The management strategies of the aluminium companies with interests on Cape York Peninsula: 1955-1978

Abstract

This thesis attempted as full and fair an enquiry as possible into the management strategies of the aluminium companies with interests on Cape York Peninsula (CYP) between 1955, when the vast bauxite deposits on the west coast of CYP were ’discovered1 and 1976. The companies* management strategies cannot be explained without reference to their interrelationships with other aspects of the economic systems in which they operate. Consequently, a Marxist framework, which assumes the interdependence of all aspects of economic activity, was found the most satisfactory model. The conflict between the perceptions, priorities and goals of the CYP Aboriginal communities who have paid most of the social and psychic costs of development of CYP bauxite, and those of the transnational corporations who have reaped most of the benefits, offers an Australian example of the ’widening gap’ between the Rich and Faor of the world.