The National Estate (and the city), 1969–75: a significant Australian heritage phenomenon

ABSTRACT

This article argues that the Australian Whitlam Labor Government between 1969 and 1975 produced a distinguishably Australian conception for heritage through its notion of the national estate. A watershed for the recognition and preservation of heritage in Australia, it was expansive, democratic and interventionist in its philosophical underpinning and approach. Focusing on the domain of urban heritage and drawing on a diverse range of archival sources, this article examines the national estate’s international origins, along with its reworking by Whitlam, his inner circle and the Inquiry into the National Estate (1973–4). The national estate reshaped public, management and regulatory understandings of heritage in Australia, and informed the Australian Heritage Commission (1975–2004) and the Burra Charter (1979), leaving lasting local and global impacts.

KEYWORDS:

• History of heritage
• history of preservation
• national estate
• Australia
• urban history
• Whitlam Government

Acknowledgments

The author thanks Professors Andrew May and Kate Darian-Smith and Dr Simon Sleight. Earlier versions of this paper were delivered at the Australian Historical Association Conference at the University of Sydney in July 2015 and the European Association of Urban History Conference in Helsinki in September 2016. Thank you to the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

The author received financial support through the Australian Government Research Training Program;Department of Education and Training [Research Training Program];

Notes on contributors

James P. Lesh

James P. Lesh is is a PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne, Australia. His thesis examines the place of urban heritage in the twentieth-century Australian city.