David Shoebridge’s rise to the Greens leadership offers a chance to challenge Labor from the Left and push for more radical action on inequality, climate change and AI, writes Dr Mark Beeson.
POLITICS IS FAMOUSLY a tough business and everyone gets mixed reviews.
It’s not a place for shrinking violets, which explains why it’s generally populated by ego maniacs, self-promoters and chancers. While we’re not as bad as our trusty allies in the U.S., of course, we do have our fair share of dills and time-servers who make the political process such a depressing and alienating spectacle.
Speaking of which, I don’t know whether it’s just the anti-depressants kicking in, but I’ve been feeling almost chirpy since I heard that Senator David Shoebridge was elected leader of the Greens.
Yes, I know it wasn’t as inclusive a process as the rank-and-file might have liked and electing a White man these days is a bit fraught for the progressive side of politics, but Shoebridge may be just what the Greens need. A bit polarising, perhaps, but someone who has a demonstrated ability to cut through.
In the interests of full disclosure, I should point out that I met Senator Shoebridge when he launched what I consider to be the most informed, readable and unaccountably neglected analysis of AUKUS. He spoke for about 20 minutes without notes and gave a brilliant analysis of Australia’s most woefully misconceived defence project ever, and had some nice things to say about the book, too.
As you can see, I was impressed. Nothing I have heard from him or about him has led me to change my opinion in the intervening period. Why would I? I find myself in furious agreement with just about everything he says. We even wrote simultaneous op-eds about Australia not deserving a seat on the Security Council. Spooky, or what?
Shoebridge has an ability and a willingness to hold the unaccountable to account and to call out the flummery and self-serving waffle that so often passes for parliamentary debate or inquiries. At a moment when the world is teetering on the edge of a climate apocalypse, a possible takeover by a form of “super intelligence” – as the most stupid man on the planet insists we call it – not to mention the increased danger of nuclear war, a bit of abrasiveness seems forgivable.
Indeed, it’s clearly what the punters want, as the rise of populists on both sides of the political spectrum demonstrates.
While politics may be a bit more toxic in the U.S. and the UK, both countries have witnessed the rise of progressive parties that are offering credible, increasingly credible alternatives in response to the abject failure of the political mainstream.
In this context, Shoebridge’s ambition to “replace the Labor Party” may look wildly ambitious, but at a time when it’s hard to know what the ALP is actually supposed to stand for, it’s appropriate and welcome. After all, who are people that consider themselves on the Left supposed to vote for these days?
If democratic socialism can look like an attractive option in the U.S. with its history of McCarthyism and red scares, it ought to be able to make an impression in a country where one of the major parties was actually created to represent working people. The ALP leadership’s pious claims about young people and battlers ‘doing it tough’ ring hollow when so many of them own multiple homes that they rent out to people struggling to survive.
Shoebridge ought to revive the Greens’ policies on a possible rent freeze, free higher education and serious wealth redistribution. Taxing billionaires and the fossil fuel companies might go a long way to funding such initiatives and provide a disincentive for the big polluters to operate here in the first place. That’s what market signals are supposed to be for, isn’t it?
Given that there’s (at least) a 10 per cent chance that AI may be about to wipe out the human race, it would be good to have someone who actually recognises a serious threat when he sees one and understands what’s going on, influencing and even making policy. Rather than welcoming data centres, as the major parties suggest, Shoebridge says ‘it is time for the Commonwealth to press for ethical, Australian-owned and controlled AI to push back against U.S. dominance’.
No doubt I’m getting a bit carried away, but that’s better than sinking into a terminal sense of despair about our collective future when we consider who runs the world. As perhaps the most fortunate and geographically blessed countries in the world, we ought to be able to get our own house in order, at least. We might even set a good example of middle power leadership, which the Government talks about but does little to achieve.
It’s easy to think that things could hardly get worse, but of course they can — possibly much worse unless radical action is taken to change the course we’re on. If someone appears with a few ideas about how it might happen, let’s give them the proverbial fair go.
Dr Mark Beeson is an adjunct professor at the University of Technology Sydney and Griffith University. He was previously Professor of International Politics at the University of Western Australia.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
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