Immigration research in the politics of an anxious nation

In this paper I examine the closure of the national government-funded Bureau of Immigration Research in 1996, soon after the election of a conservative political coalition to power in Australia. The Bureauʹs abolition is treated as a defining event in the profound shift that has been observable over the last five years in the forms of evidence produced and publicly aired about immigration. I seek both to form an explanation for the demise of this successful research institution and to provide examples of the research about immigration that was produced during the time of the Bureau, and after its closure. Using evidence primarily from a reading of contemporary media texts, government reports, and statistics, the analysis is made with reference to three themes. First, immigration as a contested ʹissueʹ, and the style of research done about it, is situated in the context of the new politics of nationhood emerging from the recent shift in federal governments. Second, views of the ʹfactsʹ of immigration that were publicly prevalent in the days of the Bureauʹs operation, are contrasted with those now dominant. Third, particular representations of immigration found in these contrasting accounts are examined.