On the first day of this year, at New York’s City Hall, socialist senator Bernie Sanders declared it was time for wealthy corporations to pay their fair share of tax as left-wing mayor Zohran Mamdani was sworn in.
asserted
Mamdani → declare → tax
Mamdani, the charismatic 34-year-old, had come out of nowhere to excite a million New Yorkers into voting for his platform of free childcare, free transport and higher taxes for the rich to foot the bill.
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rich → come → bill
A month later, in the United Kingdom, Greens leader Zack Polanski said UK Labour could no longer take progressive voters for granted as his party for the first time seized a seat from the government in a byelection, promising to tax the super rich.
uncertain
party → say → rich
The Australian Greens have been saying much the same thing, for most of this year.
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Greens → say → year
But in the polls, they’ve gone nowhere.
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they → go → polls
How come the Greens have stalled while One Nation surges?
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Nation → come → ?
Why, by contrast, have Mamdani and Polanski succeeded?
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Mamdani → succeed → contrast
Will the Greens ever crack the ceiling of a 12 per cent share of the federal vote?
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Greens → crack → vote
These questions were ventilated in the mainstream this week, when Larissa Waters, a well-liked consensus-builder, tendered a shock resignation over her health issues.
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Waters → ventilate → issues
The party room of 11 MPs elected hard-left senator David Shoebridge in a rare contested ballot.
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room → elect → ballot
Greens supporters hope that new leadership holds at least some of the answers.
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leadership → hope → answers
The political mood has shifted since last year’s election returned a lousy result for the Greens, who lost three lower house MPs, including party leader Adam Bandt.
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who → shift → Bandt
Inflation and interest rates are again on the rise, Labor is on the nose, and voters are ditching the establishment across the Anglosphere.
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voters → ditch → Anglosphere
Waters has kept the party’s vote intact despite turbulence elsewhere, and most people in the Greens emphasise their respect and affection for her.
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people → keep → her
But they believe her leadership has been lacking bite and energy.
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leadership → believe → bite
“Larissa was great in trying to get the best out of others, but that doesn’t lend itself to being a firebrand in the public eyes.
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that → try → eyes
She was a good internal leader, but I’m not sure she cut across,” a member close to the NSW Greens says.
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member → ’m → Greens
The party is spying opportunity in this week’s change.
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party → spy → change
Leadership contender senator Sarah Hanson-Young said as much in her pitch to colleagues this week, according to people in the room.
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Young → say → room
“The Greens have to be able to work with the government to get things done that our voters and supporters want,” says another source in the federal party.
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source → have → party
“But you have to be able to do that while calling bullshit when you see it.
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you → have → it
The challenge for David is whether he can do both.”
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he → do → both
Shoebridge clearly thinks a breakthrough is possible.
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breakthrough → think → ?
He wants the Greens vote to be higher, and its influence in parliament to multiply – although he’s not yet set targets.
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he → want → targets
“This is an extraordinary moment in politics, not just in Australia, but across the world,” he says in an interview.
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This → say → interview
“The challenge for the Greens has been connecting with that anger, letting people understand that we see it and we feel it.
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we → connect → it
And directing the political focus, not on migrants or your neighbour from the Philippines is working in the local emergency department, but on the 1 per cent who are driving [inequality].”
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who → direct → inequality
Pressed again on what’s been missing, Shoebridge says: “I have been hearing people want a party that is going to be out there overtly fighting for them.
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that → press → them
“The feedback I’ve been getting about the team that we put together, Steph Hodgins-May and myself, is there is this powerful sense that we have the leadership team connected to a party room that is up for this fight.
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that → get → fight
That was the combative approach of Max Chandler-Mather, the one-term MP and firebrand who is now leading the party’s think-tank, the Green Institute.
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who → lead → tank
Both he and Shoebridge have emphasised another missing factor: a grassroots mass movement of everyday Australians.
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he → emphasise → Australians
“People often ask how to recreate the political success and energy of UK Greens leader, Zack Polanski or New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani,” Chandler-Mather wrote in an open letter to the Greens’ MPs on Tuesday, before the leadership vote.
“The recipe for their success doesn’t just lie in their policies, rhetoric or even organising strategy.
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recipe → ask → policies
It lies in the process by which they won their elections.”
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they → lie → elections
One way to do that, he argued, was giving all Greens’ members a say in choosing their leader.
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he → do → leader
“We say we want to build a movement ...
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we → say → movement
But if we’re serious about that it means putting real power and trust in the hands of ordinary people – and trusting they will make the right choice,” he says.
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he → ’re → choice
It didn’t happen this week, but the debate has gained fresh energy.
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debate → happen → energy
Meanwhile, Chandler-Mather’s Green Institute has been working on the broader project, pulling together research and focus groups to help map the electorate and guide the Greens’ targeting strategy.
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Institute → work → strategy
Core to the vision is a version of the Greens that sets itself apart from Labor and positions itself as an alternative party of government – not a crossbench party that helps the government pass progressive legislation.
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government → set → legislation
Shoebridge has indicated this could see a return to a more obstructionist approach to parliament than the past 18 months under Waters.
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this → indicate → Waters
…and 52 more, not listed.
The Aporia
