When the Commonwealth of Australia was founded in 1901, the very last thing the nation wanted to be was multicultural. The measures taken to ensure this would be the case not only caused great human suffering, but in a supreme historical irony, actually helped create the very threat Australia feared the most – invasion from the Asian north.
The Second World War had far reaching effects on the history of the ‘Immigration Nation’. With no Asian migrants allowed and the pool of available Britons decreasing, Australia faced a crisis. Not only were there fears that Australia couldn’t defend itself, experts also believed the country would not grow economically without more people. So the nation’s first ever Immigration Minister, Arthur Calwell, made a momentous decision to bring in non-British European immigrants for the first time.
Despite causing widespread criticism overseas, in the 1950s under the Menzies government, Australia’s whites only immigration policy seemed as popular as ever. Indeed the rise of Communism in the region added extra justification to the need to prevent Asians entering the country.