Description

It's 1975, and the Liberal Party's Malcolm Fraser makes a ruthless grab for power. Workers resist, opening up seven years of bitter class conflict. Years of Rage analyses the crisis into which Australia plunged under Whitlam. It outlines the actions of politicians, capitalists, oppressed people and above all the organized working class. From the upheavals of the Constitutional Crisis through to the strikes in defence of universal health care and on to the 1981 "wage push", Tom O'Lincoln traces the industrial and political struggles. O'Lincoln's accounts of the social movements against oppression, unemployment, environmental ruin and war complement the story. Originally written in 1993, Years of Rage remains the key work on the Fraser years from the point of view of those who did maintain their rage. It demythologizes the standard beliefs about the Whitlam and Fraser governments. The book argues that the exhaustion of the two sides enabled the rise of the neo-liberal governments of Hawke and Keating. This is a partisan and Marxist history. The author's sympathies lie with the militants and activists fighting for a better world.