Will the Greens be the next Australian Democrats or the new Labor Party?

The decision by the Greens in Tasmania to support the incumbent Labor government carries opportunities and risks for the rising political party. The Greens must be careful not to repeat the mistakes made by their predecessors. This is particularly the case given that the Greens are being lured into the same “balance of power” role once filled by the Australian Democrats. If the Greens are to avoid the fate of so many minor parties, they will need to be more rather than less daring and demanding.

The Australian Democrats, unlike either One Nation or the Greens, were never able to inspire a loyal, coherent or consistent voter base. This was because their raison d’etre as a centre-left social liberal party was to moderate parliamentary processes rather than to express a particular social movement. The Democrats’ commitment to a responsible “balance of power” role was expressed by the party’s refusal to “cross trade” on legislation. Considering each Bill on its merits combined with the commitment never to block supply or enter into coalitions severely limited the party’s capacity to wield power or face up to the consequences of such power.

The Democrats settled into life as a permanent “third party” that existed to “keep the bastards honest”. Without a core constituency or a powerful social movement behind them however, the Democrats were dangerously reliant on the popularity of a core of MPs and their parliamentary work. The Greens should be wary of stepping too readily into the “honest broker” role vacated by the Democrats lest their MPs become too embedded in legislative fine print and thereby lose touch with the social movement that is their greatest asset.

History abounds with cautionary tales for the Greens. Yet there is an even more important example of minor party success to which the Greens should now look for inspiration. This is the rise and success of the Australian Labor Party.

In Australia’s first election in 1901, the Labor Party won just 18% of the vote and 15 of the 75 seats. Labor was third after the more established blocs of Protectionists and Free Traders. The elected Labor MPs, however, were not in parliament to tinker with the legislative agendas of the major parties of the day. Nor was the Labor Party organisation content with playing a support role to its MPs. Rather, the new MPs saw themselves as representatives of the social movement that had delivered them into parliament. Their role was thus not to be honest brokers but rather to achieve the change demanded by their constituents.

Thus their first leader, Chris Watson, achieved what he could with Edmund Barton and Alfred Deakin’s liberal Protectionists by cross trading on legislation to achieve the social reforms his voters desired. Unlike the Democrats or today’s Greens MPs, Labor was not shy of making demands for its support, and in bringing down the government as they did in 1904. On that occasion Watson also demonstrated to voters his party’s willingness to lead when he formed the first short-lived but ground-breaking Labor government in the world even as his party held a minority of seats in parliament.

In this respect, Labor was demonstrating that it had the discipline and daring to match the established political elites at their own game. In so doing the Labor Party became a truly transformational political party because it was able prove itself the vehicle through which the labor movement was able to capture the parliamentary system that had once stymied its aspirations and turn the state to a new goal — that of building the “working man’s paradise”.

Like Labor in 1901, the Greens are a minor party connected to a global social movement — but one based not merely on class but on a new set of ecological and social values hitherto stymied by the power of the state. This is especially so in Tasmania. So far Tasmanian Greens leader Nick McKim has indicated that his party will not be making demands in exchange for its support in parliament. One has to question why else voters turned to the Greens but for its representatives to make demands on their behalf. Both major parties in Tasmania are as alarmed by the rise of the Greens as the old elites were of Labor in 1901, and are determined to shut the Greens out of power.

The future of the Greens, as the next major party, or yet another “permanent” minor party may hinge on whether McKim can demonstrate that the Greens, like Labor under Chris Watson, are able and willing to wield power and deliver the kind of transformative change demanded by the green social movement, or whether the Greens as a party will instead be content with the balance-of-power role and their minor party status. If the future of the biosphere is as imperiled as the Greens proclaim, however, the green movement should not be content with anything less than power itself.

Dr Aron Paul is a Melbourne writer and historian. He is a former national president of the Australian Democrats. He taught politics and international relations at La Trobe University from 2004-09 and is currently a postgraduate student in environment and planning at RMIT.