Canberra

What I see

Canberra is filled with symbolism, flags, plaques, monuments and hundreds of institutions and organisations boasting acronyms starting with the letters ‘A’ or ‘N’, or in the case of the Australian National University both.

Unsurprisingly, as impressive as Australia’s capital is, the truth is that it is not unlike many other national capitals throughout the world. In the near 100 years since its Washington inspired conception, Canberra has been busy catching up with the ‘capital posturing’ exhibited by the rest of the world.

Washington has its National Mall, so too Canberra has its Federation Mall. Tokyo has it Tokyo National Museum, Canberra too a National Museum. London has its National Gallery, while Canberra its own National Gallery. Paris has the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Canberra its National Library. Moscow has its FSB headquarters, and so too Canberra …

Mark Twain observed of Rome, it was “a museum of magnificence and misery.”

Here in Canberra political adornments, both striking and dull, abound. There is clear evidence that the ancient and universal political tradition of employing edifice and affectation is alive and well. With gold and silver insignia, shiny coat-of-arms, robust military monuments, and flattering statues of past rulers, the subtle art of exercising power over citizens is evidenced throughout the city.

Canberra perhaps only differs from Pyongyang, in the last respect, merely in the diversity and subtlety of the symbolic political vocabulary that it employs, but is arguably similar to the North Korean capital in the frequency with which political objects and messages are embedded in the city. The commonality is the ubiquity, the decision by those in power to stamp their own political presence and their political history on geography, on place – and over time, on people.

Since ancient times generations of elites have passed down the art of securing and maintaining power and capitals, the very seats of power, have been central to this thinking. From the Egyptian, to the Roman, to our own rulers of the modern world, capital architects and builders have rigorously employed all manner of physical and psychological means possible to remind all who enter, where they are, and who they are subject to.

With this contrast in mind, when observed close up Canberra is no different. It has the power to inspire visible levels of awe in most of its newcomers. The capital’s layout and its narrative by design are intended to stir pride and deference. Buried deep into the top of a hill, Parliament House itself belies for the pessimist at least a mix of false modesty, of preparedness for siege and of concealment, while for the optimist humility, subservient grace and watchfulness. Such is the evocative power of Canberra.

Yet this constant proximity to such power, day in day out, does suggest unintended consequences. Observed over time, the city also has the power to equally inspire questionable measures of artifice, status seeking and the hunger for exclusivity in the more Machiavellian, privileged and patrician of its inhabitants. Well fed, well dressed and uniformly labelled they can commonly be found scurrying from one marble edifice to the next.

To mangle Paul Keating’s memorably utterance, “If you’re not living in Sydney, you’re camping out”, I would observe, if you’re not connected with Canberra, you’re a mere outsider.