Ordinary is now the way to be

Have Australians lost faith in a politics that is larger than themselves, asks Paul Strangio REFUGEES from an earlier political era, Paul Keating and Jeff Kennett occasionally lunch together. Presumably the former prime minister and premier dwell on past achievements, console each other about their rejection by unappreciative publics and scratch their heads at the direction of politics federally and in the states since they departed the parliamentary arena. Strange though this arrangement might seem at first blush - a former Labor warrior and Liberal larrikin breaking bread together - the source of the kinship between Keating and Kennett is not so difficult to divine. Theirs is a mutual admiration that developed in the early 1990s. Back then Kennett had brought the Cain-Kirner era to a close in Victoria (Keating always had a thinly disguised contempt for John Cain and the state Labor government’s Keynesian backsliding during the era of emerging neo-liberal orthodoxy), while Keating had not long wrested the prime ministership from Bob Hawke. The tyro heads of government recognised similar qualities in one another. They were grand-vision types, leaders who set out to forge rather than read public opinion, or as Kennett later put it: “We were both focused on big picture rather than small, on outcomes rather than politics.” Both leaders seemed most alive when in full combative mode, smiting those who dared challenge their judgement. Both were men of style, sartorially striking; they had an undeniable flamboyance, and in a previous age they would have been described as “flash”. If Keating and Kennett were bold riders, we are now deeply immersed in an era of a very different style of political leadership. In a recent study of the phenomenon of uniform Labor leaders in the states and territories, academics Brian Head, John Wanna and Paul Williams proposed that a new model of political leadership was evolving at the subnational level. The authors summarised the leadership style of the present crop of premiers and territory chief ministers as follows: “They are modern day ‘ordinary populists’ - purposely non-elitist, a little mundane, attempting to be ‘everyman’ or ‘everywoman’. They are not classically charismatic; instead, they have a natural common touch. They have cultivated the image of the normal, ordinary, relaxed, accepted leader attuned to his/her community.” The same study distinguished between this leadership style and that which prevailed in the postwar era of the so-called “boss” premiers (leaders such as Henry Bolte in Victoria, Thomas Playford in South Australia, Eric Reece in Tasmania and Joh Bjelke-Petersen in Queensland). These, too, were populist leaders but with a darker edge, usually gruff rather than urbane, and with a powerful streak of authoritarianism. It is hardly coincidence that many of the traits described by Head et al are instantly recognisable in Prime Minister John Howard, suggesting that the model of “ordinary populism” is supreme at both the centre and periphery of our political system while the heroic leadership model of Keating and Kennett is very much out of favour. Certainly Howard and Steve Bracks in Victoria seemed to consciously craft their government leadership styles to present to the electorate as the antithesis of their respective predecessors, Keating and Kennett. Peter Beattie’s fourth consecutive election victory in Queensland is further evidence of the ascendancy of the approachable, “everyman” leadership model. Indeed, Beattie probably has no peer in striking an image of familiar sincerity. His mastery was evident in the speech he gave on Saturday night claiming victory. As if to underscore that hubris has no place in the make-up of the new model leader, he was determinedly humble, almost apologetic about his achievement. Contrast this to Keating’s “sweetest victory of them all” declaration after his defeat of John Hewson in 1993, or Kennett’s ever so modest assertion after his 1996 re-election that “there has been no government in Australia since the war that has dared to govern in the way in which we have”. Political scientists have long wondered about the symbiotic relationship that exists between leaders and their publics and questioned whether particular styles of leadership suit particular climates. For example, it has been surmised that a strong, decisive leader will normally have greatest resonance in dark and threatening times, while the inspiring leader is likely to have greatest appeal when the zeitgeist is expansive and optimistic - for example, Whitlam in the late 1960s and early 1970s. What can we tell about the present national psyche from the contemporary dominance of the “ordinary populist”? What is it about our collective temperament that we seem to prefer leaders who mirror us and punish those remotely too big for their boots? Is it that, as John Howard has argued, Australians have rarely been so comfortable with themselves, self-confident and optimistic? In short, we trust ourselves to lead. The more pessimistic interpretation is that of an inward-looking, circumspect public mood in which we have lost faith in the possibilities of a politics larger than ourselves. Whatever it is, there is a fundamental paradox surrounding the triumph of the ordinary leader at a time in which politics is becoming less an ordinary sport and more a spectator sport. The major political parties are declining as grassroots organisations and we seem at a loss to find means for alternative and meaningful participation that goes beyond the artifice of talkback radio. As politics becomes the preserve of a narrowing professional class, it is perhaps inevitable that their marketing solution is to package the system in leaders that appear no different from us. • Paul Strangio is a senior lecturer in the School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash University. This article first appeared in theAge. Photo: Maartje van Caspel/iStockphoto.co