conversations.from: human
conversations.value: What could be a title for a book about Australia with the genre: History, Australia & Oceania?
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: A title for this book could be 'The Lucky Country'
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the first five paragraphs for this book
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: The Lucky Country
  It has had its material success because its ordinary people were educated enough and adaptable enough to work in modern ways; because they were eager to buy enough consumer goods to keep the whole show going; and because their masters, although not usually of high calibre, were skilled enough, with government protection, to decode the instructions they received from overseas. Now something more than that is needed. It does not seem likely that in this new age material progress can continue at the highest rate unless society jumps into new life with higher standards of training, with an increasing proportion of scientists, technologists and technicians, with a greater emphasis on administrative and managerial capacity and an absorption of the technocratic approach into ways of thinking. All the industrialized nations are now reacting to this problem, but few of them are doing it as slowly as Australia and in few of them does it represent quite such a change in social pattern. In most industrialized countries cleverness and skill are part of the national ethos, even if they share it with contradictory elements. In Australia they play no part in it. Even if more and more of Australian enterprise is run directly by overseas firms, there must be enough Australians able to decode the new instructions and carry them out. It is unlikely that enough skilled migrants can be acquired to do the whole job for us. And given the present inadequate training programmes it is likely that this crisis may become apparent at a time when it would take up to a decade to meet it.
  That a revolutionary change in attitudes towards life is needed to further material progress does not mean that this change will necessarily be achieved. A politician, government official, union leader or company director who does not wish to change his beliefs and the habits that give life meaning for him will simply not change them; they are more important to him than the further material progress of the nation. Normally, people prefer their ways of life to material progress: it is one of the reasons why most nations are 'under-developed'. What is advocated is a radical overthrow and destruction of the prevailing attitudes of most of the nation's masters. If this does not happen there is likely to be a general demoralization in Australia; the nation may become run down, old-fashioned, puzzled, and resentful.
  One can go on advocating until one is black in the face but the concept of social revolution is nonsense if there are not the people to make it. The ordinary Australian people seem adaptable; it is a matter of the people on top. Here one can draw some confidence in the possibility of change (for better or worse) from detecting a difference between the generations. On top there is a stiff-necked carrying on of old ways based on enervated wisdoms. One has only to watch a top person on television to sense in the lowered eyes, in the inability to reach towards the camera and generalize, in the lack of excitement about the problems of the modern world, in the meticulous muddling around with trivia, that these are the symptoms of a lost generation. What Bagehot said of generations in politics is true of generations generally: 'Generally one generation... succeeds another almost silently; at every moment men of all ages between thirty and seventy have considerable influence; each year removes many old men, makes others older, brings in many new. But sometimes there is an abrupt change. In that case the affairs of the country are apt to alter much, for good or for evil; sometimes it is ruined, sometimes it becomes more successful, but it hardly ever stays as it was.'
  However, beneath the pretence of sameness one can detect difference. One can make some guesses, at the same time qualifying generalization by recognizing that men are often born out of their generation. In general the remains of the Menzies–Calwell generation is antediluvian, nurtured in a backwater, strongly provincial. They are of the post-Federation generation, proud that the Australian States had federated; they developed their theories of the world in a context of British power. They can be more old-fashioned than men of the same generation in Britain because their imaginations have not been fundamentally stirred by any of the cataclysms of the last fifty years. The men who came of age between the two World Wars see themselves as the innovators and men of iron will – the one-man shows who in their brilliant improvisations changed the face of Australia. Often the changes they made represent the dreams of the 1930s rather than the demands of the 1960s; though still believing supremely in themselves they have no trust in the men underneath them (often their problems of succession are their own fault); they trust in their own intuition (which is sometimes just luck), willpower and the handling of men. The wartime and immediate post-war generation understands the demands of the age better and sees life in more complicated terms than the men they are now beginning to replace. They understand the need for expertness and cooperation more. They are the New Generation, the men who see Australia in more sophisticated terms. Some of them have imitated the Men of Will. Others already seem tired. Some of the best may have been so long frustrated by the amateurishness of the Men of Will that they may have lost their punch. But they are Australia's immediate hope. The younger generation than this seems fresher, but it is still full of mystery, not defined. It is condemned as hedonistic and stupid. Yet some of its apparent stupidity may be indifference to the bogus view of life that is presented to it and some of its hedonism an expression of a strong Australian characteristic that is now less confused by puritanism. It may be a genuinely rebellious generation, developing its own style. It may be the generation that changes Australia.
  Why is there no longer any sense of importance in Australia, no feeling that great events (except catastrophe) can still occur? Small nations usually have histories to sustain them or futures to enlighten them. Australia seems to have lost both its sense of a past and its sense of a future. In making appeals, in attempting to make policies 'rational' there is nothing to appeal to, no sense of purpose; yet people need some sense of definition to which they can relate their actions as an individual needs a sense of identity: a sense of having had a history, of having reached a particular point in it and of facing a certain kind of future. It may be that all this is because Australia sees itself as a dependent nation. It doesn't develop ideas; it looks overseas for support and recognition; it doesn't adopt policies because it has only a small area of decision. This is the way it may seem to the older successful men who are baffled about what they are supposed to do next. Among the more active younger people there is a feeling that Australia can resume its history, but in a different direction. They are fascinated by the idea of Asia. This fascination, combined with a greater concern for education and cleverness, could prove the creative, liberating element in Australia – if there is to be one.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: five more paragraphs
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: One can go on advocating until one is black in the face but the concept of social revolution is nonsense if there are not the people to make it. The ordinary Australian people seem adaptable; it is a matter of the people on top. Here one can draw some confidence in the possibility of change (for better or worse) from detecting a difference between the generations. On top there is a stiff-necked carrying on of old ways based on enervated wisdoms. One has only to watch a top person on television to sense in the lowered eyes, in the inability to reach towards the camera and generalize, in the lack of excitement about the problems of the modern world, in the meticulous muddling around with trivia, that these are the symptoms of a lost generation. What Bagehot said of generations in politics is true of generations generally: 'Generally one generation... succeeds another almost silently; at every moment men of all ages between thirty and seventy have considerable influence; each year removes many old men, makes others older, brings in many new. But sometimes there is an abrupt change. In that case the affairs of the country are apt to alter much, for good or for evil; sometimes it is ruined, sometimes it becomes more successful, but it hardly ever stays as it was.'
  However, beneath the pretence of sameness one can detect difference. One can make some guesses, at the same time qualifying generalization by recognizing that men are often born out of their generation. In general the remains of the Menzies–Calwell generation is antediluvian, nurtured in a backwater, strongly provincial. They are of the post-Federation generation, proud that the Australian States had federated; they developed their theories of the world in a context of British power. They can be more old-fashioned than men of the same generation in Britain because their imaginations have not been fundamentally stirred by any of the cataclysms of the last fifty years. The men who came of age between the two World Wars see themselves as the innovators and men of iron will – the one-man shows who in their brilliant improvisations changed the face of Australia. Often the changes they made represent the dreams of the 1930s rather than the demands of the 1960s; though still believing supremely in themselves they have no trust in the men underneath them (often their problems of succession are their own fault); they trust in their own intuition (which is sometimes just luck), willpower and the handling of men. The wartime and immediate post-war generation understands the demands of the age better and sees life in more complicated terms than the men they are now beginning to replace. They understand the need for expertness and cooperation more. They are the New Generation, the men who see Australia in more sophisticated terms. Some of them have imitated the Men of Will. Others already seem tired. Some of the best may have been so long frustrated by the amateurishness of the Men of Will that they may have lost their punch. But they are Australia's immediate hope. The younger generation than this seems fresher, but it is still full of mystery, not defined. It is condemned as hedonistic and stupid. Yet some of its apparent stupidity may be indifference to the bogus view of life that is presented to it and some of its hedonism an expression of a strong Australian characteristic that is now less confused by puritanism. It may be a genuinely rebellious generation, developing its own style. It may be the generation that changes Australia.
  Why is there no longer any sense of importance in Australia, no feeling that great events (except catastrophe) can still occur? Small nations usually have histories to sustain them or futures to enlighten them. Australia seems to have lost both its sense of a past and its sense of a future. In making appeals, in attempting to make policies 'rational' there is nothing to appeal to, no sense of purpose; yet people need some sense of definition to which they can relate their actions as an individual needs a sense of identity: a sense of having had a history, of having reached a particular point in it and of facing a certain kind of future. It may be that all this is because Australia sees itself as a dependent nation. It doesn't develop ideas; it looks overseas for support and recognition; it doesn't adopt policies because it has only a small area of decision. This is the way it may seem to the older successful men who are baffled about what they are supposed to do next. Among the more active younger people there is a feeling that Australia can resume its history, but in a different direction. They are fascinated by the idea of Asia. This fascination, combined with a greater concern for education and cleverness, could prove the creative, liberating element in Australia – if there is to be one.
  It is in dealings with Asian countries that Australians might regain a sense of confidence and importance. In different ways different kinds of Australians can feel more at home (and more important) in different parts of Asia than they do in their often unsuccessful and sometimes humiliating attempts to keep up the family relationship with Europeans. To take some examples: although Japan is a great industrial power and Australia is not, in Asia they are the two countries that have achieved economic take-off; they are familiar with the world of industrialization and they are both big trading nations; they can distinguish themselves from the rest of Asia. They are in business together. When a party of Japanese arrived in Australia in 1963 after a tour of 'developing nations' they said they felt more at home in Australia. Japanese take Australians seriously. In one sense more seriously than Australians take themselves – they see Australia as the 'great power' in Oceania, thereby showing more percipience than Australians. Another example: the kind of 'Asian intellectual' from a developing country who is lost in rhetoric is lost in a similar kind of rhetoric to that of a certain kind of Australian intellectual; they both have an obsessional usage of the word 'Asia' (without much knowledge of the subject); they are both making up their own 'nationalism'; they both see signs of cultural breakthrough from even the most insignificant art product; they both speak the language of anti-colonialism, under-development and foreign exploitation. For a third example: a Harvard-educated Filipino sitting in his air-conditioned office trying to avoid the rhetoric that stifles Manila, and get on with at least one practical thing in one small field, is likely to appreciate the kind of Australian expert who is not a rhetorician. The pragmatic, sceptical Australian can walk through the rhetoric of Asia like a blind man avoiding bullets. There they are, out there in Asia, advising on pest control, credit policies, irrigation, language teaching, some of the thousand and one little things that help civilizations survive the radiations of their own bombast. They are oblivious to all the generalities. They want to get on with a bit of detail. Their ability not to generalize, simply to get on with the job, can open the hearts of practical-minded Asians.
  Despite distrust caused by the 'White Australia' policy, the link with Britain, the great prosperity and the plain fact of being of European origin it should be remembered that there are so many differences and fears between the peoples of Asian countries that Australia is not usually high on most people's hate lists. Amendment of several traditional policies could even produce a rush of goodwill. When Australia was reclassified as an Asian country by ECAFE in 1963 many Asians were pleased. This was one up for them. What they want is for Australia to get off its high horse, be one of the crowd, express confidence in its own style. They want to cease being insulted. To do this – to be 'one of the mob', to accept one's environment and get on with the job, to be friendly with one's neighbours – these are notable Australian characteristics, part of the Australian genius. If Australians would 'be themselves' nationally tensions with Asian countries not based on power conflicts (which are a different matter) would lessen.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Swap the first and the last sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: If Australians would 'be themselves' nationally tensions with Asian countries not based on power conflicts (which are a different matter) would lessen. The ordinary Australian people seem adaptable; it is a matter of the people on top. Here one can draw some confidence in the possibility of change (for better or worse) from detecting a difference between the generations. On top there is a stiff-necked carrying on of old ways based on enervated wisdoms. One has only to watch a top person on television to sense in the lowered eyes, in the inability to reach towards the camera and generalize, in the lack of excitement about the problems of the modern world, in the meticulous muddling around with trivia, that these are the symptoms of a lost generation. What Bagehot said of generations in politics is true of generations generally: 'Generally one generation... succeeds another almost silently; at every moment men of all ages between thirty and seventy have considerable influence; each year removes many old men, makes others older, brings in many new. But sometimes there is an abrupt change. In that case the affairs of the country are apt to alter much, for good or for evil; sometimes it is ruined, sometimes it becomes more successful, but it hardly ever stays as it was.'
  However, beneath the pretence of sameness one can detect difference. One can make some guesses, at the same time qualifying generalization by recognizing that men are often born out of their generation. In general the remains of the Menzies–Calwell generation is antediluvian, nurtured in a backwater, strongly provincial. They are of the post-Federation generation, proud that the Australian States had federated; they developed their theories of the world in a context of British power. They can be more old-fashioned than men of the same generation in Britain because their imaginations have not been fundamentally stirred by any of the cataclysms of the last fifty years. The men who came of age between the two World Wars see themselves as the innovators and men of iron will – the one-man shows who in their brilliant improvisations changed the face of Australia. Often the changes they made represent the dreams of the 1930s rather than the demands of the 1960s; though still believing supremely in themselves they have no trust in the men underneath them (often their problems of succession are their own fault); they trust in their own intuition (which is sometimes just luck), willpower and the handling of men. The wartime and immediate post-war generation understands the demands of the age better and sees life in more complicated terms than the men they are now beginning to replace. They understand the need for expertness and cooperation more. They are the New Generation, the men who see Australia in more sophisticated terms. Some of them have imitated the Men of Will. Others already seem tired. Some of the best may have been so long frustrated by the amateurishness of the Men of Will that they may have lost their punch. But they are Australia's immediate hope. The younger generation than this seems fresher, but it is still full of mystery, not defined. It is condemned as hedonistic and stupid. Yet some of its apparent stupidity may be indifference to the bogus view of life that is presented to it and some of its hedonism an expression of a strong Australian characteristic that is now less confused by puritanism. It may be a genuinely rebellious generation, developing its own style. It may be the generation that changes Australia.
  Why is there no longer any sense of importance in Australia, no feeling that great events (except catastrophe) can still occur? Small nations usually have histories to sustain them or futures to enlighten them. Australia seems to have lost both its sense of a past and its sense of a future. In making appeals, in attempting to make policies 'rational' there is nothing to appeal to, no sense of purpose; yet people need some sense of definition to which they can relate their actions as an individual needs a sense of identity: a sense of having had a history, of having reached a particular point in it and of facing a certain kind of future. It may be that all this is because Australia sees itself as a dependent nation. It doesn't develop ideas; it looks overseas for support and recognition; it doesn't adopt policies because it has only a small area of decision. This is the way it may seem to the older successful men who are baffled about what they are supposed to do next. Among the more active younger people there is a feeling that Australia can resume its history, but in a different direction. They are fascinated by the idea of Asia. This fascination, combined with a greater concern for education and cleverness, could prove the creative, liberating element in Australia – if there is to be one.
  It is in dealings with Asian countries that Australians might regain a sense of confidence and importance. In different ways different kinds of Australians can feel more at home (and more important) in different parts of Asia than they do in their often unsuccessful and sometimes humiliating attempts to keep up the family relationship with Europeans. To take some examples: although Japan is a great industrial power and Australia is not, in Asia they are the two countries that have achieved economic take-off; they are familiar with the world of industrialization and they are both big trading nations; they can distinguish themselves from the rest of Asia. They are in business together. When a party of Japanese arrived in Australia in 1963 after a tour of 'developing nations' they said they felt more at home in Australia. Japanese take Australians seriously. In one sense more seriously than Australians take themselves – they see Australia as the 'great power' in Oceania, thereby showing more percipience than Australians. Another example: the kind of 'Asian intellectual' from a developing country who is lost in rhetoric is lost in a similar kind of rhetoric to that of a certain kind of Australian intellectual; they both have an obsessional usage of the word 'Asia' (without much knowledge of the subject); they are both making up their own 'nationalism'; they both see signs of cultural breakthrough from even the most insignificant art product; they both speak the language of anti-colonialism, under-development and foreign exploitation. For a third example: a Harvard-educated Filipino sitting in his air-conditioned office trying to avoid the rhetoric that stifles Manila, and get on with at least one practical thing in one small field, is likely to appreciate the kind of Australian expert who is not a rhetorician. The pragmatic, sceptical Australian can walk through the rhetoric of Asia like a blind man avoiding bullets. There they are, out there in Asia, advising on pest control, credit policies, irrigation, language teaching, some of the thousand and one little things that help civilizations survive the radiations of their own bombast. They are oblivious to all the generalities. They want to get on with a bit of detail. Their ability not to generalize, simply to get on with the job, can open the hearts of practical-minded Asians.
  Despite distrust caused by the 'White Australia' policy, the link with Britain, the great prosperity and the plain fact of being of European origin it should be remembered that there are so many differences and fears between the peoples of Asian countries that Australia is not usually high on most people's hate lists. Amendment of several traditional policies could even produce a rush of goodwill. When Australia was reclassified as an Asian country by ECAFE in 1963 many Asians were pleased. This was one up for them. What they want is for Australia to get off its high horse, be one of the crowd, express confidence in its own style. They want to cease being insulted. To do this – to be 'one of the mob', to accept one's environment and get on with the job, to be friendly with one's neighbours – these are notable Australian characteristics, part of the Australian genius.One can go on advocating until one is black in the face but the concept of social revolution is nonsense if there are not the people to make it.
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: the last five paragraphs
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: All the same something is going to happen. The demands of the age will destroy the present conventions – sometime. As Bagehot said of a sudden change in generations, things are not going to stay as they are; the results may be good or evil, success or ruin. It is time in Australia not for consideration of minor change, but for broad, general views of change. These must be based on some sense of reality, but not merely on the practicalism of what is possible for the moment. Very little is possible for the moment. But the time might come when broad views of change that now seem impractical will seem sensible and to the point. A reformer must forget the present occupants of power; they are unteachable. In the irrelevance of the present, he has to look to the future, perhaps produce ideas that may prompt action at some later time. In this situation, to be impractical may be the only way of being practical.
  One can hope that events will liberate what is good and progressive in Australians, not perpetuate what is bad; that the relaxation and ease of life and the prosperity will grow; that the ideal of fraternalism will gradually extend to include the Asian races (as it appears to be doing among the young) so that ultimately – but perhaps not for some years – Australia's population problem will be solved in what may be the only way it can finally be solved – by large-scale Asian migration. Then, assuming huge advances in science that will make development possible where it now is not, Australia might really claim the name of continent, a continent in which for a second time, but more successfully than in the USA, a new nation will be created with values that have some relation to ordinary human aspiration.
  For the present one sees only the impossible. But here again there are Australian qualities that can be liberated. The change in generations may meet some of the demands of technology and already there have been the beginnings of a breakthrough for the intellect and, more successfully, the arts. The talent in empiricism might add a new and practical dimension to economic planning, and save it from the doctrinaire. The laconicism and courage of Australians are waiting to be drawn on to face the world outside Australia: this reserve of Australian stoicism has not been summoned for many years but it still seems a feature of the existential young as it was of their fathers and grandfathers. The good qualities of Australians should be described and admired and brought into play. Their non-doctrinaire tolerance, their sense of pleasure, their sense of fair play, their interest in material things, their sense of family, their identity with nature and their sense of reserve, their adaptability when a way is shown, their fraternalism, their scepticism, their talent for improvisation, their courage and stoicism. These are great qualities that could constitute the beginnings of a great nation. This nation should be impelled to display its talents in a sense of reality. Many problems threaten the future of Australia. But we might have good luck. It's worth giving it a go.
  Asia: attitude to British link ; attitudes to 117–22, ; Communism in 121–2; definition of 109–10; events in 235–6; people of 111–12; population ; power situation in 113–14, ; racialism in 110–11; relation to 242–4; White Australia policy , 122–6
  Labor Party (ALP) , , 166–75, , , 199–201; Catholicism 60–1; Communism , ; education 63–4; trade unionism , , , ; White Australia policy
conversations.from: human
conversations.value: Delete the last sentence.
conversations.from: assistant
conversations.value: All the same something is going to happen. The demands of the age will destroy the present conventions – sometime. As Bagehot said of a sudden change in generations, things are not going to stay as they are; the results may be good or evil, success or ruin. It is time in Australia not for consideration of minor change, but for broad, general views of change. These must be based on some sense of reality, but not merely on the practicalism of what is possible for the moment. Very little is possible for the moment. But the time might come when broad views of change that now seem impractical will seem sensible and to the point. A reformer must forget the present occupants of power; they are unteachable. In the irrelevance of the present, he has to look to the future, perhaps produce ideas that may prompt action at some later time. In this situation, to be impractical may be the only way of being practical.
  One can hope that events will liberate what is good and progressive in Australians, not perpetuate what is bad; that the relaxation and ease of life and the prosperity will grow; that the ideal of fraternalism will gradually extend to include the Asian races (as it appears to be doing among the young) so that ultimately – but perhaps not for some years – Australia's population problem will be solved in what may be the only way it can finally be solved – by large-scale Asian migration. Then, assuming huge advances in science that will make development possible where it now is not, Australia might really claim the name of continent, a continent in which for a second time, but more successfully than in the USA, a new nation will be created with values that have some relation to ordinary human aspiration.
  For the present one sees only the impossible. But here again there are Australian qualities that can be liberated. The change in generations may meet some of the demands of technology and already there have been the beginnings of a breakthrough for the intellect and, more successfully, the arts. The talent in empiricism might add a new and practical dimension to economic planning, and save it from the doctrinaire. The laconicism and courage of Australians are waiting to be drawn on to face the world outside Australia: this reserve of Australian stoicism has not been summoned for many years but it still seems a feature of the existential young as it was of their fathers and grandfathers. The good qualities of Australians should be described and admired and brought into play. Their non-doctrinaire tolerance, their sense of pleasure, their sense of fair play, their interest in material things, their sense of family, their identity with nature and their sense of reserve, their adaptability when a way is shown, their fraternalism, their scepticism, their talent for improvisation, their courage and stoicism. These are great qualities that could constitute the beginnings of a great nation. This nation should be impelled to display its talents in a sense of reality. Many problems threaten the future of Australia. But we might have good luck. It's worth giving it a go.