Program for Change is an historical narrative chronicling the Australian approach to affirmative action. It describes, at unnecessary length, the American experience, examines the Australian legislative base for equal opportunity, focuses on the position of women in the ALP, dwells on tertiary institutions and looks specifically at the place of secretaries in the workforce. Indeed, the chapter on ‘Secretaries and Power’, a technical dissertation, seems out of harmony with the rest of the book.

The publishers claim that this book will provide the information which will enable me to take stock of my position as a woman and my work efforts as an equal opportunity practitioner. They were right … I was left wondering what the status quo had been changed!

Yet the tone of the essays was not one of doom and despair. Indeed, in many instances the contributors glossed over the difficulties encountered when attempting to initiate affirmative action programs. With the exception of Denise Bradley and Deborah McCulloch who gave a dispiriting account of the level of commitment in South Australia, the authors failed to present a realistic view of resistance, and often hostility to equal opportunity abd more particularly affirmative action initiatives. For this reason many of the achievements cited in the book sounded curiously trite.

The focus of the collection of essays is on the Australian public service and government instrumentalities. This is understandable considering that, at the time of publication, no legislative base for affirmative action in private enterprise had been established and correspondingly little voluntary initiative had been taken. The catalyst for the majority of private employers, who have taken steps towards improved equality, was the 1984 government invitation to participate in the Affirmative Action Pilot Program. Voluntary inactivity is not a problem peculiar to private industry. As each of the contributors emphasises, without legislation and enforceable sanctions the objectives of equal opportunity will be sought with only a taken commitment.

Since the publication of Program for Change the Federal government has introduced into Parliament the Affirmative Action (Equal Employment Opportunity for Women) Bill (1968).

As this Bill progresses through the legislative machinery much debate focuses on the distinction between targets and quotas and the concepts of affirmative action versus positive discrimination. As this legislation had been foreshadowed for some time it would surely have been ‘timely’ for the contributors to have provided a thorough discussion of these issues and perhaps made some inroads into the Australian paranoia about the American experience. Sadly, a thorough and concise debate was not contributed. However, while displaying some reluctance to confront these issues, Marian Sawer did go some way towards clarifying the use of goals in the American Affirmative Action process.

The question which kept recurring when I considered Program for Change was ‘for whose bookshelves is this book destined?’ Admittedly, as an equal opportunity practitioner who hunts out all information considered relevant to the cause, I would seek it out, with the objective of discovering not where to now, but how to now. Having done this and been dissatisfied with the all too familiar content and message I could well be tempted to let it gather dust.

Again to be fair … While Program for Change fails to answer all of my questions, it does provide an extremely informative documentary on what has been done and why, how it has been done and where we now stand in the quest for equality. Being employed in a CAE I am constantly encouraged to find some faculties incorporating the theories and consequences of equal opportunity into their course curriculum. (The pity is that it is taught rather than practised!) Program for Change is an ideal text. It provides a factual backdrop, against which students can appreciate the introduction of Federal legislation and evaluate the initiatives which follow. It provides a framework for the development of a balanced perspective about the value of an affirmative action program in today’s employment context.