Labor in Politics: A Review Article

Abstract

In the long period when Australia was notable for political innova tion, the establishment of successful Labor parties was perhaps the most remarkable innovation of all, rivalled only by the development of the public corporation. Other changes, though perhaps of no less im portance, took place within the framework of institutions which had been imported, usually from Britain and more or less in working order. The series of electoral reforms, from manhood suffrage and vote by ballot through votes for women, compulsory voting and the preferential and proportional representation methods were certainly important changes, but they could be said to involve the adjustment of methods of electing a parliament, and Australian parliaments were obviously?even proudly?derivate from the British. The Labor parties involved innovation of a different order. They were institutions of a quite new type. It is not necessary to enter the argument as to whether 'real' parties existed in Australia prior to the advent of Labor. Any other parties which existed were quite unlike the Labor parties, and that goes not only for Australian parties but for those in any other country. It is no doubt true that the wish to establish Labor parties existed elsewhere, including Britain, and that British migrants, as always, were the keenest supporters of radical political change towards the end of the nineteenth century. This does not make the Australian Labor parties derivative. Much of the aspiration probably came from Britain, but the models did not, because there were no models. No one any where really knew what a Labor party, let alone a Labor government, would be like. For some reason, within a few years towards the end of the nineteenth century, Labor parties were established in Britain, Australia, New Zealand and also in Sweden and Norway. (The Scandinavian parties actually came first, in 1887 and 1889 re spectively.) These remain the only countries in the world in which a Labor party (that is, a party which is not only supported by trade unions but to which trade unions belong) is one of the principal parties. Moreover, it now seems unlikely that there will be any other such countries in the future. This is remarkable enough to arouse our curiosity about the con ditions in which Labor parties appeared. But even within this small group of countries, the fortunes of Labor varied greatly. Only in Australia did they rise to power within one generation. By 1915,, Labor governments had been in office in the commonwealth parliament and in all states, and in every state except Victoria they had gained a majority of seats in the lower house. This did not happen until the 1930s in Scandinavia and New Zealand and not until the 1940s in Britain. The establishment of Labor parties was a rare enough pheno