Born in Melbourne? Origins of Australian Political Science

Abstract

In a pioneering academic discussion of Australian politics written in 1913, William Harrison Moore reinforced the image of Australia as an increasingly autonomous part of a slowly evolving but essentially liberal British empire. In this 34 page account of “Political Systems of Australia” published in George H. Knibbs, ed., Federal Handbook (Melbourne, 1914), the Professor of Constitutional Law at the University of Melbourne arguably generated the ur-text of the Australian Politics textbook. This paper will discuss the author and his text, and seek to evaluate the Melbourne claim to parentage of Australian political studies via this discussion.