An anthropological study of cargo-cultism in an island off the south coast of Australia
The belief in cargo-cultism of the Natives of Papua New Guinea, an Island off the North Coast of Australia, is fairly well known.
In that case of delusional thinking, the natives had observed that consumer goods came to their white masters in large silver planes.
The natives regarded them as giant silver birds and set nets in the top of the tropical rainforest to catch them, they were hoping to snare their cargo.
Despite their failures over many decades, the delusion was persistent, but apparently has now disappeared.
The late Richard Jones first observed the natives in Tasmania (previously known as Van Demons Land) tended to believe in the great benevolent transnational corporation.
The Russian peasants dreamed of the benevolent Tsar who would ease them of their misery and the natives of Tasmania dream of some benevolent multinational who will build an enormous factory, mine, pulp mill, etc, which will make them all very wealthy.
The delusion existed for decades and still persists.
When a certain Michael Field was premier of Tasmania, as the leader of the parliamentary labor party, which is a degraded remnant of Tasmania’s social democratic labor movement, the belief arose that the benevolent multinational would materialise and build the great pulp mill to solve the economic problems of the natives.
Michael Field was the leader of a minority government and needed the support of the strong green movement.
The green movement is unusually strong in Tasmania, partly because it thrived under the vilification of misguided labor politicians who failed to realise that many of their former followers had become disillusioned with their move to the right.
In the elections proceeding the ascension to office of Michael Field, the green movement had campaigned passionately against the construction of the pulp mill.
The Labor government of Australia was courting the green vote in the urban centres of Sydney and Melbourne and it was easily ascertainable that they would not grant an export license to a pulp mill that would offend the leadership of the green movement, which was led by the charismatic Dr Bob Brown.
Apparently blind to the impossibility of achieving the great pulp mill dream, Michael Field enacted legislation to enable the construction of the mill, even though Dr Brown had warned him that he would vote with the opposition for a change of government if the legislation was passed.
On technical grounds, the legislation failed to pass but the Bill was reintroduced. Again Dr Brown gave the warning, he was ignored, the legislation failed to pass as an ambitious Liberal Party, voted to defeat the legislation and then assumed office with the support of the Greens.
Michael Field had made himself extremely unpopular because he had inherited a huge debt from a Liberal government led by a certain Robin Grey and he cut government services to health and education and could only survive if his government ran its full term and he had time to win back the supporters that he had lost.
Michael Field was well educated and I am informed he was at least of average intelligence.
His conduct defied rational explanation and therefore it was suggested that perhaps he had been sabotaged by some mischievous or malevolent soul in the parliamentary catering staff, who may have mixed hallucinogenic mushrooms into his beef stroganoff or added a drop of LSD to his wine.
But it would appear that he was a victim of the great pulp mill delusion.
Two decades later, after a normal non benevolent multinational corporation had removed 2 pulp mills from Tasmania because they weren’t economic the delusion reappeared with greater virulence than before.
By this time, a monopoly controlled the Tasmanian forest industry known as Gunns Ltd.
One of the Board members was the same Grey that had nearly bankrupted Tasmania before the deluded Field became Premier.
It is said of Grey, who was an authoritarian leader that he had declared that if he was a dictator, it would snow on the GPO steps.
It duly snowed on the GPO steps (a once in a generation weather event) and Grey duly lost the next election to the said Michael Field and the greens.
To the sane and well informed it was obvious that Tasmania was no more likely to have a pulp mill than the Papua New Guinea natives were likely to catch a plane with their nets in the rain forest canopy because the cost of pulp produced from Tasmania would be $200 a tonne more expensive than pulp from Brazil or Indonesia, let alone Vietnam.
But the delusion was resilient and a certain P Lenin came to power as Premier of Tasmania.
He was a large, red haired, Irish Catholic politician and no relation to the better known Russian family.
He proposed that there be a pulp mill and referred it to the appropriate planning body, known as the RPDC.
The proponents of the pulp mill were unable to satisfy the RPDC that the project met environmental guidelines. Gunns therefore informed Lenin that if the pulp mill was not approved by a certain date, they and their investors would all have a great big sulk and not build the mill.
Lenin apparently believed that and personally drove up to Launceston and apparently on bended knees begged Gunns not to take away the pulp mill dream.
(It may be that his Irish Catholic background made him good at kneeling and praying, but it was more likely that Gunns were just bluffing him)
Lenin caused a Bill, allegedly drawn up by the Lawyers of Gunns Ltd to be passed by the Tasmanian Parliament and found some consultants somewhere in the world to say the pulp mill would be good for the environment in Tasmania.
However, the pulp mill has failed to materialise and Gunns Ltd is in liquidation and Lenin became the least popular labor politician since the latter decades of the 19th century.
He was succeeded by a female who proceeded to follow the example of Michael Field and cut government spending on health and education and is now the second least popular labor leader since the early decades of the 19th century, and is busily competing with Lenin to become the most unpopular.
Tasmanians have a reputation for being slow learners and their political leaders are doing the best they can to maintain that reputation.
The pulp mill delusion still survives and Lenin has recently said what a good thing it would be if Tasmania had a great big pulp mill to solve all of the problems of the economy.
It seems that this dark fairytale is a never ending story and a few radicals have suggested the only cure for Tasmania’s political malaise is to have all persons who aspire to elected public office certified as to their sanity and freedom of all delusions including the delusions of the great magical pulp mill and the marvellous benevolent transnational corporation.
*Madelaine Merimee is known to the Editor
