The Australian Chinese community reshaped by two historical trends: A dual-embeddedness perspective

Abstract

With China continuing its policy of reform and opening and Australia strategically turning to Asia, the period since the mid-1980s has witnessed escalating Chinese immigration to Australia. Against this backdrop, the ethnic Chinese community in Australia has changed significantly, particularly in respect of its demographic characteristics, socio-economic activities, and status, and is now widely perceived as a model and middle class ethnic community. Adopting a “dual-embeddedness” framework, this chapter offers a political-economic analysis of the ethnic Chinese community's transformation over the past three decades or so, highlighting the influence of socio-economic and political macro-cont..