Australia's Economic History

Today we heard from Evan Jones, a professor at the University of Sydney, about Australia’s economic history.  Since 1788 when the country of Australia was founded, the majority of settlers were white, but has since changed greatly to include a variety of heritages including European, Asian, and African.  As Australia has grown closer ties with China and Japan exports to these countries have increased dramatically.  Production and exports seem to be related as they seem to have an impact on one another.  Australia’s role in the global economy has brought it closer to new trading opportunities with different countries.   

Imperialism is the conquest of territory that is already occupied by a group of people, and instilling upon them new institutions and authority.  The British demonstrate this idea of imperialism in Australia as, “…the imperial state first had to establish the appropriate social relations amongst indigenous peoples, convicts, slaves, immigrants, and native-born.  This direct assertion of power was exercised over ‘subject’ populations in order to shape an expanding white settler community” (Wells).  Australia was subject to the authority of Britain for some amount of time, but eventually they somewhat formed independent institutions, industries, and authority. 

Since WWII, Australia, much like America, also experienced times of recession and times of success.  Industries such as auto development and agriculture expanded greatly to prove Australia’s role in the global economy.  Today, however, such industries have been diminishing a private companies become less and less popular and large companies begin to rule.  Professor Jones mentioned that inflation has risen by about 20% in the last year.  GDP has increased with only minor fluctuations over the past five years and is predicted to continue increasing in 2011.   The external balance of Australia has fluctuated with increases and decreases from year to year, but is most commonly seen at around $54-59 billion.  The five main trade and finance partners that interact with Australia are China, Japan, Republic of Korea, India, and the USA (Jones packet).