Resource Nationalism and Australian State Intervention

Abstract

In the early 1970s, the resource networks that had been established between the Japanese steel and Australian mining industries were largely under Japanese control. While these production networks had solved Japan’s need for low-cost minerals supply, many Australian actors felt they failed to deliver satisfactory returns for the Australian mining industry and economy more broadly. However, in the insecure climate of the 1960s Australian governments had been reluctant to act on these concerns, and acquiesced to the demands of the JSM and multinational mining corporations to avoid jeopardising the development of export-oriented iron ore and coal industries. This pattern was soon to end, however, when the Australian Commonwealth government dramatically changed its approach to its mining firms and Japan in 1973. Claiming that Japanese steel and foreign mining firms had ‘ripped off’ the country, it adopted a ‘resource nationalist’ approach to its mining sector. This new approach involved a series of aggressive state interventions, which aimed to reduce Japanese control and increase the share of value generated in the production networks that was being captured in Australia. These state interventions proved extremely effective, and by the early 1980s had both decisively ended Japanese control and resulted in a redistribution of value in the production networks toward the Australian economy.

Keywords

These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.