The rise of the Greens

Since the Hawke and Keating Governments abandoned traditional Labor policy of wealth redistribution and direct Government intervention in the economy, Labor has struggled to articulate a social democratic ideology for the 21^st century.

The broad convergence of mainstream left and right on both economic and social policy has left both major parties struggling to define and distinguish themselves.

Being the more ideological of the major parties, Labor has suffered more from this convergence than the Liberals. If the business of Government is seen as largely managerial, Labor will struggle to compete.

The Greens are not challenged ideologically in this way. They know what they are on about. Perhaps surprisingly, the prospect of future Labor-Greens cooperation might therefore depend more on adjustments within the Labor Party than the Greens.

Labor must first sort itself out ideologically and articulate a social democratic view for the 21^st century. Then it must accommodate itself to the reality that the Greens will outperform it in the inner cities and likely win seats from it there. It must learn to cooperate with the Greens, though still competing with them to some extent in the wider electorate.

If Labor can make these adjustments, then there will be a real prospect that left-of-centre politics can still compete with the right in Australia. But if it cannot, the outlook for the left is not rosy. The big imponderable is whether Labor has the political smarts to do this. Its recent performance in Government is not encouraging.