Does democracy really require an opposition party?

Part One

This is a topic with lots of moving parts, so I am going to spread it out over a couple of shorter posts. Stay tuned by subscribing.

The idea that a healthy democracy requires a strong opposition is deeply embedded in most understandings of politics, but it is another one of those truisms we must reassess in the light of the 2022 federal election. Robust alternative views are important within a democracy, certainly, but we need to rethink the idea that “the opposition” means a single, strong party (or a “Coalition” performing that function).

Mainstream commentators are slowly waking up to the fact (even as it has been blindingly obvious to the rest of us for a while) that the main conservative parties in Australia are no longer fit for purpose, that at a state and federal level they have allowed themselves to be captured by various extremists and have become deeply unrepresentative of most of the country. This growing acceptance of the obvious in the media and elsewhere is causing all s…