Post-world war two British migration to Australia: "the most pampered and protected of the intake?"

Abstract

The thesis seeks to find evidence to support the assumption that British migrants were the ‘pampered’ and ‘protected’ of the post-World War Two intake of migrants. Contemporary students of historical writing of the migration experience have virtually written British migrants out of the history of this era by such unsubstantiated assumptions.

The assimilationist construct of the 1940s to the 1960s that defined non-British migrants as assimilable, and British migrants as ‘kith’ and ‘kin’ was a vital component in the ideology of governments. It enabled them to carry out a migration programme the extent of which had no precedent in Australian history. Because social participation is vital in the process of admitting new knowledge, the construction of assimilability needed to be developed and legitimated on the basis of shared values. In effect the imposition of ‘new’ information promulgated by the institutions of society needed an empathetic response from the community, for the successful implementation of the programme. If the concept of non-British migrants as being assimilable could be ‘sold’ to the public, then it went without saying that British migrants would be the exemplar of trouble-free assimilation; they were ‘kith’ and ‘kin’. When British migrants did not fit the archetypal mould designed and fashioned for them by others, they had to be redefined for the continuing success of a policy. The thesis examines the experience of British migrants during the assimilationist era and how their settlement was affected by this ideological construct.