Description
This book contends that modern municipal government was an important nineteenth century initiative created to address social and political change. Beginning with its British origins, it argues that it performed a vital role in integrating the disenfranchised and displaced into the modern state while establishing rational civic order. It argues that it also became necessary on the Ballarat goldfields due to the failure of the government to adapt to the changing nature of goldmining, regional communities and colonial society. The book thus shows how this occurred due to the miners’ movement through 1853 and 1854, which culminated in the Eureka Rebellion and the removal of the Goldfields Commission. Quarantined from colonial society and hindered in exploiting the gold resources, it shows how the diggers after the rebellion, were then able to unite and revolutionize the local community and integrate themselves into the civic framework of the colony. Moreover, it tells the remarkable story of how the first elected councillors achieved this in just one year for Ballarat, establishing modern administrative systems and infrastructure, bringing order and progress to a community emerging out of tyranny and turmoil.
Specifications:
Publisher: Local Research publishers
Year: 2024
Format: Paperback
Pages: 327pp
ISBN: 9780645836233
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