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Research Note no. 28 2001-02
Socialism in Australian National Politics
Glen Worthington
Politics and Public Administration
19 February 2002
Socialism
Socialists since Count Claude-Henri de Saint-Simon and Robert
Owen have argued that each person begins as the moral equal of every other
and therefore has an equal claim to enjoy the resources of society.
Socialists see society primarily in economic terms:
- society as a hierarchy of economic classes
- economic and political institutions as serving the interests
of the most powerful class, and
- capitalist economic and political institutions as disadvantaging
the working class which sells its labour, while promoting the interests
of owners share-holders and managers who buy labour.(1)
Socialists therefore seek to equalise the distribution of
power and wealth. However, they differ in their views of the means necessary
to achieve equality.
Democratic or evolutionary socialists, such as Eduard Bernstein,
have argued for a redistribution of the wealth generated by capitalism
through constitutional and democratic institutions such as Parliament.
According to Bernstein, socialists ought to use existing political and
economic institutions to implement their policies. Democratic socialist
ideas are often heard in the claims of unions for increases in wages and
better working conditions, through arbitration and political representation.
Socialists therefore seek to use government to bring about
the conditions they desire.
However, they have been among the most vociferous critics
of government when it threatens community interests in general, and working
class interests in particular.
By contrast, revolutionary socialists argue that true equality
can only be achieved through the overthrow of capitalist institutions.
Revolutionary socialists call for the abolition of capitalist political
and economic structures such as parliamentary democracy and private property.
This school of socialism takes its inspiration from Marxist and syndicalist
political theory, and has been prominent in recent denunciations of global
capitalism.
Socialism in Australia
Both democratic and revolutionary schools of socialism have
influenced Australian national politics.
The main source of democratic socialist ideas within the
Commonwealth Parliament have been the policies of the Australian Labor
Party (ALP). Labor 's program has been democratic in:
- acknowledging the authority of existing constitutional
arrangements even when disapproving of them
- aiming to redress specific circumstances, rather than
attempting to implement an all-encompassing vision, and
- operating within a political culture that, for the most
part, has viewed government activity as properly providing a substantial
range of services.
In a society that accepts and even expects government activity,
Labor's democratic socialism can be difficult to distinguish from the
welfare brand of liberalism that has dominated non-Labor politics.(2)
However, Labor's platforms may be said to have been 'socialist' in so
far as many of its members have:
- seen society as consisting of classes rather than individuals
- tended to argue for constitutional arrangements that
enhance, rather than inhibit, national executive power, and
- set a wider scope, and have resorted with greater readiness,
to government activity, than members of other parliamentary parties.
Revolutionary socialism has exerted a more indirect influence
upon national politics than its democratic counterpart. Revolutionary
socialism has operated chiefly through unions under the control of organisations
such as the Industrial Workers of the World, which was active through
the 1910s, and the Communist Party of Australia, which influenced federal
politics from the 1920s to the 1960s.
Radical socialism has been seen in activities by the Seamen's
Union in the mid 1920s and the coal miners strike immediately before the
1949 election. Radical socialism has tended to undermine the success of
its reformist counterpart rather than achieve its own stated objectives.
The double-edged sword
The association of Labor with socialism has been a double-edged
sword. On the one hand, unions have provided Labor with a readily identifiable
constituency, a definite policy direction and vital organisational skills.
On the other hand, non-Labor parties have denounced Labor's democratic
socialism as the politics of envy. This strategy by opponents has played
upon community concerns that Labor's policies are made without public
debate by extra-parliamentary organisations such as unions. In linking
Labor with radical unions, for a long time non-Labor parties were able
to blur the distinction between democratic and revolutionary socialism
in the minds of electors. This tactic was developed in the first decade
after Federation when Labor faced an on-going campaign begun by George
Reid in 1904 to link it to the 'socialist tiger', and variants are still
to be heard.
From an early stage, the ALP had disputes between those
who pushed for the implementation of socialist policies, and those who
preferred to tone down the party's ideology. The clearest instance of
this internal debate occurred at the ALP Conference of 1921. On the one
hand, the Conference adopted a platform to institute a soviet-style Supreme
Economic Council. On the other, the Conference produced the Blackburn
Declaration stating that the party did not seek to abolish private property,
and would pursue collective ownership only in limited cases.
Despite the Blackburn Declaration, Labor's opponents continued
to claim that as a 'socialist' party, it was a danger to the Australian
community. Echoes of this were heard as late as 1983, when a few Liberal
Party members warned of consequences of the election of the 'socialist'
Hawke Labor Government. Some Labor politicians have attempted to counter
such claims by describing their party as a 'social-democratic'.
The impact of socialist ideas
Despite this long-standing argument over socialism, both
within and without the Labor Party, socialist ideas have had an impact
in Australia. The importance attributed to equality, and a readiness to
call upon the public sector to produce private goods and services, are
elements embedded in the Australian political make-up that are conducive
to socialist values.
The development of what became known as the 'welfare state'
owed a lot to socialist intellectuals in Australia and overseas. This
called for the implementation of policies designed to promote and protect
the social interests of all members of society. The state should be prepared
to intervene to limit or to modify the impact on individuals of the free
operation of market forces.
Although an early Queensland Labor Government established
state-run butcher shops, generally this has meant the provision of a range
of state-funded broad-based welfare policies, such as pensions and other
benefits, state-run schools and hospitals, and publicly-funded university
education. The Labor Party's establishment of the Commonwealth Bank (1911)
was a practical example of such an approach'it was to be a bank belonging
to the people', according to Prime Minister Fisher.(3)
Such state interventionism advanced pragmatically and unobtrusively,
and was not limited to ALP governments. Over the years much has been put
in place by non-Labor governments as the result of empirical responses
to specific problems. Such governments would have vehemently denied that
they were in way 'socialist' in their thinking. The Pensioner Medical
Service (1950) introduced by the Menzies Government is an example. A central
aim of the (Country) National Party has always been government support
for rural communities in such matters as controls over telephone prices
or the establishment of 'orderly marketing' schemes.
The shift from state intervention
Since the late 1970s there has been a marked, though not
total, shift away from the ideas of state intervention.
Within the Liberal Party, this was seen most clearly in
the struggles in mid-1980s between the so-called 'wets' who preferred
to retain and extend such programmes, and the 'dries' who became known
as the 'economic rationalists'. The coming to Liberal leadershop of John
Hewson (1990) signalled a major change in the Liberal approach to such
matters.
This shift in government standpoint was seen also in the
ALP. The Hawke and Keating administrations of the 1980s and 1990s were
challenged by many within their party as deserting socialist principles
because they favoured a system of indirect taxation, the sale of some
public utilities, deregulation the financial system, and reduced levels
of protection.
From the mid 1990s, attempts to redefine Labor Party values
in terms of democratic socialism have produced theories of a 'third way'.
Third Way socialism looks to government to provide funds directly to consumers
who then choose between public and private service providers. It is distinct
from welfare socialism in requiring a rather more entrepreneurial, yet
hands-off, role for government, rather than it becoming an active player.
The pragmatic character of Australian socialism is apparent
in Labor's changing policies to suit a changing environment. Perhaps the
most notable change has been a move from ideas of class solidarity to
national solidarity, and from demands for a greater equality in the distribution
of wealth to demands for a greater equality of opportunity.
- This research note summarises a large body of literature
on socialism. See, for example, T. Ball and R. Dagger, Political
Ideologies and the Democratic Ideal, HarperCollins, New York, 1995;
A. Calwell, Labor's Role in Modern Society, Landsdowne, Melbourne,
1965, R. McMullan, The Light on the Hill: The Australian Labor Party
18911991, OUP, Oxford, 1991.
- See, G. Worthington, 'Liberalism in Australian National
Politics', Research Note, Department of Parliamentary
Library, 200102.
- Commonwealth Parliamentary Debates, 1911, vol.
62, p. 2644.
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