The police regarded the crowd as hostile and destructive. According to AFP Superintendent, Peter McDonald, 'I've been a policeman here for over 32 years and I don't think I've ever seen anything as ugly as this.' It was as a 'frightening demonstration' and 'worse than AIDEX'. Indeed, over the course of two days more than 100 officers were injured. Constable Rachel Benthein said the protesters she faced had violent motives: 'Most of those involved in the assault weren't there to demonstrate against John Howard - they were there to cause destruction and, on the second day, to have a conflict with police.' Constable Corey Heldon was part of the police group swept away by the initial charge toward Parliament House on the Monday:

When asked to explain what had occurred and how the situation had got so out of hand, a security officer said that 'It was senseless, a mob, mob violence, people just got carried away.'

Press explanations concurred with this view. The Herald Sun called the riot 'a brutal and unprecedented display of mob violence.' Canberra Times journalist, Peter Cole Adams, said the assault was the work of 'a mob of bully boys and assorted political extremists'. According to Adams:

Adams also suggested that social conditions played some limited role:

Senator Brian Harradine was also emphatic that, ‘...we cannot allow a handful of Trotskyists, anarchists and thugs to exploit the genuine feelings of many people and thrust them into violent activity.’ In this view assorted outside troublemakers imposed their violent actions onto to innocent and otherwise peaceful protesters.

The Bulletin popularised the idea that the protest was the work of agitators and dupes. One article suggested that 'What began as a day of union action was hijacked by splinter groups.' Alcohol also played a role. An empty beer can from the scene allegedly bore a sticker which said 'Time to fuck the system that's been fucking us'. The sticker also invited the drinker to throw the can at 'anyone who represents the system' and featured a picture of John Howard with an axe buried in his head, 'The best cut of all'. According to The Bulletin:

The Bulletin also suggested that the violence was likely to be repeated as 'radical elements take advantage of public anger over a range of issues - from unemployment to the environment to airport noise.'

The subsequent law and order campaign led to more specific allegations about the role of 'agitators'. It was alleged that the breakaway demonstration was premeditated. AFP Assistant Commissioner, Bill Stoll, suggested that, 'a small percentage of the crowd went there with the intention of causing trouble, otherwise why did they take sledge hammers, tyre levers and other weapons. According to Taylor, members of the CFMEU were involved. 'Breaching the police line at the exit of the Commonwealth Avenue ramp were all manner of red flags of the CFMEU and the Eureka flags of the BLF, no one could have doubted it was premeditated, it might not have been officially sanctioned but it did seem pre-planned.' An article in the Sun-Herald also suggested that members of the CFMEU planned the breakaway. In particular, 'a core group of at least six of the most violent protesters shown on media footage of Monday's riot were drinking at the Trade Union club on the weekend, among interstate unionists in town.' Also identified as a leader of the 'breakaway group' was a 'prominent Aboriginal land campaigner'.

Senior left union officials, some of whose members had been involved in the attempt to gain entry to Parliament, were under pressure to find an explanation. ACTU officials were reported to have said that 'hardline Maoists' in the CFMEU instigated the violence. ACTU Assistant Secretary Bill Mansfield also said 'There is no doubt that there is always the risk of a Trotskyist group at demonstrations such as the one we had yesterday who are intent on provoking violence.' Wendy Caird, CPSU Joint National Secretary, said 'people from the fringe political parties were involved.' And a CFMEU official suggested that 'insurgent student activists' had 'disguised themselves in union shirts and caps. Students infiltrated bonafide unionists.'

Such accounts offer an easy explanations for what occurred, the most violent and sustained assault on the Federal Parliament in Australian history was the work of a few violent agitators and assorted extremists. A mass of scared, insecure, unsuspecting and otherwise peaceful protesters got caught up in the 'mob' atmosphere, or were impelled to violence by these 'fringe elements'.

The mob has a long history. The French statesman Thiers in 1850 spoke of 'the name, one of the worst stigmatised in history, mark you, of mob. The vile mob which brought every republic down in ruin.' It is significant that this mainstream construction of the August 19 riot fits into more academic literature on crowd or 'mob' psychology. The dominant academic version of crowd psychology also springs from the Nineteenth Century. Crowd psychology's most influential modern populariser, Gustave LeBon in his 1895 The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, suggested that 'several of the special characteristics of crowds [are] impulsivity, irritability, incapacity to reason, absence of judgement or critical spirit, exaggeration of emotions and more beside.' LeBon saw the crowd as an inherently destructive force in which the 'group mind' obfuscated individual judgement and left participants open to manipulation by agitators. Explanations of the riot were almost identical to the terminology and assumptions of LeBon. LeBon's 'mob psychology' has been heavily criticised as more an expression of the fears and political motives of the French ruling class in the last quarter of the Nineteenth Century than a sophisticated analysis. More recent experimental and theoretical developments in mainstream crowd psychology, such as work by Allport in the 1920s, and Zimbardo in the 1960's contradicted LeBon's explanations. They have, nevertheless, tended to agreement with LeBon's basic premises about the asocial outcomes of crowd formation.

George Rude in particular contests the assumptions and conclusions of this behaviourist school as historically inaccurate. Rude's studies on the role of the crowd in the French revolution and urban riots in Britain in the Nineteenth Century challenged the notion that crowds are necessarily irrational, degenerate, or manipulated by outside agitators. While not denying their capacity for destruction, Rude pointed to the central role of the crowd and mass action in the emergence of relatively sophisticated 'forward looking' social movements that have shaped the modern Western and contemporary world in a complex and often subtle manner. Studies of the urban 'ghetto' riots of the 1960's in the United States also suggest an integral relationship between the riots and the development of popular and potentially effective social movements. The link between social movements and collective action, even riots, suggests that crowd behaviour is more complex than suggested by the behaviourist tradition.

A critical Marxist, stream of social psychology provides a critique of mainstream crowd psychology and suggests an alternative approach. Stephen Reicher identifies two crucial problems with the mainstream approach. The first a bias, both political bias and bias of perspective. The second was an inadequate understanding of individual psychology and hence its relationship to collective action. These will be discussed in turn below.

Governments and commentators of the day are typically partisan in their defence of the establishment institutions and practices. Their main concern is to eliminate popular disturbances as a threat, not to understand them. There is also a bias of perspective. Mainstream explanations are never from participants, they regard the crowd from the outside. They are views formed without an understanding of the beliefs and experiences of those involved in protest. Further, the events are not studied first hand, since it is assumed a priori that they are undesirable, destructive and senseless. Indeed this is exactly what the term 'mob' denotes. The role of authority, and hence of social factors and legitimate grievances are down played if not ignored.

Further, mainstream crowd psychology is based on a distortion of the relationship between the individual and society. Behaviourist psychology abstracts the individual from society and behaviour from social context. This leads to theoretical distortions in relation to the dynamics of collective behaviour. On the one hand otherwise 'normal law abiding citizens' are said to undergo a loss of self and a loss of personal responsibility in the group or 'mob'. One the other, antisocial individuals may be attracted or instigate such disturbances.

Reicher posits an alternative stream of social psychology as the basis for understanding collective action. This draws on the 'social identity' model, according to which:

Only on the basis of shared understandings, can we begin to understand the dynamics of collective action. Rather than collective action involving a loss of identity on the part of individuals, or some reversion to a form of asocial individuality, control shifts from personal identity to a relevant shared social identity. Hence a 'spontaneous' occurrence, which to the police mind seems as the formally coordinated and premeditated work of outside 'agitators', even where they are conspicuously absent or marginal, can be understood to be a socially meaningful and creative response by a body of people with shared social definitions and understandings. Further, any full investigation of a specific conflict must be situated in terms of the broader historical, political, social and economic environment.

Before progressing further a point of qualification must be made. It is not proposed that the demonstrations are not capable of destructive behaviour, or that individuals may never 'lose it', but rather that demonstrations can be both creative and destructive. There are ‘limits’ on both imposed by the ‘norms’ and ideological understandings of the demonstrators. Indeed any discussion of ‘violence’ should take account of these 'limits' and distinguish between collective acts and acts by individuals.

Specific crowd actions must therefore be closely documented and analysed in terms of the role of group conflict and authority, on the one hand, and in terms crowd targets and norms and limits, on the other. Important in this process is developing an understanding of how riots can be socially meaningful responses to specific situations and conflicts. Reddy, writing about working class crowds in Rouen in the Nineteenth Century, concluded that ‘the targets of these crowds thus glitter in the eye of history as signs of the labourers' conception of the nature of society.’ Crowd action then 'tends to make sense when viewed in terms of the ideologies associated with the collectivities who were involved.'

How then do these general theoretical propositions apply to the concrete historical case of the demonstration on August 19? The construction of events by the Government, police and the media has already been examined. The dominant view suggested that the riot was the work of agitators who forced, or swept up, a larger unsuspecting mass of innocent protesters in their plans. 'Part of the crowd formed itself into a mob which broke into the building on a rampage of smashing and looting.'

One important aspect of the mainstream account was that the breakaway demonstration was pre-planned. On the basis of circumstantial evidence this cannot be ruled out. Members and a number CFMEU organisers were prominent leading the charge to the doors. At some stage a decision must have been taken to enter the forecourt. This may have been a relatively spontaneous decision, taken by those at the head of the CFMEU contingent after the police and Aboriginal protesters clashed ahead of them and left the forecourt open. It is also possible a decision was taken some time earlier. Does this mean the riot was than the work of agitators, a minority who consciously sought to arouse activity on the part of other rally participants? 'Agitators' in this sense may have played a role. But there activity still begs the question of why particular acts became normative while others did not. Why did anyone pay any attention to the 'agitators'? The demonstrators involved in the riot numbered closer to two thousand than two hundred. The vast majority of these were not hardline Maoists, Trotskyists, or anarchists. Rather they were workers, students, Aborigines, unemployed people and even pensioners. There was a handful of political activists. Reicher's approach would suggest that the bulk of these protesters acted, not because they lost their capacity for thinking under the influence of agitators, but because they shared understandings.

Slogans may provide an insight into these understandings. The slogan, 'The workers, united, will never be defeated' was chanted for long periods, suggesting a high shared identification amongst participants as workers or as supporters of workers interests. As we have seen Howard's 'mandate' was contested. A good deal of anger was directed against the Prime Minister in particular. Nurses, firefighters, public servants earlier in the day were chanting. ‘What do we want, Howard's head. How we gonna get it? Tear it off!’ Among the rioters, 'We're coming to get you Johnny' was also popular. It is in the context of a considerable degree of anger among protesters and perceptions of the Howard Government's illegitimacy, that the building was attacked. One of the most sustained chants among those attempting to gain entry to the building, was ‘Our House, lets us in.' It is clearly audible on the AFP video footage. One participant Patrick Brownlee, from Mount Bromlow NSW, explained:

In this assessment, Parliament symbolised not democracy but the lack of it. Demonstrators commented on the institution and even the design of the building itself, geographically isolated from the major population centres, as symbolic of their exclusion from decision making, as well as the practical means by which Governments exerted control over them.

Some rioters also defined their actions in counterposed to the official protest. A popular chant was 'Jennie George, time to fight, time to call a general strike.' Political activists did tend to have use of the megaphones, but the chant was taken up by large numbers of rioters and is clearly audible on the AFP videotape. There was then, a conscious division, between at least some of rioters and the aims of the official platform. This is testified to by the attempt by senior union officials to persuade their rank and file members to return to the official platform. It met limited success.

The notion of ‘limits' and ideological understandings of the demonstrators also applies to the question of violence against the police, and damage to the building. It is difficult to quantify the extent to which police were attacked directly and for what reasons, but some cautious remarks can be made.

The level of violence against the police was fairly low. The bulk of injuries sustained by the police and security guards were to their hands. Some police wore protective gloves but others did not and received strains or cuts to their hands as a result of pushing against protesters and trying to remove their placards. Others were injured as they attempted to stop demonstrators from taking their riot shields. There are reports that punches and kicks were exchanged between police and demonstrators but these were minor instances and both groups sought to restrain those involved.

Sixty police were reportedly injured, including two seriously, while an unknown number of demonstrators were injured. This was inevitable as two tightly packed groups of several hundred rammed against each other for nearly two hours. Allegations were later made that one female officer was verbally abused and kicked on the ground and that female officers were targeted specifically by the rioters. There is no evidence that this was in fact the case. One female officer did collapse as she was crushed between the wall of protesters and police. However, a security officer also said that at least two female protesters collapsed in the crush. One was passed over the police lines, the other over the protesters.

The 'ugly' and 'frightening' side of the demonstration was in part that protesters refused to accept police direction. Indeed the police were almost overwhelmed at various stages of the riot. Naturally the police and security personnel viewed the rioters as dangerous and irrational. 'Violence' does not seem to have been a motivating factor in the protesters actions. It was clearly limited, and overwhelmingly directed at attempting to push the police lines which were stopping the demonstrators from gaining entry to the building.

To what extent were weapons used by protesters? A wheel brace was used to break the glass on the outer and inner doors of the Parliament House Shop. A metal trolley, which was recorded in the Hansard and by the police as part of premeditated plan to gain forcible entry to building was actually taken from the Parliament House Shop. The Bulletin claimed that some protesters came to the demonstration armed 'with hammers, wheel braces, paint and syringes filled with diluted acid, weapons readied before the event in anticipation ... rocks, bottles, and cans were also thrown.' No evidence of the hammer has ever appeared, nor of the rocks or 'syringes filled with diluted acid'. Water bottles, cans and sticks from placards were also thrown at police after they had cleared protesters from the Parliamentary House Shop. The paint bomb and beer cans with stickers were pre-arranged. However these were produced by a tiny anarchist group, a few individuals who were completely marginal to the course of events. There is no evidence to suggested that a significant number of protesters brought weapons and intended to riot. Most of the 'weapons' appear to have been objects that the protesters would have been carrying anyway.

Individual demonstrators did attack the building directly. But again this was not necessarily a 'mindless' exercise. The choice of building was not indiscriminate. Parliament House was attacked 'precisely because it was the seat of Government.' The main damage occurred not for its own sake but as a by-product of gaining entry to the building. Glass was knocked out of a window and a door as a means of gaining entry to the foyer through the Parliament House Shop. The Shop was further damaged as the police pushed demonstrators out of the area. Among demonstrators 'looting' was not necessarily considered 'appropriate'. The taking of goods from the shop appears to have been a source of disagreement among protester involved in the riot. It would be wrong to suggest that material gain was the main or even a significant factor explaining the riot.

The bulk of the damage bill is accounted for because the frames of the main doors were buckled under the weight of demonstrators and police. A number of doors also had to have hinges repaired. None of this could be accurately described as a 'rampage of smashing'. There were at least two other isolated acts. One demonstrator attempted, unsuccessfully, to disrupt the building by holding a lighter to the sprinkler system. And a wall was grafitied with the statement 'Let, us, in' and 'the workers united, will never be defeated.' There is no way of verifying if such actions were met with approval by other protesters at the time. But, given the motivations of the demonstrators these actions may have been considered 'appropriate'.

Media reports of the 'violence' conflated incidents from the August 20 demonstration at Old Parliament House with that on August 19. On August 20 demonstration the police 'lost control' for a second time. The AFP video recording of shows the police, restraining Aboriginal demonstrators on the steps of the Old Parliament House, forcing them back to the road, and letting fly with batons and repeatedly beating any protester in reach. It was only after the police 'rioted' that Aboriginal demonstrators took up positions across the road and returned a heavy volley of rocks. A number of police were injured and the Old Parliament House sustained a broken window. Here the police were directly targeted, but this was after provocation.

The riot is more adequately understood by using the approach of a critical social psychology. It is obviously difficult to establish the precise motivations of the rioters. The conclusions are therefore tentative. However mainstream explanations of the riot do not adequately explain the motivations of the demonstrators. On the basis of Reicher's approach patterned behaviour and shared understandings appear to have played an important role in shaping the behaviour of the rioters. Further the mainstream explanations are empirically inaccurate. The level of violence was low and was not primarily directed against the police. The actions of the rioters were not malicious, indiscriminate, or irrational. This is not to suggest that individuals did not 'lose it', nor that they were not destructive, rather that there were clear limits on the protesters behaviour. As Stephen Reicher proposes such events are often the outcome of lengthy social processes, not simply reflex actions. Therefore any full analysis must also take into account how the particular outcome fits into the wider historical context of intergroup conflict. The riot must be related to the broader and immediate social, economic and political conditions. These areas will be examined in detail in the following chapters.

Emotion is an important factor in mobilisation. Anger and resentment at the established order were clearly displayed on August 19. As we have seen the mainstream account of the riot was that it was the work of 'lunatics' and 'thugs' who drew in the 'mindless' and 'senseless'. By psychologising the individuals the role of authority and context is occluded. Emotion is not simply an individual phenomenon. Hugh McKay, a prominent analyst and commentator on social trends, suggested that the emotions displayed in the storming of parliament were not the psychological problems of a few individuals. Rather they were:

A detailed examination of the wider social and political conditions is therefore essential to developing a thorough understanding of the basis on which the emotions of anger and resentment expressed in the riot were formed.

Since the early 1970's the industrialised core of international capitalism has experienced a period of protracted economic crisis characterised by an historical decline in growth rates, relative economic stagnation and mass unemployment. The experience of the Australian economy has matched this broader international economic experience. There is considerable debate as to the causes of this crisis: monetarist and keynesian accounts locate the problems in factors external to the Australian economy, such as the oil shock, deteriorating terms of trade, or to too much or too little state intervention. Marxist accounts by contrast, suggest that the problems of the Australian economy do not primarily concern state intervention or the lack of it, or some exogenous variable. The crisis in Australia is part of a global phenomenon, ultimately caused by declining profit rates.

The competitive dynamic of capital accumulation provides a continual pressure for the restructuring of capital. This process is characterised by shifting capital investment between industries, upgrading plant and equipment within individual firms and branches of industry, and changes to the labour process. The process is disruptive by nature. Two main factors condition the recent Australian and international experience. The first is a tendency towards a greater global integration of the process of capital accumulation. The second factor has been the relative strengths and weaknesses of periods of cyclical economic recession and recovery over the last two decades. Declining profit rates and the associated pressure for greater global integration of production mean uncompetitive firms or industries are shaken out, and this has meant that workers are layed off and labour intensified for those who remain.

Owing to the scope of this sub-thesis the examination of this restructuring and its social impact will be limited to its two most recent and distinct periods: that under the Hawke-Keating Labor Government's from 1983-1996, and the Coalition Government from 1996. The broad experience in Australia under Labor from 1983 to 1996 was typical of that of the OECD countries. The terms 'structural adjustment' (OECD), 'Thatcherism' (Britain), 'Reaganomics' (USA), 'Perestroika' (USSR) and 'restructuring' and 'micro-economic reform' (Australia) describe a similar process of managed economic change.

Under Labor 'restructuring' and 'micro-economic reform' was managed through a series of Prices and Incomes Accords. Union participation was a central aspect. Senior union leaders were involved in Government decision making and represented on a range of tripartite economic and industry, consultative forums. Supporters argued that the Accord would ensure that restructuring could take place within a framework that would limit social dislocation and economic polarisation. Wages in particular were not to rise faster than prices. In return the Government made a commitment to bring about growth in employment, union involvement in industry policy and higher social wage (spending on health, education and welfare).

The Accord framework was promoted as a third way between orthodox Keynesian state intervention and the 'neo-liberal' economic policies of the Australian New Right. There is considerable debate about the implementation and impact of the overall Accord framework. However, the Hawke-Keating Governments moved steadily to the right, implementing a range of policies advocated by the conservative side of politics. These included: the deregulation of the Australian financial system, deregulation of trade through tariff cuts, 'micro-economic reform' designed to improve the productivity and competitiveness of Australian industry, reduction of areas of state expenditure, rationalisation and privatisation of state-owned enterprises, shifting the tax burden away from high income earners and companies, and an increasingly decentralised and productivity based industrial relations system. The core strategy of these policies, the pursuit of international competitiveness and openness to market forces is otherwise known as 'economic rationalism'. In terms of economic policy, Labor paved the way for a more extreme and openly right-wing version of this agenda under the Coalition. I will now consider the social impact and the reaction to Labor and Coalition policies, of three groups represented in the riot: workers, Aboriginal people and students.

Workers

Through the Accord Labor Government's restrained industrial militancy over wages. Average paid real wages, which includes management salaries, actually fell by 6 per cent between 1983/4 and 1989/90. Real award wages on the other hand, not including management salaries, fell by 10 per cent on average over the same period. And although spending on the social wage did increase it was offset by: tighter means testing of and cuts to some benefits, the introduction of a raft of 'user pays' charges, and the shifting of the overall taxation burden further from the rich and companies to workers.

Labor Government's argued that restraining real wages would contribute to employment growth and security of employment. However cyclical recovery and recession, widespread industry restructuring, and contracting out and privatisation of public services resulted in major job shedding. The number of people employed in government enterprises in Australia fell by 24 per cent between 1987-88 and 1992-3. At the same time labour productivity rose by over one hundred percent. Labor Governments had promised to create jobs, however 'structural' unemployment had increased from 5 to 8 per cent by the time labor left office in 1996.

There was also an increased polarisation of the labour market under the Accord. The female participation rate grew, but much of this was in insecure and part time and casual work, in part filled by women to supplement the falling income of their partners. After the early 1990's recession the labour market polarised further: 'The growth in employment during 1993-1996 occurred mostly in the low paid area (under 75 percent of the median wage), with some growth at the top (above 175 per cent of the median), and a shrinking middle of core jobs.' Not only were there less jobs but workers were increasingly concentrated in low paid and insecure employment.

Government industrial relations policy directly affected the levels of stress and insecurity at work. Labor's introduction of a decentralised and productivity based industrial relations system aimed to boost productivity thorough a more intensive utilisation of capital. This was entrenched with the introduction of Enterprise Bargaining (EB) in 1990. The removal of 'restrictive work practices' such as penalty rates and standard working hours in a number of industries meant full-time workers worked increasingly long hours, including unpaid overtime. Their hours of work increased from 40 per week in 1978 to 44 per week in 1995, while the proportion working more than 49 hours per week rose from 28 to 37 per cent in 1996.

Business, Labor, Treasury and mainstream economic think tanks argued that the benefits of 'restructuring' and 'micro economic reform' would 'trickle down'. However the bulk of empirical evidence documents the fact that the pursuit of 'economic rationalism' contributed to increased economic and social polarisation. On the basis of real wage cuts and productivity increases the Accord period saw a substantial redistribution of income between labour and capital. Between 1983 and 1989 the share of GDP going to wages and salaries fell from 74 to 63.3 per cent, the profit share increased from 26 to 36.7 per cent. A number of studies have suggested that this objective social polarisation, accompanied by labour intensification and longer hours, combined with persistently high unemployment, have led to an increasingly ‘insecure’ workforce and ‘community.'

By the early 1990's increasing levels of economic and social insecurity contributed to a rising anger and resentment against Labor. The Federal Labor Industrial Relations Minister, Laurie Bretton, was booed by delegates at the 1994 ACTU Conference over enterprise bargaining and for advocating the watering down of 'unfair dismissal' laws. National strike action by miners and waterfront workers in solidarity with CFMEU members at CRA-RTZ's Weipa operations in November 1995 was another sign of this anger.

Labor's electoral support among blue and white collar clerical workers, especially those earning under $30 000 per annum, began to erode rapidly after the 1993 election. Half of the workers in this category that deserted Labor did so after 1993 and a majority of these alienated lower income workers said that they intended to vote for the Coalition as a protest against Labor in 1996. Indeed a central plank of the Howard election strategy was the targeting of the 'battler' vote, those who felt 'betrayed' by Labor. During the 1996 federal election anger was directed particularly at Labor leader Paul Keating for his 'Get a Job' quip. Liberal campaign advertisements made very effective use of the remark. The Coalition's own polling revealed that unemployment was consistently rated at the top of people's concerns during the 1996 Federal Election campaign.

In response John Howard promised 'battlers' a 'comfortable and relaxed' future and gave a 'rock solid guarantee that no worker would receive a cut in take home pay' or be worse off under the Coalition's industrial relations system. According to one commentator, the Howard Government's challenge was to reduce uncertainty and fear of the future. He added that, 'the problem is that the economic rationalist policies of the Howard Government do not augur well for a relaxed and comfortable Australia. Not to say that they are not socially responsible.'

Despite Labor's record, a minority of workers remained deeply hostile to the Coalition. The Victorian State Coalition Government, under Jeff Kennett, provoked a backlash against its austerity and industrial relations changes in 1992. In November a State-wide stoppage involved 800 000 workers; 150 000 marched in Melbourne. Other sectoral strikes followed by and on 1 March 1, shortly before the Federal Election, a second State-wide stoppage saw 80 000 workers demonstrate. In the March 1993 federal election the Coalition campaigned for the Fightback program. Fightback promised sweeping industrial relations changes, budgetary austerity and a Goods and Services Tax. Issues of class were raised on the agenda and the threat of the Fightback scared workers back to Labor at the polls.

By 1996 many workers were very disillusioned with Labor. This time the Coalition presented a moderate face in the election campaign and won. But it soon revealed a core policy agenda not dissimilar to the 1993 Fightback agenda which Howard had disowned. Workers were already disaffected after years of crisis and economic rationalism. Now the Coalition engaged in a particularly sharp offensive. Successive Labor Government's had restrained wages, shifted the industrial relations system further in favour of employers, and overseen public sector and industry restructuring over a period of 13 years. By contrast the Coalition's agenda of deficit reduction was to be carried out over a period of two years. The details of the new Governments program of cuts were announced within months of their election. Likewise Industrial Relations changes were to come into effect as soon as possible.

The extent of the Coalitions offensive and the period over which it was carried out apparently increased sentiments of working class identity. This helps to explain why the ACTU was so successful in mobilising tens of thousands of workers between March and August 19. By appealing to the 'battler', Howard also created a rod for his own back. For instance, CFMEU leaflets distributed on August 19 showed Howard promising that 'no worker would be worse off' surrounded with 'Lies, lies, lies, lies, lies'.

Anger amongst workers was apparent in what the Australian Financial Review called a ‘marked deterioration’ of the industrial situation since the end of the ALP government and the Accord. The number of strike days reached their highest level for three years in May 1996. 185 000 employees participated in 164 000 days of strikes and stoppages. National strikes by construction workers accounted for 59 per cent of days lost. In the health, education and community services sector 52 000 days were lost. The figures were blown out by the expiry of several Enterprise Bargaining Agreements (EBA's). Thus 2500 Toyota manufacturing workers in Melbourne struck for over
2 weeks. There were also EBA disputes at Shell’s oil refinery in Geelong and ACI at Spotswood in Melbourne. Rising levels of anger were not only apparent at Parliament House on August 19. Large numbers of workers also struck to express support for the ACTU NDA against the WRB. Ports were closed in Victoria and NSW for 24 hours. Employers in Coal, Manufacturing, Construction, and Transport industries across the country reported disruption ranging from closure of some sights to minor staffing problems.

The Coalition also evoked anger and resentment among Aboriginal people. In terms of health, employment, and social conditions Aboriginal people form the most disadvantaged group in Australia. The Federal Labor government in the early 1980s had abandoned its previous commitment to comprehensive Aboriginal Land Rights. In 1989 the Royal Commission into Black Deaths in Custody made 339 recommendations. The vast majority were not implemented by State or Federal Governments. Between 1989 and 1996 Aborigines were imprisoned at an even greater rate and deaths in custody more than doubled. In 1993, Keating set out to undermine the favourable High Court Mabo decision. By 1996 there had not been one valid land claim under the new legislation. In 1997 the Coalition Health Minister, Michael Wooldridge, said 'in my area of Health there is no evidence of any improvement whatsoever in the last decade ... the gap [between Aboriginal and White health] has actually widened.'

There was also a shift in approach to Aboriginal affairs with the Coalitions election. Labor sought cooptatation approach, for instance through the establishment of Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander Commission. The Coalition on the other hand employed a more confrontational approach, including the appeal to racist sentiments in 'mainstream Australia'. One of the Howard Government's first announcements after their election was that the department which administered Aboriginal affairs, the ATSIC would have its budget cut by $400 million. At the same time the fuel rebate of $500 million for the mining and pastoral industry was extended. There was also anger among Aboriginal people at a growth in open racism following the election. This was symbolised by the election of the openly anti-Aboriginal candidate Pauline Hanson. The Prime Minister also referred to the 'Aboriginal industry' and suggested that 'Political correctness ... had gone to far' and that there should be 'a new spirit of freedom of expression'. Aboriginal leaders suggested that this was 'code' for racism.

The Howard Government also claimed that Keating's Native Title legislation had to be changed, that the right to negotiate should be removed. Senator Nick Minchen suggested that if Aborigines 'got too much' their 'special rights' would 'undermine the reconciliation process'. The extent of Aboriginal anger over years of neglect, funding cuts and the current hostile climate was apparent in fact that August 19 was the first national protest mobilisation of Aboriginal communities since 'invasion day' in 1988. On August 19 Aborigines demonstrated in solidarity with the unions, the following day they protested specifically against funding cuts and racism.

The Coalition's higher education policies intensified Labor's policy initiatives. The OECD proscription in its 1986 Structural Adjustment advocated that 'economic considerations be given priority in education and training policy'. This recommendation was given substance from 1987 under Labor's 'Dawkin's reforms'. In 1987 the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECS) was introduced. Students were to pay for the expansion of higher education. The Keating Labor government lifted restrictions on full up-front post-graduate fees, allowing many universities to introduce them.

Although the majority of students accepted HECS in principle Labor had provoked anger among a minority of students over specific measures. In 1992 Labor flagged the abolition of student assistance, AUSTUDY and its replacement with full loans. This prompted several thousand students to demonstrate around the country. Conditions on individual campuses, such as overcrowding, lack of resources, and local fees also created resentment. In 1994, for instance the decision of the Australian National University administration to introduce full up front fees for the Legal Workshop course saw 300 students occupy the chancellery building for nine days. The National Union of Students (NUS) called two National Days of Action in March and May against continual fee increases.

The Coalition's foreshadowed changes built on Labor's legacy, galvanising student opposition in the process. The new Government's policies included: a five per cent cut ($1.2 billion) to university funding across the board, including $430 million cut to Austudy by raising the age of independence from 22 to 25 years; increased HECS, an increase in the rate of repayment and the cut in rate and differential 'higher' HECS for courses projected to have higher potential earnings. Full up-front fees for undergraduate courses were also allowed for the first time since Whitlam had abolished them.

The Coalition Minister for Education, Amanda Vanstone, provoked student anger. She said that she 'didn't know what students were complaining about. The increases are no more than the cost of a new car'. She noted that, 'someone with a degree is foolish to reject a job at McDonalds'. A poll published in The Australian budget day suggested eighty per cent of households with students or former students affected by HECS were opposed to the HECS increases. Seventy one per cent of all voters 18-34 years of age disapproved of the increases.

The Coalition's tactics in selling its budget also raised the level of anger. The Government announced the more unpopular aspects of its budget over a period of months to soften the impact on Budget night. The Australian Financial Review summarised a widespread concern that due to ministerial inexperience and incompetence the Government had bungled it management of the budget the wider policy agenda:

This problem of presentation, combined with the harshness of the cuts over a period of months galvanised opposition and generated a desire for resistance to the new Government's actions among specific groups.

Studies on participation in social protest suggest that a major contributing factor is a high level of identification with the particular group. Further, such studies indicate that the majority of those who participate do so out of concern for the position of the social group in general, rather than just the way in which specific measures will affect them as individuals. We have seen how Labor's policies adversely affected workers, Aborigines and students. And, how the Coalition's offensive galvanised rising levels of resentment into increasing anger and mobilisation. This helps to explain why the ACTU campaign was so successful in mobilising people, August 19 was a chance to protest years of economic rationalism. As Bob Murray pointed out, the:

Militant representatives of all the groups affected by these policies were involved in one national demonstration, the Cavalcade to Canberra. Specific Government attacks encouraged a collective identification among workers, Aborigines, and students with their own groups. The pace, manner and scale of the Government offensive generalised this identification. A minority of workers, students and blacks, rioted on August 19 in part because a broader common identity had been formed. This identity was defined by an anti-Liberal, anti-economic rationalist, and anti-Government stance as well as identification with the position of one or several of the groups involved.

Murray convincingly argued that:

Rioting of course is one form of collective action. Many workers, students and blacks did not riot on August 19 and instead chose to listen to speeches at the official ACTU platform. Larger numbers of these groups did not even come to Canberra. To understand why a minority rioted, and others that did not it, it is therefore necessary to examine the strategies for action on offer by the leadership of protest movement, the ACTU and the ALP. In doing this we need to understand the role and nature of the labour movement leadership. This also facilitates an explanation of the ACTU and the ALP leadership's behaviour after the riot.

The previous chapter outlined an explanation for the existence of a high level of anger among a minority of rank and file workers, blacks, students and the unemployed. This anger forms a central part in explaining the success of union and student mobilisations in the lead up to and on August 19. It also provides a part of the social background to the riot itself. However an examination of the material and social pressures on, and contradictions within, the labour movement is also necessary. Crucially, the relationship between the trade union leadership and the rank and file must be grasped in order to understand the logic of the Parliament House riot. This relationship must be historically located in the particular conjuncture of economic, social and political conditions facing the union movement as the Coalition took office. In particular I will suggest that the level of class struggle and levels of rank and file self-confidence and independant organisational coherence - were crucial features. They conditioned both the nature of the ACTU campaign against the Coalition and the riot itself. This also points to an explanation for actions of the labour leaderships in the wake of the riot.

In Australia the leadership of the trade unions is dominated by full-time union officials. These full-time officials form a distinct social layer. They perform a distinct social function, that is, mediating between capital and labour. Their role is to represent their members in negotiation over the price and conditions of labour, not to do away with exploitation. The very existence of capitalist relations and the officials' role in representing their members within capitalism has a conservatising effect on the bureaucracy. Officials come to identify with the concerns of management with the viability and profitability of the particular company, industry, and even the economy as a whole. This is compounded by other material and social pressures on officials. They are typically removed from the shop floor, situated in a bureaucratic hierarchy and are often geographically located in distant national or regional offices. They are not subject to the fluctuations of the industry in the same way as the rank and file. Work intensification, productivity deals and even mass redundancies do not directly affect the officials who are still employed even if some members lose their jobs.

Precisely because of the officials' mediating role between capital and labour, they are subject to pressures from below and above. They must satisfy their members or face leadership challenge, membership revolt or, membership apathy and organisational disintegration. They may also seek to mobilise their members in response to particular employer and government attacks. How much they respond depends partly on how much pressure is exerted by the rank and file. The higher up the hierarchy they are the more insulated they are likely to be from this pressure. Lower echelons of the bureaucracy, such as regional organisers, may therefore be more immediately responsive to the mood of the rank and file. The bureaucracy is also divided ideologically. This reflected in divisions between left and right officials, and unions. The left unions tend to be more open to pressure from their better organised and more coherent rank and file.

Regardless of divisions within the bureaucracy, the existence of a stable system of collective bargaining tends to encourage officials to depend on the machinery of the state. This entails an adherence to peaceful and legal methods of resolving conflict. Hence the officials, unless subject to severe rank and file pressure, desire to avoid full scale 'head to head' conflict with the employers and the state. At times of social crisis, establishment opinion may call on the bureaucracy to provide order, stability and restraint. For instance, during the 1975 constitutional crisis and the dismissal of Whitlam the Melbourne Age editorial asserted that union leaders had a ‘formidable responsibility’ to maintain calm. In the aftermath of August 19 major papers also called for responsibility. According to the SMH, ‘reason is what wins the day and Jenny George and Bill Kelty know it, they will fail by any measure if they abandon reason for the blunt and dangerous weapon of mass demonstrations.’

Critics of the classical Marxist analysis of trade unions have suggested that the rank and file is just as conservative as officials, who may be to the left of the rank and file. For much of the time this is true, but the relationship between the officials and members is not static. The conservatism of the bureaucracy is contingent on a range of economic, social and political factors. To understand their role at any particular point in time requires a concrete historical investigation of these forces. In some circumstances, rank and file workers move beyond the limits on action accepted by the bureaucracy. Workers' structural location within capitalism means that the rank and file is periodically subject to large scale attacks on their jobs, wages and conditions. Industrial disputes tend to affect workers' consciousness. According to Bramble:

The rank and file are therefore potentially far less committed to legality and the 'proper channels' than their full-time officials.

The trade union bureaucracy is also intimately connected with the Australian Labor Party. The basis of the ALP, as a social democratic party, is workers' recognition of differences between labour and capital. Most of the time consciousness of class differences is combined with a belief that these can be managed, to the mutual benefit of both capital and labour. Some writers have argued that the ALP has become a 'catch all' party, committed primarily to the pursuit of 'middle class' votes. While the claim to represent all groups in society is important factor in Labor's aims, the fact remains that a much higher proportion of blue and white collar workers vote for the ALP than do for the Conservative parties. Workers form a larger proportion of the Party's branch membership than the Conservative Parties.

The ALP is organically tied to the working class through the trade union bureaucracy. Trade unions are affiliated to the ALP and provide it with considerable financial and human resources. Unions send 50 to 75 per cent of the delegates to State conferences. Trade unions leaders also play a considerable role in Party affairs, and although the proportion has declined, the path from trade union official to parliamentary representation remains a well worn one.

It is often suggested that the unions control the ALP. However, the Party, especially its parliamentarians, exercise a good deal of independence from the unions. The behaviour of the ALP, especially in Government, is not determined solely by its social base. To form government the Party must be committed to managing the process of national capital accumulation, as Labor attempts to balance between the both its base and the demands of national or state government. The independence of the parliamentarians and the demands of economic management can lead to conflicts between the Party bureaucracy on the one hand and unions and the working class on the other. According to Phil Griffiths,

The belief that the ALP, given the way it is organised and its history, is more concerned about the interests of workers means that Labor in government can pursue policies which would attract more immediate hostility from workers if they were carried out by the Conservatives. Under Labor in the 1980's this situation was institutionalised in the Prices and Incomes Accord.

The social impact of the Accord on workers was documented in the previous chapter. How did the role and nature of the trade union bureaucracy and the Labor Party fit into this process? At the core of the trade union bureaucracy's approach to industrial relations is an emphasis on negotiation and compromise with, rather than struggle against, employers and the government. The ALP leadership balances between representing workers and the demands of national capital accumulation. In the context of sustained economic crisis, high levels of unemployment and low levels of class struggle, this balance shifted in favour of way maintaining the process of competitive capital accumulation. The Accord years are entirely explicable in terms of this theory. The unions became 'partners' in government decision making in return for delivering industrial peace and economic stability. According to Bramble, the unions' adoption of 'strategic unionism' meant that they:

The union leadership played a key role in facilitating the restructuring and deregulation of the Australian economy. This occurred through the Accord itself and through union representation on a range of other government and Tripartite decision making forums. Union officials, especially those on the industrial left, played a decisive role in securing wage restraint and productivity for management. Unions which launched wage claims above and outside the Accord were dealt with strongly. The ACTU and key left unions supported the deregistration of the Builders Labourer's Federation (BLF) in 1986 and stood by while Labor used of the armed forces to break the Pilots strike in 1989.

Despite senior officials' 'privileged access' to the Hawke-Keating government, the unions underwent an internal crisis. Union membership fell from 40.5 per cent when Labor took office in 1983, to 31 per cent in 1996. The burden of structural adjustment was increasingly based on workers through labour intensification and job insecurity. After 1993 the ACTU even accepted the prospect of non-union Enterprise Agreements. As Paul Kelly suggested in 1993:

The commitment to international competitiveness and market forces, became electorally self defeating. The ALP and the unions hammered their working class base. As we have seen an important factor in Labor's 1996 election defeat was the behaviour of blue and white collar workers earning under $30 000 per annum.

The Hawke-Keating years influenced the nature of the ACTU campaign against the Coalition offensive in 1996. Minority working class anger and the wider mood of disenchantment, examined in the previous chapter, explain the ACTU's success in mobilising large numbers of workers. However, under the Accord the level of rank and file activism reached historically low levels. In 1994 the number of strikes reached a fifty year low. This was partly due to the re-emergence of mass unemployment which sapped workers self-confidence.

However, as Rick Kuhn suggests, 'The ACTU endorsement of years of wage cutting through the mid-1980s, followed by its promotion of work intensification and labour shedding, led to further disillusionment with the union movement at its grassroots ... In some core industries union workplace organisation began to wither.' The initiative in setting union policy passed from shop floor participation to the senior full-time officials cloistered in industrial tribunals, government and industry forums, and in the offices of the bureaucratically amalgamated 'super unions'. As the ALP's report into its election loss put it:

During the Accord years, the absence of high levels of rank and file pressure meant that the union bureaucracy was shaped by other forces. Labor was shifting to the right under the impact of the demands of capital. The ACTU was pulled with it. The bureaucracy's link to the ALP and its commitment to negotiation and compromise meant that it maintained the Accord for 13 years, even when it became undermined the unions themselves.

After March 1996 the ACTU faced an unfavourable conjuncture. The economic climate and a weakened union movement were favourable for the new Coalition Government to implement its more confrontationist approach to industrial relations and public expenditure. The Government and employers believed that they no longer needed the co-operation of union officials to push through reductions in wages and conditions, cuts to the public sector and more stringent and decentralised industrial relations laws. Nevertheless, union leaders sought negotiation and compromise. Their core strategy was parliamentary in focus. A moderated form of the Workplace Relations Bill was accepted as inevitable. Amendments to the bill could be negotiated through the minor parties in the Senate, especially the Democrats. The broader campaign of raising 'public awareness' of the effects of the Coalitions policies was coordinated with the ALP's electoral strategy.

There was however, rising pressure from below. The public rallies and mass meetings were very well attended. As previously discussed, they were a chance for a minority to protest years of economic rationalism. Between March and August momentum gathered and the ACTU campaign of lobbying attracted a 'mass' quality involving large public rallies and a broad 'community campaign'. Pressure mounted on the ACTU to call a national 24 hour general strike. This was a notable demand raised by the ACTU delegates meeting in Melbourne on 28 May. A minority of rank and file workers wanted to express their anger against the Coalition through militant action. But the legacy of the Accord was contradictory. Minority anger and widespread dissent accompanied a lack of widespread rank and file self-confidence and militancy. The pressure from below was not coherent or great enough to substantially modify the ACTU's campaign strategy. Hence the compromise position of 'mass lobbying' involving a round of public demonstrations and the Cavalcade to Canberra.

The Cavalcade was intended to be the pinnacle of the developing, generalised national protest movement. It brought those most angry at the recent round of attacks together for the one demonstration, at Parliament House in Canberra. The SMH summed up the situation well. The national protest was:

When the opportunity presented itself, Parliament House became the focus for a good deal more attention than the official platform. According to rally participant Patrick Brownlee in a letter to The Australian:

A minority took matters into their own hands, by attempting to gain entry to the building. Long after the official part of the rally had wound up and gone home the battle was still underway at the main doors. The national protest provided the space for a very public display of pent up anger.

The ACTU and ALP shifted further to right in the wake of August 19. The bureaucracy came under sustained attack from the Government and media for having 'lost control' of a section of its own movement. The ACTU chose to condemn the rioters, rather than the Government for creating the situation. It also accepted Howard's argument that the rioters were outside the 'mainstream' of Australia's political traditions. It condemned the riot and forced organisers that were involved to resign. The attack on parliament went completely against the labour bureaucracy's predisposition, that is, to negotiating and compromise, its deep commitment to the institutions of parliament and desire to avoid 'head to head' confrontations with the state and capital.

The lack of rank and file self-organisation among workers which was independent of the bureaucracy and organised to directly pressure the bureaucracy and the lack of militancy among wider sections of workers was crucial to the ACTU's response to the riot. This was illustrated by differing responses to the riot within the union bureaucracy itself. Some right-wing unions saw the opportunity to pursue factional interests by supporting the Government position that the ACTU and certain left unions were responsible. Left union leaders in part rejected this attack. Left union leaders moreover also faced more pressure from their rank and file. The National Secretary of the Construction and General Division of the CFMEU, John Sutton, for instance, did not publicly condemn the actions of his members:

CFMEU members and even some low level full-time union organisers, had been actively involved in the riot. A minority of workers had moved rapidly into militancy on August 19. When they returned to work, however, this minority was again isolated. The shared militancy and self-confidence at the demonstration was transient. It had not been experienced by broader sections of the working class. Consequently the ACTU, under more pressure from above than below, condemned the riot.

The Labor party leadership was under even less pressure from rank and file workers. As we have seen, the ALP leadership was concerned to distance itself as much as possible from the riot. It sought to appeal to the ‘mainstream’ and present itself as a respectable opposition. After the Weipa dispute in November 1997 Bill Kelty had made a speech promising a wages 'breakout' and a 'the biggest picket line in history' if a Coalition Government tried to introduce further industrial relations changes. Senior Labor figures shunned his statements and the Coalition and the media branded Kelty as the instigator of social division and industrial mayhem. Some political commentators suggest Kelty's speech was a significant factor in blunting the union movements pre-1996 election campaign and delivering votes to the Coalition. The Canberra Times likened the political effects of the riots 'ugly display of union thuggery' to those of Kelty's speech.

Within the Labor party 'August 19' also reinforced a similar right wing explanation of the 1996 election result – that the ALP was out of touch with ‘mainstream’ Australia and beholden to minorities. According to the former Keating Labor Special Minister for State, Gary Johns, the 'electorate was sick of listening to the chant of rights - the greens, gays, feminists and disabled.' The riot strengthened the argument within the Labor party that it should adopt a more cautious and 'responsible' approach to Opposition. This would involve avoiding alienating the more right-wing sentiments of 'mainstream' Australia.

As the ACTU and ALP shifted further to the right in the aftermath of the riot, the ACTU campaign disintegrated. The union retreat and Government campaign over 'August 19' left a temporary vacuum in the Australian politics. Widespread disenchantment with increasing economic insecurity and the major political representatives and institutions had been given expression by the movement against the Government's policies. When the Labor leadership retreated and with it the movement against the Government's policies it vacated a space in Australian politics. The disillusionment and even anger among wide numbers of people did not disappear, but it lacked any organised movement and leadership to cohere it and give it expression.

What is interesting from surveying the press of the period is the manner in which this vacuum appears to be seamlessly filled by the rise of the Right wing populism of MP Pauline Hanson. The thread of continuity was that malleable concept, 'mainstream Australians'. It served to reinforce Howard's message that 'middle Australia' wanted the Coalition to be given a fair chance to govern. This fitted in with Howard's careful signals to the electorate in the lead up to the federal election and after taking office, that his Government would be a government 'for all of us', in particular for 'mainstream Australia'. This implied the outsiders be they 'politically correct minorities' or the 'lunatic fringe'. The government, like 'mainstream Australia', just wanted a fair chance without being intimidated by bloody mindedness unionists and politically correct elites. In this context the right wing shift of the ALP also had consequences. In the ensuing ‘race debate' of late 1996 Labor was conspicuously meek.

I have argued that the union and labor movement retreat, and the conservatism of the trade union leaders in the aftermath of the riot was historically contingent on the level of struggle among rank and file workers. The introduction of the Workplace Relations Act and cutbacks to public expenditure was the union movement's first major battle under the Coalition Government. The WRA set the legal parameters for the Maritime dispute in 1998. This was the second major battle. However the nature of the employer and Government attack on one of the most well organised and industrially self-confident groups of workers, the MUA, provoked a high level of rank and file resistance. In the course of the dispute mass picket lines and solidarity demonstrations took place. Despite an initial concern to avoid 'provocation' and maintain 'peaceful assemblies' rather than militant mass pickets, the ACTU leadership of the union movement was forced accommodate militant tactics. This included resisting police attempts to break picket lines, and mass picketing in the face of legal injunctions under the WRA. ACTU Assistant Secretary Greg Combet even said during the dispute 'that the laws were made against workers, and bad laws have to be broken.'