The History Wars are not over. I had the pleasure of taking a class at Melbourne Uni taught by Stuart MacIntyre, one of the main historians involved. A similar question was asked and his answer was that the History Wars are still ongoing but the battlefield is shifting. Instead of the debate focusing on Australian colonisation and treatment of the indigenous population, it is heading towards a debate over the prominence of Labor governments in Australian history and the contributions of the workers unions. Stuart based this claim on the recent comments made by Education Minister Christopher Pyne who said that he wanted to revisit the National Curriculum for the teaching of History because it puts too much emphasis on the contributions of the Unions and the prominence of Labor governments. Pyne wants a fairer curriculum that puts more emphasis on the contributions of Liberal and Coalition governments as well as the contributions made by private industry. Stuart, who helped develop the new history curriculum, was understandably quite annoyed at the prospect of his work being undone for political reasons.

Could somebody briefly explain what the 'History Wars' were? It's the first time I've heard the term and it sounds very interesting.