Donald Horne

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Professor Donald Horne (December 26, 1921 – September 8, 2005) was an Australian journalist, writer, social critic, and academic who became one of Australia's best known public intellectuals.

Horne published three novels and more then twenty volumes of history, memoir and political and cultural analysis. He also edited The Bulletin, The Observer and Quadrant. His best known work was The Lucky Country (1964), an evaluation of Australian society that questioned many traditional attitudes: "Australia is a lucky country, run by second-rate people who share its luck."

Donald Horne's early life was recounted in the first volume of his memoirs The Education of Young Donald (1967). Born and raised in Muswellbrook, he enrolled in a Bachelor of Arts at the University of Sydney in 1939 and went on to a successful career in journalism. Horne worked for a number of Frank Packer's publications, first as a journalist for The Telegraph, then editor of the magazine Weekend, and later the periodical The Observer. As editor of the flagship magazine The Bulletin, he removed the magazine's longstanding motto "Australia for the White Man", an action in which he took great pride.

He became a professor of political science at the University of New South Wales.

He also worked on writing, arts and citizenship boards and was an executive member of the Australian Constitutional Commission.

Throughout his long career, he was unorthodox and independent-minded, without a consistent political allegiance. He was, however known through much of his public career for his republicanism and opposition to the White Australia Policy.

Despite his academic career, he never completed his undergraduate degree, though he received four honorary doctorates.

He was still giving media interviews up to the last year of his life.

He was named as one of Australia's living national treasures by the National Trust.