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John Howard: Battlers, Borders and the Long Boom
Paperback
Series: Burden of the Lodge
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Dec 16 2025
Pages: 360
Weight: 0.96
Height: 0.90 Width: 6.00 Depth: 9.00
Language: English
John Howard was one of the most consequential and divisive prime ministers in modern Australian history.
Dismissed more than once as too narrow, too suburban, too damaged by defeat, or too old-fashioned for the country, Howard waited longer than almost any rival expected. When his moment finally came in 1996, he did not arrive as a dazzling visionary or a grand national poet. He arrived as something more durable: a disciplined conservative who understood the battlers, borders, and economic confidence of middle Australia.
John Howard: Battlers, Borders and the Long Boom tells the story of the suburban Liberal who rose from Bennelong to dominate Australian politics for more than eleven years. It follows his early formation in postwar Sydney, his rise through the Liberal Party machine, his years as treasurer under Malcolm Fraser, his first failed leadership, his political exile, his comeback against Paul Keating, and his long prime ministership.
Howard's government reshaped Australia. Port Arthur led to national gun reform. The GST changed the tax system. Tampa hardened the politics of borders. September 11 and Iraq tested Australia's alliance with the United States. WorkChoices exposed the danger of long power and helped bring his government down.
His supporters remember prosperity, stability, national pride, strong borders, and economic management through the long boom. His critics remember harsh asylum policies, refusal on Indigenous apology, Iraq, WorkChoices, and a politics that narrowed compassion.
This book does not treat Howard as either hero or villain. It examines him as a serious political actor whose strengths and failures came from the same source: discipline, caution, suburban instinct, belief in order, and a powerful sense of the mainstream.
From Port Arthur to the GST, from Tampa to Iraq, from WorkChoices to the loss of Bennelong, this is the story of a leader who remade Australian conservatism and changed the country he claimed simply to understand.
John Howard waited, rose, dominated, and fell. His government ended in 2007, but the Australia he helped shape did not disappear with him.
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