The Best Way to Help Vietnam is to Make Revolution in Your Own Country

With its radical print culture and Maoist style of politics, Flinders University became an epicentre of student dissent during the “long 1960s.” This article employs oral history to understand how former Flinders students constructed their radical identities. In doing so, we challenge dismissive understandings of activism as a simplistic imitation of overseas protest or naive self-indulgence. Militant solidarity with struggles in Vietnam and South Africa motivated activists who hoped to make a revolution in their own country. Global events not only encouraged students to take to the streets, they also laid the foundations for battles on campus as activists sought to democratise Flinders University. We highlight the relationship between radicals and their own institution and suggest how activists approached localised concerns such as assessment as symptomatic of wider social issues beyond the campus boundaries. A significant yet overlooked case study of student radicalisation is therefore contextualised, locating Flinders University students within a broader narrative of sixties protest

Economic history · Media studies · Political radicalism · Political science · Politics · Project commissioning · Publishing · Sociology · Academic Freedom and Politics · American Political and Social Dynamics · History · Law · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies