Tom Sheridan
University of Adelaide
Abstract
In the 1950s stevedoring took over from coalmining as the strategic flashpoint in national industrial relations. Continue reading
Category Archives: 2001 Conference
2001 ASSLH conference – Challenging equality masculinism: Edna Ryan’s struggles for equal pay 1958-1973
Professor Lyndall Ryan
Head: School of Humanities, Faculty of the Central Coast, University of Newcastle
Abstract
When labour activist Edna Ryan was widowed at the age of 53 in 1958, she became the family breadwinner. She quickly found that while pay and conditions for all workers were negotiated on a triennial basis between unions and management, whereby men had access to a career path and regular pay increases, no such provisions existed for women. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Useful images: The industry films of the Austrian Productivity Center 1951-1959
Dr Ramón Reichert
Research Institute Epistemology and Discourse-Analysis, University of Vienna
Introduction
With over 1,300 titles, the film archive of the Österreichisches Produktivitäts-Zentrum (Austrian Productivity Center) presents a resource which is not only unique in Europe but also extremely informative for contemporary history. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – ‘I was mad on housework’: Some maids’ perspectives on domestic service, c. 1908-1920
Helen Pfeil
PhD Student, Department of History, Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University
Abstract
In the first two decades of the twentieth century, the proportion of women working as domestic servants in Australia was steadily decreasing. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Union birth, growth and death: The Lithgow ironworks 1900-14
Greg Patmore
University of Sydney
Abstract
Australian trade union membership grew dramatically in the period from 1900 to 1914. While there is recognition that compulsory arbitration may have played an important role, there are a range of explanatory factors that may explain the growth. Studies of union growth also neglect the workplace. Through an analysis of the Lithgow Ironworks this paper hopes to broaden the debate about union growth. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – For the love of children: The construction of the family day care ‘mother’ 1974-1998
Wendy Paterson
Department of History, School of Humanities, University of Newcastle
Abstract
Family Day Care began in Australia, in the early 1970s, as an inexpensive and flexible means of providing community childcare places in private homes with authorised care-providers, then known as “day care mothers.” Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – The formation and role of an independent trades and labor council in Western Australia: A case study
Bobbie Oliver
Teaching and Research Fellow, Research Institute for Cultural Heritage, Curtin University
Abstract
This paper argues that adopting the Australian Labor Federation model, with the political and industrial wings in one organisation, made the labour movement in Western Australia significantly different from its counterparts in the eastern states of Australia. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Becoming ‘unionate’? From staff association to national union: The ‘industrialisation’ of university staff 1983–1993
John O’Brien
School of Industrial Relations and Organisational Behaviour, University of New South Wales
Abstract
This paper traces the history of the major unions covering Australian academic staff from the registration of the Federation of Australian University Staff and the Union of Australian College Academics in the federal industrial jurisdiction in the mid-1980s to the formation of the National Tertiary Education Union as an “industry” union incorporating general staff in 1983. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – The working miners of southern New South Wales: Subsistence men, entrepreneurs or proletarians?
Barry McGowan
Australian National University
Abstract
European miners in the colonial and post-Federation period worked in one of three ways: independently on their own account, in co-operative groups, or as wage employees for companies or syndicates. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Chinese seamen and Australian labour: The mass desertion from the SS Silksworth at Newcastle, October 1937
Paul Jones
ARC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, The Australian Centre, University of Melbourne
Abstract
In July 1937 Japan embarked on a full-scale invasion of China and by October the war zone extended to the eastern seaboard and to Canton. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Recontesting the cultural cold war: Frank Hardy, Power without glory and criminal libel
Dr Jenny Hocking
ARC QEII Research Fellow, National Centre for Australian Studies, Monash University
When a society shows an attitude of intolerance and malice towards part of the organic process of its cultural development, it is acting malevolently towards the whole culture as well as towards the part of the organism…it does not merit a living culture.1 Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Changing the face of the world: The relationship between John Dwyer’s political radicalism and his ‘occult writings’
Mark Hearn
Postgraduate candidate, Department of History, University of Sydney
Abstract
John Dwyer (1856-1934) was a London docks foreman who emigrated to Australia in 1888. Dwyer embarked upon a quest for recognition—recognition of his rights as a worker and his identity as an individual. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Sir Frank Packer and workplace relations at Australian Consolidated Press
Bridget Griffen-Foley
ARC Postdoctoral Fellow in History, University of Sydney
Abstract
This paper considers the nature of workplace relations at one of Australia’s most powerful media firms, Australian Consolidated Press. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – No quick response: Who is responsible for clothing outwork reform?
Alastair Greig
School of Social Sciences, Australian National University
Abstract
The Australian clothing industry is often regarded as a relic of a previous industrial age ill-suited to the demands of a more “knowledge-intensive” nation. However, the modern Australian clothing industry combines elements of the so-called “new economy” with elements of highly exploitative work practices associated with outwork. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – ‘A dangerous trend towards authoritarianism’: Dr James, the Menzies government and cold war Australia
Phillip Deery
Victoria University, Melbourne
Abstract
In May 1950, during the debate on the Communist Party Dissolution Bill, a young doctor with a promising career was sacked. No reasons for his dismissal were given and no right of appeal was permitted. Outside his working hours Paul James was politically active in the emerging peace movement in Melbourne and the subject, therefore, of an adverse security file. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – The Socceroos strike a deal
Braham Dabscheck
School of Industrial Relations, University of New South Wales
Abstract
In the period September 1996 to January 1998 the Australian Soccer Players’ Association and Soccer Australia were locked in a dispute over payments to, and a collective agreement for, Australia’s international players—the Socceroos. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – Forgotten foreign militants: The Chinese Seamen’s Union in Australia, 1942-1946
Drew Cottle
University of Western Sydney, Macarthur
Japan’s victories throughout South East Asia in the first months of the Pacific War stranded nearly 2,000 Chinese seamen, along with hundreds of refugees from British Malaya, the Netherlands East Indies and other European colonies, in the port cities of Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – ‘Listen mate, sailing is a working man’s sport’: Leisure, work and community on coastal NSW
Dr Christine Cheater
Central Coast Campus, University of Newcastle
Abstract
The sport of sailing small open boats (technically known as wet-boats) in Australia can be traced back to the 18th century. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – The ‘freeing’ of unfree labour: Aborigines in the Northern Territory cattle industry, 1948–1978
Rob Castle and Jim Hagan
University of Wollongong
The freeing of unfree labour has received less attention in the unfree labour debate than other issues such as the conditions under which unfree labour worked. This paper focuses on the phasing out of unfree labour in the Northern Territory cattle industry and comparing this process with the Assamese tea industry. Continue reading
2001 ASSLH conference – The ‘freeing’ of unfree labour: Coolies in the tea gardens of Assam 1908–1948
Rob Castle and Jim Hagan
University of Wollongong
In a previous paper1, we compared the industrial relations of coolies employed in the tea gardens of Assam with those of Aborigines who worked in the cattle industry of tropical Australia. Continue reading