Study On The Australian Labor Party's Reforms After World War ?

Through the historical development of the world party politics we can clearly see that, the party'development history is also a reform history actually. The fact verified by the history is that all the parties'developments are realized by self-re forms, no party who lacking self-reform ability can avoid the destiny of declination eventually. This requires all the parties must adjust themselves constantly according to the change of the times and the needs of their own self-developments.This paper is a case analysis about the Australian Labor Party's reforms after World War II. Since the establishment in 1891, the Australian Labor Party has been adjusting itself adaptively, especially since the end of World War II, the transformation of the Australian society brings plenty of new challenges for the Labor Party, in order to overcome the difficulties in its development, the Labor Party reforms itself extensively and in-depthly. This paper takes input-transform-output-feedback of political system as analysis path, and mainly uses social ecology research method in systematic studying on the Australian Labor Party's reforms after World War II. Except for the introduction, the main contents include six chapters and conclusion.The first chapter is the basic theoretical analysis of party reform. This paper definates party reform as party'adjustment of ideology, organization system, policy propositions, activity patterns and other core elements in narrow sense, it is believed that as a systematic project, the party must make all the elements keep harmony and unity on the whole by continuous integration in the process of reform. The reasons of party reform are complex, whether external factors or internal factors, their stimulating effects on party reform can not be ignored. In combination, the reasons of party reform can be attributed to four main aspects including the change of environments, the effect of leaders, the guidance of goals and the stimulation of crises. There are many standards on classifying party reform, this paper summarizes the classifications of party reform according to the degrees of reform, the attitudes of reform, the ways of reform and the reasons of reform. In addition, based on the fact that party reform is carried out around party's practical needs of self-development and playing a role, this paper will set evaluation indexes for party reform mainly on three main dimensions including party's objectives, party's social identification and party's adaptation.The second chapter is the historical investigation of the Australian Labor Party's establishment and development before 1949. Under the social background of the rapid development of capitalist economy, the polarization of social class structure, the perfection of parliamentary democracy and the whole society was filled with racism parochialism, the Australian Labor Party was set up in 1891 and developed from a political helper juggled between old parties to an independent political force on Australian political circle from 1891 to 1949. Speaking on the characteristics, the Australian Labor Party walked onto the political stage under the support of trade union movement, under the banner of labourism and as the representative of working class. Therefore, the Australian Labor Party was a typical "Labors'Party" who had obvious color of working class before World War II. In addition, confined by limitations of the times, both the policy platform and the organization operation of the Australian Labor Party were full of parochialism before World War II. The main characteristics of the Australian Labor Party before World War II embody as:the Labor Party had definite "socialist ideology", the organization system of the Labor Party was closed, conservative and loose, the policy propositions of the Labor Party were extremely class-protectionist, the Labor Party mainly relied on man-powers and newspapers to carry out daily activities.The third chapter is the investigation on the Australian Labor Party's first round reform from 1949 to 1975. The Australia has started transforming from industrial society to post-industrial society with stable economical development in the 1950s to the mid-1970s, the change of industrial structure and social class structure caused by social transformation inevitably made the Labor Party rooting in Australia's traditional economy and society face many new challenges. At the same time, the "Cold War" between East and West also inevitably made the Australian Labor Party belonging to left-wing ranks deeply affected. Except for that, the Labor Party splitted in 1955 due to internal inconsistent attitude on communism, the direct consequence brought by the split was the Labor Party's 23 years out of power from 1949 to 1972. In this case, how to adapt to the change of social environments and strengthen the party's unity was the Labor Party's theme of reform from 1949 to 1975. In specific practice, the Labor Party mediated the ideological differences by establishing the democratic socialist ideology, balanced the internal political power by redistributing the power within organization, coordinated the benefit contradiction by reconstructing the class-protectionist policies, declared the political stance by adjusting the relationship with the Australian Communist Party. The Labor Party overcame election failure brought by the change of objective environments and the party's split by reform on some level, and finally re-boarded the ruling status after 23 years, but the imbalance occurred in the Labor Party's reform also exposed the immaturation of the Labor Party's reform ability. The change of subjective and objective environments compelled the Labor Party to abandon some traditional values of left-wing party, but the Labor Party's nature of democratic socialist party hasn't been completely converted at this time.The forth chapter is the investigation on the Australian Labor Party's second round reform from 1975 to 1996. The recession of Australian economy, the formation of "olive shape" social class structure, the rise of post-materialist values and the development of television new media made the Labor Party's traditional development pattern face more severe challenges from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s. At the same time, in 1975, Whitlam Labor government was defeated after just three years in charge because of the huge policy-making error in economic management, and from then on the Labor Party didn't get ruling status until 1983. In this case, adapting to the change of social environments and enhancing ruling ability, particularly enhancing the ability of economic management to win back the trust of voters rose to the Labor Party's theme of reform from 1975 to 1996. The measures that the Labor Party took around the building of ruling ability mainly include:the neoliberalization of the democratic socialism ideology, providing organizational support for the party's political practice, starting to focus on new policy issues while further weakening class protectionist policies, displaying ruling ability with the help of TV platform, etc. From the effects point of view, this period of reform brought 13 years ruling time for the Labor Party, but the Labor Party didn't deal well with the relationship between economic efficiency and social equity due to its right-deviation of ideology during the ruling time. In addition, the deepening of reform in this period has made the Labor Party undergo a qualitative change which embodies as the Labor Party already has the nature of social democratic party.The fifth chapter is the investigation on the Australian Labor Party's third round reform since1996. Since the mid-1990s, while the upheaval adjustment of the world party system caused by the collapse of the former Soviet Union and tremendous change of East Europe, the accelerated development of economic globalization caused by the termination of the Cold War, and the big transformation of people's way of life caused by the development of internet, etc. are changing the Australian society profoundly, they also lead the future development of the Labor Party in deep level. In 1996, the Labor Party lived under the framework of neo-liberal theory can no longer bear the survival pressure brought by the loss of identity,11 years failure in election from 1996 to 2007 warned the Labor Party:Only establish a new party image can resolve the identity crisis. In this case, adapting to the change of social environments and shaping self-identity becomes the Labor Party's theme of reform since 1996. In this regard, the Labor Party establishes the'Third Way" as guiding ideology, takes openness and democracy as value-guidance in organizational construction, takes balancing efficiency and fairness as basic principle in policy adjustment, and makes sufficient use of internet to propagandize the party's image in campaign. The Labor Party re-emerges the sign of turning left after reform, but the Labor Party still doesn't definite its political attributes accurately. The raising of "third way" marks the complete end of the Labor Party's traditional democratic socialism ideology and the final establishment of social democratic ideology, the Labor Party thus intensifies its nature of social democratic party in the practice of "third way".The sixth chapter is the thought about the Australian Labor Party's reforms after World War ?. The reforms of the Australian Labor Party after World War ? embody distinct characteristics. First, the three rounds reforms of the Labor Party after World War ? all begin during opposition periods, they are all the Labor Party's passive behaviors under opposition dilemmas. Second, the Labor Party's reforms after World War ? are the Labor Party's transformation from "Labors'Party" to "National Party", they are the Labor Party's pragmatic behaviors impelled by election interests. Third, the reforms of the Labor Party after World War ? are the Labor Party's orderly adjustments according to the change of social environments and the Labor Party's own need of self-development, they are the Labor Party's gradual behaviors full of moderate. In terms of results, the Labor Party's priority goals gets occasionally achieved, but the "socialism" goal has faded away; the Labor Party gets the support of cross-class in a certain extent, but the support rate in working class has seriously declined; the Labor Party's function of social integration gets some reinforcement, but the function of class-interests representative has been gradually weakened; the Labor Party's organizational efficiency gets improved, but the organizational base becomes flexible. From the Labor Party's reforms after World War ? we can realize:First, survival challenge brought by the change of social environments is a practical problem that no party can avoid, the change of social environments is the fundamental reason for party reform, therefore, adapting to the change of social environments is the logical starting point of party reform. Second, the pursuing of long-term goal must be based on the realization of short-term goal, but the pursuing of short-term goal can't be at the cost of sacrificing the long-term goal without limits, only combining the realization of short-term and long-term goal can realize the long-term development of party, therefore, dealing well with the relationship between short-term goal and long-term goal is the basic requirement of Party Reform. Third, the establishment and maintenance of party-organization is essential for party's survival and development, all work of party reform must be achieved by a sound party-organization, therefore, strengthening the construction of party-organization is an important task of party reform. Forth, the value and meaning of party's existence is being able to affect a country's political life and playing the function and role as the national political subject, therefore, enhancing governing ability is the value orientation of party reform.