The living dead: The Australian Labor Party

Geoff Davies has written a challenging and important piece on his blog Better Nature in which he reflects on the current state of the Federal Labor Party and the troubles dogging the Rudd Government. The article also appears here in the online journal Online Opinion where it has generated considerable debate.

This is one of the most important and insightful articles I have read on the appalling state of the Labor Party. Davies writes about the Federal Labor Party, but his arguments are as relevant to State based Labor parties.

Davies argues that we should declare the Labor Party dead. He writes:

'Isn’t it time we declared the Labor Party officially dead?

The party has become a façade, an empty shell, a Faux-Labor Party. It lost its vision long since. It has forgotten why it exists. It has no purpose, other than to gain power for the egos that inhabit it.

Lacking a vision, Faux-Labor is purely reactive. Lacking a vision, it cannot frame issues to its advantage. It cannot seize the initiative. Caught awkwardly in its opponents’ framing, it is forever on the back foot, only ever able to be less bad, never able to proclaim a noble goal and pursue it. Its collapse in the polls is surprising only for its speed".