Call to action to break the stifling political malaise

The strategy by Labor to run a negative campaign against Peter Dutton’s “arrogant, aggressive and reckless” personality at the federal election is as predictable as it is depressing. The move signals a small-target mark II campaign for Anthony Albanese. Together with Mr Dutton’s reluctance to give detail on fleshing out the practicalities and cost of his alternative vision for the nation, it appears voters risk being short-changed by politicians again. These signals mark a bigger structural break in our political times that characterise state, national and international affairs. At a state level, it is reasonable to ask what it will take for a leader to have the confidence needed to institute bold actions to repair the fruits of a decade of financial drift. Victorian voters have been poorly served by an opposition unable to seize the moment, but they seem satisfied with a Labor machine that knows only how to plunge the state further into debt. Mindful of the fate suffered by the last LNP premier in Queensland, new hopeful David Crisafulli has shown himself unprepared to campaign on the bold reforms Queenslanders deserve.

Combined, the result is what editor-at-large Paul Kelly has described as the slow, decisive death of Australian exceptionalism. He writes that the contemporary story of Australia is underperformance by governments and sullen suspicion from the public: “The nation needs bold, breakout policies but the electorate is wary of national-interest reforms or big changes, preferring instead single-issue causes and pursuit of narrow sectional interests.”

The result is big government, high spending, weak productivity, poor growth and the rhetoric of compassion.

Australia is not unique and it is not too late to act. A call to action can be found in the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship conference to be held in Sydney this week, which brings together key thinkers passionate about restoring belief in our core values of freedom, democracy, the rule of law and human dignity, and trust in the institutions that defend them.

The conference is being held against a background of high global tensions and uncertain leadership. In a keynote address, British historian Niall Ferguson will reprise his thoughtful essay on the present dangers of American demise. His realisation is that in the new Cold War, the US, and not the Chinese, might be the Soviets. As with the failing Soviet Union, Ferguson sees in the US ill-discipline in budget management and the insertion of central government into the investment decision-making process. He says economists keep promising a productivity miracle from information technology and AI, but productivity growth remains stuck in the slow lane. There are high military ambitions but the reality is a military that is simultaneously expensive and unequal to the task it confronts. Ferguson is talking about America but the themes are only too familiar.

ARC co-founders Philippa Stroud and former deputy prime minister John Anderson argue the West is weak: culturally, we are witnessing the deconstruction of the value system that laid the foundations of our freedom, prosperity and, in Australia, our valued egalitarianism. This has been facilitated and enabled too often by political leaders who have lacked the courage to push back or, worse, have actively pushed a deconstructionist agenda. Politically, we are polarised and divided. Socially, we are unstable, confused and incoherent.

The ARC provides a welcome platform for the free exchange and exploration of ideas. Tony Abbott will give a keynote address in session one that acknowledges we are at a civilisational moment. It is an existential moment because of threats abroad and weakness at home. Session two looks at how the deterioration of the social fabric matters profoundly for our societies and economies. The demographic trap is ailing nations across the West in a zero-sum choice between mass migration and economic stagnation.

A related but distinct trend is the fact that public services will not be able to withstand the growing burden of debt that is required in an individualistic culture. Care has historically always been a subsidiary responsibility. From family formation to care for children and on to care for the elderly: the more responsibilities the state takes back from the family, the more we are likely to see countries come to a profoundly difficult decision-making point. The choice is between spiralling debt or collapsing public services. Peter Costello will give a keynote address on the economic costs of reliance on the government and a reduced civil society. Another session will explore the threats posed to prosperity by what Paul Marshall has described as “woke capitalism, crony capitalism and monopoly capitalism”, and governments that have made life more difficult through overstimulating economies via quantitative easing and failing to address housing crises. Vital to the debate will be a full account of the trade-offs required on energy and the environment.

These are the issues – not divisive identity politics, woke capitalism, timid reform agendas or cheap character assessments – that should seize the imagination of our political and leadership class if we are to prosper.