School of Historical and Philosophical Studies - Theses
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ItemThe opposition to Montanism from church and state: a study of the history and theology of the Montanist Movement as shown by the writings and legislation of the Orthodox opponents of Montanism( 1978)This thesis is primarily an examination of the ecclesiastical and imperial opposition to the Montanist movement throughout the four centuries of its existence (c. 165-550 A.D.). Section I deals with the pre-Constantinian period, arguing that the earliest ecclesiastical opponents were local bishops who, through oral controversy, conciliar condemnation, and literary activity, tried to negate the influence Montanism was having upon the catholic flock. During the third century a few non-episcopal ecclesiastical scholars joined in the literary struggle against Montanism. It is argued, however, that more important than their non-episcopal status is the fact that these scholars, like more and more third century bishops, opposed Montanism without having any personal contact with contemporary adherents of the sect so that by the end of that century opposition to Montanism had become literary warfare from a distance. The extant fragments of this warfare reveal that pre-Constantinian opponents charged Montanists with a variety of offences centering around three main charges: pseudoprophecy, novelty, and heresy. Each of these charges was vigorously defended by Montanist apologists, the chief of whom was Tertullian. The second section covers the same time-span as the first, but examines state opposition. Before 250 A.D., persecution of Christians was usually instigated by the local pagan population at times when the pax deorum appeared to be threatened. It is argued that, whilst Montanists suffered during these persecutions, pagans did not distinguish between Montanists and catholics even though, in some instances, Montanists may have been the indirect cause of these persecutions. After 250 A.D., emperors became more and more involved in instigating persecutions, but, again, they did not differentiate between various types of Christians. Despite the views of certain modern historians, there is no evidence that any pre-Constantinian emperor or governor instigated a persecution against Montanists, hence this section does not contain specific chapters on imperial opponents and their charges. The major issues discussed in this section are "charges" levelled at Montanists by modern historians, namely that Montanists were invariably volunteer martyrs, that they refused to flee during persecutions, and that, even in times of peace, they displayed a provocative attitude towards the state. Much of this alleged Montanist "fanaticism" disappears as a result of a careful scrutiny of all the available evidence. After Constantine became sole ruler of the Empire, he, and his successors, persecuted Montanists in an attempt to preserve the purity of the catholic church. The distinction between ecclesiastical and imperial opposition, therefore, becomes somewhat blurred for the last phase of Montanism (c. 324-550 A.D.). Hence, church and state opposition are both treated in Section III. During this period the trend of ecclesiastical opposition "from a distance", commenced in the third century, continued. Anti-Montanist tracts, letters, and sermons proliferated and large sections of heresiological surveys and church histories were devoted to condemning the movement. Much of this literature was composed by opponents who had no personal contact with Montanists. Charges still centred on pseudo-prophecy, novelty, and heresy, although the range of specific allegations multiplied. A number of the Christian emperors of this period enacted laws aimed at eradicating contemporary Montanism. As a result, a significant number of Western Montanists joined the catholic church, but many others, especially in Rome, Constantinople, and Phrygia, continued their separatist existence until the combined efforts of church and state finally wiped out the movement during the middle of the sixth century. This thesis also re-evaluates the history and theology of Montanism in the light of what is revealed about the movement by the writings and legislation of its orthodox opponents. The view of Montanism presented by the opponents is compared with the Montanists' self-assessment and both are judged in the context of all other available evidence. As a result, it is argued that Montanists did not practice, or believe, many of the things with which they were charged and that, even when there was some substance to a particular charge, the charge was not always applicable to Montanists everywhere. Montanism, in fact, was a very diverse movement. Despite certain modern assessments, the picture of Montanism which emerges from this study is that of an innovative prophetic movement intent on bringing Christianity into line with what it believed to be the ultimate ethical revelation of the Holy Spirit given to the church via its prophets.
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ItemThe Australian Railways Union: railway management and railway work in Victoria 1920-1939( 1989)This thesis takes the Australian Railways Union as a focus for an examination of the Victorian Railways between the two World Wars. The development of the union is traced through the optimistic expectations of the early 1920s, the disillusionment which followed the union’s affiliation with the ALP and registration under the Commonwealth Arbitration Court, to the increasing polarisation of the union on political lines as the 1930s progressed. At the same time the union’s relations with, railway management are explored. The innovative management style of Harold Winthrop Clapp, whose term as Chief Railways Commissioner covered the two decades under discussion in this thesis, is examined and set in the context of developments elsewhere in Australia and overseas. The repercussions of Clapp’s administrative and technological changes in railway work are discussed throughout the thesis, and particular attention is paid to the relationship between such changes and job loss. The problems arising from lack of clarity over control of the Railways Department, which are also examined in a separate chapter, were common to other statutory authorities as well. The financial situation of the railways is discussed in relation to that of other Australian railways. The problem of transport regulation to prevent uneconomic competition between motor transport and railways, which received growing recognition during the period of this thesis, also receives special attention. During the Great Depression, the Victorian Railways Department and the ARU played a central role in the national arena. The railway basic wage case of 1930, which resulted in a ten per cent cut in wages, set a precedent for all major industries. The analysis of transcripts of this lengthy case has produced much which is of general significance for economic and labour history. In the final chapters of the thesis, the ARU is shown approaching the radicalism of the 1940s, when large scale industrial action was carried out under Communist leadership. The union in 1939, following two decades of activity as part of a federal railways union, and experience of arbitration and affiliation to the ALP, was very different from the union which had existed up until 1920 in Victoria, with its narrow sphere of activity bounded by ‘the railway fence’, and this thesis explores that transition.
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ItemVagrancy and the Victorians: the social construction of the vagrant in Melbourne, 1880-1907( 1990)In Melbourne between 1880 and 1907, the construction and propagation of a vagrant stereotype and its manifestation in law, constituted an important means of controlling the behaviour of individuals and groups who were perceived to be socially undesirable or economically burdensome.
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Item"Most humble homes": slum landlords, tenants, and the Melbourne City Council's health administration, 1888-1918( 1987-07)The thesis examines the relationship between public health and questions of housing and poverty, in Melbourne, 1888- 1918. It is concerned with the way that with certain groups of people - local council workers, tenants of houses referred to as ‘slums’, and the owners of those houses - represented their experiences. And it seeks to place those representations in the context of the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century concern about the ‘housing problems’. It compares the public rhetoric of the housing reformers and politicians with letters written to the Melbourne City Council by landlords and tenants, and in doing so seeks to show that there were a whole range of housing ‘problems’ not addressed by the public discourse. The first half of the work seeks to place the housing issue into a late nineteenth-century context, and concentrates on public and official discourse. First it considers the City itself, and examines dominant myths about wealth and poverty in 'boom' Melbourne. It argues that these myths shaped contemporary discussion of and responses to housing questions. It then suggests that housing was to a great extent a public health issue for contemporaries, and therefore proceeds to examine the nature of public health administration in the city, both at a central and at a local level. The emergence of housing as a discrete issue in public health discourse is also considered. The thesis then seeks briefly to examine the concept of the 'slum' and to relate it to Melbourne's inner city rental housing market. It then considers in more detail two inner city wards renown for their 'slum' housing. Finally it considers the housing debates which gathered momentum in Melbourne between 1910-1913 and which culminated in the appointment of a Royal Commission to enquire into the housing of the people of the metropolis. It also considers the results of that inquiry. The second half of the work, using an ethnographic and cultural approach looks at slum tenants, landlords and council-workers in an attempt to explore how they perceived their worlds. The correspondence files of the Melbourne City Council are extensively used to consider how these people represented housing issues. Tenants' descriptions of their houses, their concepts of health and disease, their relationships with their landlords and the Council workers, their descriptions of the housing market, and their sense of community and neighbourhood networks are all considered. In turn the thesis considers landlords' representations of their financial positions, and their relationships with Council officials and tenants. Finally, the daily work of the Melbourne City Council's health workers is re-examined in the context of the evidence given before the Royal Housing Commission by the Chairman of the Council's Health Committee, Alderman William Burton.
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ItemMagic and science: aspects of Australian business management, advertising and retailing, 1918-40( 1989)This thesis is concerned with four dominant themes: - the rise of a new managerial formation and associated ideology during the inter-war period, which provided an important base for the spread of managerial skill and power in later decades. - the reconstruction by managers of workers as consumers during the inter-war period. Structural and ideological changes in industrial managements, especially in the fields of advertising, media and retailing were important in promoting a particular ethic of consumption. - the role of empirical social sciences, especially economics and legitimating managerial psychology, aspirations in and technology and in fuelling the reconstruction of social and cultural life. - the influence of ideas and developed in America on businessmen, their practice thoughts. values first Australian and their thoughts.
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ItemThe Victorian Labor Party, 1885-1894( 1984)The Victorian labor party, compared with its counterparts in the other colonies, had a retarded development as a distinct and independent radical party. It was smaller in number and played less of a role in forming and making ministries by August 1894. Victorian labor's slow growth was due to the strong grip of the liberal reform tradition with its progressive and strong liberal party of the 1870's, which advocated radical reforms, such as protection and land taxes, that appeased the workers. And labor was largely overshadowed by and relied on the leading liberals' stronger electoral appeal, legislative initiatives and performance in parliament, which continued into the 1890' s. Liberalism’s attraction ensured that, from the birth of the labor party, labor would see itself as an ally of the liberal party, fragmented and disunited as it was from the mid - 1880's, and as a separate, radical force within the liberal reform tradition, as well as a totally independent radical party of the workers and unionists, who had not been properly represented by the liberals. The other main factors in labor's lack of strength were the party's limited appeal to only a section of the working class (artisans rather than miners, rural workers and non-unionists), the party's lack of financial and organizational independence in depressed times, the rampant apathy and divisions within its ranks, the union movement and the working class, and the peculiarities of the unfair electoral system. But the labor party, as defined, had earlier origins (1885) and was more independent of and influenced the liberals than has previously been supposed. It was influential in having its policies adopted or supported in and out of parliament and in moulding, to some degree, Victoria's political system. Contrary to the view that the THC and craft unions were uninterested in direct representation of labor, it was the Melbourne craft and semi-skilled unions, rather than the new unions of Shearers and Miners, which were the most interested and active of all the other trade unions in forming and furthering support for the labor party. Although the Sydney Trades and Labour Council played a bigger role in forming the largest labor party in 1891, the THC had a larger part in initiating the party from 1885 and controlling the PPL at the top levels than has previously been thought. At the 1886 and 1889 elections, the labor candidates showed the magnetism of liberalism by using labor and liberal titles interchangeably and espousing the same major policies. But they were distinguished by having their own committees, receiving union and unofficial THC support, and pushing for specific grievances and interests, especially protectionist, of the skilled workers or THC, as well as their own. The maritime strike of 1890 was not a turning point in the moves for direct representation, then, as moves had started in the eighties, but it served, like the depression, as a great impetus by helping to radicalize the workers into wanting greater representation and more reforms. Before June 1891 Victorian labor, with three parliamentary members, had achieved very little success in obtaining labor legislation; but, in this, it was in a similar position to its counterparts in the other colonies, and, indeed, it was in a stronger numerical position in parliament than N.S.W. labor at that time. Between 1891 and 1894 labor's influence in and out of parliament grew and it helped to shape the modest beginnings of a modern political party system, as party lines, although still somewhat loose, became more defined and polarized. Victorian labor was not as significant in moulding the party system as its counterparts in the other colonies. They were numerically larger, and so were a major third party or a partner in a ministry, and labor and anti-labor lines were more pronounced in those colonies. But it had a larger role in shaping politics up to August 1894 than has been argued by writers. In 1891 the labor party had introduced some new features. The pledge resulted in the party's higher unity in voting than other parties in the Assembly in 1892. Its extra-parliamentary organization, although not as elaborate as that of the old liberal party of the 1870's, was unique in that it was larger than that of other Victorian parties, was based upon union support and most of its executive and parliamentary representatives were from union and THC ranks. Labor was more radical than liberal in wanting more urgently the enactment of further protection, which was a dividing line between them from the eighties, the end of subletting and the introduction of a minimum wage, the legalization of eight hours, one man one vote, conciliation and arbitration, a higher income tax and other taxes, land nationalization, and some banking and financial reforms. Accordingly, there was much agitation in and out of parliament, especially between 1892 and 1894. Because of its significant influence upon the Shiels government in regard to taxation, especially the increased customs duties, labor was indirectly responsible for the fall of the liberal government, as many liberals deserted supporting it and voted for the conservative Patterson government. Labor was largely responsible for the conservatives' uniting in and out of parliament. The conservatives became the most cohesive group in parliament, as party lines deepened between liberal and conservative. As protection and other policies were placed in jeopardy or were not enacted, labor drew closer to the liberal forces to unite in order to defend these policies and helped to oust the Patterson regime in 1894.
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ItemDarwinism and Australia, 1836-1914( 1992)This thesis is an examination of certain themes and ideas surrounding the development of Darwinism as an intellectual concept in Australian culture. Beginning with a discussion of the manner in which Australian resources played a role in the formulation and growth of Darwin's ideas, it then moves to an analysis of a number of public controversies and debates around aspects of Darwinism which are seen by current Darwinian scholars as being of central importance. The work of a number of Australian scholars is explored to illustrate the way in which evolutionary theory found its way into the academic and public culture of Australia. Finally, discussion is given over to the way in which evolutionary theory became diffused through all areas of intellectual life. Among the chief claims made here are firstly, that, Darwinism played a significant role in the intellectual life of Australia in the last part of the nineteenth-century and that Australians made significant contributions to the development of evolutionary theory. Secondly, it is claimed that for the history of Australian science to have any real meaning it must be understood in its own terms, here on the periphery, and not as an adjunct to events and happenings at the centre. Finally, it is urged here that Australian science and its growth is not bound to a pre-determined and periodised historical development, but that insofar as it is tied to the history of Australia generally, it exhibits the stresses and tensions of the social context in which it exists. At all times this thesis should be seen as an attempt at intellectual history, but one seeking to embed that history within a specific social context.
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ItemThe emergence and character of women's magazines in Australia 1880-1914( 1975)Four major points relating to the emergence and character of women's magazines in Australia are explored in this thesis:- when they began, why they began when they did in the 19th century, what form they took when published and the views they expounded about the status and life of women in Australia between the years l880-19l4. Thirty-five women's magazines were consulted, but only one or two representative examples of each type are discussed in any detail. The magazines themselves fall into two distinct categories during this period - the general or service magazine containing fiction, fashion and homemaking features; and the suffrage or political magazine dealing with the implications of votes for women. The thesis is divided into three sections and follows a basically chronological pattern. The first section of four chapters deals with the English background of women's and family magazines to 1850; the popularity of these publications in the Australian colonies throughout the 19th century; the level of education and literacy among women in Australia during this period; and the early attempts to found women's magazines in Melbourne and Sydney in the 1880's. Section two discusses the suffrage and political magazines published for women in Sydney and Melbourne between the years 1889-1914. The first of these two chapters is devoted to a detailed examination of Australia's first successful feminist magazine, Louisa Lawson's Dawn (1888-1905); while the second discusses the suffrage and political magazines for women in New South Wales and Victoria, and compares their failure to the success of Mrs. Lawson's publication. The third and final section examines the emergence of the modern American-influenced magazines in Australia from 1894 to 1914, a whole chapter being devoted to the New Idea (1902-14) as the archetypal example of this trend.
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ItemA history of the Australian meat export trade, 1865-1939( 1967)This thesis is about the production, treatment and export of meat from Australia between the 1860s, when the trade began, and the Second World War. Primarily it is a study of those involved directly in the trade in Australia - graziers and farmers, meatworks operators and exporters - and of their actions and attitudes. To some extent, however, it has also been necessary to examine the trade in the broader context of Australian rural production as a whole, of domestic demands for meat and stock, and of the leading overseas markets and competitors with Australia in those markets.
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ItemThe economic and political development of Victoria 1877-1881( 1951)Alfred Deakin wrote in a short (unpublished) memoir on the period surveyed in this thesis, “Whatever the relative importance or interest of the years 1875 – 1882 may be, it is certain that the tide of political life ran then much more fiercely than at any subsequent period.” It was to see why political life was so bitter and ran ‘so fiercely’ that this work was undertaken. Letter books and other MS material belonging to members of the Victorian Legislature in the period have been made available by several Victorian families and the access given to this material has been of great assistance to the writer. The division into sections – Part I Economic Development and its relation to Politics, Part II, Political Development – has been made necessary by the pioneering character of the work. Although the whole theme of the thesis centres in the complex interaction of economic and political development, the division was found necessary in order to deal more completely with topics on which there has been no detailed study.