Chetna Mahadik is general manager at the Robert Menzies Institute in Melbourne, a fellow stacker and the editor of, and contributor to, a recently published book of essays, Immigration & Multiculturalism: The Past, The Present and The Future. Chetna’s essay, Racism in Australia: Narrative and Reality, tracks her encounters with the country’s sometimes mystifying debates about its national character. As she explains in the piece, Chetna migrated to Australia from India in 2011 with a master’s degree in globalization and media. At the time Melbourne was experiencing a spate of attacks against Indian international students, with student leaders alleging the violence was part of a broader pattern of anti-Indian racism. Chetna decided she’d write about the controversy — but what she found surprised her.

We talk about her essay and what she learned about “anti-racism” discourse. We talk about the insights she gained from editing the politically-heterodox essay collection, which explores the evolution of Australian immigration policy from the postwar ethos of “populate or perish” through to the dismantling of the White Australia Policy and the adoption of multiculturalism. We talk about the fraught debate around Muslim immigration to the West, and to Australia after the Bondi Beach massacre, the rise of the populist right and Pauline Hanson’s promotion of “monoculturalism.”

A few things of note:

On 21 July the Robert Menzies Institute is holding a public conversation on “Conditions for a Successful Immigration Policy” with Coalition Senator Jonno Duniam. You can book tickets here: https://www.robertmenziesinstitute.org.au/event/jonno-duniam-policy-dialogue/

The essay collection, Immigration & Multiculturalism: The Past, The Present and The Future, is available from the publisher here: https://www.connorcourtpublishing.com.au/Immigration-Multiculturalism-The-Past-the-Present-and-the-Future-edited-by-Chetna-Mahadik_p_681.html

Or on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com.au/Immigration-Multiculturalism-Past-Present-Future/dp/1923568760

Or on Booktopia.

And Chetna’s newsletter, which includes columns first published in the AFR, is here:

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