She’ll Be Right? Social Cohesion and the Unspoken Australian Identity

“I’m not really sure I can talk about this sort of thing…”

“I don’t want to talk about it. If I say the wrong thing… you know….”

“I’d really rather not…”

Three responses from three different people. The subject? It was not the usual social pariah subjects of religion, politics, or sex. Far from it. But what else could elicit such universal aversion? The question; “would you like to talk about Australian culture?”.

I thought it’d have been an easy task. Ask someone their views on Australian culture. Move on to the next. I discovered this was not going to be so straightforward as I had planned.

I run a small business providing leadership advice on matters of internal strategic development, including matters of culture. And the above responses came just a few short days after I had received an email relating to another two stories I’d posted on social media. The email was from the interviewees of a previous little project. And in that project I had been talking to them too about Australian culture.

The interviewees proffered astute and valid, but otherwise benign observations about aspects of Australian culture during my time with them. Everything discussed was largely couched in positive and productive tones. Dare I say, politically correct? Nothing that any reasonable person would consider concerning or disconcerting. But in the following days, they asked to “have [their] responses and photos not be posted”. This is following on from, and in the midst of, receiving countless other responses from others who politely decline to participate for a variety of reasons.

The ongoing and undeniable theme, however, is that there is a clear aversion to discussing anything relating Australian culture. At least formally. Or with strangers. or otherwise, untrusted ‘others’.

When I ask people questions about Australian culture “off the record” they generally tend to open up. But the minute I ask if we can use any of this for my social media account, the response is clear and sharp. And it’s hard not to chalk it up to fear.

I’ll never forget one particular response: “I support Australia day…”, responded one local shop owner to me in hushed tones. The lady began fidgeting nervously after blurting the now, apparently, controversial statement. Almost as though she was making a confession and was cautiously awaiting judgment.

It’s a puzzling scenario indeed. In a country where robust debates on contentious issues are part and parcel of daily discourse, the reticence towards discussing one’s own cultural identity is a perplexing phenomenon. The fact that Australian culture appears to be becoming an officially taboo topic, which in itself is a fascinating new cultural artefact worthy of analysis, presents a fascinating, albeit disconcerting, evolution in Australian cultural identity.

It does, however, also present a very clear and present challenge. In ways that many may not truly appreciate.

I have a colleague in my business who is a migrant herself and whose integration into Australian society was exceptionally difficult. She tried hard, very hard, to integrate into Australian society. She refused her elder sister’s advice (big taboo in Asian culture) to stay at a university on-site college full of international students where, she was assured, she would make ‘easy friends’. Instead, she opted for a more Australian college where she aimed to make Australian friends.

The net result was periods of exceptional and forlorn isolation culminating in daily trips to her local supermarket in the hopes of having a brief conversational exchange with the checkout operator. Maybe even a person wanting to solicit donations? It would be her only social exchange for the whole day. Her life was miserable.

It was under these pretences that, then “Ms.” Tan, originally from Singapore, decided to dedicate her life to exploring and understanding the cross-cultural experience, acculturation, and acculturative stress. She attained her Ph.D. in the field, and was quick to discover that she was not alone in her dire cross-cultural experiences in Australia. And her story was not, in fact, that unique. Far from it. She discovered that many people, in particular Chinese, had originally tried to integrate into the Australian community but faced such intense, will-breaking challenges that they ended up retreating to the social and cultural protection and security of their own geographic enclaves around the city. Places well-known to have many of ‘their own kind’, with access to familiar supermarkets, restaurants, and other services. Places of minimal social stress. But perhaps maximum damage to social cohesion.

Social cohesion in Australia is at an all-time low. According to the 2023 Scanlon report on social cohesion, Australians are seeing levels of social cohesion never before witnessed. It was low during Covid, and appears to be trending downward. Well “so what?” one might ask.

Social cohesion is a metric of just how well society gets along. The Scanlon Institute uses the following five indicators to measure social cohesion; belonging, worth, social justice, participation, and acceptance. And it is these five metrics that define just how much trust and cooperation exists within a community or body of people. And it is trust and cooperation that forms the foundational core of any functioning society. It allows businesses to believe that contracts will be honoured. It helps us to have confidence our neighbour won’t steal our garden gnomes. It is the central pillar upon which every other arm of Australian society, political, social, and economic, is fully dependent.

The fact that social cohesion is at its lowest in recorded history, and the fact Australia has record high immigration is not necessarily just correlation. Cultural, linguistic, and racial diversity are all contributing elements to a decline in social cohesion. Fear of the unknown ‘other’ has deleterious effects on social cohesion. Enclaves emerge where the ‘other’ may, upon his/her choosing, never come into contact with members of the host society. And in the worst-case scenarios, can devolve into the sorts of split or sectarian societies as seen in say, Iraq, Sudan, the former Yugoslavia, Northern Ireland of the mid 20th Century or the United States in the mid 19th.

Taking perhaps a less dramatic, but still significant, stance; much research has been conducted and has found that members of a society are more likely to support a welfare state when they perceive the fellow members of that state to be most like themselves. A society where the populous views themselves ‘as one’. Low levels of social cohesion can, and do, imply challenges for future support toward a welfare state. If people do not support a welfare state, can the Australian government still politically support a ‘fair go’?

This is not to say cultural, linguistic, and racial diversity are bad. Australia is, by its nature, a settler state. One of only four in the world. As Australia is known today, is largely a product of immigrants. Australia’s very essence is cultural, linguistic, and racial diversity. It is its history. What can be bad, is unmanaged changes to cultural, linguistic, and racial diversity. Just ask the indigenous population of Australia.

Unmanaged migration, as indicated by uncontrolled numbers and unsupported arrivals, can cause unfathomable damage to the social fabric of a society.

However, the merits of cultural, linguistic, and racial diversity of Australia are somewhat beside the point. Australia needs immigrants if it wishes to maintain its current standard of living (as evidence by GDP per capita). With fertility rates in the country declining to 1.7, Australia has dropped below reproduction rate. And the trend, for now, is further decline.

Declining fertility in itself, is neither here nor there. It is a value-neutral fact. However when put into the context of longer term economic security, there are significant potential risk and complications. For as you may, or may not be aware, fertility rates have some rather significant consequences for two of the “three P’s” of Australian Growth: Population, Participation, and Productivity. Low fertility, in the long run, means lower population. It also means lower participation.

As Peter McDonald, of the University of Melbourne, found in 2018, Australia is, right now, essentially in a state of population stagnation. If the Australian Government decided today to close its borders to new residents, effectively reducing Australia’s Net Overseas Migration (NOM) to zero, Australia’s population would, in a best-case scenario, effectively plateau at the current level.

Conversely with a NOM of 180,000 to 200,000 per year, Australia would continue to grow at a healthy rate to a population of 36 million and would enjoy an additional 12% growth in GDP per capita, over the next thirty or so years. When it comes to the health of the Australian economy, these are important numbers for the quality of life for
anyone who lives in the country.

Furthermore, these facts speak nothing of the other equally important social issues such as population aging and the associated standard of care for the elderly. If the population growth continues to stagnate, and the population ages, there will be significant implications for the state’s ability to support elderly Australians in their most medically intensive, and costly, periods of their lives. With a fertility rate of 1.7, the only way, short of forcing people to reproduce, to ensure enough taxpayers exist to support the elderly is to ensure there are enough working, and tax paying, age migrants, with the right skills, to contribute to the economy.

Unless some new way of maintaining a twenty first century standard of living is discovered, I hope I have made two things quite clear at this point:

• socially – cohesion is important, including the need to appropriately integrate, or ‘manage’, new arrivals who are culturally, linguistically, and racially diverse.
• economically – migrants are needed in this country.

So. How does Australians’ reticence to discuss culture have anything to do with the above two points?

In case it hasn’t thus far become apparent; it actually becomes crucially important.

If it is taken as a given that migrants are needed to, not enhance, but maintain, the quality of life in Australia as indicated in the research, and Australians accept as true that socially cohesive societies, societies where members have a sense of belonging, can actively participate and feel accepted, are societies optimally configured for the pursuit of our subjective well-being, socially, economically and politically. Then the question arises: what exactly do we expect migrants become? What exactly is it Australians are expecting migrants to integrate and adapt into?

This is not a side issue. It becomes the main show.

Integration into a new culture can be challenging at the best of times. Some argue even impossible to be able to fully integrate – some states make this official policy, relegating newcomers to the status of perpetual ‘outsider’ because the migrant will never truly be ‘the same’ as the host. These are often states with long, long histories and know and understand themselves very well.

Australia, as a settler state, doesn’t do this. The Australian government shares similar views with its three settler kin, the US, Canada, and New Zealand, in embracing and welcoming migrants to become citizens and culturally ‘one’ with their new home. This is true, at least, rhetorically. Cracks begin to emerge as one scratches the surface a little deeper.

Because what does it actually mean to be Australian? It’s a question most Australians’ will have some vague allusion of an answer to. And I’m beginning to think the response is vague for good reason. Australia, as a settler state, has cultural problems that many other states do not have.

Lets examine:

Australia is, on the culture history map, very ‘new’, in many respects. However, equally valid, is the view that the territory known today as Australia, is very old, if one considers the ‘first nations’ as being the appropriate Australian culture. However another popular conception of Australian culture is one of attitude. Everyone knows a laid back Australian. Or is the attitude more of a joker-like larrikin? What about the ‘fair go’ attitude? Is Aussie culture an outdoors orientated culture? If so, is it best represented on the red sands of the outback? Or maybe the of the red and yellow flags on the golden beaches? And let’s not forget the cricket…. or football…. and do i mean the Victorian football or the other type?

To anyone who might quip “it’s all of these things”, the pertinent response is, is anyone all of them? Chances are nobody is all these things. But usually, some sort of set or combination of them. However, it doesn’t really stop there.

Let’s say migrant X goes to the beach every single weekend. It’s in their blood. They love it. “I’m a true-blue Australian” they might say. However. When they go to the beach, they get odd stares. Is it something to do with their long denim pants. And their long sleeve shirts? As they prop up their tent to shade themselves from the sun? Would Australians still consider that to be ‘true blue Aussie?”. Acknowledging my own bias – I know I myself have given quixotic stares to people who do exactly that.

Let’s suppose Australian culture is ‘first nations’ culture, in such case, how are migrants expected to integrate? Can a migrant integrate in such circumstances? Would non-indigenous Australians even recognize a migrant who has integrated into indigenous culture? If Australian culture is ‘fair go’ culture, will the precipitous drop in social cohesion, negating the desire for a welfare state, fundamentally undermine the state’s ability, or willingness, to provide all Australians a ‘fair go’? Even Australia’s political system, coyly referred to as the “Washminster” system, is built upon two conflicting world views that inspired the chalk and cheese governments of Britain and the US.

As the ending of the White Australia policy allowed for the inflow of non-white migrants, old differences between white Australians faded to the background. But the reality is, as a penal colony, Australia was 90% Protestant and 10% Catholic. The latter swelling to almost 30% of the population in the mid 1900s, before declining back to 20% where it sits today. Given the relatively short cultural history of colonial Australia, how much of Australian culture should therefore be considered catholic culture versus protestant culture? The question may seem benign, but the differences in cultural values, outlook, and impact are quite significant.

Nevermind, she’ll be right mate.

The point here isn’t to admonish one view and promote another. It is simply to say that Australian “culture” is built on a number of philosophical and practical contradictions. Protestant and Catholic, Washington and Westminster. Environmental and attitudinal.

It’s not a stretch to suggest that these conflicting and contradictory cultural values leave a duplicitous impression on those looking to join the young Australian culture. It is difficult to know and understand. Just like a teen going through an identity crisis, Australian culture doesn’t stop to consider the finer points, when a callous ‘who cares’ will suffice. Australians simply do not want to dwell on these existential problems. Which, when taken as a cultural outlook, nets the country a progressive renaissance-style future orientation, rather than, history, legacy, or tradition.

Australians, it would appear, have long avoided this critical self-reflection. So much so, they have turned it into a cultural value: They don’t take themselves too seriously. And it’s a well-known cultural virtue of Australians worldwide. Curiously, Australians have developed a global reputation for valuing ‘work-life’ balance, which one might argue is a relic of the Catholic predisposition to avoiding ‘worldly’ things. But stands in stark contrast to the world-class product of Australian labour, which is heavily influenced by, as Max Weber would now famously suggest, the ‘protestant ethic’. A way of life influenced by two competing, and very different, world views.

So where does that leave our ever-eager but perplexed migrant? To not take their interest in Australian culture ‘too seriously’? It would appear unwise, for the sake of social cohesion, that a migrant take such a laissez-faire approach to the culture of their host country. But one might argue, in this instance, that they are actually integrating by doing so. Once again, another cultural contradiction.

In my work I have come across many enthusiastic migrants, eagerly looking to live the Australian way of life. We in the business tend to spend a portion of our time discussing common understandings of what Australian culture is. However, we spend an even greater portion of time dealing with acculturative stress and equipping the migrants with the skill and abilities to embrace cultural change, and to deal with the stress and anxiety that comes with navigating the void between cultures. Or as is apparently the case with Australians, navigating a departure from their own culture, into the void of Australian culture. Because it is with profound disappointment we are forced to focus on this component of skills development and stress management, as even Australians themselves seem to have no clear or definitive understanding of who exactly they are.

Which brings me full circle – Australia has an emerging social cohesion problem. And layperson reticence in discussing any matters of culture, with any sort of confidence or conviction, is only making things worse.

Australians need to understand the importance of taking a stand on who they are. They need to be more culturally self-aware. They need to openly and unashamedly admit the parts they like, and the parts they think could do with some improving. Because culture
is a moving feast. It isn’t static. It is forever dynamic and changing. Australian cultural history is being written right now. A big fat chapter early in the post-federation story. Australians, and soon-to-be Australians, should be passionate champions of this chapter. Not passive participants.

At what point did the common Australian develop an aversion to openly discussing the culture of their country, and why? ‘Silence leads to sadness’, as the eminent philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau once famously said. And more to the point, silence is antithetical to a cohesive and shared understanding of exactly what it is to be Australian. And this, in the current era of migration dependant growth, is the pre-condition for Australia to be a trusting, cooperative society. Australians need to understand the impossibility of expecting migrants, the lifeblood of their future economy, to integrate into a way of life that the people who live it don’t even fully understand.

Very few issues in contemporary society are as far-reaching, politically, economically, or socially as social cohesion. It is the central pillar around which all society is built. The future success of the country may very well depend on resolving the cultural identity of Australians, lest fragmentation and division curse the land down under, as it has done in many parts of the ‘old world’.

But the very actions taken, or, as may well be more the case, actions not taken, by everyday Australians set a new dimension to Australian cultural milieu. As highlighted above, disengagement on the topic is a type of attitudinal response emblematic of a culture. And may, perhaps, be the most iconic Australian cultural value. It’s unfortunate that it might cause the lucky country to sleep-walk right into a social catastrophe. But that sort of dramatic and serious parlance usually gets most laid-back Australians to switch off.

She’ll be right, mate.