressure examinations, giving them a natural advantage in large-scale international assessments. By contrast, Western countries such as Australia place greater emphasis on student autonomy, creativity and a freer form of education, putting them at a disadvantage in standardised tests.

This explanation is not entirely wrong. A number of Asian education systems, including Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan and Taiwan, have indeed had high-stakes public examinations for a long time. The OECD has also pointed out that high-stakes central examinations can affect school teaching and student behaviour. But attributing all of East Asia’s high scores to examination culture is also an oversimplification.

First, PISA itself is not a typical curriculum examination. It deliberately tests the ability to apply knowledge to new situations. In fact, when the OECD compared PISA and TIMSS, it found that countries’ relative performance in the two assessments was not completely the same. Some of the differences came from the content of the assessments, as well as the fact that PISA samples by age while TIMSS samples by grade.

Second, Singapore’s high scores cannot simply be explained by saying that it only selects elite students to sit the test. PISA requires participating jurisdictions to select a representative sample of 15-year-old students enrolled in school, rather than choosing only students from elite schools or top performers. Singapore’s small system, highly centralised policies, and the strong coordination between its curriculum, teacher training and assessment may all be factors more worthy of study when understanding its results than simply saying that “its students are better at taking tests”.

The same applies to Hong Kong. The gradual move from “elite education” towards a more universal education system is indeed part of Hong Kong’s education history, but it cannot therefore be directly claimed that the recent decline in PISA scores is “because elite students were taught in the past, while everyone goes to school now”. PISA itself is based on the population of 15-year-old students enrolled in school, and Hong Kong had already entered the era of universal basic education when it participated in PISA.

Population structure, curriculum reforms, learning time, examination systems, family resources, student motivation and even sampling methods may all affect the final scores. This shows that the illusion most easily created by international rankings is to compress a complex education system into a single number.

AI’s Fault

When PISA was released in 2022, COVID-19 was an unavoidable part of the background. Students in many countries experienced school closures and remote learning, while mathematics and reading scores across OECD countries also experienced historically unusual declines. But at the time, the OECD had already warned that declines in many countries had actually begun before the pandemic.

By 2026, a new explanation has emerged: AI. This PISA cycle is the first full-scale international assessment conducted after generative AI such as ChatGPT became widespread, so the OECD asked students in detail for the first time about how they use AI.

In Australia, 50% of 15-year-old students said they used AI chatbots to help with learning at least once a week, above the OECD average of 46%. Thirty-five per cent used AI to conduct initial research on new topics, 33% used it to summarise assigned reading, and 27% used it to draft homework. Only about 15% of Australian students said they almost never used AI for the learning tasks covered by PISA.

On the surface, the data seems to provide an easy story: “Students rely more on ChatGPT, so they are becoming worse at reading.” But PISA itself did not draw such a simple conclusion.

The data shows that students who used AI to summarise, conduct initial research or write tended to have lower average scores than those who did not use it at all. But the OECD specifically emphasised that this is a correlation and does not mean that AI itself caused lower scores. Students who already have greater learning difficulties may be more reliant on AI, or the key issue may not be “whether it is used” but “how it is used”.

Australia’s data reflects this point particularly well. Some 68.3% of Australian students said they had learned in class how to assess the quality of AI-generated information, above the OECD average of 62.6%. Among students who frequently use AI, those who had received this kind of AI literacy education generally performed better in science.

So the real question may not be “Should students use AI?” but whether students are treating AI as an answer machine that replaces thinking, or as a tool that helps them think.

PISA in the Age of AI

This is also the most noteworthy aspect of this year’s PISA. The OECD found that some of the reading abilities that have declined most significantly in recent years are precisely those that are most needed in the age of AI: comparing different sources of information, evaluating evidence, distinguishing facts from opinions, and making inferences when information is contradictory. Compared with 2018, the proportion of “hasty readers” who gave incorrect answers after reading quickly had almost doubled in 2025.

This makes something somewhat ironic.

When ChatGPT can write an article in seconds, and Google and AI can provide answers immediately, we might think that memorising knowledge and reading long texts are becoming less important. But the easier it becomes for AI to generate answers, the more people need to know: Is this answer trustworthy? What has it left out? Where is the evidence? When two claims contradict each other, which one should I believe?

These are precisely the abilities that PISA has been trying to measure for years.

PISA 2025 also introduced “Learning in the Digital World” for the first time, testing whether students can learn independently in digital environments, use computational tools, break down problems and adjust their problem-solving strategies. Australia scored 532 on the currently released computational problem-solving indicator, above the OECD score of 500, and performed relatively better on this measure than on its three traditional subjects. A complete analysis will not be released until 2027.

Therefore, PISA 2026 may have raised a question that is more important than rankings.

More than 60 years ago, international education comparisons emerged because Sputnik made countries concerned about whether their students could be trained to become the next generation of scientists and engineers. Today, the threat is no longer a satellite suddenly launched into space, but an artificial intelligence technology whose capabilities are changing almost every few months.

But the core question facing education has not really changed. We are still asking: Is what schools are teaching today enough to prepare the next generation for a completely different world?

So rather than simply asking whether Australia ranks 10th or 16th, or how many more points it has fallen, perhaps the more important questions are: Why have students’ reading and mathematics abilities been declining for two decades? Why have some education systems managed to improve against the trend? What types of technology use genuinely promote learning, and what types simply outsource thinking?

One Nation is on the right of the political spectrum. Like many populist parties, it has raised issues such as housing and the cost of living, which many Australians are finding difficult. But this does not mean that Hanson has correctly assessed these problems, let alone provided the right answers to Australia’s social problems. However, with the Victorian and New South Wales elections approaching, mainstream parties such as the Liberal Party and Labor Party have not responded strongly to One Nation’s position on a monocultural society. The reason is simple. At a time when these parties are both losing voter support, the second preferences of One Nation supporters, as well as the possibility of minority governments emerging, have become decisive factors in determining whether these parties can govern. It can be expected that in the upcoming November Victorian election, neither party will actively respond to One Nation’s demands. As a result, One Nation’s momentum continues to grow day by day.

What is worth watching is whether Australians really support One Nation, which will become clear in the Victorian election. Victoria is the most multicultural state in Australia, and migrants have not developed long-term established support for either Labor or the Liberal Party. Whether they will actually cast their votes for One Nation is therefore a real indicator of the level of support for One Nation. In the Melbourne City North-East electorate for the Legislative Council, a migrant is running as an independent candidate with “intercultural democracy” as their political platform, clearly asking voters who are dissatisfied with the mainstream parties to make a choice between voting for One Nation.

One Nation sees immigration as the biggest problem facing Australian society today, believing that the problems Australia faces today are all caused by Australian society having absorbed too many multicultural migrants, and that if the number of migrants is immediately reduced and certain groups of migrants regarded as “bad” are restricted, Australia’s problems can be solved immediately. Faced with this situation, responsible and capable political parties should put forward accurate analyses and solutions to difficulties such as housing supply, house prices, the cost of living and public safety, rather than being led by One Nation and focusing only on questions such as the speech delivered by Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke last week: “Who can come? Who can stay? Who needs to leave?”

In Burke’s speech, the sharp increase in temporary residents was identified as the biggest issue behind population growth, and Burke proposed a series of policy responses. However, society generally believes that these reforms will have little impact on the fundamental problems and are merely going through the motions. As first-generation migrants, we can actually feel more strongly that after settling here for decades, Australian society has undergone fundamental changes. What is needed is for society as a whole, including multicultural settlers who have arrived over the past 40 years and generations who have lived here for many generations but mistakenly believe that Australia is still a Western society like Britain, to work together to find a new definition of Australians and Australian society today.

Australia’s Self-Redefinition

To make such a redefinition, as migrants, we need to understand some of Australia’s immigration history and how it has evolved into its current situation before we can develop a balanced and practical response.

Australia, as a country, has gone through roughly seven stages since colonial migration began in 1788.

(1) Colonial migration, (2) White Australia Policy, (3) Populate or Perish, (4) Assimilation, (5) Multiculturalism, (6) Immigration management, and (7) Intercultural democracy.

(1) Colonial Migration (1788–1901)

Before 1850, Australian society was mainly made up of British colonists, along with a small number of Europeans. After gold was discovered in 1850, the gold rush brought large numbers of Chinese migrants, while Queensland’s sugar industry made extensive use of Pacific Islander indentured labour. At the time, white workers and politicians often regarded Asian migrants and Pacific Islander labourers as threats to wages, employment and “white society”. The colonies therefore introduced different degrees of exclusionary policies.

When Australia became a federation in 1901, immigration directly became one of the important responsibilities of the new federal government.

The first major piece of legislation passed by the first Federal Parliament was the Immigration Restriction Act 1901, which opened the way for the White Australia Policy.

(2) 1901–1945: The White Australia Policy

This was the first major stage in Australian immigration history. Its core idea was very clear: Australia was to become a country of white people from the British Empire. The law did not simply state that “Asians could not enter Australia”. Instead, it achieved this objective through an administrative system.

The most famous example was the dictation test. Immigration officers could require applicants to write 50 words in a specified European language, with the particular language chosen by the officer. This meant that it could easily be used to make certain people “fail”. Between 1901 and 1909, 1,359 people were required to take the test, and only 52 were allowed to enter. After 1909, no one required to take the test passed it. At the time, there were also:

• Pacific Island Labourers Act 1901
• Restrictions on non-European immigration
• Various restrictions imposed on non-white residents already in Australia
• Preferential encouragement of British migration

Therefore, the White Australia Policy was not simply an “immigration policy”, but a population, racial and national identity policy.

By 1947, people born outside Australia, Ireland and Britain accounted for only a small proportion of the Australian population. The proportion of the Asian population also fell from approximately 1.25% in 1901 to around 0.21% by the late 1940s.

(3) 1945–1960s: Populate or Perish

This was the first major turning point after the establishment of the Australian Federation. The Second World War created a very strong sense of national security in Australia: if the population was too small, the country would not be secure. In particular, the military threat posed by Japan during the Pacific War led Australia to seriously consider the idea of “Populate or Perish”: Australia needed to increase its population or it might not be able to defend the country.

After the war, Labor Immigration Minister Arthur Calwell began strongly promoting immigration. But there was a contradiction: Australia still had the White Australia Policy. Therefore, the large numbers of migrants initially recruited were mainly from Britain, displaced Europeans, the Balkans, Southern Europe and Eastern Europe. One of the most representative examples of the policy at the time was the “Ten Pound Poms” scheme, which operated from 1945 until it ended in 1982. More than one million mainly British European migrants paid ten pounds and received subsidies from the Australian Government to settle in Australia. During this period, Australia’s population increased from only seven million to 15 million.

(4) 1950s–1973: From a “White Country” Towards Non-Racial Immigration

The White Australia Policy was not created in a single day, and it was dismantled gradually. In 1957, the government relaxed some restrictions on non-European immigration. Non-European migrants began to have the possibility of longer-term residence and citizenship, although they were still subject to stricter conditions than European migrants. In 1958, immigration legislation formally abolished the dictation test, marking a very important institutional reform. In 1966, the Liberal Government under Harold Holt decided that immigration selection would no longer be based on race and nationality, but would begin to be based on skills and contribution.

This marked the first very important transformation in Australian immigration policy: moving from asking “What race are you?” to asking “What can you contribute to Australia?” This policy eventually evolved into the skilled migration program that exists today.

(5) 1973–1990s: The Emergence and Institutionalisation of Multicultural Australia

The real ideological transformation took place under the Whitlam Government. In 1973, Immigration Minister Al Grassby formally introduced multiculturalism. Australia officially abandoned the final institutional remnants of the White Australia Policy and stated that Australia could be a country made up of people from different cultural backgrounds. Grassby had a particularly noteworthy concept of seeing citizens as a “family of the nation”. Grassby believed that members of a family could uphold common interests without every member becoming exactly the same. Family members did not need to have the same appearance, behaviour or thoughts. He also pointed out that individuals or ethnic communities did not need to abandon their cultural heritage, personal identity or characteristics in order to reach consensus.

Grassby’s proposal in 1973 represented an ideological turning point, but for it to truly become government policy, institutional changes were required. The 1978 Galbally Report was an important milestone. It pushed the government to expand settlement services, English-language support, migrant services and equal access to community services. In other words, migration did not end when migrants arrived in Australia. On the contrary, this was only the beginning. The government needed to help them settle, learn English, find employment and participate in society.

When the Galbally Report was published, non-white migrants accounted for only 5–6% of Australia’s population. Most of the migrants who required assistance to integrate were British and European migrants whose cultures were relatively close to Australian culture, which was completely different from the circumstances of multicultural Australia today. Unfortunately, over the decades, successive governments have not seriously adjusted the recommendations of the Galbally Report to suit globalised migrants who arrived in Australia after the 1990s and who had completely different cultural and social backgrounds, experiences and goals from those who settled in Australia before the 1970s.

The fact that multicultural Australia is being questioned today precisely demonstrates the indifference of successive governments towards migrant communities and social integration, as well as their lack of basic understanding.

(6) 1990s–2010s: From Multiculturalism Towards Australian Values

During this period, the Australian Government began placing greater emphasis on both cultural diversity and shared Australian values. In other words, people can retain their languages, cultures, religions, food and festivals, but everyone must still accept democracy, the rule of law, equality, freedom and civic responsibility. Therefore, multiculturalism should not mean that “each community lives separately”, but rather that “cultures can be diverse, while civic institutions must be shared”.

Clearly, today some people see the root of Australia’s increasingly difficult social conditions as multiculturalism being unsuitable for Australia, and are calling for a return to a monocultural Australia. This reflects the fact that over the past 50 years, while governments at all levels have significantly increased immigration, they have failed to address how to establish Australian values and social cohesion within society. When economic and livelihood difficulties arise, migrants are seen as the root of the problem and become scapegoats for the policy failures and governance failures of successive governments.

The reality is that Australia today is already one of the most multicultural societies in the world. A return to a single British or European culture is no longer possible. How to turn Australia’s ethnic diversity into its greatest asset as it moves towards globalisation has become the most important issue facing society today.

(7) Immigration Becomes an “Economic Management Issue” (2010s to Today)

At this stage, the focus of immigration policy changed again. The initial question asked by Australian society, “Who can enter Australia?”, became “What kind of people does Australia need?” As a result, skilled migration became extremely important. For example, doctors, nurses, engineers, teachers, IT professionals, construction workers and tradespeople became people Australia sought to attract. The government also used points-based systems, occupation demand lists, employer sponsorship, regional migration, temporary visas and permanent residency planning to manage immigration, with the focus also placed on numbers and economic benefits.

But the government has overlooked the fact that migrants today are no longer lower- and middle-class people without much leverage seeking a place to settle. Instead, they are successful people from different countries around the world who aspire to Australia’s high quality of life and bring higher education, capital, experience, global networks and successful experiences to this country, hoping to achieve greater development in their lives. These migrants come with the motivation to build a future together with Australians and to contribute their abilities more fully, yet the majority of society still has not recognised their potential to help build Australian society.

During this period, dealing with the issue from an economic management perspective highlighted the lack of consensus among different sections of society about how migration should be managed. Farmers who have long faced labour shortages in regional areas have had to rely heavily on working holiday visa holders or certain refugee groups to provide workers during harvest seasons, or on overseas workers who do not speak English in slaughterhouses, in order to keep production going. Investor migrants temporarily brought capital into Australia but were unable to drive industrial development, create employment or diversify the economy, and this category of migration was eventually abolished under pressure. The points-based skilled migration program…