Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 411A R T I C L E
Discourse & Society
Copyright © 2007
SAGE Publications
(Los Angeles, London, New Delhi
and Singapore)
www.sagepublications.com
Vol 18(4): 411–436
10.1177/0957926507077427
Constructions of racism in the
Australian parliamentary debates
on asylum seekers
D A N I E L L E E V E R Y
U N I V E R S I T Y O F S O U T H A U S T R A L I A
M A R T H A A U G O U S T I N O S
U N I V E R S I T Y O F A D E L A I D E , A U S T R A L I A
A B S T R A C T The proliferation of the subtle and slippery nature of the new
racism has made it increasingly difficult to define racism and to develop
an effective anti-racist rhetoric with which to challenge it. To explore the
implications of the new racism for anti-racist discourse, this article uses
discourse analysis to examine the parliamentary speeches of politicians
opposing Australia’s new asylum-seeking laws for what these refugee
advocates challenge and make accountable as racist. Using a corpus of
the 2001 Australian Hansard speeches on the MV Tampa, amendments to
the Migration Act, and the Border Protection Bill 2001 as data we identify
four ways in which the government’s representation of asylum seekers was
constructed as racist. These included: the use of categorical generalizations
in talk about asylum seekers, the unequal treatment of asylum seekers
compared with other categories of ‘illegal’ immigrants, talk about the
nation and cultural-difference-talk. We demonstrate how articulating these
constructions of racism in political discourse (and no doubt, in everyday
talk) is a socially delicate conversational act that was carefully managed. We
suggest that anti-racism strategies must take this issue of the complex nature
of making an accusation of racism into account, and search for ways to
articulate such accusations in a hostile political climate.
K E Y W O R D S : anti-racism, asylum seekers, new racism, political discourse, racism
The categorical denial of racism and the simultaneous exclusion, oppression and
demonization of minorities is a defining feature of contemporary responses to
out-groups such as asylum seekers. This is true of Australia’s asylum policies, in
which the mandatory detention of asylum seekers, including children, in isolated
and inhospitable desert prisons was defended in parliament as ‘not draconian,
racist or discriminatory’ (MP Crosio, House of Representatives Hansard, 23/8/01:
30130).
412 Discourse & Society 18(4)
The expression of negative views of others coupled with discursive strat-
egies used to present these views as ‘not racist’ has been referred to as ‘new’ or
‘modern’ racism, which denies being racist, in contrast to ‘old-fashioned racism’,
which was less ambiguous in terms of its racist agenda. Billig (1988) explains
this shift as a response to the contemporary social taboo against expressing
unjustified negative views against out-groups. He argues that general norms
and values against irrationality prohibit blatant forms of prejudice, which,
since the Enlightenment, has come to be understood primarily as an irrational,
unreasonable and subjective/emotional response (Billig, 1988; Van Dijk, 1992).
In view of this, speakers attempt to maintain a ‘rational’ subject position by strat-
egically working up their views as reasonable, and framing their talk in such a
way as to undermine or prevent possible charges of prejudice. Those who wish to
express negative views against out-groups take care to construct these views as
legitimate, warranted and rational (Rapley, 2001), denying, mitigating, justifying
and excusing negative acts and views towards minorities in order to position
themselves as decent, moral, reasonable citizens (Condor et al., 2006).
An extensive body of discursive research has accumulated on this new
racism in western liberal democracies, including the Netherlands (Van Dijk,
1984, 1987, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1997; Verkuyten, 1997, 1998, 2001, 2005),
Belgium (Blommaert and Verschueren, 1998), Austria (Sedlak, 2000; Wodak and
Matouschek, 1993), Spain (Rojo, 2000; Rojo and Van Dijk, 1997), South Africa
(Barnes et al., 2001; Seidel, 1988), the UK (Barker, 1981; Billig, 1988; Billig et al.,
1988; Condor, 1988, 2000; Condor et al., 2006; Gilroy, 1987; Lynn and Lea, 2003;
Reeves, 1983), the USA (Mehan, 1997; Santa Ana, 1999; Thiesmeyer, 1995),
Greece (Figgou, 2002; Figgou and Condor, 2006), New Zealand (Abel, 1996;
McCreanor, 1993a, 1993b, 1993c; Nairn and McCreanor, 1990, 1991;
Praat, 1998; Tilbury, 1998; Wetherell and Potter, 1992) and Australia (Anti-
discrimination Board of NSW, 2003; Augoustinos, 2001; Augoustinos et al.,
1999a, 1999b, 2005; Clyne, 1995, 2001; LeCouteur, 2001; LeCouteur and
Augoustinos, 2001; LeCouteur et al., 2001; O’Doherty, 2001; Rapley, 1998,
2001; Saxton, 2003).
Collectively, this research has detailed several pervasive features of contem-
porary discourse that denies, rationalizes and excuses the dehumanization and
marginalization of, and discrimination against, minority out-groups, including
asylum seekers. These include denials such as the ubiquitous disclaimer ‘I’m not
racist but . . . ’ (Van Dijk, 1992). More subtle strategies for deflecting a prejudiced
identity can also be employed. For example, Lynn and Lea (2003) identify the
differentiation of asylum seekers into ‘genuine’ and ‘bogus’ as one such way to
bring off a criticism of asylum seekers that simultaneously appears ‘reasonable’
(Billig, 1988). Their analysis shows that letters to the editor of a UK newspaper
protected claims such as ‘refugees are housed ahead of homeless British citizens’,
which may be countered as unreasonable, erroneous and prejudiced, by following
this with a disclaimer ‘No one begrudges genuine refugees a home, but when
bogus ones are housed within weeks . . .’. This presents the writer’s anger as a
justifiable response to bogus refugees, a group which commonsensically should
not receive housing.
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 413
New racist strategies to present practices of exclusion and oppression as
legitimate also include the deployment of liberal tropes of equality and fairness
(Augoustinos et al., 2005; Katz and Hass, 1988; Kinder and Sears, 1981;
McConahay, 1986; Wetherell and Potter, 1992). This was used to particular effect
in the asylum-seeker debates in claims that asylum seekers were ‘queue jumpers’.
As Gelber (2003) has argued, culturally, the queue represents a central ideal of
modern bureaucratic democracies, that impartial decision-making is unaffected
by distinguishing status characteristics such as class, race or health. The queue
is claimed to be rational and impartial, in the sense that decisions are made
according to rules, rather than subjective criteria. To present asylum seekers
as ‘jumping the queue’, therefore, presents them as violating the impersonal
criterion of waiting in line and therefore of fairness. This queue analogy can be
used to good effect to discredit asylum seekers, whilst at the same time protecting
negative opinions and practices against asylum seekers as ‘standing up for
fairness’ rather than as prejudiced.
Exclusion and oppression may also be warranted and presented as ‘not
racist’ through recourse to nationalist discourses. In this new racist strategy,
the exclusion of groups such as asylum seekers is warranted as the legitimate
enforcement of national boundaries and the protection of the national interest.
Saxton (2003) demonstrates that letters to the editor opposing asylum seekers
drew upon themes of familiarity, security and a sense of community to present
Australia as our home and asylum seekers as unfamiliar, threatening and
socially disruptive. These discourses draw upon commonsense conceptions of
national sovereignty, national rights and a national character to justify calls
to ‘turn them back’ as a legitimate defence of the national space and identity.
Similarly, exclusionary views and practices can be legitimated and warranted
through the use of culture, rather than race, as a marker of difference. Wetherell
and Potter (1992), in their examination of Pakeha (white New Zealanders) talk
about Maoris, found that although references to race were still common, racial
explanations of social relationships (i.e. those emphasizing biological differences
as the basis of racial superiority and inferiority) were no longer used. They found
that culture, constructed as a naturally occurring (and irrefutable) difference
between people, took over some of the same tasks as race in terms of naturalizing
inequality and legitimating oppression and exclusion. In this culture-as-natural-
difference discourse, the Other is constituted as inferior in their cultural practices,
attitudes and values, and as a threat to the dominant culture.
The deployment of a culture-as-natural-difference discourse was utilized in
the negative differentiation of asylum seekers in the Australian debates on this
issue. Corlett (2002) highlights that arguments in support of the exclusion of
asylum seekers were organized around a central premise – that the ‘alien culture’
of asylum seekers threatened Australian ‘culture’. This was particularly made
use of during what has become known as the ‘children overboard affair’ in which
asylum seekers were falsely accused by the Australian government of throwing
their children overboard to blackmail their way into receiving protection (Mares,
2002). Government ministers, such as the then Minister for Immigration and
414 Discourse & Society 18(4)
Indigenous Affairs, Philip Ruddock, used this event to build a widely accepted
message that
parents from different backgrounds to ‘Australians’ are incapable of understanding
the significance of their actions because they do not, as a result of their cultural and
religious backgrounds, share the deep emotional attachment to their children as ‘we’
do. (Corlett, 2002: 46)
The Prime Minister John Howard later consolidated this message of cultural
difference in the soon to become ubiquitous phrase ‘I don’t want people like that
here’ (Saxton, 2003). Claims such as these are produced as a rational, reasonable
justification for the exclusion of asylum seekers, and are defended as ‘not racist’
on the grounds that speakers are not referring to race and racial difference.
An important function of these new racist strategies and their deployment in
the asylum-seeker debates is the contestation of what counts, and what does not
count, as racism. Those supporting policy measures to mandatorily detain asylum
seekers, or to turn back their boats before they reach Australian waters, present
these practices as the necessary protection of Australian culture and values,
Australian national borders and sovereignty, the defence of equality and the
legitimate exclusion of ‘bogus’ asylum seekers. Despite the extensive academic
work that concludes that such discourse is racist, oppressive and exclusionary
in its effects, the commonsense consensus is that Australian discourse and
practices in relation to asylum seekers (and Australia/ns in general) are not racist
(Hage, 1998). In such a context, how can those who position themselves as anti-
racists and refugee advocates contest the popular denial that the imprisonment,
vilification and dehumanization of asylum seekers is racist?
Challenging what does and does not count as racist is a particularly salient
and urgent issue for anti-racism and for refugee advocacy given that presenting
something as racist is a way of presenting it as inappropriate and morally wrong.
However, in doing so, advocates must wade into a highly charged and defensive
public, political and academic struggle over definitions of racism. The research
on new racism demonstrates the many ways in which talk may be presented as
not racist. In examining what does count as racist, however, research on repre-
sentations of racism in social psychology, politics, the media and everyday talk
demonstrates that there is no single, consensual definition of racism. Rather, this
work, a summary of which is presented below, highlights that there are multiple
ways of defining racism and prejudice.
Billig (1988; Billig et al., 1988) identifies two common understandings of
racism, both of which emerged from Enlightenment concerns with rationality
and equality: racism as a subjective, irrational judgement; and racism as unequal
or discriminatory treatment. Figgou (2002) identifies multiple understandings
of racism in evidence in social psychological texts including, as Billig also
found, racism as irrational generalizations about out-groups, but also racism
as the attribution of differences to biological rather than social factors. Figgou
(2002) and Figgou and Condor (2006) demonstrated the variable discursive
constructions of racism and prejudice in everyday talk. In interviews concerning
the settlement of Albanian refugees in Greece, the interviewees displayed multiple
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 415
understandings of racism and prejudice: prejudice as irrational categorical
accounting; prejudice as intolerance of difference; prejudice as internal attri-
butions for negative social acts; and prejudice as antipathy towards lower status
groups. In their interviews with middle class second-generation Bangladeshis
in the UK, Ahmed et al. (2000) found that racism was constructed as a problem
of the past rather than of the present, but also as a present but hidden phenom-
enon. These definitions are oriented to the particular context in which they
are deployed: for example, to deny racism in oneself and one’s fellow nationals
(Figgou, 2002; Figgou and Condor, 2006), or to avoid labelling someone or
something as racist (Ahmed et al., 2000).
This previous research on the social construction of racism demonstrates
that there is no singular, uncontested definition of what counts as racist.
Rather, there are multiple ways in which this concept is defined. In this article,
we are interested in how racism is defined in the anti-racist context of refugee
advocacy. That is, we analyse the social construction of racism in the Australian
parliamentary debates on asylum seekers. This is of particular interest given
the widespread consensus, propagated in new racist discourse, that Australia’s
current policies towards asylum seekers are not racist. We focus on instances in
which advocates count as ‘racist’ talk and actions that have been constructed
in new racism discourse as ‘not racist’. These include the following constructions:
categorical generalizations; the differential treatment of asylum seekers and
other unauthorized migrants; talk about the nation; and cultural-difference
talk. We analyse these instances in terms of the multiple and conflicting ways in
which this talk may be understood simultaneously as racist and not racist, and
the discursive resources upon which advocates draw in making talk and actions
against asylum seekers morally accountable as racist.
The data
The data for this article are from the Australian Hansard, a written record of
speeches in the Australian parliament in both the Senate (upper house) and the
House of Representatives (lower house), on the introduction of new asylum-
seeker legislation during 2001. Electronic versions of speeches in the parliament
were sourced from www.aph.gov.au.
An advantage of examining political talk is that politicians are part of what
Van Dijk (2000) terms ‘the elites’: those who occupy positions of socioeconomic
advantage, influence and power. Van Dijk (2000) argues that elites are highly
influential in issues such as immigration, being responsible for drafting and
administering immigration policies and laws, and through their greater access
to the media. According to Van Dijk:
If . . . elite groups . . . engage in discrimination against immigrants or minorities,
the consequences are considerable: the ‘Other’ will not be allowed into the country
in the first place, or they will not get a job, or they will not be promoted in their job,
will not get decent housing, or the mass media or textbooks will spread negative
stereotypes about them . . . the role of leading politicians, journalists, corporate
416 Discourse & Society 18(4)
managers, teachers, scholars, judges, police officers and bureaucrats, among others,
is crucial for the (un)equal access to material or symbolic resources in society.
(Van Dijk, 2000: 15–16)
Conversely, when elites mobilize against intolerance, discrimination, prejudice
and racism, and use their position to influence public opinion in this way, it is pos-
sible that popular resentment against groups such as asylum seekers may well
be lessened (Van Dijk, 2000). Analysing politicians’ talk allows the researcher
to examine the discursive resources employed in a highly influential context for
the ways in which these elites disseminate, reinforce and challenge popular views
about asylum seekers.
Our methodology is informed by critical discourse analysis (CDA; Fairclough,
1995; Van Dijk, 1996), and the development of this approach in psychology
in the early work of Potter and Wetherell (1987) as well as Billig (1988, 1991),
Edwards (1997), Edwards and Potter (1992), Potter (1996) and Wetherell (1998).
Broadly, this approach analyses how talk and texts are socially organized to
achieve local actions, such as identity management, as well as ideological effects
that rationalize and legitimate oppression. It examines both the broad patterns
and themes within talk (interpretative repertoires or discourses), as well as the
resources and linguistic tools through which accounts are imbued with the status
of fact and truth. It also examines how accounts are organized argumentatively,
i.e. how they are designed to compete with alternative versions of social reality
(Billig et al., 1988).
The first stage of analysis involved identifying all exchanges that referred
to the topics of racism, prejudice and discrimination. The coding for this was
broad and included: race (and its derivatives), bigot (and derivatives), xenophobia,
demonization, hate, fear, division, ethnic, Muslim, Arab, dog-whistling and
Pauline Hanson.1 The second stage of analysis involved identifying regularities
in the accounts and indexing the material according to common patterns of
what was being constituted as racist (Wetherell, 1998). Having identified the
key understandings of prejudice/racism that politicians were reproducing,
analysis then focused on similarities to and differences from discursive work on
the racialization of asylum seekers and definitions of racism that have emerged
in the discourse on new racism.
BACKGROUND TO THE DATA
Australia’s relationship with immigrants and refugees has been both wel-
coming and hostile (Jupp, 2002). However, over the last ten years, with the
periodic arrival of boats of asylum seekers mostly from ‘Asia’ and the ‘Middle
East’, refugee policies have become more oppressive, focused on ‘keeping
them out’, including punishing those who are already here as a deterrent to
other potential asylum seekers (Mares, 2002). These policy changes included
mandatory detention for all boat arrivals (including children), who remain
incarcerated until all court procedures are complete and they are either granted
access to Australia or deported (or, in cases of statelessness, forced to remain
incarcerated indefinitely), and temporary rather than permanent protection
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 417
for boat arrivals (Mares, 2002). However, the events, debates and policy changes
of 2001 marked a turn towards even more aggressive and oppressive policies
(Marr and Wilkinson, 2003).
The arrival of the MV Tampa in 2001, which occurred two weeks before
the September 11 attacks, and the later arrival of other boats carrying asylum
seekers primarily from Iraq and Afghanistan, brought a long-running debate
on asylum seekers and refugees to the fore of an election campaign. The Tampa,
a Norwegian shipping vessel, rescued 438 people who were on their way to
Australia to request asylum. The Australian government, however, denied
the Norwegian ship entry into Australian waters. The Tampa was boarded by
Australian SAS troops who transferred the asylum seekers to the small, im-
poverished island nation of Nauru for resettlement through the UNHCR, in a
hastily established processing centre (Marr and Wilkinson, 2003).
A second boat of asylum seekers arriving soon after were accused of throw-
ing their children overboard. The Australian Navy had intercepted the Olong,
carrying 223 asylum seekers, on its way to Christmas Island, as part of Operation
Relex (a project to turn around boats carrying asylum seekers). They began to
escort the boat back to Indonesia; however, the ship began to sink, forcing the
Navy to rescue those on board. Philip Ruddock, then the Minister for Immigration
and Indigenous Affairs, claimed that those on board had thrown their children
overboard in an attempt to blackmail the Australian government into granting
them asylum (Marr and Wilkinson, 2003).
In the wake of the Tampa and the subsequent boat arrivals, further legislative
measures were introduced extending the punitive regime already established
by mandatory detention and temporary visas. On 26 and 27 September 2001,
seven bills relating to asylum seekers were rushed into law. These amendments
to the Migration Act 1958 removed the right of appeal of asylum decisions to
the Federal Court; allowed the minister to draw adverse inferences about asylum
seekers who do not have identity documents; excised islands from Australia’s
migration zone preventing people landing there from claiming asylum in
Australia; allowed Australian authorities to board vessels, tow them back out to
sea, detain the passengers and remove them to another country; and redefined
‘persecution’ and ‘serious harm’ more narrowly.
Analysis and discussion
Our analysis identified four ways of talking about asylum seekers that were com-
monly constructed as racist by refugee advocates in the Australian parliament,
and which have also been presented as ‘not racist’ in defences of Australia’s
policies against asylum seekers. These include:
• the use of categorical generalizations about asylum seekers;
• the unequal treatment of asylum seekers compared with other, similar,
groups;
• talk-about-national-sovereignty;
• culture-as-natural-difference talk.
418 Discourse & Society 18(4)
RACISM AS CATEGORICAL GENERALIZATIONS
According to Billig (1988), the formulation of categorical generalizations as
racist has its roots in the Enlightenment, where the concept of prejudice was
first mobilized to differentiate between ‘rational’ science and the ‘irrational’
(prejudiced) church. During the twentieth century, prejudice acquired its con-
temporary association with race, when the attribution of homogeneity to racial
groups, and the positioning of these groups in a social hierarchy of inferiority
and superiority, became widely considered to be fallacious and irrational. The
use of negative racial categorical generalizations became less widely accepted
as being an objective judgement of the facts (of either out-group hetereogeneity
or universal social diversity [Figgou, 2002]) and was criticized as subjective and
irrational, i.e. as prejudiced (Billig, 1988). It is most often negative generalizations
that are seen as problematic, especially those that imply that the Other is inher-
ently inferior, and that We, as a group, are inherently superior on crucial values
such as honesty.
Constituting these negative, superior/inferior categorical generalizations
as racist is commonplace in social psychological accounts of racism. According
to Figgou (2002), Katz and Braly (1933) were the first to formulate racism as
fallacious categorization (stereotyping). The conceptualization of racism as rigid
categorical thinking is also dominant in Adorno’s theory of the authoritarian
personality, in Allport’s influential work on the nature of prejudice, and in social
cognition models of prejudice (Figgou, 2002).
However, a number of studies of social psychological texts, political dis-
course, and participants’ talk in interviews and focus groups, have noted a
pervasive presentation of categorical generalizations as not racist, but as factual
representations of groups. Condor (1988) and Hopkins et al. (1997) examine
the construction of racial categorizations as cognitive representations of
‘real’ differences between groups, and of this categorizing process as natural
and value-free. For example, social cognitive researchers such as Stephan and
Rosenfield (1982, cited in Condor, 1988: 79) argue that ‘[t]he major function
of attaching labels to different racial and ethnic groups is to impose order on a
chaotic social environment’, implying that these categories reflect real-world,
observable differences between groups. Similarly, forming generalizations about
ethnic groups (stereotyping) has also been constituted as a value-free cognitive
process, as in this example from Taylor (1981, cited in Condor, 1988: 77): ‘Stereo-
types, both benign and pernicious, evolve to describe categories of people, just
as sunsets are characterised as colourful or balls as round.’
Following this, in the Australian debate on Indigenous land rights, Pauline
Hanson claimed that identifying a criminal as ‘Aboriginal’ was not racist but
‘honest’ (Rapley, 2001), whilst Van Dijk (1991) found that journalists justify their
ethnic marking of criminals in media reports as not racist, but ‘telling the truth’.
These researchers argue that the presentation of categorical generalizations as
‘fact’ has the effect of reproducing potentially discriminatory opinions as ‘not
racist’. This justification of racial categorization as ‘factual accounting’ has been
identified as a strategy of new racism (Van Dijk, 1991) and as evidence of the
increasingly accepted racialization of Australian politics (Rapley, 2001).
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 419
It is of significant interest then, that in the debates on asylum seekers in the
Australian parliament, refugee advocates drew upon these intellectual resources
to constitute negative categorical generalizations of asylum seekers as indeed
racist. In this first extract, an interaction between Senators Brown, of the
Australian Greens, and McGauran, of the National Party, which forms a coalition
with the Liberal Party as the Australian government, Brown constitutes as racist
McGauran’s categorization of fraudulent asylum seekers as ‘Pakistanis’.
Extract 1 The member for racial discrimination
1. Brown I keep hearing the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural
Affairs on our airwaves about what rotters these asylum seekers are.
2. He says that some of them actually have money in their pockets;
they have paid intermediaries.
3. McGauran Pakistanis.
4. Brown ‘Pakistanis’ interjects the not helpful member for racial
discrimination opposite.
[Unrecorded interjections]
5. Brown He can discriminate who they are from where he is sitting.
6. I do not happen to have the information, but he interjects, so he
must know.
(Senator Bob Brown, Australian Greens, and Senator Julian McGauran,
National Party, Senate Hansard, 24/9/01: 27723)
Senator McGauran’s interjection ‘Pakistanis’ (l. 3) follows Senator Brown’s
report of the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs (Philip Ruddock)
calling asylum seekers ‘rotters’ and ‘economic migrants’ (ll. 1–2). McGauran’s
interjection categorizes these ‘rotters’ as Pakistanis (thereby supporting the claim
attributed to Ruddock that they are not refugees but are indeed bogus economic
migrants). Senator Brown takes up this interjection and accuses Senator
McGauran of being ‘the not helpful member for racial discrimination’ (l. 4).
This is followed by unrecorded interjections. (In the Australian parliament,
interjections are only included in the transcript if they are referred to by the
speaker.)
Brown constitutes ‘Pakistani’ as an erroneous categorical generalization by
challenging the truth status (and thereby the rationality) of this claim. ‘He can
discriminate who they are from where he is sitting’ (l. 5) implies that ‘Pakistanis’
is not a claim founded on empirical evidence – McGauran has not himself seen the
asylum seekers, nor, implicitly, can nationality be determined simply by looking –
McGauran is merely making an unfounded claim while sitting in his chair in
parliament. The likely veracity of McGauran’s claim is further undermined
when Brown goes on to say: ‘I do not happen to have the information, but he
interjects, so he must know’ (l. 6). Again, this implies that McGauran has made
a comment that is not founded on any objective evidence and casts doubt on the
validity of McGauran’s claim. As only McGauran possesses the ‘information’ that
the asylum seekers are Pakistani, whilst Brown and others in the parliament,
who might generally be expected to also have such ‘information’, do not, it is
undermined as a subjective and individual opinion.
420 Discourse & Society 18(4)
As noted, the defence of categorizations, particularly racial categorizations,
as factual, is a key strategy in new racist arguments. However, examining this
particular account suggests that such racial categorizations do not remain
untroubled, but can be constituted as racist, and therefore as morally accountable.
Senator Brown, in this account, re-draws the boundaries of what counts as
racism to include the racial marking of asylum seekers. Far from being defendable
as a mere reporting of the facts, Brown undermines the veracity of McGauran’s
claim that the ‘rotters’ are Pakistanis. He problematizes the claim – how does
McGauran know this? Has he seen them? Even if he had seen them, can we tell
a person’s nationality simply by looking at them? The potential status of racial
categorizations as ‘knowledge’ is called into question in this interaction.
A second example of the constitution of negative categorical generalizations
as racist appears in the Extract 2 from Duncan Kerr, ALP member for Denison in
the House of Representatives, who is speaking on a bill limiting judicial review
of refugee applications.
Extract 2 ‘. . . some will be lying . . . but others will be deserving’
1. It is not right to find ourselves gathering in the parliament of Australia
and describing people who come to this country and seek refuge here
as all – and I use the words that have been used – criminal aliens.
2. This is not language appropriate to such people.
3. Some, of course, will be seeking to abuse the system, some will be
lying, some will be creating false stories and fictions in order that they can make
their claims but others will be deserving; others will require protection.
[. . .]
4. It reminds me of the kind of narrow, dog-whistling populist politics
that sometimes comes up in the lead-up to elections, where we are
hearing the kinds of appeals that the member for Fowler so correctly identified as
associated more with trying to ingratiate oneself with
those who support the odious views of Pauline Hanson.
(MP Duncan Kerr, Australian Labor Party, House Hansard, 6/2/01: 23949)
Line 4 of this account, in which Kerr equates the term ‘criminal aliens’ with
‘narrow, dog-whistling populist politics’ and Pauline Hanson,2 makes it clear
that Kerr is treating the generalized account of all asylum seekers as criminal
aliens, introduced in l. 1, as racist. In ll. 1–3 Kerr constitutes ‘criminal aliens’
as a generalization that is contrary to the fact of the asylum seekers’ diversity
(‘. . . some will be . . . but others . . .’ l. 3). Racism (as categorical generalizations)
is viewed as unreasonable: the generalizations are considered to be ‘inappro-
priate’ (l. 2) and the belief that all asylum seekers are criminals is devalued as
‘trying to ingratiate oneself ’ and as ‘odious’ (l. 4).
Kerr does not deny that there may be ‘some’ liars and cheats among the asylum
seekers. He allows room for a kernel of truth in the representation of asylum
seekers as criminals: there are some who are taking advantage of Australia’s
refugee immigration programme and lying to obtain an humanitarian visa (l. 2).
What Kerr does problematize is the application of the stereotype ‘criminal’ to all
asylum seekers.
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 421
Against the claim that all asylum seekers are criminals, Kerr counterposes
the ‘reality’ of intragroup differences between asylum seekers (‘others will
be deserving; others will require protection’, l. 3). By pointing to intragroup
differences, Kerr also works up his position as rational and reasonable whilst
simultaneously positioning as irrational and unreasonable those using the
categorical generalization ‘criminals’.
As in Brown’s account above, the use of pejorative categories to refer to
asylum seekers is constituted as racist, rather than as a neutral reporting of the
‘facts’. Kerr’s accusation also extends the types of categorical generalizations
that are constituted as racist in these debates – whilst Brown constitutes as
racist the racial marking of asylum seekers, Kerr seeks to constitute as racist the
attribution of criminality to all asylum seekers. In doing so, Kerr is re-producing
the social psychological construction of prejudice as the attribution of negative
stereotypes to a group of people (Figgou, 2002). This is an important challenge
to the hegemonic descriptions of asylum seekers as criminals that formed a
central part of the government’s campaign.
Kerr also constitutes as racist a categorical generalization that does not refer
to race, thereby making an accusation even where talk is de-racialized, suggesting
that this new racist strategy of de-racialization is not always successful in fending
off accusations of racism. However, although the conceptualization of racism as
categorical generalizations is a common one in psychology, the extracts presented
here were the only instances in this data set in which categorical generalizations
were constituted as racist. This suggests that categorical generalizations are not
often being made accountable as racist in this particular context.
RACISM AS UNEQUAL TREATMENT
Another commonplace account of racism and prejudice, both in psychology
and in the current data set, regards the preferential treatment of ethnic–racial
in-groups and the negative, or discriminatory, treatment of ethnic–racial out-
groups. According to Billig et al. (1988) this understanding of racism also has
its roots in Enlightenment thought, specifically in the value placed upon equality,
which proscribes that all people be treated without either negative or positive
bias. This understanding of racism as in-group/out-group bias is also reproduced
in some psychological accounts of racism such as social identity theory (Tajfel
and Turner, 1986) and self-categorization theory (Turner et al., 1987).
However, there is substantial research demonstrating the ways in which
the concept of equality has also been taken up not to challenge exclusionary
views, but to articulate them and present them as justified and warranted. For
example, McConahay (1986) found that opposition to black political demands
in the USA was expressed in terms of unfairness and inequality; that ‘they’ are
getting special privileges, which ‘we’ are not. Billig et al. (1988) also notes this
in relation to the common argument that ‘they’ are not following ‘our’ rules and
are gaining unfair advantages and privileges. This is also common in Australian
debates on Indigenous land rights. For example, Pauline Hanson claimed
that Indigenous people received disproportionate government assistance and
gained unfair advantages through land rights and affirmative action programmes
422 Discourse & Society 18(4)
(Rapley, 2001). Similarly, claims that asylum seekers arriving by boat should
not be allowed into Australia were justified on the basis that, by jumping the
‘queue’, they were receiving unfair advantages over other migrants and refugees
(Corlett, 2002).
Given these conflicting uses of ‘equality’, it is therefore interesting that in
the Australian parliament, refugee advocates utilize the discourse of equality in
order to present the response to asylum seekers arriving by boat on Australia’s
shores as different from that of other migrant groups, and thereby constitute
this response as racist. In this repertoire, two groups are constructed and their
treatment compared. The differential treatment of these groups is attributed
to their different racial composition.
Extract 3 is taken from the House of Representatives speech by Dick Adams
on a bill to restrict asylum seekers’ access to the courts. He constructs the new
asylum-seeker policies as racially discriminatory, as demonstrated by the unequal
treatment of visa over-stayers and boat people.
Extract 3 ‘Maybe . . . those people come from Europe . . .’
1. Thousands of illegal immigrants come in by air or legitimate means;
sometimes they are not touched by the migration people until they are picked
up in the community for other reasons.
2. The government does not seem to be too worried about them.
3. I think there are about 50,000 a year.
4. How many boat people do we have?
5. About 2,500.
6. The previous speaker, the member for Chifley, said we are spending $200
million on the 2,500 or 3,000 boat people.
7. But we have 50,000 people each year who arrive by air and overstay their
visas.
8. This government does not seem to be too worried about that group of people.
9. Maybe it is because most of those people come from Europe, America,
Canada or other white, English-speaking countries.
(MP Dick Adams, Australian Labor Party, House Hansard, 7/2/01: 24039)
As is common in this repertoire, Adams constructs two groups and contrasts
the response to them. One group is the ‘illegal immigrants’ who ‘come in by
air or legitimate means’ (l. 1), the other group is the ‘boat people’ (l. 4). Whilst
the groups are different in terms of the means of their arrival, neither are
‘legal’ immigrants. It is interesting that Adams describes over-stayers as ‘illegal
immigrants’, using the same terminology commonly deployed by the government
to connote asylum seekers. In this context, he takes up, subverts and re-uses
this terminology; by constituting both overstayers and asylum seekers as ‘illegal
immigrants’ Adams can problematize any differences in the way they are
treated.
Adams compares the number of over-stayers and asylum seekers: ‘50,000’
(twice) and ‘about 2,500’ and ‘2,500 to 3,000’ (ll. 5–7). He then argues that,
although there are far more over-stayers than ‘boat people’, there is relatively
little attention paid to them: ‘sometimes they are not touched by the migration
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 423
people until they are picked up in the community for other reasons’ (l. 2) and
‘the government does not seem to be too worried about them’ (twice: ll. 3–4
and 8–9), whilst in relation to the boat people ‘we are spending $200 million on
the 2,400 or 3,000’ (l. 6). Kerr employs a contrast structure here, a rhetorical
device that allows a speaker to contrast two actions in a way that enables moral
inferences to be drawn about those actions (Wooffitt, 1992). Through this con-
trast, a commonsense assumption that greater financial expenditure, resources
and government attention would be focused on the greatest number of illegal
immigrants is seen to be violated. This comparison makes this differential
treatment accountable and sets up the necessity to explain why this imbalance
has occurred.
The comparatively large expenditure on a relatively small number of people
arriving by boat is made sense of as a response to the racial composition of each
group. Adams concludes that: ‘Maybe it is because most of those people come
from Europe, America, Canada or other white, English-speaking countries’
(l. 9). Implicitly, by contrast, the smaller group of boatpeople is non-white and
non-English speaking, presenting the differential treatment of asylum seekers
arriving by boat as racist.
Senators Andrew Bartlett and Christ Schacht also draw upon this same
contrast structure, but using different groups. Extract 4 from Senator Bartlett’s
speech on the Tampa contrasts the unequal treatment of boat people and people
aboard a passenger liner.
Extract 4 ‘If this boat were carrying people from a passenger liner’
1. Let us not kid ourselves that we would be acting the same way if this boat
had anybody else on it other than a boatload of asylum seekers from the
Middle East.
2. If this boat were carrying 100 people who had been rescued from a
passenger liner, Australia would not think twice, and yet they have used
this subterfuge, this extremely technical and highly dubious interpretation
of the Law of the Sea to refuse entry to over 400 asylum seekers – men,
women and children.
(Senator Andrew Bartlett, Australian Democrats,
Senate Hansard, 28/8/01: 26783–4)
Bartlett contrasts two groups – asylum seekers on a boat, and people on a pas-
senger boat – both of whom need to be rescued. In response to the passenger liner
‘Australia would not think twice’ (l. 1) before rescuing its passengers, however,
the asylum seekers have not been rescued but refused entry into Australia based
on a ‘highly dubious interpretation of the Law of the Sea’ (l. 2). This contrast
constructs the response to asylum seekers as abnormal, as well as unequal and
discriminatory. The difference between this particular boat and the wider cat-
egory of people at sea which Bartlett puts forward to explain their differential
treatment is that the ‘asylum seekers [are] from the Middle East’ (l. 1).
In Extract 5, from Senator Schacht’s speech on the excision of islands from
Australia’s migration zone, the differential treatment of asylum seekers is
424 Discourse & Society 18(4)
attributed to Senator Lightfoot’s racial preference for white people. Schacht is an
ALP senator, whilst Lightfoot is a member of the Liberal Coalition government,
who are introducing the new, harsher, asylum policies.
Extract 5 ‘If they were black farmers from Zimbabwe’
1. I tell you what: if unfortunately because of the circumstances in Zimbabwe
with the way the white farmers are being treated – and I do not agree at all
with the way they are being treated; I think that what the Mugabe
government is doing is a disgrace – those farmers fled that country in some
sort of boat and came to Australia Senator Lightfoot would be at Cottesloe
Beach welcoming them with a banner because they are white and they are
farmers and they are from Zimbabwe.
2. But if they were black farmers from Zimbabwe he would be standing at the
shore saying ‘Get out we don’t want you.’
(Senator Chris Schacht, ALP, Senate Hansard, 25/9/01: 27844)
Schacht uses the now familiar contrast structure of two groups and their differ-
ential treatment. Both groups are identified as farmers from Zimbabwe potentially
arriving in Australia by boat; however, one group is white and the other black,
and thus one is welcomed and the other refused. This is attributed to Senator
Lightfoot’s preference for white people over black.
As noted, presenting policies and actions as upholding the principle of equal
treatment is often used to defend them as not racist. However, this same liberal
value of equality is utilized by refugee advocates in order to challenge these same
policies. They are constituted as unfair and discriminatory in order to make these
policies morally accountable as racist.
RACISM AS TALK-ABOUT-THE-NATION
Several researchers examining new racism have found that opposition to Indi-
genous claims, immigration and asylum seeking often employs a discourse of
‘nation’ to legitimate this opposition as ‘not racist’. For example, Barker (1981)
argued that British Conservative politicians concealed racial discrimination and
prejudice within apparently neutral appeals to nationalism. Similarly, Wetherell
and Potter (1992) found that white New Zealanders used the repertoire of ‘we
are all New Zealanders’ to position Maori calls for land rights as divisive and
unwarranted, and to present their opposition to these land rights as ‘not racist’
but patriotic.
However, there is also evidence that the presentation of talk-about-the-nation
as ‘not racist’ exists alongside an understanding of such talk as potentially racist.
Condor (2000) found that national categories were treated as problematic by
interviewees in England, who avoided or otherwise managed any such claims
as they would ‘racist’ talk. By examining interview data for the ways in which
national references are taken up as unproblematic or made accountable as
prejudice, she found that her English respondents treated talk about ‘their
country’ as a delicate topic. She argues that: ‘Far from mobilizing “innocent”
national categories to mask or neutralise potentially accountable racist senti-
ments (Barker, 1981; Reeves, 1983), these respondents seemed inclined to treat
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 425
talk-about-this-country as essentially prejudiced, and (often) as tantamount to
racism’ (Condor, 2000: 193).
The refugee debates in the Australian parliament offer an interesting site
in which to examine the ways in which refugee advocates treat talk-about-
the-nation. In Extract 6, MP Albanese treats Hardgrave’s claim to be ‘standing
for national sovereignty’ as racist. This extract is taken from the end of MP
Hardgrave’s speech supporting the government’s stand on the Tampa.
Extract 6 Sieg Heil!
1. Hardgrave The Australian Labor Party want to create some sort of splittist
agenda in Australia, some sort of racist and religious campaign
to claim the government is not acting properly.
2. Of course, the majority of Australians see through their parlous
and splittist approach to Australian politics and support the
government, because we are standing for national sovereignty.
3. Albanese Sieg Heil!
4. Hardgrave Mr Speaker, the member for Grayndler has made a suggestion
to me which I find highly offensive.
5. In fact, given my track record in defending multicultural
Australia
6. Speaker The member for Moreton will resume his seat.
7. The member for Grayndler will withdraw the remark.
8. Albanese Mr Speaker, I found that speech offensive.
9. All five minutes of it had racist overtones.
(MP Anthony Albanese, Australian Labor Party and MP Gary Hardgrave,
Liberal Party, House Hansard, 30/8/01: 30703)
In a standard reversal move, Hardgrave accuses the Australian Labor Party
(of which Albanese is a member) of running a ‘racist . . . campaign’ (l. 1). In
Hardgrave’s speech, the government and the majority of Australians, who are
allegedly the target of charges of racism, are re-constructed as defendants of
‘national sovereignty’ (l. 2). This is a form of disclaimer: ‘we aren’t racist, we’re
patriotic’. However, the success of such strategic utterances depends ultimately
upon their subsequent reception (Condor et al., 2006). In this case, Albanese
does not take up Hardgrave’s appeals to national sovereignty as socially accept-
able and unproblematic, but responds with ‘Sieg Heil’ (l. 3).
Albanese’s response to Hardgrave’s speech, together with Condor’s (2000)
research, suggests that talk-about-the-nation can count as ‘racist’. However,
neither is this accusation taken up as unproblematic. Hardgrave in turn
responds by re-positioning himself as someone with a ‘track record in defending
multicultural Australia’ (l. 5), once again presenting his position as ‘not racist’.
Hardgrave’s choice to defend himself as a multiculturalist also suggests that
he has heard ‘Sieg Heil’ as an accusation of racism. His reply gives a different gloss
to ‘standing for national sovereignty’ – Hardgrave is standing for a ‘multicultural’
national sovereignty, and is therefore both inclusive and a patriot.
Hardgrave’s response to Albanese’s accusation of racism, and the Speaker’s
ruling that the remark be withdrawn, suggests that constituting talk-about-the-
nation as racist, particularly through recourse to Nazi metaphors, is unlikely to
426 Discourse & Society 18(4)
be taken up as unproblematic. The deployment of terms and symbols associated
with Nazi Germany appears elsewhere in debates about race and immigration,
both to articulate racist views and to challenge them. For example, participants in
Verkuyten’s (1998) study defined racism as extreme violence, such as that of the
Nazis, using this to position their own talk and actions as ‘not racist’. However,
Lynn and Lea (2003) found that challenges to mandatory detention utilized Nazi
metaphors, particularly that of the concentration camp, to make this practice
visible as a morally accountable, racist act. Similarly, Seidel (1988) noted in the
European debates on apartheid that the pro-sanction, anti-racist lobby utilized
Nazi imagery to condemn apartheid. Despite the potential to use Nazism as an
historical discursive resource to condemn present actions, in the current data
corpus there were few examples of Nazi imagery. Its increasing deployment as
a measure of extremism, as suggested by Verkuyten’s findings, may mean that it
is more difficult to justify its use in the context of the asylum-seeker debates.
It is also significant that this extract is the only instance in which talk-about-
the-nation is constituted as racist. This suggests that whilst national discourse
has the potential to be represented and treated as racist (Condor, 2000), pol-
itically, this is not an easy thing to achieve, particularly as appeals to the
nation and the national interest commands considerable rhetorical power. The
construction of the arrival of asylum seekers as a violation of national rights
and sovereignty was hegemonic in the Australian debates. Further, refugee
advocates also deployed constructions of the nation and the national interest
in their defence of asylum seekers. In this context, constituting talk about the
nation as racist could be tantamount to political suicide; however, it meant that
much of the government’s justificatory nationalist discourse was rarely made
morally accountable.
RACISM AS CULTURAL-DIFFERENCE-TALK
Constituting cultural-difference-talk as racist is a relatively recent understanding
of racism in the social sciences more generally, and social psychology more spe-
cifically. In 1981, Barker argued that racist talk was being concealed in a
discourse of culture-as-natural-difference. According to Barker (1981),
immigration restrictions proposed in the UK in the late 1970s were justified by
politicians as a necessary protection for the British ‘way of life’, which it was
claimed was under increasing threat from an influx of foreign cultures. More
recently, Wetherell and Potter (1992) identified the naturalization of cultural
difference as a key strategy in white New Zealanders’ justification of their
opposition to Maori land rights and autonomy. In Australia, Corlett (2002)
examined how the exclusion of asylum seekers was re-framed in the Australian
parliament and media as the preservation of ‘our’ culture. He notes the ways
in which asylum seekers were constituted as culturally different, and culturally
incompatible with ‘Australians’.
Although this view of cultural difference talk as potentially racist is becoming
more widely accepted in academic work on racism, it was not frequently drawn
upon in these debates. However, there was one instance in the Australian parlia-
ment in which cultural-difference-talk was constituted as racist. Extract 7 is from
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 427
Senator Andrew Bartlett of the Australian Democrats, speaking in the debate
on a migration bill amendment to excise islands in Australian waters from the
migration zone, and thereby removing the right of those landing there to invoke
Australia’s asylum process.
Extract 7 ‘. . . a question of difference in civilization . . .’
1. As I said yesterday, in a lot of ways hearing this debate is like being struck
by de ja vu, particularly in relation to this chamber over recent years.
2. The Migration Amendment (Excision from Migration Zone) Bill 2001 is an
enforcement in a literal sense of the Fortress Australia attitude.
3. Many of the statements that have been made – including some of the speeches
we heard from senators during the second reading stage, some of the statements
from ministers and obviously some of the statements in the community and on
talkback radio – would not have been out of place 100 years ago.
4. I have been reading through the Hansard from 100 years ago in relation to the
Immigration Restriction Bill, the bill that introduced the White Australia Policy3
which I mentioned last night.
5. I am not specifically saying that the Migration Amendment (Excision from
Migration Zone) Bill 2001 is promoting White Australia.
6. The bill does not specify details in that respect, but the comparisons between the
bills are nonetheless quite marked – for example, in the rhetoric that was used to
justify excluding people who are unwanted, whom we do not want here.
[. . .]
7. It is fascinating to read the arguments put forward 100 years ago today – a special
centenary – in the House of Representatives on 25 September 1901.
8. Mr Henry Willis, who was the member for Robertson, said: It is our plain duty to
prevent any further influx of these aliens into our midst.
[. . .]
9. Mr Edwards, the member for South Sydney, said: We are afraid that our
civilisation will be permanently injured by contact with a large number of persons
of races belonging to a different civilisation.
10. To my mind, it was not a question of colour at all – as with the current legislation
– but was a question of difference in civilisation.
11. There are very interesting echoes with a lot of the comments around the place
that we cannot let in people with a different way of life.
12. They might be terrorists, they might be criminals.
13. They are people who have paid their way, they are people who have done the
wrong thing; they will be a bad influence on our life.
[. . .]
14. Today, 100 years on from the Immigration Restriction Bill, we are still hearing the
same justifications.
(Senator Andrew Bartlett, Australian Democrats, Senate Hansard, 25/9/01: 27841)
In Extract 7, Bartlett constructs the standard anti-asylum seeker arguments
about cultural difference and homogeneity (some examples of which he gives
in ll. 8 and 9, and 11 to 13) as racist. What is interesting about this extract is
the way in which Bartlett builds his accusation of racism. As noted previously,
the strategy of de-racializing racist arguments through the deployment of more
neutral concepts such as ‘culture’ may pose a problem for anti-racism; namely,
428 Discourse & Society 18(4)
that it is more difficult to justify accusations of racism in a context in which
there is no mention of race. Obviously, the de-racialization of this discourse
serves as a prolepsis against accusations of racism, whereby the speaker has
the ready defence that they have not mentioned race. Bartlett himself orients
to this issue in ll. 5 and 6. In l. 5 he denies that he is making a claim that the
new asylum-seeker bill is a bill restricting the immigration of non-whites into
Australia, as the White Australia Policy did. In l. 6, he offers a concession – that
the bill does not specify details about race. He follows this denial and concession
with the argument that, despite the lack of references to race in this new bill ‘the
comparisons between the bills are nonetheless quite marked’ (l. 6).
Further, he manages the issue of the absence of references to race in the
bill by shifting his critique from the bill itself, to the rhetoric in support of this
bill, a place where he is on stronger ground for claiming that the intentions, if
not the actual wording, are racially exclusionary. He builds his argument that
this rhetoric is racist by citing two claims made in support of the original White
Australia Policy, both of which present non-Anglo immigrants negatively: as
‘aliens’ and as people who will damage ‘our’ civilization, with the implication
that the immigrants are threateningly different and not civilized like ‘us’. Here,
Bartlett is relying upon the understanding of prejudice as the attribution of
negative qualities to ethnic–racial out-groups and the presentation of the
ethnic–racial group of the speaker (white Australians) as a superior group. He
demonstrates that such prejudiced claims are not only relics of the past, but
are being used again in the current rhetoric about asylum seekers in which all
asylum seekers are being negatively categorized as terrorists, criminals, a bad
influence, and doing the wrong thing (ll. 11–13). In these rhetorical moves, he
manages the potential criticism that the present bill and the arguments in defence
of it do not directly refer to race.
In order to warrant his accusation of racism in a context in which race
has not been specifically mentioned, and indeed, in which racism has been
vociferously denied by government ministers and their supporters, Bartlett
strategically works up comparisons between the rhetoric supporting a bill
(the White Australia Policy) that has been widely condemned as racist by both
sides of the political spectrum and the current bill (ll. 7–13). In l. 10, he again
attends to the potential rejoinder that there is no mention of race in these bills by
constituting ‘civilization’ rather than ‘colour’ as the marker of difference relied
on by proponents of the White Australia Policy and by proponents of the current
policies against asylum seekers. In doing so, he is reproducing the identification
of cultural-difference-talk as potentially racist, an argument that has been
central in discursive work on the language of contemporary racism.
Conclusion
Our analysis found that refugee advocates in the Australian parliament consti-
tuted the use of categorical generalizations (both racial categorizations and those
that did not refer explicitly to race), the differential treatment of asylum seekers
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 429
from other categories of ‘illegal’ immigrants, talk-about-national-sovereignty
and cultural-difference-talk as racist. These understandings of racism drew upon
constructions of racism as categorical generalizations and unequal treatment
found in social psychology and in everyday talk (Figgou, 2002; Figgou and
Condor, 2006), and also upon newer understandings of racism as talk about
nation and culture found primarily in research on new racism in the social
sciences (Figgou, 2002).
This analysis also highlighted the ways in which these constructions of racism
challenged the deployment of new racist strategies in these debates. Refugee
advocates in the parliament constituted as racist talk that did not employ racial
categories or imagery, talk-about-national-sovereignty and cultural-difference-
talk, all of which are key new racist strategies for warranting the exclusion of
asylum seekers.
At the same time it is evident that new racism presents particular challenges
for parliamentary refugee advocates making accusations of racism. The analysis
also highlighted that the constitution of ‘criminal aliens’, talk-about-national-
sovereignty and cultural-difference-talk as racist only occurred once in this
corpus of data. Further, in the case of Albanese’s constitution of talk-about-
national-sovereignty as racist (Extract 6), this accusation was not allowed to
stand unchallenged, but was contested by another MP, and led to Albanese being
disciplined by the House Speaker. It is notable that whilst Albanese’s comments
were deemed unacceptable, the comments by Hardgrave that Albanese was
challenging as racist were not required to be withdrawn. Although ‘moderation’
is a feature of political talk (Obeng, 1997), the positioning of new racism as ‘mod-
erate’ and the ruling that Albanese’s naming of new racism as racism was in
contravention of parliamentary moderation points to a public and political shift
in which accusations of racism can be seen as more serious social infringements
than racism itself (Van Dijk, 1992). Further, Bartlett’s careful management of
his constitution of cultural-difference-talk as racist suggests an orientation to
the limited acceptability of such alternative understandings of racism.
How then, do we challenge new racism in a way that is both critical of it, but
that is also able to be heard? Much of the recent attention focused on how to
challenge new racism has centred around the most effective construction/s of
racism for anti-racism campaigns. There are generally two, opposing, points
of view. In the first are those who argue that there are few who can now be
identified as racist according to the narrow historical definition of the term as a
belief that humans can be classified into superior and inferior races. However, it
is argued that many can be identified as racist in terms of the multitude of ways
in which they marginalize, demean, threaten, exclude, discriminate against and
dehumanize others on the basis of the other’s appearance (e.g. ‘Middle Eastern-
looking’) and on a de-valourization of the other’s religious, cultural and ethnic
group identity. This is the definition of racism adopted by many researchers in
new racism, some of whose work was outlined earlier. The current silencing of
anti-racism claims has been attributed to the fact that anti-racism often relies on
an ‘old-fashioned’ definition of racism as the expression of a belief in biological
430 Discourse & Society 18(4)
superiority, or the use of overt and negative racial language, and thus has not yet
adopted newer understandings necessary to challenge new racism. As Wetherell
and Potter (1992) point out:
Even relatively blatant fascist propaganda and blatant advocates of racism (such as
Le Pen in France) have learnt to modify their discourse so that on some occasions
racism can occur without biological categorization and the more familiar
paraphernalia of ‘advanced’ and ‘primitive’, ‘negative’ and ‘positive’, ‘superior’ and
‘inferior’ distinctions. Given this flexibility of the enemy, and the way debates move
on, it seems sensible not to commit oneself to one exclusive characterization of
racist claims. There is a danger of being silenced when racist discourse continues to
oppress but no longer meets the main characteristics of social scientific definitions
of racism. (Wetherell and Potter, 1992: 71–2)
On this basis, Wetherell and Potter (1992) conclude that anti-racism discourses
and interventions need to incorporate newer understandings of racism in order
to be able to effectively combat new racism.
On the other hand, there are those who argue that taking up this broader
definition of racism is dangerous and counterproductive. Cox (2006) argues that
what has been termed ‘new racist’ strategies are not, in fact, racist, and many acts
of ‘everyday racism’ are more productively viewed as uncivil and discourteous
behaviour. She argues that naming these kinds of acts (e.g. insulting someone
on the basis of their religion) as racist is to close down debate and set up
defensive positions on both sides. She argues that combating the resurgence of
attacks against minority groups requires a different approach in which everyday
incidents are separated out from ‘institutionalized’ racism and are approached
differently.
This seems to fall into the trap of excluding everyday racism as a legitimate
concern, a strategy that has been heavily criticized as tacitly reinforcing the
consensus that everyday racism is ‘not racist’. This argument reproduces one of
the fundamental themes of new racism, that ‘real’ racism is violent and extreme
(Verkuyten, 1998). More ordinary, everyday incidents, which do not include ex-
treme physical violence, are protected from being criticized as racist. We would
argue that Cox’s argument colludes with the push to exclude everyday examples
of racism as an accountable matter, thereby minimizing their significance in the
continuing reproduction of racism. However, her argument against adopting
the broader definition of racism advocated by researchers such as Wetherell and
Potter (1992) does raise the question of advocates and anti-racist campaigners
‘being heard’, an issue that other researchers have also highlighted.
Guerin (2003) has argued that it is important to find ways of engaging with
racist talk that do not bring an abrupt end to a conversation, in order to both
challenge racism and allow this challenge to ‘be heard’. Pedersen et al. (2005)
come to a similar conclusion in their review of research on anti-racism strategies.
On the one hand, they acknowledge the importance of speaking out against
racism, which has, in previous research, led to a reduction in racism in those who
have been exposed to these counter discourses; however, they also acknowledge
that if people feel under attack they are less likely to listen, and speaking out
against racism may be less effective in these circumstances.
Every and Augoustinos: Constructions of racism in Australia 431
Conversation analytic research on disagreements is also pertinent to framing
constructions of racism in ways that can be ‘heard’. Conversation analysis,
which examines the fine-grained micro-detail of talk, shows that disagreements
such as those that are being attempted in the data we have examined here are
complex conversational interactions, incorporating delays, prefaces, palliatives
and accounts (Hutchby and Wooffitt, 1998; Kitzinger and Frith, 1999; Wooffitt,
2001). These conversational markers of disagreement often result in talk that
is softened, hedged and carefully managed, much in the way that we have seen
in our data. Based on this, Kitzinger and Frith (1999) argue that injunctions to
perform disagreements, such as constructing someone’s talk as racist, without
such markers, i.e. to just say ‘no to racism’, are unlikely to be taken up, as such talk
would violate social norms around expressing disagreements.
From the research presented here, it appears that anti-racist campaigns, as
represented by refugee advocates in the Australian parliament, fall somewhere
in the middle of this divide between adopting the broader definition of new racism
as racism, and ‘being heard’. These extracts demonstrate both that politicians
have in some instances condemned instances of new racism as racism, but
have also softened and hedged these claims. We would argue that these refugee
advocates are taking up new understandings of racism, but that references to
racism, whether relying upon old or new understandings of racism, are not
able to be said, as campaigners may risk their legitimacy and persuasiveness
in making new racism accountable. Although new racism is sometimes being
recognized as racist, it seems that anti-racist campaigners are often constrained
from publicly identifying and naming these practices as racist.
This suggests that adopting the broader construction of racism in new racist
research, may not, on its own, allow this understanding to effectively infiltrate
common sense understandings of racism and be used as a tool to challenge new
racism. Speeches such as that by Bartlett suggest that advocates are focussing on
the ways in which racism can be challenged that attend to the sensitive nature
of these kinds of accusations, as well as at the same time effectively making
these practices accountable. As Cox’s (2006) arguments that everyday racism
is actually impoliteness demonstrate, constructions of racism used in an anti-
racist context may easily slip into the same denial of racism they are ostensibly
attempting to make visible. The challenge for anti-racist campaigns is not
necessarily simply to draw upon newer understandings of racism, nor to ignore
them in favour of more narrow definitions, but to find new ways of mobilizing
these in a difficult political climate that do not in turn collude with new racism
by failing to break the silence around it.
N O T E S
1. ‘Dog-whistling’ is a figurative device referring to talk that cannot be heard or
understood by everyone. It has been used to indicate racist talk pitched so that it is
unidentifiable as racism to most members of an audience (Double-Tongued Word
Wrester Dictionary, 2005). Pauline Hanson, an Australian politician, has come to
symbolize the increasing racialization of politics in Australia. Hanson won a seat in
432 Discourse & Society 18(4)
the 1996 Australian general election as an Independent, after being dropped from
the conservative Liberal/National Party for ‘racist’ comments. Her election, achieved
with a large swing in the vote in her favour, was accompanied by a media furore in
which the race debate came to be identified with her. She was named in many media
reports as the ‘spark’ that ignited this debate (Rapley, 1998). She was widely vilified
in the general press as anti-Aboriginal, anti-Asian and against multiculturalism. Her
party campaigned for asylum seekers arriving by boat to be turned away.
2. As we noted in Note 1, the term ‘dog-whistling’ has previously been identified as
a synonym for racism, whilst Hanson became widely known as racist during her
political career.
3. The Immigration Restriction Bill, commonly known as the White Australia Policy,
legislated against the migration of non-whites into Australia. Much of the policing
of this racial boundary was achieved surreptitiously, through means such as the
infamous dictation test, which, it was understood, but never explicitly stated, would
be in a language unknown to those migrants deemed ‘undesirable’ (Jupp, 2002).
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D A N I E L L E E V E R Y is a research associate at the Hawke Research Institute for Sustainable
Societies, University of South Australia. Her doctoral thesis The Politics of Representation:
A discursive analysis of refugee advocacy in the Australian parliament, analysed anti-racist
and pro-refugee discourses. She has previously published research on the language of
racism and anti-racism. A D D R E S S : University of South Australia, Hawke Research Insti-
tute for Sustainable Societies, Murray House, Magill, South Australia, 5072, Australia.
[email: danielle.every@unisa.edu.au]
M A R T H A A U G O U S T I N O S is Professor in the School of Psychology, University of
Adelaide, where she teaches social psychology. She has written extensively on racism and
prejudice in Australia and is co-editor with Kate Reynolds (Australian National University)
of Understanding Prejudice, Racism and Social Conflict (SAGE, 2001). A D D R E S S : School
of Psychology, University of Adelaide, Adelaide, South Australia, 5005, Australia.
[email: martha@psychology.adelaide.edu.au]