Abrogating responsibility? Applied anthropology, Vesteys, Aboriginal labour, 1944-1946.

Gray, Geoffrey

Abstract: Towards the end of the Pacific War, two young anthropologists began work on a survey of Vesteys northern cattle stations. Ronald Murray Berndt and Catherine Helen Berndt were employed, between August 1944 and April 1946, by the Australian Investment Agency (Vesteys) to conduct a survey of the conditions and treatment of Aboriginal labour to advise on these matters, to assist in the recruitment of new Aboriginal labour, and to make recommendations for the better management of Aboriginal labour. This was a departure for Vesteys, who were universally seen as taking little interest in Aboriginal labourers and their dependants. The survey is considered, especially by the Berndts, as the first applied anthropological study conducted in Australia. This article examines aspects of this survey and the effect it had on policy and practice on Northern Territory cattle stations. It also addresses two concerns expressed by Ronald Berndt: the direct and indirect use of applied anthropology and its benefit for Indigenous people, and whether, by leaving others to implement their recommendations, anthropologists were abrogating responsibility.

Introduction

 The contradictions inherent in fieldwork as an enterprise [are]
 contradictions mediated through habits of concealment, deception and
 dissembling. While all social encounters may entail some deception,
 fieldwork is also a professional practice, and anthropologists'
 interpretations are authorized by powerful institutions ... The
 anthropologist in the field is also an emissary from the white world, an
 instance of an encounter between colonial and indigenous cultural realms, a
 fact which those we encounter in the field recognize more often than do the
 anthropologists. (Cowlishaw 1997:111)

 The real questions are whether we [anthropologists] have the courage to say
 and use what we know. (Gouldner 1964:205)

In 1976 the eminent Australian anthropologist Ronald Berndt made the following observation about anthropology and its purpose; `our discipline', he declared:

 stands or falls on the degree to which it can be directly and indirectly
 used for the benefit of someone. Who that someone is--that is, who should
 benefit--is a question that can nearly always be easily answered, but it is
 often outside the control of the anthropologist to ensure that
 recommendations are put into effect. And this raises a number of ethical
 issues with which anthropologists have been concerned for a long time ...
 [and] continues to be a major problem area and one with no easy solutions.
 (Berndt 1976:30-1, original emphasis)

He made this observation partly in response to the charge of anthropology being a product of colonialism, and partly because the anthropological enterprise was portrayed as being complicit with the colonial enterprise (see Berreman 1968; Gjeesing 1968; Gough 1968; see also Asad 1975). This also, unwittingly, problematised the relationship between anthropologists and indigenous peoples.

Ten years later, Berndt (1984:173), still concerned about the predicament in which anthropologists found themselves, added a moral stricture: `Many of us [anthropologists] would agree that it is not anthropologically ethical to present recommendations and leave it at that, abrogating to others the responsibility of making a decision'. Earlier, when reviewing Lucy Mair's Applied Anthropology, he had been critical of an anthropology that stopped short at `pointing out the changes brought about by alien impact, their implications, the possible results of various courses of action and at recommending without weighing alternatives, and most certainly without influencing administrative and political judgment' (Berndt 1958; see also Gouldner 1964).

These themes appeared to interest him for some time before the 1970s, but I argue that, at this point (the early to mid-1970s), Ronald, and presumably his partner Catherine, were faced with a crisis in their ethnographic enterprise brought about not only by international and local critiques of the discipline but also by recognition of a series of changes occurring within Aboriginal Australia: the Yirrkala bark petitions in 1963, the Wave Hill walk-off in the mid-1960s, the Gove dispute, the Freedom Ride of 1965, the 1967 Referendum which gave the Commonwealth government power to legislate on Aboriginal affairs, self-determination replacing assimilation and integration as government policy, the introduction of land rights and so on--all altered the relationships between anthropologists, Aboriginal people and government (Barnes 1988). This not only affected the way in which they themselves understood their past applied work but also how it fitted into those ethical and moral predicaments and strictures articulated by Ronald Berndt (see Gledhill 2000:214-15).

This article addresses two concerns expressed by Berndt--the direct and indirect use of applied anthropology and its benefit for indigenous people, and whether, by leaving others to implement their recommendations, anthropologists are abrogating responsibility--by examining the survey of the Australian Investment Agency (Vesteys) cattle stations in the Northern Territory. This survey, conducted by the Berndts between August 1944 and April 1946, was largely a result of discussions between EWP Chinnery, the director of the Northern Territory Native Affairs Branch, and AP Elkin, professor of anthropology in the University of Sydney.

My primary argument focuses on how Ronald and Catherine Berndt dealt with the ethical and moral dilemmas in which they found themselves when employed by the Australian Investment Agency (AIA). There are, however, secondary considerations: did the Berndts have an obligation to see their recommendations implemented into policy and practice by the AIA? Was there a benefit for Aboriginal people as a result of the survey? Were they acting as agents for the government to expose practices on Vesteys stations or were they genuinely committed to effecting change in work practices on the stations? They assured AS Bingle, general manager of the AIA, that they were working in the interests of Vesteys, despite his suspicion that they were not.

A more perplexing but associated problem is: for whom were they writing? It is unclear whether it was strictly for Vesteys, or also for Elkin and Chinnery and hence with a wider agenda. Some three months after they had commenced their survey, they wrote to Elkin: they ask him if he could advise Chinnery in regard to `some of these points [about conditions on Wave Hill] ... because they are matters of which he should be aware. We have much information which will be of interest to his Department.' (1) These matters are considered within the ethical framework set out by Ronald Berndt, which forms the basis of the discussion here.

This is a complex story because of the intersection of government (Chinnery and the Northern Territory Administration as well as the Commonwealth government), Elkin, an absentee landlord (Lord Vestey) and Vesteys cattle station management, Bingle, the Berndts themselves, and the perceived interests of Aboriginal people--all claimed to know what these interests might be. The brevity of this article unfortunately simplifies these complex interactions. All parties were interested in one way or another in moderating the situation in which Aboriginal labour was worked on Vesteys properties.

The first part of my article briefly outlines the implied promise of government and what might be done to mitigate the inhumane treatment and poor conditions of Aboriginal workers and their dependants. I then discuss the Berndts' employment by Vesteys and their work as well as briefly referring to changes in Aboriginal employment brought about by the occupation of the Northern Territory by the Australian Army during the Pacific War. The final part focuses on the question of abrogating responsibility within the framework of Ronald Berndt's assertions: I conclude that government, the AIA and the Berndts all failed in effecting significant change in the working and living conditions of Aboriginal labour and their dependants on Vesteys cattle stations.

Vesteys

Between 1914 and 1916 Vesteys, a British family company, purchased 36,000 square miles of pastoral land in the Northern Territory and northwest Western Australia. They were long regarded as poor employers who were keen to monopolise the beef industry in Australia (Riddett 1989:233-6). They were absentee landlords: Jack Kelly (1966-67:24) made the observation that the `source of the most frequent complaints about Aboriginal workers is the large absentee holdings. It is their stations also which flagrantly ignore the standards of accommodation set out in the [Northern Territory Ordinances] and reward their Aboriginal workers with the bare minimum payable under Northern Territory legislation' (see also Stevens 1974). The Vestey-dominated Northern Territory Pastoral Lessees Association, established in the 1920s, consistently opposed proposals for the betterment of Aboriginal wage and industrial conditions (see McLaren 2001a, 2001b).

An example of conditions on Vesteys stations at the time the Berndts did their research comes from Bill Harney, a patrol officer with the Native Affairs Branch, who undertook a patrol of the western stations in June 1945:

 encounted [sic] and inspected over 700 natives in this patrol and of that
 number 307 are working on the stations as stockmen, yardbuilders,
 teamsters, butchers, truck-drivers, etc. The hours of this work is from
 daylight in the morning till late at night for every day in the week and
 the only holiday is when they are on walkabout ... As usual with all these
 places a native is only looked upon as a labour unit, the health of the
 people only looked at, not from a human angle, but because sickness means a
 lowering of the labour unit, and this causes concern ... They work for no
 wages, just bread and beef with tea and sugar, his wife if young is worked
 too, children also work if old enough ... [W]ith few exceptions the housing
 conditions and supervision of these natives and their dependants is
 deplorable. [The material for their houses] is gathered in odd sorts of
 ways such as off the wood heap or with the help of some sympathetic white
 truck driver, and iron is bits of cast off pieces or petrol tins flattened
 out and nailed on with nails from packing cases ... At Wave Hill I saw a
 lot of new galvanised iron in a shed, yet the huts of the natives begger
 [sic] description. At Birrundudu Station no shelters at all. (2)

The employment and accommodation conditions offered to the Aborigines by the army during the Pacific War were vastly superior to those which had been offered by the traditional employers of Aboriginal labour (Hall 1989). The attraction of the work in army camps, and the conditions provided by the army, drained many Aboriginal labourers from the Territory's pastoral stations. To help resolve this dilemma, Vesteys employed the Berndts to find remedies against the shortage of labourers.

This was a new approach for the company, which was universally seen as taking little interest in Aboriginal labourers and their dependants. Riddett (1989:237) describes this as `the double shuffle Vesteys executed in their dealings with Aborigines, i.e. denying them basic rights while complaining to government about the scarcity of Aboriginal labour', illustrated by the Berndts' survey. The company was quite committed to keeping Aborigines in their native state. The motive was economic: while their Aboriginal workers were able to live off the country and remain independent of the cash economy, Vesteys did not have to pay wages or supply them and their dependants with rations and it could turn them off the stations at the end of the muster.

A `New Deal'

By the end of the 1930s there was pressure, internationally and domestically, to change Aboriginal policy and practice in the Northern Territory as well as in the states. Included in these concerns were the conditions of Aboriginal labour on cattle stations in the north. Between July and September 1938, John McEwen, then Minister for the Interior, made a tour of the Northern Territory and parts of Western Australia; he took with him EWP Chinnery, director of district services and government anthropologist in the League of Nations Mandated Territory of New Guinea. They were accompanied by the Administrator of the Northern Territory, CLA Abbott.

In early 1939 McEwen proposed a number of reforms in Aboriginal policy and practice, often referred to as the `New Deal' for Aborigines (McEwen 1939). It introduced the possibility of uplifting Aboriginal people, offered hope of citizenship, albeit a limited one, and promised better conditions and treatment. (3) It was profoundly influenced by contemporary anthropological thinking and imbued with the spirit of the humanitarian ideals of the time. McEwen's policy was the precursor to a policy of assimilation formally introduced as Commonwealth policy in 1951, although McEwen never used the term.

McEwen (1939) proposed, among many reforms, the establishment of a `separate branch of Native Affairs ... [which] will be placed under the control of an officer, with administrative ability and training in anthropology, who will function as Director of Native Affairs [and] be available to advise the Government generally on any matters relating to native affairs'. The officers of this inspectorate, trained in anthropology, would be able to oversee and report on the conditions of Aboriginal labour in the Northern Territory.

The man chosen for this position, EWP Chinnery, had had a distinguished career, spanning nearly 30 years as a colonial administrator in both Papua and New Guinea. On 17 February 1939 he became Commonwealth Government Advisor on Native Affairs and Director of Native Affairs of the Northern Territory. (4) One of his abiding concerns was native labour, the conditions of their employment and their treatment by their employers (Gray 1999). In his report to McEwen (`Preliminary Notes'), Chinnery made special mention of the cattle stations and the need to train Aboriginal people in order to `make them more valuable as stock hands on the various stations'. (5)

Soon after he ceased being Minister for the Interior, McEwen commented to Chinnery that he was:

 very glad to hear you are settling down so satisfactorily and I look
 forward with complete confidence to the success of your administration and
 all that you will do for the unfortunate Abos. I came out of the job of the
 Interior confident that in what we have done together in connection with
 Abo. policy, I have had a share, and that it is something that will remain
 long after I am forgotten. (6)

McEwen was replaced by Senator Hatti Foll, who continued McEwen's policy initiatives. Administrator Abbott was not so enthusiastic about the policy nor about the appointment of Chinnery and his connection with the Department of the Interior. Throughout the early 1940s Abbott maintained a strong resistance to any improvements, especially in regard to Aboriginal labour and their dependants, on Northern Territory cattle stations. (7)

On taking up his appointment, Chinnery asked the Protectors of Aborigines for a `report on aboriginal conditions in the district under your supervision'. He wanted to be fully informed of `the existing conditions of aboriginals--men, women and children--associated with places of employment and aboriginals living elsewhere'. (8) In January 1940 he told Abbott that he was:

 anxious to make a close investigation of the native labour conditions ...
 especially on the cattle stations and mining fields, and as soon as the dry
 season commences, I shall visit these places and enquire closely into
 conditions of employment, and the life of the half-caste and aboriginal
 labourers and their dependants ... The whole matter of labour must be
 carefully examined on each place of employment and adjustments made
 wherever necessary ... Droving conditions especially call for careful
 investigation and attention. (9)

By 1942 northern Australia was on full alert, fearful of imminent attack by the Japanese; there was a mass evacuation of `Europeans' and `half-castes' to the south (Powell 1988:51-6). The cattle stations, especially Vesteys, benefited from the army's occupation by supplying beef to the armed forces and their employees. (10) The war affected the further implementation of McEwen's policy and, afterwards, there were other factors which led to a new policy direction.

Something must be done

Elkin told JA Carrodus, secretary of the Department of the Interior, that he had `spent some considerable time with the General Manager of Vesteys [discussing] something of the scheme that [he and Chinnery] are trying to work, namely, to get Vesteys to employ Mr and Mrs Berndt as welfare officers among their Aboriginal employees'. The Berndts would keep an eye on `conditions of employment, and gradually endeavour to build these up, so that the welfare of the Aborigines and the interests of Vesteys would both be served. Matters of diet and health, increase or decrease of population, and such like would be in their province.' He was pleased that `after an interview with the Chairman of Directors and the Manager yesterday, the matter seems finalized, at least for the first six months survey'. This matter had been under discussion since early February 1944. (11)

Elkin told the Berndts that he had `arranged a position for you both, which I hope you will accept. Mr Chinnery likewise hopes that you will accept it. It will give you both great opportunities for research, and also should help in a practical way. [The position] is, in short, to be Aboriginal Welfare Officer and Liaison Officer on the Vestey's stations in the North.' The work, he continued, `would be somewhat like that which Mr Chinnery carried out for the Copper Mines in Papua years ago' (Chinnery, because of his anthropological training, had supervised native labour in the early 1920s).

Bingle would expect them to advise him `on ways of improving the conditions and attitudes' on the stations. Vesteys `will look for practical advice and practical help in keeping up their native labour'. Their work had the potential to provide an outcome which he, Chinnery and Bingle wanted, that is, `a contented Aboriginal community' [around the] pastoral Industry which they [Aborigines] like'. A way of achieving this Elkin suggested was `build[ing] up a good Aboriginal settlement or several of them on central bases on the Vesteys Properties--eventually you may have a half-caste in charge of each, while the Government could supply the teachers'. (12)

When Elkin told Harney that the Berndts were to `make a study of the native labour problem on [Vesteys] stations with a view to the future', Harney remarked: `I am glad the move is on as I have despaired of events that way'; he knew that once the Berndts `find how the stations have been treating their natives ... beware of the row they will start'. (13) Elkin was nonetheless optimistic: `they [Vesteys] will be quite happy to see the time when Aborigines receive their pay in the ordinary way and maintain their dependants'. (14)

This fitted in with his ideas about assimilating and modernising Aboriginal people as well as their preservation (Gray 1998). The Berndts' work for Vesteys, he told HV Evatt, the Minister for External Affairs, was important and would assist in the `preservation of Aborigines' which was linked with the continuance of the pastoral industry in the north. (15) The future of the pastoral industry in the Northern Territory:

 depends on native labour, it is hoped that both employers and
 Administration will agree to the adoption of enlightened policies regarding
 the health, diet, education and community life of aboriginal employees and
 their families. Otherwise, to say the least, within a generation or so
 there will be few, if any, native labourers, let alone aboriginal citizens.
 (16)

Ronald Berndt and Catherine Webb met in early 1940 in Elkin's rooms: Catherine had recently arrived from New Zealand, Ronald from Adelaide. Both were enrolled for a diploma in anthropology at the University of Sydney. They married in April the following year. Earlier that year Elkin arranged for Catherine to obtain a grant for six months fieldwork in Ooldea (she was accompanied by Ronald who was not eligible for a grant as he had no formal academic qualifications). They were awarded their diplomas in May 1943, after submitting a report on Ooldea which was published in the journal Oceania (Berndt and Berndt 1942).

Elkin arranged for further funding for them to conduct research in rural and urban South Australia (including two months at Menindee in southwest New South Wales) between 1943 and 1944. Although they had spent time in the field, only Ooldea was in a remote part of Australia; they were inexperienced researchers and their only applied anthropology was that undertaken at Menindee: they were poorly prepared for the survey of Vesteys cattle stations. Nevertheless, their inexperience was not an impediment: they were keen to `accept the position' and were `extremely grateful for [Elkin's] kindness'; they looked `forward to the opportunities for practical research and applied anthropology'. (17)

There were not many positions for anthropologists other than war work and this was mainly offered to those who were experienced and trained (Gray 2000:188-9). Moreover, Ronald Berndt was no longer welcome in the University of Adelaide and the Museum of South Australia where he had started out as an ethnologist. JB Cleland, chairman of the University of Adelaide's Board for Anthropological Research and chairman of the South Australian Protection Board, wanted Berndt, as did other members, to be `engaged in war work like other young men'.

Opposition to the Berndts working in South Australia hurried Elkin's attempts to find them more congenial places for research. (18) He asked Chinnery if he could find a position for them in the Native Affairs Branch in the Northern Territory. Chinnery had written to Carrodus, supporting the employment of the Berndts `if jobs are available'. (19) Moreover, funding for research was limited, notwithstanding Elkin's having provided them with funding through the Australian National Research Council (ANRC) and the NSW Aborigines Welfare Board, of which he was vice-chairman (Gray 2001:1-29).

Bingle interviewed the Berndts several times before he decided to employ them. As a result he considered them `well worth a trial and therefore engaged them to undertake this important work for our Organization'. (20) Despite their enthusiasm in accepting the position, in later publications they claimed that they had had reservations from the start and it was largely because of the reasons advocated by Elkin and Chinnery, plus their own interest in acculturation, that they agreed to undertake the survey. What convinced them, they said in 1987, was that the `AIA wanted to co-operate so this was a unique opportunity; if we didn't do it, nobody else would and the opportunity would lapse ... It was put to us as an urgent matter' (Berndt and Berndt 1987:29-30).

An experiment in applied anthropology

The survey, the Berndts explained:

 was intended to be an experiment in applied anthropology, the first of its
 kind in Australia. That is, it was hoped to apply a social anthropological
 approach and methods to certain problems which had arisen through contact
 of semi-nomadic aborigines with European settlers. The emphasis was to lie
 on the aborigines, and the effect upon them of these settlers, rather than
 any reciprocal influence which might have been at work.

The Aboriginal people `were the principal figures in this survey'. The methodology was to first deal with `culture contact, the second with the aborigines' own life'. For such a study, it was of course `essential to investigate and take into account the traditional and "tribal" life of these aborigines, in order to understand their reaction to introduced ways'. (They noted: `This statement will not be amplified here, since the validity of the assumption which it makes has been recognized for some time by social anthropologists. See, for instance, Methods of Study of Culture Contact in Africa, Memorandum XV, International Institute of African Languages and Cultures, 1938'.) By working with Aboriginal people on `purely indigenous topics' the Berndts were enabled, they aver (1948a:31-8), to `obtain, directly, their point of view and their attitude towards life' as well as obtaining `relatively frank and truthful accounts of their reaction to the contact situation'.

Almost from the beginning of their work for Vesteys, the Berndts expressed dissatisfaction with Bingle, the station managers and their general treatment as employees of the AIA as well as resistance from some senior members of the Northern Territory Administration. They claimed that the AIA was uncooperative: it did not supply them with regular transport, nor with the transport--a car--promised them and how this affected their fieldwork. The military occupation also restricted their ability to move freely, although they blamed Bingle for this. When they told Bingle at the beginning of November 1944 that they wanted to work at Delamere rather than Birrundudu, he irritatedly declared:

 I think it is essential to tell you that we know our problem, or rather,
 what we think you should do to help us to solve this problem. Briefly it
 amounts to this--that we want you to contact the bush natives, endeavour to
 settle the Myal [sic] tribe somewhere on our stations, where we will be
 able to more or less keep them in hand, and utilise the labour that is
 available. Now to follow this up your movement to do this work is
 controlled through us by the Army, and the supreme command is vested in the
 Headquarters, NT Force, who have recently instructed us that we must seek
 approval for each movement that you make. All previous movements are of no
 authority, so, firstly we must get this approved before we decide where we
 will put you for the `wet' season, secondly it is no use putting in the
 `wet' season where there are no bush natives, and there are certainly very
 few at Delamere, besides the question of transport ... does not come into
 the picture during the `wet' for motor transport is quite impossible, so we
 are dependant entirely on air transport, and, consequently, we must have
 you near an aerodrome. (21)

Nevertheless, as they had told Elkin, they were `convinced' that `we could make a success of the survey from the point of view of Vestey's, of the natives, and of the Department of Native Affairs', despite Bingle's perceived opposition. (22) Their defiant confidence was mirrored by Bingle's growing disappointment in them. The West Australian government refused them permission to enter Aboriginal reserves, which meant that Bingle had to alter plans for their work. Bingle had not expected problems with state or military authorities. Elkin had no doubt assured him, as Elkin did, that researchers under his auspices would not cause problems with either settlers or Aborigines. He also had unrealistic expectations about the Berndts' abilities and skills as anthropologists: he expected them, within the space of six weeks, to `have picked up some of the tribal language and find out certain information regarding the movements of the different tribes'. (23)

The Berndts' brief report on Wave Hill (what is often referred to as their `initial impressions') marked a change in their relationship with Bingle; (24) it became increasingly tense, with the Berndts convinced that he deliberately placed obstacles in their way. They were also disappointed that he had discussed their initial impressions with some of his station managers, which they saw as a breach of confidentiality. From now on Bingle became increasingly wary of what their employment might mean for the future of the company: could he maintain the station managers' interest in supporting the project? Was there any benefit for the company from the work that the Berndts were doing? Bingle was reassessing their value. It was clear by the end of October 1944 that his demands and expectations and the expectations of the Berndts were in conflict and remained so for the rest of their employment. Bingle later told them that his chief objection to their work was `the fact we were anthropologists, and as such would not adopt a sufficiently commercial attitude to recruiting labour for the stations'. (25)

The recruitment of `Bush' or `Myall' Aborigines to work on Vesteys pastoral stations bedevils much of the discussion on this survey, as does the relationship between the Berndts and Bingle; their correspondence is punctuated with disagreements over the purpose of the survey. It is central to much of the discontent expressed by them about Bingle and the effect of the survey. Recruitment, the Berndts recalled in 1987, `tended to overshadow all other issues involved, and seemed to represent to the AIA a definitive answer to all its labour troubles'. The message they got was that Vesteys `preferred to use Aboriginal labour both indiscriminately and unconditionally, drawing it as if from an unlimited reservoir of human material'. It was, they declared, `primarily on this account that the survey was terminated' by them in May 1946 (Berndt and Berndt 1987:38, 44).

This statement, although not incorrect, nonetheless seeks to create an impression which is misleading. Catherine notified Elkin, in early March 1946, that `there seems to be nothing further we can do [here]'. (26) They did not leave Darwin for Adelaide until the end of April and they left Vesteys soon after: earlier, in December 1944, they had been dismissed by Bingle, but he had relented largely because of representations made by Chinnery; and the Berndts had on numerous occasions threatened to resign, claiming that their work was farcical, futile and such like. (27) Thus, to make recruitment the central cause for their `termination' of the survey is beguiling as well as simplifying a complex relationship between them and Bingle (Vesteys), their concern for their future, and their motives in continuing in the employ of Vesteys.

The army and change

Anthropology, as an informing discipline for native administration, had not had the same sympathetic reception in prewar Northern Territory as in the Australian external territories of Papua and New Guinea. Nevertheless, it was regarded as useful by the army in responding to the immediate perceived threat of invasion by the Japanese and the uncertainty in regard to the perceived loyalty of Aboriginal people. The army sought from anthropologists, particularly WEH Stanner and Donald Thomson, comment and advice on how best to use Aborigines in the war effort. Elkin continued to provide unsolicited advice to both army and government on Aborigines and the war effort, as did the Berndts. (28)

Northern Australia was not invaded by the Japanese but, rather, by Australian soldiers with little knowledge or experience of the embedded racial and social attitudes of the white settler population. This invasion brought about changes, albeit unintended ones. War is a time of change both at a personal and social level. This has been well researched and documented for white Australian soldiers and civilians on the home front and for Aboriginal servicemen, but not for Aboriginal civilians. These histories highlight the role and involvement of Aboriginal soldiers in World War II as well as the changes that occurred, particularly in the Northern Territory, in social and race relations during and after the war (Berndt and Berndt 1987:249-52; Hall 1987, 1989; Powell 1988:243-67).

The army employed Aborigines under much the same conditions as it did other civilians (Hall 1989) and thus created a new model which had far-reaching consequences not only for social and economic relationships in the north. It also altered the way in which anthropologists, such as Elkin and the Berndts, understood culture contact and caused them to revise their views on the ability of Aborigines to adjust to changing situations and adapt to new ways of living. Thus, the relationship between the army and Aborigines, and the manner in which Aborigines were employed by the army, raised issues that were of interest to an anthropology premised on helping and understanding as well as providing practical assistance to government and mission on ways to manage and develop Aboriginal people. Both the Berndts and Elkin were at the forefront of such thinking and vigorously promoted assimilating Aboriginal people by ameliorating the conditions in which they lived and worked.

Abrogating responsibility?

The Berndts made a series of recommendations in a number of interim reports which they thought Vesteys would accept and thus would lead to improvement in the situation for Aboriginal labourers and their dependants on the cattle stations. (29) These recommendations ranged from matters to do with sanitation, housing, diet, and sexual relations between Aboriginal women and white stockmen, to the creation of settlements where Vesteys could train stockmen for their stations (Berndt and Berndt 1946b, 1987:235-52; cf Berndt and Berndt 1946a:184-215, 289-94).

In End of an Era, the Berndts (1987:256) declare that Chinnery viewed the final report, `Native Labour and Welfare', as `a vital document which could lead to a revolution of conditions existing then on the pastoral stations'. (30) This was somewhat of an overstatement and represented a desire of the Berndts. Cowlishaw (2001:179) argues that their `report about conditions on the Vesteys' pastoral stations was intended to reveal in order to correct practices taken to be fundamentally unacceptable' to humanitarian views. The Berndts were concerned that their work might have been futile and there is little to suggest that their report had the significant effect they later claimed for it. Ronald Berndt was pessimistic in July 1946 about whether it would have any influence; he told Chinnery that `I suppose that in the end nobody will want it, or it will be too "honest" for publication: we hope not, though, because it really is time something is done before all the natives in those areas disappear'. (31)

On 8 and 9 January 1947, a conference was held at Alice Springs between representatives of the Northern Territory Administration, including Frank Moy, who had replaced Chinnery in late 1946 as Native Affairs director, and those of the Northern Territory, and Central Australian, Pastoral Lessees Associations. The purpose of the meeting was to discuss Aboriginal employment on pastoral stations. Elkin urged Moy to `bring the employer/native-labourer relationship onto a better basis--in other words, perform a revolution there, you will have laid the foundation for real progress in your work'. (32) Despite expressions of a readiness to improve conditions for Aborigines in the pastoral industry, it was resolved to maintain the status quo. The Native Affairs Branch had neither the political clout to insist upon better conditions, nor the statutory power to ensure that any improvements were effected (see Kelly 1966-67:11).

The resolution of the problem was not as simple as that of merely providing new and better facilities, or improved diet, sanitation, and such like, for Aboriginal employees and dependants on reserves and settlements. Europeans had vested interests in resisting efforts to improve conditions of employment. Bingle, in his autobiographical memoir, wrote that in his `observation the aboriginal is happy working in the pastoral industry. The stations have in the past looked after the dependents within the tribes, as well as the immediate families of the aboriginal workers.' Government, through `all sorts of harsh and unrealistic conditions', had undermined `happy relationships between managers and overseers and aboriginal workers'. And in regard to `the aborigines' living quarters, the Government wanted special huts or cottages erected to give them improved conditions ... Numbers of these cottages were built ... But the aboriginal, being nomadic in his habits' was not suited to this `new style of building' (Bingle nd:7-8).

It is difficult to assess the value of the Berndts' reports to the AIA; they recollect that Bingle told them that Vesteys wanted to discuss with them:

 many matters concerning [our] future handling of native employees on our
 northern stations and, in particular, to the improvements that we are now
 in the course of constructing which will more or less conform to the
 recommendations made by the Native Welfare Department. I have told you your
 survey whilst in our employ has in many cases been most instructive and
 constructive.

Chinnery told them that Bingle `had concluded' that they had `made some [practical] recommendations so something helpful to the natives may result after all'. Near the end of the survey Bingle told them that he planned to discuss with Abbott, the Northern Territory Administrator:

 the general control and employment of aboriginal [labour]. We are quite
 aware that at the present time our conditions of employment may not be all
 that they should be but we are not going to make two bites at the cherry.
 We will evolve a scheme which will be acceptable to all authorities so, in
 the meantime, it is no use making any criticism on the present conditions.
 (33)

But the Berndts saw all this as a facade `to assist the firm in evading its full responsibilities toward its Aboriginal employees' (Berndt and Berndt 1987:255-6). Their cynicism was undoubtedly brought about by their frustration at failing to effect change and the recalcitrance of Vesteys to act on any of their recommendations. But it also showed a naivety and an impatience on their part, expecting a company such as Vesteys to change a work and management culture in such a short period of time on the sole basis of their recommendations.

Elkin and Chinnery also had a more practical view of how the Berndts' work could be implemented. They too were disappointed that `so far no practical use has been made of your work ... and position'. Elkin planned to discuss with Bingle the substance of their October (1945) report. He hoped that they had placed the idea of settlements in it: both he and Chinnery `hope that the firm [Vesteys] will establish a community settlement with yourselves in charge ... to set it on the right lines'. Such settlements would enable families to `go off mission reserves' and live on them while the `husbands were at work'. This meant `the establishment of schools, health centres and all the rest of it'. (34)

Despite Bingle's recalcitrance, the Berndts had opportunities to press for change and the acceptance of some of their recommendations: Elkin urged them, after they left Vesteys, to write a study on labour conditions in order to bring about public pressure. He also advocated sending the report to Vesteys:

 [it] should eventually be sent to the Firm, if you have not done so, and
 also to its managing director in England ... [if you haven't sent a] full
 report to the Firm, [do] not ... give them [it] until you have prepared the
 book on Aboriginal labour conditions in Northern Australia. Then they could
 have a copy of both.

He was sure if this was done it would bring about a change in Vesteys; public opinion would also be `aroused when it is made public, not only with regard to the conditions under which the natives work and live, but also in many cases with reference to those concerning white employees. In the latter case, it might not be slavery, but is a form certainly approaching that institution' (Berndt and Berndt 1987:256-8). In End of an Era, the Berndts place responsibility for the delay in publication firmly with Elkin, which is an explanation that has acquired wide currency (Cowlishaw 2001:179; Stanton 1990:96; see also Gray 2000b).

The Berndts did not, in fact, produce the book on Aboriginal labour in the late 1940s that Elkin had urged them to write, but four decades later they wrote End of an Era, an amended and revised version of the 1946 `Being a Preliminary Report ...'. This account is carefully edited so that it conveys a particular reading of the survey, especially the role of Bingle, their response to him and the importance of the survey in effecting changed conditions on pastoral stations. I contend that an analysis of their correspondence to Bingle, Elkin and Chinnery, their interim reports for the AIA and their 1946 report allows for a different reading, which challenges the one they so carefully produced in 1987.

Conclusion

The Berndts wanted to see an end to the appalling conditions and treatment of Aboriginal people on Vesteys stations, and they were in a unique position to comment on those conditions and treatment: they had observed at close quarters the workings of cattle stations in ways that no one had hitherto. (Their record of their time on the stations is important for this alone.) Paradoxically, they also wanted to record what they considered a still existing but passing way of life: in an article about Aboriginal art (Berndt and Berndt 1950), not only did they elide the purpose of their work but they also represented an illusory picture of Aboriginal life on Birrundudu outstation:

 During our fieldwork in the Birrundudu (Gordon Downs) area in 1944-5, we
 were fortunate in obtaining a large representative collection of drawings
 in lumber crayon on brown paper. They were done by aborigines with a
 minimum of alien contact. They are ... a people who [devote] much of their
 time and energy ... in food collecting and in performing ceremonies which
 are considered vital to their very existence ... On account of the paucity
 and the impermanent nature of their forms of artistic expression, we
 adopted the introduced medium of lumber crayon drawings. (35)

But wanting to do something publicly about what they witnessed in the field, and develop a career, are often uncomfortable partners. So, when they insist that recruitment was the point of rupture between them and Vesteys, one has to ask why they continued in the employ of Vesteys. There are several explanations. First and foremost is the encouragement by Elkin and Chinnery to stay: `Stick to the job ... Your opportunity is good to study culture contact, and of course, the anthropological background, as well as all that happens on the frontier ... So grind your teeth and stick to it a bit longer ... I shall discuss the matter with C[hinnery] at the first opportunity'. (36) As a result, the Berndts encouraged Bingle to think they would do his bidding with regard to recruiting new labour, especially from army compounds and mission stations, while at the same time relentlessly collecting ethnographic data and artefacts (Berndt and Berndt 1987:254).

If, however, this was the case, then it appears that Aboriginal welfare came second to their collection of ethnographic data. This has added weight when one considers the prolonged gap between the research and publication of End of an Era as well as their reluctance to press either publicly or privately either Vesteys or the government over matters associated with their recommendations and the results of their survey. If remaining in the employ of Vesteys enabled them to provide sufficient evidence to force change not only on Vesteys but on government, as they claim, one would expect a stronger resolution to pursue these matters at least until the Gurundji Wave Hill walk-off for wages and land was resolved in the early 1970s. In fact, the Berndts never returned to Wave Hill or Birrundudu. Talking up the importance of their survey at the time is used by them to mask their silence and their failure to bring about change.

They were aware also that their reputation as anthropologists was at stake. They told Bingle that `it is not for ourselves that we are concerned (although naturally we would be reluctant to leave such an important survey only half-completed), since there is plenty of opportunity for anthropological research, both here and overseas, which offers considerably more scope and co-operation than is apparently to be found in this matter'. (37) Within 12 months of beginning their employment with Vesteys, they commented to Chinnery that, `without describing in detail our present position as "anthropologists to Vesteys", it is easy to gauge the farcical nature of our appointment. In other words we are definitely prostituting our work for no adequate reason.' (38) But there were no other positions available for anthropologists during the war.

There is little doubt that, after the survey, they felt awkward about their employment and this helps to explain (partially) their coyness about their time with Vesteys and their reluctance to write up their work. Once they left Vesteys, they did not mention the company by name and gave the impression that they were employed by either the University of Sydney or the ANRC (Berndt and Berndt 1948b:14). Catherine Berndt stated that her Women's Changing Ceremonies (1950:10) was `based on field work carried out under the auspices of the Australian National Research Council, and the Department of Anthropology, University of Sydney'; she did not mention her employment by Vesteys.

To return to the beginning: did the Berndts abrogate their responsibility and leave to others the responsibility of implementing their recommendations and, concomitantly, were their research results used, either directly or indirectly, for the benefit of Aboriginal people? To claim, as they did, that their report was instrumental in bringing about change in the pastoral industry elides the role of government and its agents in promoting change. It overstates the importance of their work vis-a-vis that of government and its agents in the field.

It was a report written by VG Carrington, deputy director of the Native Affairs Branch, which formed the basis of the 1947 conference and the limited changes to the pastoral award. Reports by Chinnery, Harney and Gordon Sweeney also contributed to the changes in the pastoral industry after the Pacific War. (39) Many of the ideas and recommendations adopted by the Berndts were frequently articulated in government reports by the Northern Territory Native Affairs officials with whom they had contact both before and during their survey. Last but not least, the army had shown that payment of wages and reasonable conditions of employment and treatment had a beneficial effect.

When Ronald Berndt pointed to the shortcomings of applied anthropology as laid out by Lucy Mair, we would anticipate that he and Catherine would be sensitive to the interests of Aboriginal people, their welfare and the use of their knowledge to bring about change beneficial to Aboriginal workers and their dependants on the cattle stations. They were sensitive, but the tension between advocacy and career remained. Aboriginal people had, as the Berndts point out in End of an Era, expressed their discontent of the situation as well as their expectation that the Berndts could do something about it, that is, the Berndts could help redress the wrongs.

There is little doubt, by their prolonged silence and their concomitant lack of action, that the Berndts failed Aboriginal people working and living on the stations. Both Chinnery and Elkin also hoped for much from the survey but were given little because the Berndts did not write a general text on Aboriginal labour and the systematic abuses of Aboriginal workers and their dependants on Vesteys cattle stations in the Northern Territory. To paraphrase Ronald, the Berndts' applied work for Vesteys stood or fell on the degree to which it could be used, directly or indirectly, for the benefit of the Aboriginal people. The Berndts were not alone, of course, in failing to bring about change and an improvement in working conditions: government failed in its fiduciary duty, and Vesteys continued to use Aboriginal labour without much regard to their well-being.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Other versions of this paper were presented to the Australian Historical Association annual conference, University of Adelaide, July 2000, the Anthropology Seminar, Australian National University, August 2000, and the Australian Anthropological Association, University of Western Australia, September 2000. I thank the participants for their constructive and informative comments, and also Christine Winter, Deborah Rose, Darryl Lewis and Lyn Riddett for their comments on some of the issues raised. I also thank Sheila Waters for permission to use her father's (Chinnery) papers, Tim Robinson at the University of Sydney Archives, and John Stanton for permission to quote from the Berndts' correspondence. I have recently completed a book on the Berndts, Vesteys and applied anthropology.

NOTES

(1.) R Berndt to Elkin, 8 November 1944, Elkin Papers (EP).

(2.) Harney, `Report of Patrol Western Stations', 29 June 1945, National Archives of Australia (NAA): CA1070, CRSF1, Item 1944/275.

(3.) Alan Powell (1988:245) refers to McEwen's `New Deal' as a mixture of `paternalism, expediency and altruism'.

(4.) Various, NAA: A220, item 539/606.

(5.) Chinnery, `Preliminary Notes on Trip to the Northern Territory', nd, probably October/November 1938, Chinnery Papers (CP).

(6.) McEwen to Chinnery, 4 May 1939 (CP).

(7.) Abbott to Carrodus, 16 February 1939; Carrodus to Abbott, 23 February 1939 (NAA: A220, item S39/606). Abbott to Chinnery, 1 June 1939; Chinnery to Abbott, 7 June 1939 (CP).

(8.) NAA: CRS F126, Item 22.

(9.) Chinnery to Abbott, 18 January 1940 (CP).

(10.) Various, NAA: MP729/6, 47/402/2114. There was some resentment directed towards Vesteys by independent station owners who believed Vesteys were profiteering from the war. This was investigated but the files relating to this have been lost (Darryl Lewis, pers. comm.).

(11.) Elkin to Carrodus, 9 August 1944 (EP); AIA to Chinnery, 22 May 1944 (CP).

(12.) Elkin to R Berndt, 30 May 1944 (EP); cf Berndt and Berndt (1987:32).

(13.) Elkin to Harney, 23 June 1944; Harney to Elkin, 2 August 1944 (EP).

(14.) Elkin to R Berndt, 30 May 1944 (EP).

(15.) Elkin to Evatt, 9 October 1944 (EP).

(16.) Notes and News, Oceania, vol. 15(3), 1945, p. 276.

(17.) R Berndt to Elkin, 9 June 1944 (EP).

(18.) Various, NAA: D1915/0, Item SA19248. Various, State Archives of South Australia, GRG52/1/1941/25. Elkin to Chief Secretary (South Australia), 10 November 1943; Cleland to Elkin, 30 November 1943 (Cleland Papers, Museum of South Australia). Elkin to Cleland, 13 December 1943; R Berndt to Elkin, 6 December 1943 (EP).

(19.) Chinnery to Elkin, 3 February 1943; see also Chinnery to Elkin, 25 August 1945 (EP). For a brief biography of Carrodus, see Markus (1990:122-9).

(20.) Bingle to FI Bray (Commissioner of Native Affairs, Western Australia), 10 August 1944 (WA State Archives: ACC993, 794/44).

(21.) Bingle to R Berndt, 6 November 1944 (EP).

(22.) R Berndt to Elkin, 15 September 1944 (EP).

(23.) Bingle to R Berndt, 6 November 1944 (EP); cf Berndt and Berndt (1948:68).

(24.) Berndts to Bingle, 4 November 1944 (CP).

(25.) R Berndt to Elkin, 22 April 1946 (EP).

(26.) C Berndt to Elkin, 15 March 1946 (EP).

(27.) Chinnery to Bingle, 14 December 1944; Bingle to Chinnery, 18 December 1944; R Berndt to Chinnery, 23 December 1944; R Berndt to Chinnery, 24 June 1945 (CP).

(28.) See also Berndt and Berndt, `Voluntary War Service for Aborigines', April 1942 (Sydney) (Museum of South Australia: AA60, Cleland Papers; various, NAA: MP508/1,275/750/1310).

(29.) They wrote a number of interim reports: Berndts to Bingle, 4 November 1944; `Suggested Recommendations in Regard to Aboriginal Labour on Pastoral Stations under the Control of the Northern Agency', Berndt and Berndt, 21 July 1945; `Annual Report to the Australian Investment Agency as at 15 October 1945', Berndt and Berndt (CP). Their final report was completed in July 1946: `Being a Preliminary Report ...' (Berndt and Berndt 1946a).

(30.) This title is an invented title by the Berndts. It should read `Being a Preliminary Report ...' (Berndt and Berndt 1946a). The report is in four parts: (i) `Native Labour and Welfare in the Northern Territory, First Phase: From August 1944 to June 1945, the North-Western Central Part of the Northern Territory', pp. 1-215; (ii) `Native Labour and Social Welfare in the Northern Territory, Second Phase: From June 1945 to April 1946, the Upper Northern Section of the Northern Territory', pp. 217-94; (iii) `Sketch Map of the Western Central Area of the Northern Territory'; (iv) `Sketch Map of the Upper Northern Part of the Northern Territory'. It is typescript (294pp) and loose, that is not bound. Only three copies were made.

There are several people who claim to have seen this report in the University of Sydney Department of Anthropology; Gillian Cowlishaw, for instance, claims that in 1974 she `came across a copy of the Berndts' report but after I spoke of it, wondering why it had not been made public, the report disappeared from the shelf'. She blamed Elkin's ghost, but as he died in 1978 this is unlikely. What she most likely saw was a copy of an abbreviated version (`A Northern Territory Problem') which the Berndts distributed to students in the department in November 1948 (Roslyn Poignant, pers. comm.). Elkin returned his copy of the 1946 report to the Berndts in early 1947.

(31.) R Berndt to Chinnery, 11 July 1946 (CP).

(32.) Elkin to Moy, 14 January 1947 (EP).

(33.) Bingle to R Berndt, 9 October 1945 (EP).

(34.) Elkin to R Berndt, 19 October 1945 (EP).

(35.) See also R Berndt to Chinnery, 24 June 1945 (CP). They told the editor of Meanjin, Clem Christensen, that `we have tried to give the anthropologist's attitude toward Aboriginal art, and incidentally explained something of our reasons for writing "Art in Arnhem Land" (Berndts to Christensen, 31 July 1950, Meanjin Archive).

(36.) Elkin to R Berndt, 31 January 1945; 7 June 1945; 21 June 1945 (EP).

(37.) Berndts to Bingle, 22 December 1944 (CP).

(38.) Berndts to Chinnery, 21 August 1945 (CP).

(39.) See, for example, AIA to Chinnery, 22 May 1944; Harney to Chinnery, 26 October 1944; Harney to Chinnery, 26 October 1944; Chinnery to Administrator, 8 November 1945 (CP). Memo, Sweeney, 9 April 1945; Sweeney to Chinnery, 9 April 1945 (NAA: CRS F1 Item 1945/157).

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Geoffrey Gray
AIATSIS, Canberra