Q&A: Hugh Mackay, social psychologist & author, 83

Social psychologist Hugh Mackay on the nascent revolution he’s witnessing — and the ‘radical kindness’ espoused in his new book.

Young at heart: Hugh Mackay. Picture: Sean Davey.

Australia has faced down a perfect storm of challenges in 2020-21 and instead of congratulating ourselves there’s a groundswell of disillusionment in our institutions. What’s going on? The level of discontent in those institutions – political, financial, cultural, religious – was emerging a decade ago, way before the bushfires and the pandemic. I think it’s all come to a head precisely because during 2020 we had more time for reflection on what kind of society we want to live in.

You think this could be a turning point. The start of a revolution, no less... The fact that people are demonstrating and calling out [injustice] – saying, “We’re not going to stand for this” – that’s classic grassroots revolutionary stuff. If it’s sustained, eventually it will reach the political class and they’ll realise they are simply not responding to changes that have taken place around them. I think it would be a tragedy, this time, if we didn’t make the most of the crisis.

In the six decades you’ve been interviewing Australians, what have you observed? Particularly over the past 25 years, the preoccupation has been with change and its impact; things seem less stable, less predictable than ever, from economic upheaval to technology, work and the gender revolution. What really raises people’s levels of anxiety is when they’re caught in the grip of changes they don’t understand. To many others, these upheavals are exciting, the sign of a dynamic society.

What is the “radical kindness” you espouse in your book The Kindness Revolution? By kindness I mean compassion, tolerance, respect, sensitivity towards other people. And the radical version is absolutely non-discriminatory; the revolution is when you are kind not just to your nice neighbour, but to the ones you don’t know or don’t like much. The pandemic has shown us we are actually quite good at this. We are a social species that can only survive by creating relatively harmonious communities, and the only rational response to that is to say, well, kindness had better be our default position.

You’ve moved 16 times, had a multitude of jobs, married three times, settled in Canberra. If a life is, as you write, like a “long, complex piece of music”, what might yours be? A Bach fugue, perhaps. The thing about a fugue is that it often seems a bit chaotic, a bit dissonant, with a number of voices competing; you wonder if it will ever lead to a harmonious conclusion. And then, suddenly, it does.

How do you stay young at heart? I think I am still genuinely open to new ideas and change – as a social researcher you have to be able to truly hear what people are saying, and then make sense of it. I recognise in myself a certain naivety... that has kept me flexible and perhaps has also kept me young.

Your non-fiction books, starting with Reinventing Australia (1993), have overshadowed your eight published novels. Why do you write fiction? I just love the emotional freedom. Novels are where I can take what I know about human nature and relationships and give it all free rein. In a curious way I think I get even closer to the truth about what makes people tick when I express it all through fiction.

Your latest book has been described as “the distillation of your life’s work”. Does that mean it’s your last? It feels like that. I can’t imagine returning to this kind of wide-ranging social analysis. It’s always hard to say what might pop up that I’ll find irresistible, but I have brought together a lot of themes here… and the next two books brewing in my head are fiction.

The Kindness Revolution by Hugh Mackay (Allen & Unwin, $32.99) is out on May 4.