I've just received a copy of an interesting new book titled The Howard Legacy. Written by a distinguished Australian scientist, Dr Peter Wilkinson, it looks at one of the most radical legacies of John Howard's term in office, namely the coming dominance of the professions by overseas fee-paying students.
I'll write a detailed review shortly, but those interested in further information can visit The Independent Australian website and click the Howard Legacy button to the left.
Short term gain for long term pain?
ReplyDeleteLet's hope not.
The Australian Immigration Crisis
ReplyDeleteA mirror image of our own crisis.
Peter Wilkinson, The Howard Legacy: Displacement of Traditional Australia from the Professional and Managerial Classes, Independent Australian Publications, 2007,
soft cover, 170 pp. $25 (Australian).
reviewed by Thomas Jackson
Australia has an immigration policy that is like ours stood on its head. The United States is filling up with unlettered Hispanics, who make every social problem worse, whether it is crime, school failure, illegitimacy, youth gangs, obesity, or drug-taking.
Australia is importing hundreds of thousands of smart, hard-working people who are streaming into the nation’s best universities and working their way to the top. Mass immigration at its best? No. “In 1994 the acerbic Le Kuan Yew, then Prime Minister of Singapore, forecast that Australians were destined to be the poor white trash of Asia,” writes Peter Wilkinson in The Howard Legacy. “Today one can say that white Australians are destined to be the poor trash of Australia.”
These successful immigrants are almost all Asians—mainly Chinese—and white Australians have begun to resent their increasing dominance. As columnist Michael Duffy asked in the Sydney Morning Herald, “Is it perhaps the first time in history that a nation’s elite have invited another group to come in and replace it?”
Peter Wilkinson, a former president of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute and now editor of The Independent Australian, has written what is probably the first book-length treatment of this replacement. He has no resentment against Asians, pointing out that they are only exploiting an opportunity, just as the Chinese have done everywhere in Southeast Asia. It is white politicians who have sold out their children’s birthright who are the targets of Dr. Wilkinson’s anger.
The Nature of Immigration
John Howard was prime minister from 1996 until he left office after a Labor victory on November 24, 2007. During that time, explains Dr. Wilkinson, Asians have accounted for a steady 40 percent of all immigrants. The Chinese percentage has drifted down slightly, from about 20 percent to 15 percent of the total, with Indians taking their places. Whites continue to be a minority of all immigrants, at 20 to 25 percent. Asians are now about 7 percent of the population and the Chinese, who account for half them, have an impact far beyond their numbers.
The Australian immigration system used to be weighted towards family reunification, but during the Howard years, the number of immigrants admitted because of skills rose from 28 to 45 percent. In some cases immigration quotas were even allocated to tradesmen, such as carpenters and electricians. This, says Dr. Wilkinson, is because of the foolish idea that everyone should have an “academic” education, which leaves many men with useless degrees in psychology or sociology and no trade. Whites from Europe and South Africa are the immigrant tradesmen; the engineers, accountants, and currency traders are Asian. Asians tend to be concentrated in the power centers of Sydney and Melbourne, where most of the Chinese movie houses and the 14 Chinese newspapers and magazines are found.
The Australian university system helps explain the Asian influx. Higher education is almost entirely free for Australians—only three percent of citizens pay fees—but the government has reduced the education budget over the years. This means universities have come to depend on foreign students, who pay full tariff. Almost one quarter of students are now fee-paying foreigners, and they supply 15 percent of national universities budget.
Graduation with an Australian degree almost guarantees the right to live in Australia. As Dr. Wilkinson explains, “the universities market themselves as providing education but they know, and certainly their prospective applicants know, that they are marketing permanent residency visas.” “Migration agents” do a brisk business recruiting foreign fee-payers. Some low-level cram schools have become almost entirely dependent on Asians, and they lower admissions and credentialing standards to keep the tuition money rolling in. Dr. Wilkinson notes:
“At one time in many cases the staff would have probably conceded passes in the knowledge that the students would be out of Australia soon and out of sight and out of mind. Not these days; most likely they will be applying for residency, then appointments to professional positions denied to Australian residents who have to met rigorous standards.”
Many classes are filled with people who hardly speak English, and are not much use to Australians, but anyone who complains is, of course, a “racist.”
Dr. Wilkinson points out that Asians who can afford to move to Australia or send their children to school there are middle class at least, and often wealthy. He says that if the first generation is held back by poor English, the second generation will not be. Their children will be just as diligent as they are, and will keep moving up.
Dr. Wilkinson admires the “firm family discipline” of Asians, and contrasts it to the lax, party atmosphere common among white students. Dr Wilkinson notes with disgust that whites are often so badly educated that “many born and bred locals have such poor English grammar and expression skills that recently arrived NESB [non-English-speaking background] immigrants are not particularly disadvantaged.”
Wealthy, motivated Asians take places in the top private schools, and buy houses in the best public school districts, often pricing out whites. The state of New South Wales, which is Australia’s most populous and has Sydney as its capital, has 19 selective high schools. No fewer than 12 have a majority of students who come from homes where English is not spoken. The three most heavily non-white are an astonishing 92 percent, 83 percent, and 78 percent NESB.
Hard work pays off. In 2005, the 3.4 percent of the population that was Chinese won 24 percent of the Australian Student Prizes given for high school work. The state of Victoria is 4 percent Chinese, but Chinese carried off 32 percent of the scholarships at the state’s prestige universities, Melbourne and Monash.
The table on this page shows just how overrepresented non-whites are in Australian universities, especially in the eight top-ranked schools, known collectively as the “Group of Eight.” The abbreviations are confusing, but the table shows what type of student is studying which subjects. In the fourth column, for example, we find that 37 percent of all students studying information technology were either born outside of Australia or were born in Australia of non-English-speaking parents. It is safe to assume that a large majority are non-white, with a heavy representation of Chinese. The last column on the table shows figures for the Group of Eight. No fewer than 49 percent of students in information technology are O/SB or ABNESB.
Dr. Wilkinson writes that most Australians have no idea how non-white Australia’s best universities have become. “Go to any Group of 8 university,” he writes. “Walk around, believe your own eyes.” At the University of New South Wales — in the Group of Eight, of course — 44 percent of the students are Asian. Dr. Wilkinson points out that Asians are heavily concentrated in dentistry and optometry, but do not yet dominate medicine because the English-ability requirement for doctors is high; patients and doctors must understand each other. This language requirement is routinely attacked as “racist,” and, in any case, Australian-born Asians, fluent in English, will soon be gliding into medical schools.
Dr. Wilkinson writes that if current immigration continues, Chinese will be 6 to 10 percent of the population by 2030, and will be concentrated in the best-paid management positions. “The Chinese have become an economy-dominant minority everywhere that they have a significant presence,” he writes. “Why would the situation be any different in Australia?”
There will be more than economic consequences: “Australia will gravitate over time into the Chinese sphere of influence … Traditional links with the UK, Europe and USA will fade … The leading politicians will be traditional Australians, in the pockets of the Chinese, as is the case in SE Asia.”
Dr. Wilkinson says whites will become rare in selective schools and in the corridors of power: “The cognitively gifted traditional Australian will be a minority. Traditional Australian culture is unlikely to survive in such an environment. Links to Anglo-European culture will evaporate.”
Chinese have generally refrained from boasting about their success, but there have been exceptions. Michael Choi, a member of parliament from Queensland said, “I want the world to know that we [Australians] are hard workers and entrepreneurs and able to sell ice to Eskimos because we have learned that from the Chinese community.” Peter Wong of the New South Wales legislative council says high immigration is a great benefit for Australia because the nation state is obsolete anyway. Whenever a Chinese—or anyone else—points out that whites resent the Asian influx he is hooted down.
Dr. Wilkinson makes the obvious recommendations: immigration should be cut, colleges should not have to depend on foreigners, and an Australian degree should not be a ticket to citizenship. He even suggests preferences for whites.
None of this seems likely. The new prime minister Kevin Rudd majored in Chinese as an undergraduate and held a diplomatic post at the Peking embassy. He is widely known as a Sinophile and even has a Chinese son-in-law. Mr. Rudd will not make it harder for Asians to tighten their grip.
What is happening in Australia is yet another example of why racial diversity does not work. The Chinese who can afford to immigrate are well above average in ability and even further above the Australian average. There is nothing to stop them from displacing the WASP ruling class, and changing the country in ways whites will not like.
Had these talented immigrants been Britons, Canadians, or white South Africans, there would be nothing like the friction that is sure to come. There might be a few murmurs of discontent if Boers, for example, took over a few major banks, but in a generation Boers would be indistinguishable from old Australian stock. The Chinese will remain Chinese, whether they are running a corner laundry or the foreign ministry. And, as Dr. Wilkinson points out, when the old WASP elite discovers that its children and grandchildren are sweeping floors in Chinese-owned factories, they will have only themselves to blame.
The Howard Legacy can be purchased on the Internet from the “book store” at digitalprintaustralia.com.
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Enter the Dragon: Australia Imports a New Elite
ReplyDeleteBy R. J. Stove
November 26, 2007
As you have probably heard by now, Australia’s general election of November 24 swept from power Liberal Party Prime Minister John Howard, who had held the office since 1996. It proved a triumph for his opponent, the Australian Labor Party’s new and largely untested leader Kevin Rudd, who has a 27-seat majority in the federal parliament.
Among the election’s issues: Iraq (to a very limited extent), the economy, tax cuts, national security, climate change, and quasi-generational change (Rudd is a youthful-looking 50 years old, Howard an increasingly tired-looking 68). Almost everything, in fact—except mass immigration, on which both candidates were locked in a bipartisan embrace.
Sound familiar?
Don’t expect the average Australian newspaper editor to notice, let alone to challenge, this state of affairs. There is a reason why VDARE.COM has a disproportionately high number of Australian readers.
But, happily, one Australian noticed it—and not only noticed it but published a whole book devoted to it before the election campaign started.
Peter Wilkinson, editor of the quarterly Independent Australian, brought out The Howard Legacy: Displacement of Traditional Australia from the Professional and Managerial Classes (Independent Australian Publications, Post Office Box 8, Essendon 3040, Victoria, Australia, 2007, 170 pp). A past president of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute , Dr. Wilkinson comprehensively knows whereof he speaks.
The Howard Legacy is entirely unmarred by the crank-pamphlet Gestalt. Its author has concentrated severely upon number-crunching (Steve Sailer will enjoy reading this study). It bears no personal rancor towards the Chinese immigrants whose invasion he chronicles. When a government is foolish enough and short-sighted enough to roll out the welcome mat regardless of the possibilities for long-term assimilation, then, as Dr. Wilkinson says, "Who can blame people for taking advantage of these policies if they can?"
In table after table, diagram after diagram, Dr. Wilkinson explains the trends. Once John Howard first obtained office in 1996, he immediately cut back on immigration from all sources. In the 1995-96 fiscal year 99,139 immigrants were admitted; the annual total fell to 85,732 in 1996-97 and then to 77,327 in 1997-98.
But then it crept up after Howard’s narrow victory in the 1998 election to a postwar peak of 107,366 in 2000-01. Another cutback followed this peak—the totals for 2001-02 and 2002-03 were respectively 88,900 and 93,914 immigrants. But by 2003-04 the total was ballooning again: in 2005-06 we had another postwar peak of 131,593. (A much more detailed statistical breakdown of immigrants’ arrival patterns over the last decade can be found here. [Settler arrivals 1996-97 to 2006-07 Australia States and territories (PDF)])
To give Howard credit, he remained tough on illegal immigration, ever since his deeds in 2001. It was legal immigration that he encouraged and increased to record levels. But his 2001 success meant that his opponent declared his own opposition to illegal immigration, too. [Rudd to turn back boatpeople, By Paul Kelly and Dennis Shanahan, The Australian, November 23, 2007]
Australia is famously "girt by sea," and is a luckier country than the US with no shallow, fordable Rio Grande River for immigrants to cross. Illegal immigrants are thus a minor element in Australian demographics. The real problem will always be those immigrants the Government allows and encourages to immigrate.
Whence come these immigrants?
One thing for which we can be (slightly) grateful: in Australia, the U.S.-style family-reunification racket is no longer the juggernaut it was. Skilled migration has become much more prominent. There are even, mirabile dictu, attempts made to demand from skilled-migration candidates a certain proficiency in English. So far, so good.
But note how theory breaks down against the seemingly irresistible onrush of open-borders practice. Theoretically, as Dr. Wilkinson explains, overseas applicants for university study in Australia need to have passed Band 6 of the International English Language Test System (IELTS), which declares them to be "competent" in the tongue. But if a migrant is already here and wants the so-called Subclass 880 skilled-migrant visa, he need only pass IELTS Band 5. Two-thirds of those migrants who qualify for Subclass 880 are, in fact, stuck at the Band 5 stage. How very reassuring if you are forced to depend on them for preparing your tax return, or removing your brain tumor.
And yes, naturellement, however far behind the eight-ball the ethnic lobbyists might be at actually writing or uttering grammatical English, there is one word which they have perfectly mastered the art of pronouncing, to good careerist effect. That word is, of course, "racist".
Dr. Wilkinson takes us on a guided tour of the giggle-house now euphemistically known in Australia as "university education", with its zeal for handing out degrees to even the most inept foreign students. He quotes the surreptitious—and, necessarily, anonymous—confessions of the academics faced with such students: such as "I give them 51% to get them out of my hair", and "An audit demonstrated that it was almost exclusively international students who appealed against penalties."
The little darlings are impressively gifted in plagiarism also. Encouraged, no doubt, by the plagiarism-mania already flourishing locally at the highest levels, thanks to the likes of David Robinson, former boss of Melbourne’s Monash University, who resigned after the third time he was caught committing plagiarism.
On and on it goes, with a particularly valuable rogues’ gallery of modern Chinese-Australian legislators, few of whom could be trusted on any topic more controversial than tomorrow’s sunrise. Most of them have nuisance value rather than anything more sinister. Some are downright amusing, such as one Peter Wong. Mr. Wong served in New South Wales’ parliament (from the 1999 state election to the 2007 state election) as representative for an anti-Pauline-Hanson operation, only to fall out with the party’s Jewish executive director by denouncing Israel.
The sole gallery member to make a national name for himself has been Melbourne’s mayor John So, subject of a reverential rap ditty called "John So He’s My Bro."
Mr. So’s more or less total inability to speak English, despite having lived in Australia since 1964, is the stuff of Internet legend. It briefly threatened to derail his chances of obtaining the mayoralty, when that office was thrown open to popular election for the first time.
An opposing candidate, Peter Shepperd, bravely raised the matter of Mr. So’s difficulties with the English language. Then, in Dr. Wilkinson’s words, "The dreaded cry of ‘racism’ was raised and Shepperd withdrew from the contest."
Clearly, no one has dared tell Mr. So about Tom Lehrer’s deathless epigram: "If a person can’t communicate, the very least he can do is shut up."
VDARE.COM readers will already have encountered the saga of Australian law professor Andrew Fraser, suspended from Sydney’s Macquarie University after he dared to question the prevailing utopian dreams of multiracialism. These ludicrous proceedings The Howard Legacy discusses at some length.
Dr. Wilkinson makes it clear—without actually saying outright—that the single most tragic element in modern Australian society is not the "racist" culture in which we are supposedly marinated, but rather, our complete lack of a First Amendment or anything like it. The anti-Fraser campaign was, after all, doing nothing more obscure than imitating the success of the lynching bee that 20 years earlier had forced the eminent historian Geoffrey Blainey out of his job.
Dr. Wilkinson’s interests are not confined to the Australian scene. One book to which he repeatedly refers is Amy Chua’s World On Fire, with its first-hand accounts of successful but locally detested Chinese in the Philippines, and its surveys of economically dominant but politically hounded market minorities (whether Chinese or other) elsewhere.
Malaysia has famously addressed the problems resulting from its own Chinese market minority by two methods:
1. mass murder, such as Kuala Lumpur’s May 1969 anti-Chinese rioting, which remains off-limits for public discussion in Malaysia;
2. a racial quota system, which Prime Minister Abdul Razak formulated in 1971 to give preference to Malays in education and bureaucratic employment.
Dr. Wilkinson is not, need one say, advocating such anti-Chinese maneuvers by Australian rulers. But one does wonder how far Australian administrative Caucasophobia has to continue before alienated and marginalized whites start pining for a Malaysian-type solution.
Thus far, The Howard Legacy has been totally ignored by Australia’s predominantly dopey Mainstream Media. Meanwhile, said media are happy enough to report with slavering enthusiasm such fatuous schemes as former Queensland Premier Peter Beattie’s demand that the country’s population be raised from 20 million to 50 million. And no, this is not an official bulletin from the Lyndon LaRouche brigade. This is reality, or what passes in Australia for same. ['We need 50 million Aussies', The Courier-Mail, September 04, 2007]
As for the November 24 election, its outcome combines with Dr. Wilkinson’s text to inspire the hope that the Liberal Party will be euthanized altogether. (Already the Liberal Party has proved unable to control any state or territorial legislature since 2001.)
A good precedent exists for this collapse: the annihilation during the 1940s of the United Australia Party. Since this movement was little more than a shill for Big Business at its stupidest—and had forced from office Sir Robert Menzies, its one leader of stature—there was no point in trying to revive it after it had been clobbered at the 1943 general election .
Instead, Menzies had the insight (even before that election) to start a genuine conservative movement from scratch. The movement which he envisaged—and which, after 1943, he very largely effected—would avoid the UAP’s dim-witted class warfare, and would focus on those whom Menzies himself called "The Forgotten People." In this respect, Pauline Hanson may prove to have been a harbinger.
Merely to read Menzies’ remarks is to realize anew how unthinkable they would be, from any large Australian political organization’s head, today. To find out exactly why they are unthinkable, we need look no further than Dr. Wilkinson’s painstakingly assembled statistics.
R. J. Stove lives in Melbourne and is a Contributing Editor of The American Conservative. The views he expresses are his own.
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Hi
ReplyDeletedid you ever complete a review on this book?
Anon,
ReplyDeleteNo, I think that one got away from me.