The Tyranny of Distance: How Distance Shaped Australia's History

First published in 1966, the book examines how Australia's geographical remoteness, particularly from its colonizer Great Britain, has been central to shaping the country's history and identity and will continue to shape its future. The long distance between Australia and its colonial forebears in Europe, and also the United States, made Australians unsure of their future economic prosperity.

The expression "the tyranny of distance" from the book's title has become common parlance in Australia.

Although Blainey is widely credited the term in his 1966 work, the term appeared five years previously in the geographic research of William Bunge.[1] Bunge uses the term in quotation marks, indicating that the phrase may have had earlier usage.