<
https://theconversation.com/are-we-learning-the-wrong-lessons-from-history-186199>
"Can historians influence government policy? Should they? And, if so, what
kinds of historical knowledge should they produce?
I suspect policy-makers only rarely think of historians as a first port of call
when seeking guidance. And historians, for their part, don’t usually have
policy-makers in mind as a primary audience. But historians in Australia – as
elsewhere – have long been involved in policy debate.
There are traps for those who travel this road. Interpreting the past might
offer clues and insights, but it doesn’t normally present clear lessons. The
priorities of political players and historians are often in tension, and
history risks being misused.
Two recurring examples illustrate this well: the allegation that Australia’s
economic decline in the twentieth century was caused by the interventionist
policies reversed by the governments of the 1980s and 1990s, and the failure of
“appeasement” in the period before the second world war.
In both examples, which I deal with my contribution to a new book,
Lessons
from History, professional historians have produced careful and accessible
research. And yet simplistic versions have circulated within media, think tanks
and government, with little or no regard for the evidence."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
