School of Historical and Philosophical Studies - Theses
Permanent URI for this collection
Search Results
1 - 4 of 4
-
ItemCharles Joseph La Trobe: the making of a governor( 2002)The central argument developed in this thesis is that Charles Joseph La Trobe was a highly distinctive individual whose background and experiences during the first four decades of his life to 1839 shaped his character and informed his administration, firstly as Superintendent of the Port Phillip District of New South Wales until 1851, and then as Victoria's first Lieutenant-Governor from 1851 to 1854. His Huguenot descent isolated him from the traditional British mould, and yet, for all that, he was very much the typical Englishman with all the attitudes then prevailing in the educated middle-class. His Moravian faith and the advanced Moravian school system in which he was nurtured set him apart from the norm of those recruited to the Colonial Office as representatives of the imperial power of Great Britain. He was altogether, in fact, an unusual choice as administrator of a valuable and remote colony, having none of the administrative experience, military training or aristocratic background usually sought in vice-regal envoys. La Trobe came from a deeply religious and highly intellectual family whose evangelicalism and social consciences dominated their lives. He was drawn to the outdoor life and to the landscape wherever he went in his extensive travels, seeing it as God's creation, and he described what he saw and experienced fully in his four published books and in his works of art. From his youth, he developed a lifelong passion for Switzerland, the country where he formed his closest friendships. Acknowledging the seriousness with which he regarded his Australian posting as a representative of the Crown, La Trobe's every action was governed and, to a certain extent, hampered by his allegiance to the Governor in Sydney and the Colonial Office in London. La Trobe's actions, ideas, assumptions and behaviours during his fifteen years in office in Melbourne may, however, be best understood by an examination of the way his character was shaped, especially by the influences on him of the Moravian faith and education, by his passion for travel, and by the devotion and support of his family and friends in England and in Switzerland. La Trobe departed from office a wearied and disappointed man whose contribution to the development of the colony was not immediately recognised. His was a vision of a cultured, economically viable and Christian society, with equality of opportunity for all. Any recognition of his achievements eluded him, the obvious negativities of his administration, especially regarding the Aboriginal people and the goldfields administration, obscuring his successes. Charles Joseph La Trobe was a complex man of striking contradictions: he was capable of great courage, yet he often appeared timid and self-effacing; he was charming and sociable at times, yet he loved nothing better than to escape the weight of his duties by riding into the 'bush'; he had strong views, but often came across as unassertive.
-
ItemThe escalation of hostilities in Manchuria, 1945-47: a study of strategic realities and normative guidelines in military conflict in the context of the Chinese civil war( 2002)This dissertation is a revisionist study of the early stages of the Chinese Civil War with a focus on the conflict in the Manchurian theatre. The military operations in Manchuria during the late 1940s were pivotal to the outcome of the Chinese Civil War, which in turn determined the political landscape of contemporary China. Clarifying the strategies employed by both sides, this study advances beyond a history of the Civil War as milestone or watershed in Chinese political history, explaining the war from the perspective of theories of conflict. Reviewing the debate between realists and cultural theorists in the international security studies, the dissertation shows that existing interpretations of the war are haunted by tacit realist assumptions on the part of authors, combined with a relative neglect of the actual strategic practices of Chinese military leaders. Based on newly released Civil War documents from both PRC and Taiwan, supplemented by major English sources, this empirical study provides an analysis of the link between the strategic preferences and behavioral norms of political actors. Tracing the ebb and flow or war and peace during the early stages of the Civil War and the inadvertent escalation of hostilities in Manchurian theatre, the thesis demonstrates the interaction between realist position and value-driven considerations in the decision-making processes of leaders in the conflict, notably Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek. The key finding is that the military decision-making of modern Chinese leaders was not founded on a simple Realpolitik approach, as Alastair Johnston might argue. Rather, their strategic culture was hybrid and heterogeneous, presenting mixed features of realist and value-driven considerations. Their perceptions of war, including preferences for guerrilla or mobile warfare, and a belief in swift and decisive victory, were influential in their techniques of crisis management. Of almost equal importance were ethical, historical and emotional factors such as nationalist sentiment, and feelings of moral responsibility or hatred for the enemy, which powerfully informed the behaviour of these leaders during military conflict.
-
ItemMind, mania and science: psychiatry and the culture of experiment in mid-twentieth century Victoria( 2002)Psychiatry developed from the practices of nineteenth century medical practitioners based in asylums, transforming itself by the second half of the twentieth century into a specialty operating from many more places and equally concerned with temporarily disturbed “normal” people as with individuals with intractable conditions or an intellectual handicap. By the middle of the twentieth century, psychiatry in Victoria, Australia, was the site of a vigorous debate about the nature of mental illness and the appropriate way to investigate it according to the precepts of science. Using archival materials and patient records, I examine efforts by three competing schools of psychiatric thought - the biological, social and psychotherapeutic - to align themselves with scientific medicine via several emerging fields, including clinical trial research. I suggest that the biological school had an initial edge and I explain in what form academic and religious support was forthcoming for it. I also consider the influence of celebrated Melbourne psychiatrist, John Cade, whose research on lithium influenced the alignment process. The struggle for science's imprimatur was crucial to psychiatry's transition during the twentieth century. Having once been detached from medicine's main currents and remote from the community gaze, it gained increased recognition within the field of medicine. This transition was not without some cost however. In learning how to re-invent their care, study and treatment of people with disordered mentality, psychiatrists chose to privilege certain sorts of knowledge and to downgrade aspects of their healing art.
-
ItemFraming Fitzroy: contesting and (de)constructing place and identity in a Melbourne suburb( 2002)This thesis examines the ways in which Melbourne's 'worst suburb', Fitzroy, was constructed, both physically and culturally, from the Great Depression of the 1930s until the gentrification of the suburb in the early 1970s. The thesis argues that an array of institutions, extending from social welfare and slum reform groups to the media and a variety of policing agencies, relentlessly constructed Fitzroy as the site of social evil in Melbourne. It examines the variety of texts, both written and visual, that were utilised to construct a singular and negative representation of Fitzroy that legitimated particular forms of intervention. The thesis critiques and contests this representation through an analysis of the lives of those who lived in Fitzroy in the period covered by this thesis and by using a variety of original sources, including the testimonies of those who lived and worked in Fitzroy. It is a central argument of this thesis that Fitzroy was a place of complexity, vitality and cultural value for those who lived there.