Nick Osbaldiston
A natural landscape with a distinctive scent and pristine beaches where golden sand meets sparkling, crystal clear water. This is how Nick Osbaldiston describes Australia’s coastline in Towards a Sociology of the Coast. “We were not just fascinated by the coast, we lived off it”, are the words of one of the characters in his research. While the majority of the Australian population lives within fifty kilometres of the coast, there are significant differences between different places. The current trend of people seeking out specific places on the coast where they want to find tranquillity and an authentic environment is referred to in Australia as ‘Seachange’. However, this phenomenon reflects a broader international trend called ‘lifestyle migration’ or ‘amenity migration’.
This publication seeks to capture the changes that are taking place on Australia’s coastline and their implications for both local people and the environment. It presents a view of the landscape and its history in a broader context, which includes a search for the roots of current events in the past. Developments in the past are seen as key to understanding what is happening on the coast today. The author explores the spatial practices that define the coastline through a number of different representations, and in this context the general trend of seeking authenticity is portrayed as one of the key elements that influence the character of place in the present and determine its future development.
The methodology used here, termed ‘rescue narrative’, diagnoses the problem and then offers a solution. The theoretical considerations are primarily based on Weber’s ideas, which discuss the concepts of rationalisation and disenchantment. We also find numerous references to the thought concepts of Simmel and Durkheim and an extensive discussion of objectivity, which omits value judgments altogether and ideally has no interest in transforming reality. This is a key theme throughout the book, and all of the considerations associated with the future of Australia’s coastline extend into the general area of evaluation in sociology with regard to climate change on the planet.
The author also emphasises the need to examine the topic in its historical context, calling this perspective a ‘tweezer’ that is able to grasp historical reality at a point between different tendencies. This approach can help us to separate what is general and what is part of a particular tendency in its historical context. What is important is to identify how different strands of society rationalize over time. In any case, the unique rationalizations of these distinct social circles can be revealed in this way because their unique rationalizations may look completely irrational from other perspectives. This lens of observing reality is somewhat different from similarly themed works that are more oriented towards the actual situation of migrants and place itself (M. Benson. Lifestyle migration: Expectations, aspirations and experiences. Routledge 2016).
Given these stated aims, the beginning of the story of the Australian coast is set in what is here termed the ‘premodern coast’. Under this temporal definition, we briefly travel back with the author to the creation of the world in the book of Genesis, to the very roots where the sea is portrayed as dark and dangerous, the shore is the boundary of the known world, and the view of the coast is imbued with a sense of reverence for the divine. Modern times, then, are characterised by precisely the absence of these feelings. And the transition between these two sections was accompanied by the first explorers. One of them was the cartographer Mathew Flinders, who sailed around the Australian coast. Although his voyage was described as romantic, the aims of his journey were scientific, with the purpose of exploring and mapping the shores. From today’s perspective, the scientific approach to the coastline had the effect of neutralizing the unknown divine forces controlling the coastline and connecting these places to the rational world, i.e., making them somewhat accessible. Decades after his death, the Australian colonies began to recognize Flinders as a national hero. He was perfect for the role of Australian hero precisely because he was excluded from the pantheon of British heroes. In this way the future shape of certain places on the coast was predetermined in the early stages of the modern period, the seeds for the present form of these places were sown at this time. Through Flinders’ story we can see how modernity began to open up the coast.
Once we move back in time a bit, we get into the stories of two slightly different coastal resorts near Brisbane. The first is the area around the Noosa Delta (Queensland), which is seen as the first area where the phenomenon of lifestyle migration in modern Australia manifested itself. The Noosa coast was primarily an industrial centre in the 19th century, gradually changing over the years from a place of work to a place of leisure. Noosa is not just a place full of tourists, but it is home to some ‘lifestyle migrants’ or people just looking for a slower pace of life. Given this type of population, there is a strong emphasis on preserving local authenticity in the further development of the place. In an effort to preserve these values, shared by the local community, planning laws are being passed in Noosa to ensure that some form of aesthetics are maintained in the future and the place is protected against similar mistakes that have happened in the past.
Historically, this was a region that was marked by a dominant industrial logging industry. The mouth of the Noosa River and its surroundings have been marked by its use as a waterway for commercial logging in the area. The mining industry has also left its mark on the landscape. However, it was at this time that the first mining visitors began to arrive at the nearby coast on their days off. The first holiday cottages and guesthouses around the Noosa River also began to appear around this time, around 1890.
Importantly, the Noosa lifestyle, influenced by the natural beauty of the area, played a large part in the later distinctive character of this part of the coast during this time period. In this case, the historical story of this place is not shaped by the bourgeoisie, who did not give the place their interest and resources at the end of the 19th century, but its development is based on the working class – mainly miners – and their desire to escape from industrial centres such as Gympie.
Although Noosa is a small coastal enclave compared to the vast coastline found in Australia, its story illustrates an important principle in the development of the phenomenon the author refers to as the ‘lifestyle coast’. Noosa’s appearance today is the result of space planning regulations that indicate a local ethos that prioritises the natural authenticity of place. These planning regulations, which were infused with core ideals and values, allowed for the development of these ideals preferred by the local community. Without these measures, the place could easily lose its specific ‘genius loci’.
Noosa has undergone developments in its past that have resulted in specific geological changes in the area, resulting in a specific coastline. We are therefore forced to ask whether enough foresight has been exercised in the past in places such as Noosa, since its current form is the result of the choices of previous generations. Their ideas of what Noosa might look like in the future have determined the character of the place today. So when we consider the future of places like Noosa, which are inherently vulnerable to future sea level rise, we must also ask what choices we are making now to better face these challenges in the future, because future generations will one day be dealing with the consequences of our choices today.
The example of Noosa shows how this notion has been fulfilled here with the help of local community efforts that incorporate a range of subjective values including environmental conservatism and conservation.
The story of Surfers Paradise represents a different type of local development. While the locals in Noosa have chosen as their way to effectively protect the coastline through the maintenance of its specific aesthetics, Surfers Paradise has actively sought to open up its coastal space to the world of consumption and entertainment and has had no significant interest in preserving the authenticity of the place.
Surfers Paradise is an attractive location on the coastline known as the Gold Coast. It was established with the intention of appealing to the hearts and values of the middle class. The pursuit of their ideas – the commercialisation of beach culture in general – offered an evolution through ideas of sexuality, fame and romantic love. The author compares the development of this place to the tragedy of modern times. A problem created by the dominance of objective things such as money, which create a foundation where all life becomes a grey and colourless existence. Money becomes the common denominator of all values regardless of its emptiness, which does not affect the basis of things.
Visiting places largely becomes a consumption of experiences, and the important distinction between lifestyle and entertainment is that the latter alternative actively promotes a wide range of diverse exciting stimuli that are quite different from the former type. A rationality that has guided the actions of previous generations in reshaping places like Surfers Paradise. That is to say, in places where rationality has been chosen and which are commodity driven, there is a consumerist culture of fragmented visitor experiences encouraged, compared to ‘lifestyle places’ which are derived from a substantial rationality and prefer slowness and harmony between behaviour and natural living.
Today’s inhabitants of the site, who originally came for the sea, seclusion and relaxation, were perhaps a harbinger of the emerging bustling resort that this place has become in the years since. The emphasis on a supposed ‘quiet life’ indicative of Romanticism has crept into modern thinking about the coast. Unlike Noosa, the railway was brought to Southport (a place on the Gold Coast near Surfers Paradise) as early as 1889, and so the influx of people tired of Brisbane’s city life was very rapid. The influx of day-trippers to these coastal areas had a dramatic impact on the region from the start. For the Gold Coast, this is when new opportunities began for developers who gradually began to create a real estate mecca in the area. The right conditions have allowed for the greatest building growth, particularly in the Surfers Paradise area.
However, this development has borne fruit on the Gold Coast, where significant changes to the landscape have taken place. In particular, marshes and heathland have disappeared as watercourses have been modified for water transport. Much of the eucalyptus forests fell victim to the building boom of 1974-1989 and it is now difficult to assess the extent of landscape and wildlife loss during this period. Many houses were built on the dunes and subsequently fell victim to shifting sands before the problem was noticed. Yet the idea that the closer a house is to the water, the more valuable it is, still sticks in the mind. This mentality is no exception on the Australian coast.
The book under review is interspersed with poetic language and pleasantly understated humour, but this does not detract from the seriousness of the message in places where it is needed. It is very clearly organized into coherent chapters, which are always concluded with a summary that opens the door to further questions on the subject. In addition to an objective assessment of the facts and context, however, there is also an evaluation of approaches that are viewed from the perspective of ‘better’ and ‘worse’ in terms of environmental impact, which is currently a major topic not only in the world of science. These reflections can be seen as an important contribution to the debate on evaluative sociology. We have the opportunity to glimpse irreversible changes in the landscape, in this case the Australian coastline, that serve or have served different interests, and the outcome is not yet final; much can still be influenced.
The purpose and aim of this book is to show the different paths of a landscape over time, comparing the story of one place with another from its historical roots to the present day, and using these examples to demonstrate how some decisions at a given time can affect the shape of a place’s landscape in the future. On the basis of this analysis of place, the author then declares unequivocally that sociology is a science that should be invited into discussions where decisions about the shaping of public space are made.