Forgotten labour beliefs? : producerist ideas in Australia

Even during the class tension of the late nineteenth century, when it might have been expected, revolutionary class-consciousness among the working-class did not materialise to any significant extent in Australia or the other Anglo-Celtic countries. One contributory factor may be that many of the workers, rather than viewing their world from the perspective of their class position - part of a united proletariat confronting the capitalist - instead viewed the world from the perspective of their own productive labour. American 'new labor historians' have termed this phenomenon 'producerism' and some suggest that it was the presence of producerism which may partially explain the absence of socialism in that country. Attacking corporate capitalism, finance, inherited wealth and corrupt government, it united manual workers, small farmers and small manufacturers against the idleness and parasitism of both the wealthy and 'undeserving poor' in a three class society. This paper suggests that searching for a similar phenomenon in nineteenth century Australian history may prove fruitful and evidence of producerist language may suggest the existence of the phenomenon itself.