What are positives and negatives of the gold rush in Australia?

Answer 1

There were many positive effects from the Australian gold rush.

One of the positive effects was Immigration. The goldrush brought a large number of immigrants to Australia, all of whom contributed their own cultural influences. It was the beginning of multiculturalism in Australia. The Chinese in particular converged on Australia, and resentment against the Asian nationalities was a contributing factor to the introduction of the White Australia Policy in the twentieth century. Enormous numbers of immigrants, especially Chinese, brought their unique cultural influences to Australia, and many of the Chinese stayed on to build businesses in the towns once the main gold deposits were mined out.

There was a new boom of Victorian architecture in cities such as Melbourne, and the richness of this architecture can still be seen today. Victoria itself became a very wealthy colony, rivalling New South Wales.

The newfound wealth meant that Britain no longer had any reason to withhold self-government. New rules, policies and legislation were implemented, giving Australia more of an understanding of how to draft future legislation and, indeed, its own constitution. Australia now had the confidence to "go it alone" - to break free from 'Mother Britain" and aim for independence, which it achieved with the federation of the states in 1901.

The goldrushes helped bring improvements in transportation. The famous "Cobb and Co Coaches" ran successfully for half a century, thanks to the goldrush. Train lines were built, linking the major centres, and roadways were improved.

Arguably the most positive effect of the gold rush was in the development of democracy. The Eureka Stockade was the 1854 miners' uprising on the goldfields of Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, protesting certain conditions on the Australian goldfields and the fact that delegations for miners' rights had met with inaction from the Victorian government. On 29 November 1854, the miners burned their licences (another source of extreme discontent) in a mass display of resistance against the laws which controlled the miners. On December 1, the miners began to construct a wooden barricade, a stockade from which they planned to defend themselves against licence arrests or other incursions by the authorities. At 3:00am on Sunday, 3 December 1854, 276 police and military personnel and several civilians stormed the stockade. It remains unclear which side fired first, but in the ensuing battle, 22 diggers and 5 troopers died.

Although the rebellion itself failed in its objective, it gained the attention of the Government. A Commission of Enquiry was conducted and changes were implemented. These included abolition of monthly gold licences, replaced by an affordable annual miner's licence. The numbers of troopers were reduced significantly, and Legislative Council was expanded to allow representation to the major goldfields. Peter Lalor and another representative, John Basson Humffray, were elected for Ballarat. Later, Lalor was elected Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Victoria. For these reasons, the Eureka Stockade is regarded by many as the birthplace of Australian Democracy.

Some negative effects for Australia included:

The greater displacement of the indigenous people as more and more of them were forced off their land.

Families were separated as fathers left their jobs and went to the goldfields, hoping to strike it rich, while their wives stayed behind, sometimes having to operate the farms and stations on their own.

Environmentally, the goldrush was a disaster, although unrecognised at the time. Features of the Australian landscape were forever altered in the space of a few decades, and soil erosion was a major effect, the evidence of which can still be seen today. Water quality was affected as people used the creeks and rivers for all their activities, including bathing and washing dirty (sometimes disease-ridden) clothes. Water salinity rose as natural watercourses were diverted. Introduced noxious weeds decimated native flora and affected native fauna, as did the introduction of domestic animals to hitherto unpopulated areas