Increasingly Australia's agriculturalists are looking to the nation's north to escape the
decline in southern Australia's water and soil resources. Booming mineral and gas development
is also helping to drive the nation's economic success. At the same time the south's
conservation sector would like to see much of the north preserved as iconic wilderness. Both
conservation and resource development interests alike are often at odds with the interests of
the north's traditional owners many of whom remain trapped in welfare dependency and poverty.
Indeed to the ire of north Australians the past five decades of north Australian history have
indeed been characterized by these national-scale conflicts being played out in regional and
local communities. This book explores these conflicts as well as the many emerging
opportunities facing the development of the north suggesting that a strong cultural divide
between northern and southern Australia exists one that needs to be reconciled if the nation
as a whole is to benefit from northern development. The author first explores where these
historical conflicts could take us without a clear forward agenda. A story-based personal
narrative from his long and diverse experience in the north gives life to these themes. Finally
the book then draws on these stories to help shape a cohesive agenda for the north's future.
