Election Series, No. 6

This article continues our online series of election-year commentaries by American and international writers. We welcome your response to any of the articles, and, with your permission, will post some of them as commentaries in their own right. The series will run until shortly before Election Day.

No. 6—September 10, 2008

Getting Beyond 9/11 Down Under

by Bruce Wearne

After September 11, 2001, Australia’s relationship with the United States intensified. Prime Minister John Howard, leader of the Liberal Party, became so identified with the US, in fact, that many Australians now believe that his unstinting support of President Bush’s “war on terrorism” eventually led to his electoral downfall in 2007.

Americans might not recall the fact that Howard was in Washington, DC, on that fateful day, but Australians certainly do. His NewsHour interview with Jim Lehrer can still be accessed through the PBS online archive. Shortly thereafter, Howard’s coalition was reelected for another three-year term.

How things have changed! When sentiment turned against US foreign policy and President Bush in particular, Howard’s approval rating in Australia dropped precipitously. He could not deny that he had styled himself the US President’s best friend. Mr. Bush continued to dub him Australia’s “man of steel.” And so, in last year’s federal election, not only did Howard’s Liberal-National Coalition lose its majority, Howard actually lost his seat.

That story is essential background for understanding Australian views of the American presidential election this year. Australian support for any Republican candidate in the US is muted these days. There is ongoing and wide coverage given to the many problems associated with the Bush presidency, and Senator John McCain looks as if he will continue in Bush’s line.

What about Barack Obama? To convey something of the Australian view of the Illinois senator, let me return to recent political events and consider one facet of the change in government last year and the change in national outlook that led to it. Keep in mind that Australia now has Labor governments in all states as well as in Canberra, the national capital. This is unprecedented in our political history.

Before becoming leader of the opposition in December 2006, Kevin Rudd, our new prime minister, published an article, “Faith in Politics," which takes its cue from Dietrich Bonhoeffer: “. . . when Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” Rudd noted how the Howard government had allowed itself to be feted by conservative right-wing religious groups, which were content to “traduce Christianity by turning it into the political handmaiden of the conservative political establishment.”

Desire for a new way

In his article Rudd provided for himself and his political opponents a criterion by which to judge a person’s contribution to public life, a standard by which to evaluate a politician’s contribution to Australian politics. “Bonhoeffer’s vision of Christianity and politics,” he wrote, “was for a just world delivered by social action, driven by personal faith.”

The challenge Rudd threw out was not just a challenge to his political opponents. It was and is an invitation to a new style of political self-criticism that judges political action by Christian standards of justice. Such a challenge makes room for voters to disagree, while inviting those who dissent to engage in open and frank debate.

It is in this context, I think, that the election of a Rudd Labor government in Australia confirmed a change in political mood that fosters sympathy for the presidential bid of Barack Obama. The “sound” or the “feel” of Obama’s appeal is somewhat similar to that of Rudd’s. In the spirit of Christian openness, it appears to welcome exposure of hypocrisy and critical judgments of policy decisions. Obama, I would imagine, will stay within the boundaries of the American liberal, pragmatic tradition, which is different from Rudd’s. The latter appeals not only to Bonhoeffer but also to the British Christian socialist tradition of Keir Hardie (1856-1915), R. H. Tawney (1880-1962), Bishop William Temple (1881-1944), and Andrew Fisher (1862-1928). Senator Obama does, however, appear to be raising a Christian social standard of the kind that many Australians associate with Rudd’s perspective and approach.

Within Australian politics these days, as elsewhere, there is a strong desire to find a new way, pulled along by a hope that national life amounts to more than materialism and consumerism. That is also part of the reason why, at this point, the Obama campaign is so positively interpreted in this part of the “Western world.” There is the expectation that an Obama presidency will enable Australia’s relationship with the US to blossom in new and creative ways.

Dr. Wearne, who lives near Melbourne, is a sociologist and political commentator who has written for the Center’s Public Justice Report.