Australian political reform could give citizens more influence between elections. Explore how democracy, representation and accountability could be strengthened.
Quick Answer: Australian political reform could strengthen citizens’ influence between elections through greater transparency around political donations and lobbying, stronger accountability mechanisms, broader representation and carefully designed forms of public participation such as citizens’ assemblies.
Australia already has strong democratic institutions; the question is how those institutions could provide citizens with more meaningful and equal opportunities to influence public policy.
Introduction: What Does Democracy Actually Deliver?
Australia proudly describes itself as a democracy. Every few years we vote for our representatives and decide which major party will form government.
But there is a question we rarely ask:
How much influence do ordinary Australians actually have once the election is over?
We are told that citizens can influence government through elections, petitions, protests, submissions, lobbying and contacting MPs. Yet having the right to influence government is not the same as actually changing government policy.
This raises an uncomfortable question: Is democracy simply about choosing who governs, or should it also mean that government listens to citizens and delivers for them?
China provides a fascinating comparison because it operates under an entirely different political model.
Australia: The Power to Vote
Australia’s House of Representatives is elected for a maximum three-year term, using preferential voting. The party or coalition commanding a majority forms government.
This gives Australians an important democratic right: we can remove a government at an election.
But what happens between elections?
This raises a fundamental question: does Australia’s democratic system really serve the people?
Citizens can protest, sign petitions, make submissions and contact politicians. Yet governments are not required to accept those demands.
Political influence is also unequal. Australia’s parliamentary research has recognised concerns that political donations can create opportunities for undue influence, while research into federal lobbying has identified weaknesses in transparency and accountability.
So we have political participation—but does that participation translate into political power?
Labor or LNP: Does Changing Governments Change the System?
This is perhaps the most important question.
Australians can vote Labor out and elect the LNP, or vote the LNP out and elect Labor. The policies of the two parties are certainly not identical, and governments make genuine differences in areas such as industrial relations, welfare, climate policy and public spending.
But do these differences fundamentally change Australia’s economic and political direction?
There is substantial academic literature examining Labor’s relationship with neoliberalism. Research has argued that Labor governments have operated within, and sometimes helped develop, the neoliberal economic framework.
More recent research suggests that today’s Labor government has made tangible policy changes while still accommodating significant elements of the existing market-based framework.
This leads to a provocative possibility:
Perhaps Australians can change the government without being able to substantially change the system.
The parties may argue fiercely about individual policies while accepting many of the same underlying economic assumptions.
If that is true, elections can become a choice about who manages the system, rather than allowing citizens to choose fundamentally what kind of system they want.
China: A Completely Different Model
China cannot be described as a multiparty electoral democracy like Australia.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leads the political system, and opposition parties do not compete for national government in the Australian sense. China’s Constitution explicitly establishes CCP leadership while also providing for people’s congresses and political consultation.
However, it would also be misleading to claim that Chinese citizens simply have no elections or political participation.
China has elections for people’s congresses at different levels. County and township-level deputies are directly elected, while higher-level congresses are elected indirectly. The Chinese system also incorporates political consultation through bodies such as the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference.
It is a different conception of political participation—not Australia’s competitive party model.
Does China Deliver for Its Citizens?
This is where the comparison becomes particularly interesting.
Whatever criticisms we make of China’s political system, it is difficult to deny the scale of its economic and social transformation.
The World Bank reports that China eliminated extreme poverty by 2020 and that access to health, education and other services improved significantly over the preceding decades.
China has also invested enormously in infrastructure, housing, transport, education and industrial development.
That doesn’t mean everything in China is successful. China faces serious problems, including inequality, an ageing population, environmental pressures and economic imbalances.
But it does challenge the simplistic Western assumption that a one-party political system necessarily means a government that does not serve its population.
Do Chinese Citizens Support Their Government?
There is evidence worth taking seriously.
A major Harvard Kennedy School study conducted eight surveys between 2003 and 2016, involving more than 31,000 Chinese citizens in urban and rural areas.
In the final 2016 survey, 95.5% of respondents reported being either relatively or highly satisfied with the central government in Beijing.
Earlier reporting on the same research cited 93.1%, depending on how satisfaction was calculated. The important point is not the difference between those figures but the consistently high level of reported satisfaction.
The researchers also found that satisfaction with China’s central government was considerably higher than satisfaction with lower levels of government.
This research is not proof that every Chinese citizen supports the CCP. Nor does it eliminate legitimate concerns about political freedoms, censorship or dissent.
But it does demonstrate something Western commentary often overlooks:
Many Chinese citizens have reported being highly satisfied with their government.
What About Political Freedom?
This is where comparisons must remain honest.
Australia provides genuine political competition, a free electoral choice between parties and much greater space for organised opposition.
China does not provide those same political freedoms.
But political freedom is only one dimension of government.
Another is government responsiveness.
A citizen may have the freedom to vote against a government but still feel that the government ignores them for three years.
Another citizen may have less influence over who leads the country but feel that their government is delivering improvements in their community and their standard of living.
Neither experience should automatically be dismissed.
Why Australian Political Reform Matters
Australia has valuable democratic institutions that should be protected. But we could learn from the idea that government legitimacy should depend not only on winning elections but also on delivering for citizens.
These reforms are also essential to addressing Australia’s major social justice issues, including housing insecurity, inequality, healthcare and insecure employment.
We could create stronger mechanisms for citizens to influence policy between elections. We could strengthen lobbying transparency, limit the influence of political money and make governments more accountable for their promises.
Most importantly, we need to examine whether Australia’s political system gives voters sufficient choice and whether reforms could enable a broader range of political voices to influence government.
Broadening Political Representation
Australia already demonstrates how electoral systems can produce broader representation.
The Senate uses proportional representation, enabling smaller parties and independents to gain representation alongside the major parties.
A range of reforms could be considered to broaden political participation and increase accountability, including:
- reviewing electoral systems and proportional representation;
- reducing the influence of large political donations;
- increasing transparency around lobbying;
- improving opportunities for independent and smaller-party candidates;
- citizens’ assemblies on selected national issues;
- greater use of direct public participation where constitutionally appropriate;
- stronger local democratic participation;
- examining barriers faced by new political movements and candidates.
The objective of such reforms would not necessarily be to weaken or replace existing political parties. Rather, they could be assessed according to whether they increase political competition, representation, transparency and citizens’ ability to hold governments accountable.
A political system in which voters have meaningful alternatives may also give elected representatives stronger incentives to respond to changing community priorities.
Democracy Should Be About People
Comparing Australia and China also demonstrates why political systems should not be reduced to simple labels.
Australia provides competitive elections, political pluralism and civil liberties that are substantially more restricted in China. China, meanwhile, has experienced major economic and social transformation alongside considerable continuity in national policymaking.
Research from Harvard Kennedy School’s Ash Center found that reported Chinese citizen satisfaction with government increased substantially between 2003 and 2016. Importantly, the researchers also cautioned that censorship and propaganda are widespread and found that public attitudes responded to changes in people’s material wellbeing. Ash Center
This does not establish that one political system is preferable to another. Rather, it raises a useful question:
How can democratic institutions give citizens meaningful opportunities to influence government and hold decision-makers accountable?
For Australia, reform could involve strengthening participation between elections while preserving competitive elections, political freedoms, institutional checks and the rule of law.
Research on democratic governance increasingly examines mechanisms designed to make government more participatory, transparent, responsive and representative.
What Do You Think?
Is voting every three years enough to make Australia genuinely democratic if citizens have limited opportunities to influence government between elections?
Or should democracy involve more continuous participation, accountability and public involvement in decisions that affect our lives?
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Oh, so this is not about reform, but sedition.
Id vote for the political arrangements with the least connections to crimes against humanity.
Maybe thats “neoliberal” or “woke”
Bob, I think we are actually closer on the question of political influence than your comment suggests.
I deliberately said that not every political donation is a bribe because, legally, that would be an inaccurate claim. But that does not mean money has no influence. Your point that unequal financial resources can create unequal access to politicians is precisely why I argue for stronger transparency, lobbying rules and controls on political donations.
On the economic question, I think we disagree more fundamentally. My argument is not that government spending somehow avoids all financial consequences. It is that Australia, as the issuer of its own sovereign currency, does not operate financially in the same way as a household, business or state government. Interest payments are a real policy consideration, but they do not mean that every dollar of public spending must first be obtained through taxation or private borrowing.
That deserves a much longer discussion than a comments section allows.
As for your suggestion that the article is about sedition, I think that takes the argument somewhere it plainly doesn’t go. I am arguing for **more democratic participation and accountability**, not the overthrow of Australia’s constitutional system.
And I certainly don’t think asking whether our political institutions can be improved makes someone “woke” or “neoliberal”. It simply means we are debating how democracy should work.
Spot on, Denis.
Yes, there needs to be some serious change in our political system so that citizens have a say between elections.