Reviewed by Norrie Sanders
Most of us have grown up with the idea that the Antarctic is a relatively untouched land of ice, mountains and penguins. It seems unthinkable that we should exploit it for mining or oil or whales. Yet through the 19th and most of the 20th centuries, Australia saw Antarctica as a future resource, for which we should claim a large share. So, our lobbying in the 1920s to restrict whaling by Norway was not about protecting cetaceans, but protecting our access to them.
But Rohan Howitt’s central thesis is that Australia’s aspirations towards Antarctica are part of a much grander picture than mere economic gain or thirst for knowledge:
…approaching Australian history from the perspective of its southern frontier reveals Australia to be not simply an outpost of British imperial expansion but the centre of a distinctively Australian imperial project in the Southern Hemisphere [p8].
Fortunately, these vast expanses of sea, ice and rock were not yet owned by anyone. In comparison to the norms of most colonisation, including dispossession, cultural devastation, violent conflict… the Antarctica and the Southern Ocean islands, by contrast, had never been permanently settled [p12].
The author argues that three fundamental ideas underscored Australia’s interest – geographic proximity, exploitable resources and sphere of influence. Although this book focuses on the south, our imperialist aims extended in all directions – west (Christmas Island), north (Papua and New Guinea) and east (Norfolk Island):
The Australian empire was a product of popular ideas, geopolitical anxieties, expansionist policies and relentless political manoeuvring [p219].
Australia provided material and/or moral support to early Norwegian, British and American expeditions, as well as Douglas Mawson’s expeditions of over 6,300 km of unmapped land. Persistence paid off and Australia’s claim to 42% of the continent is still in place to this day.
The book is meticulously researched. For example, there is a summary of an 1850 lecture at the Hobart Mechanics Institute. The annals of short-lived and long dead institutions such as the Philosophical Society of Australasia and the Van Diemen’s Land Scientific Society also make it to the page. Howitt even dredges up letters to the editor of the Ballarat Star and the Mount Gambier Border Watch. Just as our present-day social media and newsfeeds may never make history, these old sources are a window to the mood of the times – the zeitgeist.
These sources indicate that Australia’s actions to secure a southern empire were sporadic and the diverse stakeholders – academics, governments, media, commercial interests and the general public – rarely seemed to act in lock step. Perhaps it was more a set of aspirations than a clearly defined project.
Though it may not be strictly an empire, to successfully claim an area almost as large as Australia was quite an achievement. Plotting that journey has delivered a fascinating book that sheds light on Australia’s motivations over more than a century. The elephant in the room is that as the ice melts and exposes potential resources, will Australia be forced to protect its claims against international players who refuse to play by the rules? Just ask Greenland.
Rohan Howitt is a lecturer in environmental history at Monash University. His research focuses on the interconnected histories of Australia, New Zealand, Antarctica and the Southern Ocean. His work has been published in leading scholarly journals such as Australian Historical Studies, History Compass, and The Journal of Global History. The Southern Frontier is his first book.
The Southern Frontier
by Rohan Howitt
(May 2025)
MUP
ISBN: 978 052288 051 9
$39.99 (Paperback); 288pp