186: THE FRIGHTENED COUNTRY
ISBN 0 9775171 3 6
AUTUMN 2007
published 30 March 2007

In politics, Coleridge famously warned, what begins with fear usually ends in folly.

Australia has become the frightened country, a nation permanently terrified by real and imagined threats. We remain far, far more likely to die from lightning strikes or bee stings than terror attacks, yet the government has committed or spent an almost hallucinogenic 11.5 billion dollars on the fight against terrorism.

Foolishness? Perhaps, but there’s also a sinister logic to the politics of paranoia.

Fear has, after all, proved an invaluable asset to the forces of conservatism. Throughout the Western world, governments have strengthened repressive laws, increased the powers available to police and security forces and cut back on democratic space.

In this edition, journalist KATHERINE WILSON investigates the operation of Australia’s anti-terror laws in the case of Abdullah Merhi and other Muslim-Australians currently held in the maximum security prison at Barwon, Victoria.

Novelist STEVEN LANG examines the success and failures of two important attempts to fictionalise the age of terror.

MICHAEL HEAD tells the forgotten story of Australia’s most recent sedition case.

ANTHONY ASHBOLT writes on public education and the scare campaigns used against it.

JOHN McLAREN ruminates on the fears underlying the so-called History Wars.

KEITH McKENRY discusses the pioneering work of the folklorist PERCY JONES, in the worried years of the Cold War.

RAEWYN CONNELL pays tribute to the feminist activist and theorist LYNNE SEGAL and her struggle against society’s fear of women who stand up for their rights.

Plus more ARTICLES, NEW FICTION, POETRY, REVIEWS and MEMOIR.

Enquiries to JEFF SPARROW or KALINDA ASHTON on 03 9919 4163 or email or overland@vu.edu.au or jeff.sparrow@vu.edu.au