Cunneen, Chris --- "Book Review - Black, White or Brindle: Race in Rural Australia" [1989] AboriginalLawB 63; (1989) 1(41) Aboriginal Law Bulletin 14

• Book Review-Black, White Or Brindle: Race In Rural Australia

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Book Review -

Black, White or Brindle: Race in Rural Australia

by G. Cowlishaw

Cambridge University Press, Melbourne, 1988, RRP; $39.50.

Reviewed by Chris Cunneen

Cowlishaw's book is an important contribution to the understanding of race relations in Australia. The setting is "Brindleton", a pseudonym for a north western NSW town where the author conducted her research. While the book is not concerned specifically with the relationship between Aborigines and the white justice system, it does provide important insights into the nature and constitution of that relationship.

Cowlishaw begins her analysis from the position that race is related to cultural characteristics rather than being a biologically-defined category. The task then is to question precisely what those characteristics are, how they are developed, and the ways in which they are continually reconstituted. For Cowlishaw the categorisation of people by race occurs psychologically, socially, economically and politically. It is through these processes that racism is perpetuated. Intertwined with these processes is the legal system.

By analysing the dominant white culture, the author gives illuminating insights as to the way the inequality of power inherent in racism is maintained on a day-to-day basis. The decision-making processes of the Local Council are held up to scrutiny. For instance, for a number of years the Local Council blocked State Government attempts to establish a proclaimed place for intoxicated persons in 'Brindleton' as an alternative to detention in police cells. It was only after the threat of a State Government over-ruling, that the Local Council withdrew its opposition. It then purchased the house of an ex-council employee who was about to leave the town. The collusion between the Local Council and the police in controlling the Aboriginal population is demonstrated. Disaffection with the repeal of the (old) Summary Offences Act in NSW and the introduction of the 1979 legislation which carried a maximum penalty of $100 for offensive behaviour led to the development of alternative measures. Local Council minutes read:

The Local Government Act [covering public order] is relatively easy to enforce and incurs a $300 fine and the police wish to proceed under this section. Section 640 indicates that the police are quite able to act under the Local Government Act as they are deemed to be acting for the Council.

The Council then resolved that police be authorised to act on its behalf in relation to offences in public places under the Local Government Act.[1]

The processes of racism often take more prosaic forms. Cowlishaw writes:

It is interesting to discover why the town council removed the seats that were once provided in the main street. The reason given to me by a councillor was that Aborigines sat on them. This explanation was quickly amended to `Too many sat on them, lounged all over them. It did not look nice for the tourists.

Such decisions - from the removal of seats to the use of the Local Government Act - impact on a justice system which, at the local level, is concerned with the maintenance of `order'. That order is itself defined within the parameters of a dominant hegemony: the whites' cultural practices and institutions which dominate the town.

Cowlishaw also analyses the 'oppositional cultural' of many Aborigines living in town. This culture is the result of a creative response to the particular conditions. She argues that there is an `intense consciousness of the meaning of behaviour which is threatening to the hegemony of whites'. Such behaviour is often the source of police intervention. The oppositional culture fuels a continuing rebelliousness and it is an immediate trigger to white hostility. Cowlishaw writes:

Rather than being accorded dignity, many Aboriginal practices ... are disliked, disdained or pitied. Were Aborigines passive and silent in the face of such judgements there would be no point in continuing to actively dominate a population that had accepted subordination. Rather than showing shame, oppositional culture acts as both a challenge to those who would despise Aborigines, as well as a defence against them.

The importance of Cowlishaw's book for understanding the impact of the criminal justice system is that her analysis is capable of locating that particular institutional response clearly within the wider processes of institutional racism. Further, she demonstrates that the dynamics of race relations in such a town is about an ongoing struggle around the maintenance of inequality. One instrument in that struggle is, and historically has been, the legal system.

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[1] Research into police charges which I conducted during 1986/87 indicated that only Aboriginal people were charged with breaching Local Government `public order' ordinances in Bourke, Brewarrina and Walgett (see Cunneen, Robb, Criminal Justice in North West NSW, NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, 1987).