One People of Australia League

The One People of Australia League (often abbreviated OPAL) was an Australian Aboriginal political grouping in the 1960s and the 1970s. In contrast to the more radical and left-wing bodies advocating for indigenous sovereignty at the time, OPAL was for most of its existence overtly assimilationist, advocating for the integration of Aboriginal Australians into mainstream white culture.[1]

One People of Australia League
AbbreviationOPAL
Formation1961

History

OPAL was founded by white Australians[2] in 1961 in order to facilitate the integration of Aboriginal people in Queensland into a single "multicultural" society.[3] Conservative in outlook from the start, it declined to affiliate itself with the Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders (FCAATSI), with which it had significant ideological differences.[3] It also had a long standing rivalry with the Queensland Council for the Advancement of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders (QCAATSI), which it saw as subversive and communist.[1] Senate Neville Bonner, the first Indigenous Australian elected to parliament, was president of OPAL from 1968 to 1974.[4]

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References
  1. "One People of Australia League". National Museum of Australia. Archived from the original on 13 November 2013. Retrieved 30 March 2014.
  2. Zierott, Nadja (2005). Aboriginal Women's Narratives: Reclaiming Identities. p. 86. ISBN 9783825882372.
  3. Jupp, James (2001). The Australian People. Cambridge University Press. p. 128. ISBN 9780521807890.
  4. Tim Rowse. "BONNER, NEVILLE THOMAS (1922–1999)". Biographical Dictionary of the Australian Senate.
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