Dehumanising the Boat People.

This article analyzes the Australian government's approach to boat people in terms of the concept of othering within a general framework of discourse theory. The refugee issue has been central to Australian politics, and systemic analysis in these terms should add to its understanding. The term boat people is used because it includes the word people and differentiates those involved from other asylum seekers who arrive in Australia by airplane and are treated differently. The topics of border protection, national sovereignty, mandatory detention and boat people have dominated the popular press and been an object of political focus in Australia. The government's stance on such issues has been very popular among the Australian public generally, helping the Coalition split the Australian Labor Party along such demographics as socially conservative blue collar workers skilled white collar workers, and possibly deciding the 2001 federal election. Since the revelation of the inaccurate political representation of the so called children over-board affair of October 2001, there has been greater critical analysis of the policies, treatment and discourse concerning boat people, and the terms demonisation and dehumanization have been applied to the government's approach.