last sem's essay

Didn't do it very well, but yeh, at last I handed in a full draft. If you wanna reference, PLEASE CITE THE SOURCE.

Chinese Post World War II Immmigration



INTRODUCTION

After World War II, the reconstruction effort and low birthrate in Australia called for more immigrants. Although encouraging immigration under the White Australian Policy resulted in dramatic increase of overseas-born population according to a report from DIMIA (2003), during which Chinese people were looked down, it was not satisfactory enough. In this phase the need for a more diverse population was increasing. It was not until 1973 that the White Australian Policy was abolished (DIMIA, 2003) and it was not long before the policy of multiculturalism was introduced in 1978, after which Chinese migration started to fluctuate and made contributions to the society. This paper will discuss issues in the period before the policy of multiculturalism was introduced as well as the period after that. Firstly, it will focus on society's attitudes towards Chinese immigrants in terms of their social cultural and economic impact on the country. Secondly, governments' policies towards immigrants will be talked about.



AUSTRALIANS' ATTITUDES TOWARDS CHINESE

Chinese immigrants as well as other non-white immigrants were looked down and were not encouraged to come to Australia in the period immediately after World War II. This was because of the Immigration Restriction Act, which was introduced in 1901 and mainly aimed against Chinese (Chan, 2000). This kind of viewpoint didn't fade away even after World War II. Although Chinese were not treated as bad as they were in the gold rush period, they were still viewed as an inferior group. London (1970) argues that Chinese were perceived as a threat to Australia's cultural heritage and development because of their generally lower standard of living as a threat to labour employer relations. Goot (1978) also points out that the antipathy to Chinese migrants was generated by some considerations, like concerns about the costs of immigration and the competition for jobs. This kind of attitude could be perceived from Queensland Parliament's revoke of a legislation under which any house where Asian women lived could be viewed as a house of prostitution in 1966 (London, 1970). This was really a down point after World War II. However, some positive attitudes existed despite the fact that the overall attitude was negative. London (1970) has the opinion that Chinese later were gradually accepted by the cities’ resident in Melbourne and Sydney and Australians’ sympathetic support of China accelerated the assimilation process. This was the trend of the shift of Australians’ attitudes towards Chinese in that time period as well as the Integration period.

According to a review report from DIMIA (2003) – Report of the Review of Settlement Services for Migrants and Humanitarian Engrant, the situation didn’t change much until the introduction of multiculturalism by Galbally report in 1978. The result of assimilation and integration was not satisfactory in spite of the fact that Australia had paid a considerable amount of effort to policy making to encourage immigration in order to increase the country’s population. The multiculturalism policy gave rise to a large-scale Chinese migration. As a result, Australia had a very high Chinese migration intake over the past two decades. Those Chinese immigrants not only made a culturally and linguistically diverse population together with other groups of immigrants (DIMIA, 2003), but also contributed to Australian society, which changed Australians' attitudes towards Chinese people dramatically. Their contributions mainly fell into three categories – social, cultural and economic aspects.

From a social perspective, Chinese immigration during this time period really gave Australia a new look. In the first place, the large number of arrivals changed the make-up of the population dramatically. The number of Chinese immigrants was over 92,000, ranking second among all the Asian counties in 1995 (Millbank, 2001). Millbank (2001) also states that in this time period – 1995 to 1996, recent surge from mainland China and Hong Kong resulted in the fact that Northeast Asian settlers outnumbered Southeast Asian settlers, which reflected the current trend of Chinese migration into Australia. This was important because immigrants' average ages were below the Australian average, which could to some extent solve the aging problem of Australian population. In the second place, the large-scale immigration also resulted in more investment that government put on education, and made the quality of education higher, especially for language training. Immigrants came from different counties, so English was a second language for most of them. Hence paying attention to language training was essential and beneficial because this cleared the main obstacles and hurdles for immigrants to contribute to the society. Last but not least, according to APMRN (2004), the large-scale Chinese migration as well as immigration of other groups made the government have laws against racial discrimination and incitement and have special agencies to enforce them. This is, to some extent, an advance of the discrimination of racism.

China is famous for its mysterious 5000-year history and the culture developed during the long time period, so under the light of the multiculturalism policy Chinese people brought their culture to Australia, which had great effects on the society. Firstly, Chinese migrants brought various Chinese food and products into Australia, which gave Australians more choices on food and a chance to experience this special culture around the world. There were Chinatowns in major cities in Australia, hence many Australians who were keen on Chinese food or history could go to Chinatown for lunch or dinner with their families, which would be very fantastic. Secondly, some Chinese festivals and customs were taken into practice in many places in Australia. For instance, many Australians ate dumplings on New Year's Day in Australia. In addition, plenty of Australians had the preference for Chinese tea culture; they drank tea and talked about tea with friends in leisure time and enjoyed it pretty much. Thirdly, Chinese culture contributed to the ever-increasingly cultural diversity greatly because of the large intake of Chinese immigrants during this period..

Chinese immigration over the past twenty years benefited Australia’s economy a great deal. It mainly affected Australia’s economy in two ways, the demand side and the supply side (DIEA Fact Sheet30, 1995). DIEA fact sheet 30 (1995) also states that in terms of the demand side, the first factor is migrants own demands. Their needs for food, housing and leisure activities stimulated factories and companies to invest more money and to produce more products, the economy benefited from this to some extent. More arrivals meant that more heath, education and welfare services were needed, hence these aspects advanced due to the immigration. With regard to the supply side, the most direct benefit Chinese immigrants brought to Australia was workforce, skills and money. Workforce shortage could, to some extent, be solved through immigration of younger people. Skeldon (2004) points out that the majority of Chinese migrants today are highly educated or have specialized skills selected through a special “points” system, so immigrants with high business skills also contributed much to the economy. In addition, new business can be introduced into Australia. Chinese immigrants contributed a great deal in this aspect because China was quite different from western countries in terms of dressing, eating habits and so on. So some Chinese food such as noodles and tea, and Chinese featured clothes were introduced into Australia and the demands for these kinds of products definitely helped the development of the economy. From another perspective, this also added productive diversity through knowledge of international business markets. (DIEA Fact Sheet 30, 1995).



GOVERNMENT'S POLICIES FOR CHINESE AND OTHER IMMIGRANTS

Australian government made a series of policies on migration throughout the post World War II period according to the times. It fell into two phases. The first phase was the period before multiculturalism, the second - the period after that. As mentioned at the beginning of this paper, immigration immediately after the war followed the Immigration Restriction Act introduced in 1901, which was widely known as White Australian Policy. The government then realized that only European immigrants were not enough - Australia still in a desperate need for a large population. Also a review report from DIMIA (2003) says that the Commonwealth Government established DIMIA in order to assist migration into Australia due to the concerns regarding Australia’s low birthrate and strong need for industrial labour. Hence the government put forward the assimilation policy, after which many non-British migrants came to Australia. The scale of Chinese migration in this period wasn't large because Australians still perferred Europeans instead of Asians. Although Australia witnessed a higher intake of migrants, the assimilation policy was limited. So the government shifted from the policy of assimilation to a policy of integration. And during this period, due to the removal of discrimination from within the immigration program, the White Australian Policy was abolished in 1973 and equal treatment for immigrants from different origin became an official standard (DIMIA, 2003). As a result of the process of this removal of discrimination, the shift towards multiculturalism on a policy level was finally seen in 1978, which according to Elliot (1984) was also because of an economic factor. Elliot points out that Australia had to develop and maintain trading relations with some neighbour countries. If Australia’s immigration policy was discriminatory against migrants from those countries, it would definitely not only have a negative effect on Australian economy, but also would have some more serious problems.

After the introduction of multiculturalism – the start of the second phase, the country went through a dramatic change, and the government paid a great deal of effort to policy making to benefit from and also to support these changes. Firstly, the definition of multiculturalism was being completed and changed according to the contemporary situation. Three principles were adopted 1989 – cultural identity, social justice and economic efficiency (DIMA, 1999). Secondly, DIMA (1999) also says that in 1986, Jupp argued that successful settlement by non-English speaking migrants needed not only the effort of the migrants, but also the services provided by the host society. The government thus had access and equity policy to help immigrants to adjust to the diverse society more easily and more quickly. This policy, according to Jupp's report in 1986, included two main aspects. The first one was to equip overseas-born families and idividuals the basic resources to enable them to function effectively on an equitable level in Australian society. The second was on an institutional level – let institutions which made decisions about making services and providing them implement them on an equitable basis. This kind of policy have been playing an important role in Chinese immigration, or we wouldn't see so many things reflecting Chinese culture around us here in Australia. Thirdly, the Australian government noticed that it should enourage more skilled and educated people to come to Australia to contribute to the society. So the Australian government put forward a series of laws to help highly skilled individuals and successful businessmen to have permanent residence in Australia. According to the fact sheet Assisting Skilled and Business people (DIC), applicants are classified into several categories, skilled independent, state/territory nominated independent, skilled – Australian sponsored, etc. Obviously, the Australian Government paid a considerable amount of attention to absorbing high-tech people to boost Australian economy. Last but never least, the Australian government also set up a policy a to meet the Chinese increasing interest in visiting Australia. Fact Sheet 58 (DIMIA) states that as Australia was the first western country approved by Chinese government a destination for tourists, Australia has paid some effort to make it easier. Although this is not about migration, some tourists could be would-be immigrants because of the beauty and power of Australia. So this could encourage Chinese people to migrate to Australa to some extent.



CONCLUSION

Whilst Chinese immigrants didn't have a good reputation at the beginning of the second World War, they have been doing their best to get adjusted to the society and their contributions to the society in many aspects really made a difference. It's very pleased to see that Chinese people were gradually accepted by the Australian society and the Australian government has been trying to incease the diversity and scale of the population – going on with the multicultural policy.

Having considered the fact that Australia is still short of industrial labour and workforce, it's believed that government will have more policies on immigration to support highly skilled and educated people to come to Australia, and more corresponding policies that can solve problems caused by the immigration. And it's also believed that Chinese people will play a more important role in Australia and make as many contributions as they can to the society to meet the government's original intention.



REFERENCES

DIEA, Fact Sheet 30, 1995.

Asia Pacific Migration Research Network (APMRN), Migration Issues in the Asia Pacific, ISSUES PAPER FROM AUSTRALIA, [online] Available:
http://www.unesco.org/most/apmrnwp5.htm

Assisting Skilled and Business People, (Fact Sheet) Department of Immigration and Citizenship, Australian Government, [online] Available:
http://www.immi.gov.au/media/fact-sheets/48assisting.htm

China - Approved Destination Status, (Fact Sheet) Department of Immigration and Citizenship, Australian Government, [online] Available:
http://www.immi.gov.au/media/fact-sheets/58china.htm

Chan, H. (2000) From Quong Tarts to Victor Changes: Being Chinese In Australia in the Twentieth Century. CSCSD Public Seminar at the Australian National University. 24 May 2000.

DIMA, New Agenda for Multicultural Australia,
DIMA, Canberra, 1999, p. 8.

DIMIA, Report of the Review of Settlement Services for Migrants and Humanitarian Entrants, May 2003.

Elliot, J. D. (1984). Immigration: The economic benefits. In F. Milne & P. Shergold (Eds.), The great immigration debate. Sydney: Federation of Ethnic Communities in Australia.

Goot. M, Immigrations and Immigration: Evidence and Argument From the Public, 1943 – 1987, Macquarie University.

London. H. I., 1970, Non-White Immigration and the “White Australian” Policy.

Millbank, A, Asian Immigration, Current Issues Brief 16 1996-97, Social Policy Group, [online] Available:
http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/cib/1996-97/97cib16.htm

Skeldon, R, 2004 China: From Exceptional Place to Global Participant. [online], Available:
http://www.migrationinformation.org/Feature/display.cfm?D=9 – 41k