The defeat of the Fraser government, 40 years ago this month, was a watershed moment in the history of Australian conservatism. In considering the state of the Liberal Party and the broader intellectual right in 2023, it pays to look back to the 1980s for comparisons.
Firstly, consider the parallels.
When Bob Hawke brought Labor to power, seven and a half years after the trauma of the Whitlam Dismissal, conservatives were deeply demoralised. They held office in just two states: Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s Coalition in Queensland and Robin Gray’s Liberals in Tasmania. Importantly, Malcolm Fraser had been a significant disappointment. But rather than mourn his defeat, most conservatives lamented his lack of achievement in office.
Conservatives were similarly demoralised when Anthony Albanese won last year’s federal election, eight and a half years after another generational Labor trauma: the failed Rudd and Gillard governments. Again, conservatives were left in charge of only two states — Dominic Perrottet’s Coalition in New South Wales and Jeremy Rockliff’s Liberals in Tasmania. And for differing reasons, the governments of Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison had failed to live up to expectations.
So what did each generation of conservatives do next?
Post-mortems
The first thing any professional political party does after an election defeat is conduct a review. In 1983, the Liberal Party’s committee of review was led by its NSW president, John Valder. Importantly, the committee did not limit itself to investigating organisational, administrative and campaigning issues — it set about provoking the party into policy change.
Thus, the Valder report wholeheartedly endorsed the free market economic revolution that had taken hold in Thatcher’s Britain and Reagan’s United States. Fraser had initially been supportive of this movement, even hosting neoliberal intellectuals such as Friedrich Hayek and Milton Friedman at the Lodge, but was unwilling to implement its policies in office. The Valder report was deeply critical of Fraser for this, and its interpretation was shared widely across the party.
The Valder report was followed in 1984 by a parliamentary policy review, led by John Howard. Key policy proposals included: economic and financial deregulation; cuts to tax, spending and tariffs; and privatisation of state assets. Both the organisational and parliamentary wings of the party were now embracing the core tenets of neoliberalism.
In 2022, the Liberal Party’s post-election review was led by Brian Loughnane and Senator Jane Hume. In contrast with the Valder report, Loughnane and Hume have very little to say about policy directions. They identify the challenge of facing independent teal candidates in the centre and minor parties on the right, but offer no suggestions as to how to defeat them, beyond the sort of ordinary preparation that should be standard for any serious party.
The Liberal Party’s deep disconnect from the Australian people and the world of ideas is starkest when the report dances around the prospect of thinking about policy. Recommendation 38 is to “conduct work to develop policy proposals, that are developed consistent with the party’s values, are tangible, implementable, and relevant to the current mainstream public debate”.
How will this be ensured? Why, with Recommendation 49, of course: “undertake a ‘deep-dive values study’ on the attitudes and values of the Australian community”.
Fraser’s Liberals took the fight to him in office, criticised him publicly afterwards, and were inspired by his failures to advance new ideas. Morrison’s Liberals stood by while he tried to turn the party into a policy-free one-man show, and have offered only limp criticism since. Critically, they have no new policy ideas.
The ‘New Right’
The 1980s Liberals were also under extraordinary pressure from external “New Right” individuals and organisations. As David Kemp — himself a participant in the process — wrote:
Over the decade to 1985 something akin to a broad, though not unified, liberal movement came into existence with political and intellectual leaders, publicists and pamphleteers, journalists and commentators, policy support in the public bureaucracy and in private ‘think-tanks’, interest group mobilisation and an apparently expanding base of mass support.
Particularly prominent at this time was the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA), which was established in the 1940s alongside the Liberal Party but was revived in 1982 and transformed into a more radical proponent of economic and social reform. The Centre for Independent Studies, founded by Greg Lindsay in his backyard shed in 1976, pushed similar arguments, as did a variety of smaller groups, most of which have long disbanded.
This intellectual activism was helped along by sympathetic reporting in The Australian Financial Review, The Australian and The Bulletin. Such external pressure paid off. By the end of the 1980s, the economic “dries” had comprehensively outgunned the moderate “wets” within the Liberal Party, laying the groundwork for the economically liberal, socially conservative Howard government.
Today’s Liberal Party is also subjected to intense external pressure, but little of it could be described as constructive. Can the Liberal Party build an election-winning coalition based on the inane culture war rantings of Sky News’ Outsiders? Or the obsessive hatred for First Nations peoples that spews out of Quadrant magazine?
Long-standing conservative institutions that once reached broader audiences are now little more than hard-right propaganda outfits. The IPA is a Gina Rinehart-funded vessel for pretending that Tony Abbott is still relevant. The Australian continues to publish many of the same relics from the 1980s whose ideas are long past their use-by date, with a bit of scaremongering thrown in about rampant wokeness and youth crime to keep its ageing readership on guard.
Doldrums
In the 1980s, the Liberal Party was in the electoral doldrums, a situation made worse by the leadership battle between Howard and Andrew Peacock. But in the background, significant policy innovation occurred, with the support of critical friends outside of parliamentary politics. Crucially, as the neoliberal revolution took hold around the world, Liberal thinking was in step with the times.
Today, the Liberals are in the doldrums again. At a time of acute economic and environmental crisis, who on the right is prepared to undertake the equivalent intellectual work that will point the direction for the next Coalition government?
How is the Liberal Party of today different to the Liberal Party of the post-Fraser years? What does the Coalition need to do if it wants to return to power? Let us know your thoughts by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.
Abbott made sure there was no room for thinking inside the Libs. Turnbull was too terrified of the nutters to attempt it, and Morrison (like Abbott) too deluded by sky fairies and too lazy to even bother thinking.
The Libs have been captured by nasty private school god botherers beholden to the US culture wars of the hard right.
Turnbull could have been PM for a decade if he’d kicked them all out. He would have won all the swinging voters and decimated Labor. But paid the price for cowardice.
“Turnbull could have been PM for a decade if he’d kicked them all out. He would have won all the swinging voters and decimated Labor. But paid the price for cowardice.” – he would have needed more allies within the party and parliament to fill the gaps – huge gaps with the number of nutters who opposed him from Morrison’s and Dutton’s kamps.
“Kamps” or “Kampfs” ?…………………….
…………a lot of them certainly look like they fancy themselves in the black uniform with lightning flashes.
How could he have done that with a majority of the parliamentary caucus and the National Party against him? He paid the price for thinking being clever beats sheer power. It doesn’t
After his great electoral triumph in 2016, saving a single seat from the previous Abbottslide, I recommended that he just skip to the last page and put it to the crazies – “back me totally or sack me – I’ll resign, cause a by-election which you’ll lose and kiss your perks goodbye”
It was going to happen anyway but he dragged it out for 2 agonising years and caused such unknowable damage to this country that it elected Scummo in 2019.
The alternative was Dutton, who probably has the butler tie his shoelaces.
Good gag ?
Ironically, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but Dutton would have been preferable to ScoMo.
Everything about Dutton is transparent, and he would have been voted out in 2019.
The rot at the heart of Australian ‘conservative’ politics is the original concept of it being a ‘broad church’. It’s very formation was of a rag-bag collection of the furthest-out, reactionary, dumb chancers needed to make up the numbers. Not for any particularly good, but expressly for the purpose of keeping the working class in it’s place.
With such a menagerie, it was always inevitable that the most driven would eventually coalesce into the most influential groupings, hence the rise of the RWReligious NJs that have brought the party to the brink of oblivion.
What such people, having supported the nonsense of organised religion for 2,000 or more years brought to the party was the complete adherence to doctrine and dogma, therefore a lack of flexibility, such as the ability or willingness to acknowledge that the world changes.
The rot was started by Howard, in his ridding the party of the very moderates who kept the party electable. It was exacerbated by the bloke who really belonged in the DLP, who was the archetype of ignorant, old-testament wrathful patriarch, Abbott.
Morison was the ( hopefully zenith or really nadir ) latest manifestation of that tendency, with Dutton merely a dumb acolyte, bur supported by the same drongos who brought Abbott and Morrison to power. Until the Lib Party takes a collective emetic its hard to see, even given the unfathomable support from the sheeple, that they will in their present form, ever be a significant force again in Australian politics.
Agree wholeheartedly with the first paragraph, the name of the Liberal Party should have been ABL, (Anyone But Labor), as that is what it was, and as described above a rag tag bunch of loonies.
I think you miss the point “Fly on the Wall” about the Turnbull prime ministership. Turnbull did not want to become PM to implement and manage some grand bargain. Being PM was simply something to tick off on his “to do” list (e.g. become millionaire DONE; buy mansion DONE; have kids DONE etc.).
In any case, the same problems bedevil all centre-right parties around the Western world, and, in particular, the Anglo countries like Australia. Conservative (if you can call them that anymore) are only interested in keeping the Treasury benches warm, and not governing. They would rather revel in culture wars with the intent of wedging their political opponents.
Maybe the Liberals are in the doldrums. Alternatively, perhaps it’s just that their work here is done. In 2002 Margaret Thatcher was asked her what was her greatest achievement. She replied, ‘Tony Blair and New Labour.’ As she saw it, after 20 years or more of neoliberal government the Tories did not have to be in power to see their policies in action; their policies were the consensus. The Coalition could make the same boast here.
Dragged the Overton window into the asylum.
Sky after dark still seems to think it’s on a mission………..other than irrelevance it’s difficult to imagine what.
Great comment.
This government is about as interested in the poor and down-trodden as the other mob.
Bitterly disappointed.
But surely not in the least surprised?
Important to mention the UK Conservatives, parallel universe as nowadays they appear to be influenced by the same external ‘think tank’ influencers as the LNP (& Labor to an extent) and leads to same issue, neither grounded policies from genuine grassroot constituencies nor members?
ByLine Times identified Tufton St. ‘libertarian’ think tanks in the now US based Atlas Network (no longer public, but Sourcewatch has inc. e.g. CIS) as major influencers on policies inc. Brexit, climate science denial, culture wars e.g. anti-woke etc. with ‘dark money’ support and media agitprop from the usual suspects; one article exemplifies ‘The Tentacles of Tufton St. Think Tanks Alumni Handed Top Government Roles’ (Sam Bright, 4 Oct ’22) and linking to Kochs or the ‘Kochtopus’.
Like Sunak could….. any true conservative wanting a legacy would keep well away from ‘libertarian’ think tank research/policies, nativist NGO demands for immigration restrictions and/or population control then rebuild branch memberships and grass root communities for grounded & in house policy development in the interest of most citizens and the nation.
The UK Tories, the US Republicans, and our LNP are all under the thrall of the Murdoch organisation. And as a consequence all have descended into totally munted polities.
Canada and New Zealand stand apart, anglosphere countries withotut the influence of the Murdochs and they appear to have vibrant, robust liberal democracies. I hate to say it, but Kevin was right.
Not just Kevin but over half a million people who supported his petition to parliament. The Conservatives(?) haven’t ‘woke’ up to the fact that Murdoch and his minions really are on the wrong side of history. The reckoning finally came down at the last election.
Murdoch and Koch; think the latter is far more powerful while the former cooperates or shares interests with other media e.g. in UK inc. Barclays’ Spectator & Telegraph, Daily Mail, (K)GB News etc., to do PR, messaging and comms.
And Koch who is far more powerful, while the former cooperates or shares interests with other media e.g. in UK inc. Barclays’ Spectator & Telegraph, Daily Mail, (K)GB News etc., to do PR, messaging and comms.
As for the future of the Liberals…..who cares??? However, Conservatism does have followers; the rag tag ratbags that are the Nationals, PHON and various other fringe groups. the problem is actually get any change to the Neo-liberal orthodoxy of the past 40 years. So far, the Albo/ALP govt shows no appetite for tacking the fraud, and failure that all the evidence demonstrates!! By picking a few key areas and challenging the myths of ever lower taxation, smaller govt and privatising services a LABOR government has the chance to do what it is supposed to and change public perception to see that there is an alternative. The times and the demographic changes are in their favour!!! So far it looks like they will blow it!! If they are bold, they also have the chance of demoralising conservatives and keeping them out of Govt for an extended period.
Apologies for lack of proof reading.
At its core, current right wing politics is a blend of messianic leadership styles and performative ‘anti-wokism’ designed to run interference for giant corporate oligarchs. In this form, it can only ever be against things and, with its media enablers and religious zealots vested in such an approach it is difficult to see if they have any room for manoeuvre to transform this state of affairs. Logically its only outlet is to keep doubling-down on a rhetoric that is increasingly hysterical, unmoored from reality and dangerous in its ‘othering’ of easy targets such as immigrants. Perhaps it doesn’t believe it needs to move away from this as public institutions have been so comprehensively trashed, assets sold to mates, the working class atomised and the Overton Window so decisively shifted rightwards that social democratic opposition is indistinguishable and presents no real material threat to the backers of neoliberalism.
So my argument is that the right hasn’t ‘lost its way’, it has reached its destination.
Nah, the destination is a barren wasteland.
…Oh, wait
Excellent post. Yes the destination has been reached with both main political parties thoroughly neoliberal and incapable of dealing with any of the serious problems the world faces. What next though? The right will not give up and large swathes of the population will cop out by saying all politicians are corrupt.
This reminds me that perhaps a similar destination has been reached for religion. Scandals, cover-ups, and main legacy players lacking grassroots membership. Happy clapper profit centers now filling the void where once community-based religions filled an important void. I will now go and consult my Chat GPT for some advice.
Both major parties are so beholden to their big donors, and afraid to lose them, that both are severely hamstrung when it comes to dealing with serious problems. How bad do these problems have to become before a critical mass of voters realises that our only hope is to end the two party system? Unfortunately I think we have a way to fall yet.
Well put, especially re performative anti-wokism.
The US one-time conservative talkback host Charlie Sykes describes the current GOP as interested only in “performative assholery”.
Agree, as many of the same are (long standing) fossil fueled corporate/wealthy donors, with antipathy towards the lower orders & immigrants, they can play the eugenics &/or nativist cards to deflect from climate science and any threat to their existence.
Investigative journalist Jane Mayer and historian Nancy MacLean, plus many others, have researched and written in the US describing Kochonomics as ‘radical right libertarian’ economics, but more from a muse in the background, ‘segregation economist’ James Buchanan and ‘public choice theory’.
Suggests eugenics &/or disempowerment masquerading as economic policy or ideology, buying off politicians and knocking out the middle rungs of the ‘social mobility ladder’.
Liberal Party thinking is still in step with the times; the neoliberal con job the world’s conservatives embraced is belatedly on the nose (hope Albo et al are in for a nasty surprise that folks won’t take neoliberal crap from anyone), and given the entire platform is just a collection of fancy-sounding justifications for obscene greed, they’ve never been able to draw on the talents of many capable of intellectual rigor…
Conservatives the world over are leaning hard on their hegemony, with previous little else to support them. Witness the desperate scrambles to hold onto power in both the UK and US; the game is up, and the mob is coming with pitchforks sharpened and torches lit.
Only a couple of decades too late.
Sorry, I meant Liberal Party thinking is still in step with that of other conservatives
Not sure if that was a brilliant pun or a typo…………………….
“Rigor” is what dead people get – “Rigour” is thoroughness of thinking.
(Either one works for me…………..)
Gaze at a photo of the current Federal Libs, and remember Joel Hayley Osment’s most famous line.
They all bear a remarkable resemblance to the archetypal Golem…………….
…………..made of mud, unable to speak, lacks a soul and follows orders.
That’s almost the job spec…………………..
Took me a bit of googling, but I think I got there. “I see dead people” I guess, is the line you’re refering to, but “Some people are too scared, or something. I guess it’s hard for people who are so used to things the way they are, even if they’re bad, to change” is also an apposite line from Joel with repect to the Liberal malaise.
Humans are generally scared of change and conservatives, by definition, don’t like change, so the Liberals are in for a tunnel of pain.
Q: How many psychoanalysts does it take to change a lightbulb? A: Just one, but the lightbulb has got to WANT to change!
If the majority of Liberal Party rank and file membership are navy suited males aged 60-80 you do wonder whether the desire for change will come before electoral annihilation occurs.
I also didn’t know and thought it was this one.
Acting is not acting. It isn’t putting on a face and dancing around in a mask. It’s believing that you are that character and playing him as if it were a normal day in the life of that character.
Haley Joel Osment
Unfortunately, i think there will always be a coterie of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed acolytes emanating from the various pol sci., legal and economic courses. All of them chancers, with absolutely no concept of the social compact, society and the mutual obligation conferred by living in a democracy. With no life experience, they infest the democratic feed-lines of both sides, but to lesser degrees in some.
I voted Liberal from Fraser 83 until Turnbull in 2016. Can not and will not vote Liberal (or Neanderthal) in the foreseeable future.
They are going one way and I am going the other.
My values are Integrity, Equality, My Children/Grandchildren and economic security.
On one of those, the Liberals are semi acceptable – the others, a complete fail.
The Greed and the “Winning is everything/Values are negotiable” attitude does not sit well with me at all. The influence of the far right, hypocritical, Pentecostal Christian and Public School Boys club is a Cancer that needs to be excised before they can become relevant again.
Oh, and “Lord Voldemort, The Unelectable”. Your dreaming……
Sorry, which of integrity, equality, the future, and economic security are the Liberals allegedly semi acceptable on?
I must admit I’m kind of curious how someone could be OK with Tony Abbot but think Malcolm Turnbull was a bridge too far.
Could it be because Abbott, for all his faults, is always true to himself, but Turnbull in his second go as the Liberals leader was spineless and false?
Abbott being true to himself reminds me of the story of the fox and the chicken crossing the river.
“I voted Liberal from Fraser 83 until Turnbull in 2016” – did you seek treatment for such an appalling illness?
No, they were probably conceptually comatose.
Given that up to 4% of Neanderthal gens are present in those of European descent, and to a lesser degree in others, I’d say you’re caught in a conceptual trap.
Took you a while Beachy, didn’t you see Turnbull was a fraud? Anyway welcome to the broader church