Australia has much in common with the United States. It was initially settled by teeming masses — in its case, largely convicts — fleeing England. Its identity was forged in the populating of its vast, empty spaces. And today it retains a considerable frontier mentality, and a considerable amount of ranching and hunting.
But the similarities end when it comes to guns. While gun ownership has been a part of Australians’ way of life, they have a much more utilitarian view of their purpose.
So, when a gunman killed 35 people in 1996 with a semiautomatic rifle in the tourist town of Port Arthur, on the island of Tasmania, the Australian people decided it was time for a change.
A new law, backed by a conservative prime minister, divided firearms into five categories. Some of the deadliest assault-style weapons and large ammunition clips are now all but impossible for individuals to lawfully own.
Firearms are subject to a strict permitting process, and dealers are required to record sales, which are tracked by the national and territorial governments. What’s more, the law encouraged people to sell their firearms back to the government, which purchased and destroyed about 700,000 of them.
The results are hard to argue with. According to a Harvard University study, 13 gun massacres (in which four or more people died) occurred in the 18 years before the law was enacted. In the 16 years since there has been none. Zero.
The overall firearm homicide rate dropped from 0.43 per 100,000 in the seven years before the law to 0.25 in the seven years after. By 2009, the rate had dropped further, to just 0.1 per 100,000, or one per million.
In the USA, the 2009 firearm homicide rate was 3.3 per 100,000, some 33 times higher than Australia’s.
There are, to be sure, some significant differences between Australia and the United States. Australia has 3million guns; America has roughly 300 million. The U.S. has greater constitutional protections for keeping and bearing arms. And the gun lobby in Australia is nowhere near as powerful as the National Rifle Association is in the U.S.
But the Australian experience demonstrates what can be accomplished if a people gets serious about gun violence.
The key is not merely to adopt new gun laws, but to undergo a cultural shift. Similar shifts have occurred around such issues as smoking and excessive drinking, especially when driving is involved.
The early signs are that the massacre in Newtown, Conn., will cause a significant push for tighter gun restrictions, which the White House endorsed on Tuesday.
As the debate takes shape in coming weeks, lawmakers would do well to focus on the successes in Australia. That country has shown how tighter gun laws, and sensible attitudes about the role of guns in society, can make a real difference.
We could learn much from our friends down under.
As you can see, not only do gun control laws help reduce violent crimes, they can be enacted in a country where the guns had already been in circulation for centuries, and have some seriously positive effects.
