Key Arguments and Early Developments

According to the conventional wisdom, socialism in the Antipodes derived much, but not all, of its character from the movement in the ‘mother country’. This was because Australia and New Zealand occupied subordinate positions within the British Empire and because dominant ideas and movements flowed largely from the metropolitan core to the colonial periphery. In the image of its British counterpart, therefore, Australasian socialism has been seen as predominantly pragmatic, commonsensical, largely ‘without doctrine’, ethical, in some cases ‘infused with Christian morality’, gradualist and evolutionary. In contrast, much continental European, and especially German, late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century socialism has often been described as being far more ideological, abstract, rational and scientific – as being influenced significantly by the revolutionary historical materialism of Marx and Marxism. In 1907, Mann himself gave some credence to this view when he noted that ‘reluctant’ socialists in Australia were far more likely to subscribe to ‘practical’, ‘safe’ and ‘evolutionary’ rather than ‘Continental’ socialism.

In terms of the particular case of Mann and the VSP, the prevailing viewpoint is that up to the later months of 1907 they were similarly shaped far more by gradualist and ethical socialism, ‘moderate co-operation’ and ‘acceptance of the parliamentary road’ as advocated variously by Robert Blatchford of the Clarion movement and the Fabians, than by the ideas of Marx and Marxists. Ross's contact with, and great respect and admiration for, Mann and the VSP and his contributions to the Socialist during 1907 might suggest that he was also greatly influenced by gradualism and parliamentarianism at this time, despite his adoption of explicitly revolutionary socialism during the 1890s and early 1900s.

In truth, however, there has been no detailed and systematic published account of the nature and aims of the kind of socialism espoused by Ross from the commencement of his editorship of the Barrier Truth in 1903, through his subsequent editorship of the Flame (1906–8), ‘sparked’ by the example of the Socialist from November 1908 onwards, when he succeeded Mann, and the Maoriland Worker (1911–13).