The Pilbara, a large, thinly populated region in the north of Western Australia, has become central to the Australian economy and imagination. With millions of tons of iron ore shipped to China, the Pilbara is a media staple, through stories of mining companies' profits, the earnings of fly-in-fly-out workers, and the wealth of new entrepreneurs. For all this, what we know about a vital region such as the Pilbara remains incomplete. The boomtime stories do not reveal much about the Pilbara itself, a place completely transformed across fifty years of mining. No one has acknowledged the Pilbara's ancient history, or the men and women who worked there from the 1960s, building unions and making communities as they worked the mines. In those days, the Pilbara excited both hope and dread about its workers and their power. "From the deserts prophets come," AD Hope wrote years before in his poem, Australia. And it appeared that the Pilbara might be the site of a novel kind of unionism, with workers winning not only high wages but control of the places where they worked and the towns where they lived. But it was not to be. Starting in the 1980s, the companies fought back, defeating the unions and remaking the Pilbara. The managers were now the prophets, with new ways of organising work and managing workers. The companies reinvented the Pilbara through workplace control, fly-in-fly-out labor, and twelve-hour shifts. Their vision reshaped not just the desert but the cities, not just the work in mines and ports but in offices and shops. When the biggest boom in mining history came along, it unfolded across a Pilbara landscape very different from a generation earlier. The union prophets were gone; the companies' profits grew. This book reveals the story of fifty years of conflict over work and life in the Pilbara, and how this conflict has affected the rest of Australia. [Subject: Australian Studies, Labor History]

This monograph describes the Candoninae fauna of the Pilbara region, containing 84 species and 12 genera, of which 83 species and 11 genera are endemic. The Pilbara region has emerged since the Precambrian and is therefore the most ancient landscape on Earth. The underground life, discovered only recently in the calcrete systems, speaks clearly about the antiquity of the region. One of the most diverse groups thriving in these ancient systems is the ostracode subfamily Candoninae. The number of endemic taxa (83 species, 11 genera, and 1 tribe) illuminates the conservation value of the entire region, which is more than in the ancient Lake Baikal. This exceptional fauna has a separate position on the phylogenetic tree of Candoninae, presented here for the first time. Therefore, this monograph is not only a story about one fauna but also about the entire subfamily.

The Pilbara region in Australia’s arid northwest is rich in flora that is suited to extreme temperatures and boom and bust cycles of moisture availability. It is also a region important for its natural resources. In places where mining activities have finished and the land is under management for ecological restoration, there is increasing demand for information about native plant communities and the biology of their seeds. Pilbara Seed Atlas and Field Guide is the first book to combine plant identification with robust, scientific criteria for cost-effective seed-based rehabilitation. It describes 103 regional plant taxa and provides guidelines for effective collection, cleaning, storage and germination of their seeds. It addresses issues such as timing of collection, quality and viability of seed, and dormancy release, which are essential for successful restoration programs. With photographs to portray the subtle differences and unique features of each species’ biology, this book will be of great use to practitioners in the field, including environmental consultants, rehabilitation companies, commercial seed collectors and government authorities, as well as naturalists and people interested in growing the Pilbara’s remarkable plants.

The green transition presents the Pilbara with an opportunity to diversify its economy and improve well-being conditions of its communities, while becoming a strategic player in the global shift towards more sustainable mining. This study offers guidance on how the Pilbara can shape a more inclusive and sustainable development model that supports economic diversification and prioritises improving the living conditions of its communities, particularly First Nations.

The monograph describes the Candoninae fauna of the Pilbara region, containing 84 species and 12 genera, of which 83 species and 11 genera are endemic. This ancient fauna holds one of the most important clues about the evolution of the subfamily.

Spending time in the Pilbara region of Western Australia as part of the Aboriginal Deaths in Custody Royal Commission, Sydney lawyer Noel Olive began listening to, and then recording, the stories and experiences of the local Indigenous people. That material forms the basis of a history from an Aboriginal perspective of Aboriginal-European relations in the region, from colonial times to present day. The author previously edited a book of Aboriginal histories from the same region (Karijini Mirlimirli FACP 1997), which was well received by reviewers and is a recommended text in both the legal profession and Aboriginal Studies courses.

This Special Publication will be an important tool for geoscientists, aimed at increasing the awareness of their societal role and responsibility in conducting education, research and practice activities. What are the responsibilities of a geoscientist ? And what motivations are needed to push geoscientists to practice the Earth sciences in an ethical way? The major environmental challenges affecting human communities require not only a strictly scientific and technical preparation by the geoscientists, but also a reflection on their broader obligations towards society. It is important that geoscientists consider geoethics as an indispensable framework on which to base their training and activity. The principles of geoethics can guide them to pursue the common good by weighing the benefits and costs of each choice, and identifying eco-friendly and society-friendly solutions that guarantee the respect of the right balance between human life and the dynamics of the Earth. Communication and dissemination of geosciences should become core activities in building a knowledge-based society, which is able better to protect itself and the Earth ecosystems in order to guarantee a life in harmony with our planet for future generations.

This book will appeal to an international audience as well as be irresistible to local readers. Anyone working or with an interest in Australia’s arid zone should need ready access to this book. There is no equivalent publication out there at the moment, and this book has many authoritative chapters, richly illustrated with colourful material. The challenge of this book was to assemble current knowledge on particular topics and concepts, and principles relating to them. It is also forward-looking by identifying where there are gaps or inadequacies in knowledge, and where future research needs to be directed. Lead authors were encouraged to take such an approach; they had the opportunity to involve any author they considered appropriate. The final product shouldbe a fabulous resource, also for university courses, especially at MSc level.

Agreements between the mining industry and Indigenous people are not creating sustainable economic futures for Indigenous people, and this demands consideration of alternate forms of economic engagement in order to realise such futures. Within the context of three mining agreements in north Australia this study considers Indigenous livelihood aspirations and their intersection with sustainable development agendas. The three agreements are the Yandi Land Use Agreement in the Central Pilbara in Western Australia, the Ranger Uranium Mine Agreement in the Kakadu region of the Northern Territory, and the Gulf Communities Agreement in relation to the Century zinc mine in the southern Gulf of Carpentaria in Queensland. Recent shifts in Indigenous policy in Australia seek to de-emphasise the cultural behaviour or imperatives of Indigenous people in undertaking economic action, in favour of a mainstream conventional approach to economic development. Concepts of value, identity, and community are key elements in the tension between culture and economics that exists in the Indigenous policy environment. Whilst significant diversity exists within the Indigenous polity, Indigenous aspirations for the future typically emphasise a desire for alternate forms of economic engagement that combine elements of the mainstream economy with the maintenance and enhancement of Indigenous institutions and livelihood activities. Such aspirations reflect ongoing and dynamic responses to modernity, and typically concern the interrelated issues of access to and management of country, the maintenance of Indigenous institutions associated with family and kin, access to resources such as cash and vehicles, the establishment of robust representative organisations, and are integrally linked to the derivation of both symbolic and economic value of livelihood pursuits.