A beginning
The Greens as a political entity started in the Australian state of Tasmania with the United Tasmania Group (UTG), which formed around opposition to the impending destruction of Lake Pedder through dam-building by the Hydro-Electric Commission (HEC). Formed just before the May 1972 state election, UTG’s purpose was to raise awareness about the destruction of the lake and the apparently wanton environmental destruction of other places in Tasmania in pursuit of development. The UTG was ultimately unsuccessful in stopping the damming of the lake, or getting anyone elected, although the ‘No Dams’ movement would re-emerge successfully ten years later around another dam proposal on the Franklin River.1
At almost the same time in New Zealand (in August 1972), a group of activists formed the Values Party to campaign on a progressive platform for the 1972 national election. The Values Party also looked to environmental campaigns for support, in particular groups opposed to a major dam project at Lake Manapouri, but also questioned New Zealand’s role in international affairs and opposed the Vietnam War. The Values Party did moderately well, but although it contested further elections, it was denied electoral representation due to the first-past-the-post electoral system, and the party faded towards the end of the 1970s. Slightly earlier, Europe saw the formation of the first ecologist party in Switzerland, Mouvement Populaire pour l’Environnement (MPE), in December 1971.2 This party also formed around an environmental issue, in this case the building of a road, which motivated local residents to form the group and challenge at the cantonal level. Although unsuccessful at that time, the MPE would succeed in 1979, with the election of the first Green MP globally.
Green parties emerged simultaneously in several Western nations. Thus it was for many campaigns and groups around the world, spurred on by the social changes of the 1960s. Whether it was the Moratorium marches in Australia that campaigned against Australian involvement in Vietnam, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) in the UK, or the coalition of groups and ideas that converged on the US Democratic Party Convention in Chicago in 1968, there were social and political movements advocating large-scale political change. Such books as Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, E.F. Schumacher’s Small is Beautiful and the Club of Rome’s Limits to Growth provided critiques of Western industrial capitalism that inspired activists to consider non-Marxist radical ideas. Drew Hutton, founder of the Brisbane Greens in 1984,3 noted that many of his generation, growing up in the 1960s, were strongly influenced by the anti-Vietnam war marches and by New Left criticisms of Western capitalism.
In Australia at the time, there were limited political options. The formation of the UTG did not herald a national party formation process, built as it was around dissatisfaction regarding the flooding of Lake Pedder. Indeed, individual progressive activists were still working on diverse projects across the country, such as the Rainbow Ecology Party, based in the south-west of Western Australia and the Troskyist group Resistance, which began as a youth group in opposition to Australia’s Vietnam involvement. The formation of the Australian Democrats in 1977, as a result of the merger of the New Liberal Movement, Centreline Party and the Australia Party, brought together a number of strands of environmental thinking, but in a purely parliamentary paradigm, and did not engage a grassroots activist base.4
At the same time, tendencies within the ALP, influenced by other traditional leftist and progressive thinking, were developing. Moss Cass, Minister for the Environment under Prime Minister Gough Whitlam, was influential in advancing a new ethic of environmental protection. Left-wing ALP members in inner-city districts such as Balmain, New South Wales, were mobilising around social and environmental issues as much as industrial and labour movement issues. The development of the emancipatory and identity politics of the ‘New Left’ in the 1960s also saw similar statements as expressed in the UTG founding charter. The diversity and complexity of the story is characteristic of any narrative of green party formation in Australia.5
Indeed, in terms of electoral campaigning, by 1989 there were some thirteen green parties throughout Australia registered federally with the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC),6 with eighteen campaigning at the 1990 federal election. They represented a wide variety of groups and structures. On top of that were a further number of state-registered parties and unregistered groups (some not using the name ‘Greens’) that would later form part of the Greens. For instance, in Western Australia these included the federally registered Vallentine Peace Group, the state registered Alternative Coalition and the unregistered Green Development, all of which merged finally with the small but federally registered Green Party of Western Australia to form the Greens (WA) on 1 January 1990. Although discussions on forming a Green party in Western Australia stretched back to the mid-1980s, registration of such a party did not occur until 1989, with the merger in 1990 as the final step in that process.
The name ‘Green’ itself was derived from the green bans of the early 1970s in New South Wales. The green bans, initiated by the Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) under Jack Mundey, were so called because they combined the more traditional black bans against unsafe worksites with a new, ‘green’ idea of environmental protection and community action. The first of the green bans, at Hunter’s Hill, New South Wales, in 1971 saw the BLF allied with local community members attempting to save an iconic piece of local bushland, Kelly’s Bush. This alliance of community interests, environmental concerns and workers (labour) was an exemplar for Petra Kelly, founding member of the German Greens (arguably one of the most successful green parties globally). Indeed, Petra Kelly’s tour of Australia in 1984 was pivotal in the formation of an Australian green party and a catalyst for future political action.7
However, in considering the name ‘green’ here, it is important to note that it was coined not by the emerging environmental parties such as the Values Party in New Zealand (NZ) or the UTG in Tasmania, but as an expression of the emerging connections between differing social movement activists. These new connections linked the old labour movement with the newly emerged environmental movement.
The first European Green party was formed in Switzerland in December 1971, at the cantonal level, with the first national party in Europe being PEOPLE in the UK in 1973. However, the first usage of the word ‘Green’ as a party label was in relation to the German Greens (Die Grunen) in 1980, in preparation for the European election later that year. The Swiss Greens won seats in their national parliament in 1983, although Daniel Brelaz became the first Green elected to a national parliament in 1979, as a candidate for the MPR’s national list Group for the Protection of the Environment. While it seems obvious that a variety of Green parties were forming at this time, each with their own charter, ideals and ideology, what is also clear is that these early formations were establishing themselves in a more generalised milieu as opposed to being simply branches derived from each other.
The bringing together of the old and the new can be seen in the classic four pillars of the green movement. Leading West German Greens member August Haußleiter described the process of formulating the four pillars at the often fractious German Greens congress at Offenbach in 1979:
I took a piece of paper and wrote four words on it: ecology, social responsibility, grassroots democracy and non-violence. Then I called Gruhl (leader of the conservatives) and Reents (leader of the left) into the room where the journalists were and said ‘Sign’. We then went back into the convention hall and announced we had a programme.8
Greens internationally
The German Greens, with a lengthy and at times turbulent history, have been the subject of much academic study. Scholars have examined the forces at play within the German Greens, and scholarly interest has been extended to studies of the French Greens, the Greens in the United Kingdom and other European nations. Still others have written on the philosophical backing for a green party. Each has noted the movement of the party from a relatively fringe political party towards the centre of political life in their respective countries, although this has been tempered both by internal debates and by external political realities and opportunity structures.9
If we are concerned about the current and future developmental path of the Australian Greens, then how the internal debates of the various green parties have been characterised and analysed will be of interest, and finding out whether this describes the nature and form of those parties’ trajectories towards the political centre is important. The best-known debates are those from within the German Greens, particularly between the factions struggling for control of the party’s program and, importantly, its political direction, whether operating within government or aloof from it. The struggles between the competing factions of the Fundis and Realos, however, both mask yet also reveal deeper debates about the purpose of the party. Simple characterisations of people and ideas into dichotomous positions masks the wide variety of possible positions and potential solutions to ecological crisis, while at the same time making explicit the basic split between those who see the existing system as the problem and those who see that it might be possible to work within it.10
Werner Hulsberg defined factional groupings within the German Greens as primarily within four strands of thinking regarding the party in relation to the state. The Realos (or ‘proponents of realpolitik’) looked to entering parliament to achieve reform. Fundamentalists (or Fundis) argued that accommodation with the major German parties (the Social Democrats or Christian Democrats) is to become like them: that a continuation of the transformation of the people is required, and this can only be achieved by working directly with people and not through the institutions of the state. Eco-libertarians supported reformism and compromise, and in that gathered up the remnants of the right of the party who had departed as the Greens was forming. Eco-socialists adopted a generally socialist line, seeing parliamentarianism as an illusory goal, but also considered that electioneering and campaigning were necessary components of building an opposition according to the existing social and political paradigm. Thomas Poguntke defined the debates as principally between the Fundis and Realos, with the other tendencies operating more as subfactions.11
The main arguments stemming from the four key strands of thinking within the German Greens in the 1980s have been replicated in many other green parties, just as they have in green philosophical thinking, but to varying degrees across different parties. However, most of these green parties have moved from being amateur parties based on social movements, to a professional vehicle for legislative reform. The relatively rapid move within the German Greens from the early structures that attempted to spread power inside the party away from MPs and people in leadership positions towards, a more professional and hierarchical structure was mirrored in a series of green parties, although not always with immediate success.12
Equally significant is that the parties’ successes, or lack thereof, are also linked to the opportunities the parties face, both electorally and politically. Since most European nations have proportional electoral systems, Green parties have found the path to parliament to be relatively open, even when the political opportunities have been lacking. In countries with a Westminster tradition (such as UK and Canada) this has provided far fewer electoral opportunities and a greater tendency to focus on localised politics or broader policy issues. Particular political situations (Chernobyl for Sweden, nuclear disarmament for Germany, a disintegrating Grand Coalition in Austria, and independence in the Ukraine) have also allowed for public policy debates assisting the rise of Green parties, although again have not been a guarantee of success. So it is important, then, to examine the Australian political context.13
Developing a party political culture
An issue under-canvassed in the examination of political parties from a political science perspective is that of ‘culture’: the internal dynamics that drive the organisation and are based not in particular forms of political psychology or in party constitutions, but on the invisible and often unspoken web of actions and expectations that operate within meetings and between people.
In thinking about party culture, it is useful to place the party within an extended idea of political culture, whether based on the nation, class, religion or other categories. However, studies that focus on national understanding of culture alone, while providing an overview of the contours of a national politic, will not be differentiated enough to offer an understanding of what occurs within any particular party. Equally, examining the party culture alone might provide a rich description but little insight into what drives the various actors within the party. Where examination of party culture has occurred, it has tended to focus on why particular groups do not participate in party politics, on political socialisation or on why parties are in decline.14
To reach an understanding of the distinctive character of the inner culture of the Australian Greens means looking closely at its history and realising that the very nature of the party’s development, from its series of separate but linked local organisations to a federation of state-based parties, has meant that there is not one over-arching monoculture at work within the party. Instead a diverse set of behaviour, expectations and activities are present thanks to the different formation paths and histories of the local and state parties.
Party culture is important to understand given the context of the significant changes within the Australian Greens’ constitution that occurred in 2014. These changes reduced the importance of long-held traditions of consensus decision-making, multi-level diffusion of decision-making, and strong state representation on central party bodies. These elements of party operation were also part of the party culture, and signify a shift from the party’s movement past, even while retaining active state and local branches with diverse histories.
The party culture of the Australian Greens is therefore marked by state and local differences. While there are obvious similarities, such as the use of consensus and the tendency to sit in a circle at meetings, there are also differences between the interpretation of how meetings should be run, the view on the power of executives, the role of the local group, the way in which group members socialise and the minutiae of meeting and event protocols, such as how to acknowledge Indigenous people, the pattern and form of meetings as well as other idiosyncratic meeting practices. These differences subtly influence the decisions made at party meetings.
For instance, the Greens NSW was created as a state-based party several years after a series of separate local parties had already formed. The process of amalgamation into a single party was one requiring discussion and negotiation, especially as some of the constituent groups had been active parties in their own right for a number of years. Issues of local autonomy needed to be balanced with single policy positions, even if there was contention over proposals. The struggle to develop the state party reflected the very different foci and ideologies of these groups, and their own internal practices were then reflected in the state party. The very clear acknowledgement of the autonomy of the local group is a reflection of the early struggles between groups, as is the continued (and contested) opposition to both a hierarchy and executive. As the New South Wales state party continues to develop, claims over needing to change policy, structures and processes will continue to be aired, whether internally or externally, generating internal divisions over these issues.15
In contrast, the Tasmanian Greens have utilised very different structural arrangements. The Tasmanian party developed more as a response to having elected MPs than to the need to network a set of local groups, and developed in the wake of the formation of the Wilderness Society. While the party’s annual state conference holds supreme power within the organisation, the state executive clearly directs the normal running of the party and determines when and how the state party operates, including the candidate selection process in its entirety. The adoption of a parliamentary leader before the existence of a party also provided a focus for party energies in parliament, even while many party activists retain strong links to an external and activist environmental movement. The features of the party constitution and the role of the party leader follow a different party development path from the New South Wales and Western Australian parties, reflecting the different motives and necessities of the Tasmanian party.
In examining Green party culture, it is useful to consider both the local and the general milieu in which the party operates. Florence Faucher-King noted the varying cultural practices in both the Aixen-Provence and Oxford Greens, but does not attribute the observed practices to any specific national party characteristic, even though broader cultural practices might be at work.16 So it is with the Australian Greens.
If we consider the historical developments of each of the state parties, and in some cases local parties that became local branches of the Australian Greens, we would be able to note the separate cultural practices at work. In then looking at the Australian Greens we would need also to consider the practices of the Australian Greens meetings in isolation from those of the party’s constituent parts, even though there is an iterative process between the state and national levels of the party.
The national Greens party operates as part of the national political scene. It has a national headquarters in Canberra, with a national manager and staff. The operations of the national party have tended to be more hierarchical than most state and local groups. Final decisions on campaigns and national-level arrangements tend to need at least the agreement of senior MPs. However, the ‘cultural’ practices at an Australian Greens’ national meeting derives in part from the collective experience of the state party members attending, as much from what might be expected as from the peak meeting of a national political party. In this context, some of the same practices observed at state and local levels can also be observed at a national level. The national level practices include: delegates sitting in a large circle so that they can face each other; national office bearers acting as functionaries, not as leaders; regular breaks for further discussion; and the use of alternative dispute resolution techniques to break policy and procedural deadlocks. At the same time, business is expected to be dealt with expeditiously, and agendas maintained through disciplined decision-making. This is in contrast to the practices of states and earlier practices at the national level. These practices were characterised by long initial discussions, with meetings disintegrating towards the close of the meeting as they rushed to get decisions made or deferred, all with a perceived drop in the quality of decision-making.
However, some of the older decision-making practices still persist. New South Wales Greens delegates will withdraw consent—called ‘blocking consensus’—on proposals if its delegates do not think there has been adequate discussion at the state level. This replicates practices at the New South Wales state-level meetings, where decisions might be deferred if local branches have not had sufficient time to discuss issues and make a decision on them. This deliberative style of decision-making was a feature of early meetings of some Greens parties, and borrows heavily from the Quakers and US peace activists. In maintaining this practice, Greens have attempted to entrench it as a process thought to produce better decisions. A former reference (now removed) in the Greens (WA) constitution cited a book on which decision-making practices were to be based and provided a direct link to those peace group activities. An early study of the Greens (WA) highlighted, however, that different groups within the early party still contested these practices, even as the internal party culture developed.17
Indeed, the study of the Greens (WA) provides an historical snapshot of the formative period. Within it are noted the various practices associated with meetings, including the difficulty in gaining consensus, the referral back to local branches—called ‘local groups’ in Western Australia—and the struggles over what ‘green’ practice might be. It becomes clear that the meetings are the core socialisation of newer members into the party, yet can be both frustrating and alienating for those members, who are as yet unaccustomed to the particular modes of behaviour and mechanics of the meetings. This suggests that the socialisation process itself is a key component of the construction of group identity as well.18
The acculturation process can be seen by observing a state-level meeting of the Greens (WA) from 1991, when it was comparatively large among Australian Green parties (with 340 members and a federal MP). At this meeting the activities and processes utilised by various members to discuss issues and make decisions could be observed and described. A key observation was that individuals within the meeting resorted to accusations of ‘un-greenness’ on a variety of occasions to defend or criticise positions. At the same time, the absence of concrete arguments was also fairly obvious to the meeting participants. The rhetorical activities of participants in the meetings alluded to various opaque power dynamics operating within those meetings.19
In contrast, the Greens NSW specify a process of decisionmaking, contained on their members website and periodically referred to within meetings. This is a process, listed as Interim Standing Orders and adopted in 2002, designed to codify previously existing decision-making practices. These Standing Orders also codify the grounds for referral back to local groups, in the same way as the Australian Greens’ practice does, and allow for voting within the consensus framework, if required. While not definitive (meetings can still decide to suspend their own rules), this codification takes what was once a cultural practice and makes it the standard.
The pervading culture of consensus decision-making within the Greens while generally enshrined in party constitutions and papers, is not complete. Consensus decision-making is part of a commitment to participatory democracy. Local decision-making provides legitimacy to state or national decisions, and further supports the continuing value placed on participatory practices. Proposals have, at various times, been put forward to apply ‘modified’ consensus to all processes even while that was not a constitutional requirement, with a shift to modified consensus occurring with the constitutional changes agreed in November 2014. Modified consensus allows for voting to take place where consent cannot be gained from all present, and could be seen as weakening a commitment to consensus. That the earlier proposals failed is perhaps as much because it was not seen as an urgent issue as for any cultural attachment to consensus processes. The changes in 2014, which removed the requirement for strict consensus (i.e. no voting on decisions) for any decisions except changes to the constitution and policy, occurred in the context of structural change, which removed the number of quasi-executive bodies of the Australian Greens from three to one. While consensus remains as a ‘goal’ mentioned within the new constitution, it no longer holds the status that it once did, and might in fact now be a historical artefact, at least in terms of its strictest interpretation.20
While the best evidence we have for Greens groups’ cultural markers is anecdotal, that they exist should equally be telling us that there is at times a high degree of individuality between groups. These cultural activities or signifiers can be addressed by looking more deeply at some of the state party activities, such as meetings and conferences, and then at the way in which these activities inform the outcomes. While research about the local level is limited, some anecdotal evidence can be used to form conclusions.
Just as Faucher-King describes the entrenchment of differing meeting practices of the Aix-en-Provence and Oxford Greens, a sudden change to existing practices can cause significant resistance. In the context of the Australia Labor Party this was noted by Michael Organ in the Illawarra Greens, whose election was largely the result of the imposition of a candidate by the ALP State Office, with a resulting backlash from both party members and the public.21 To this, Michael Organ noted that ‘we’re seeing problems down here [in the Illawarra], with Labor, where the State [Office] has imposed candidates and so forth. It just causes problems’,22 while also being wary of state office direction from his own party.
Conclusion
The progress of a party, from earliest beginnings to the current point, necessarily involves changes to the party’s organisation, platform and personnel, particularly if the party has any degree of electoral success. In the case of the Australian Greens, the process of development was slow for the first fifteen years of the party’s history, coupled with only limited and variable electoral success, and a relatively low membership level. However, the years following the 2001 federal election saw a dramatic shift in the party’s fortunes. From 2001–11 the party tripled in size, in both membership and MPs elected, with those MPs now sitting in multiple upper and lower houses.
In chapter 2, we will look at some of the theoretical grounding for discussion of the Australian Greens, including how the party might be situated between movement and professional party. In chapter 3, we will be introduced to the people in the party, the members, and two groups of those members not often discussed or seen in the literature on parties: the staff and party activists. These two groups are crucial ‘players’ within the party, as interlocutors and communicators between the MPs, the membership and the electorate, yet are largely ignored in the Australian context. Their experiences, knowledge and actions have been crucial in the development of the party, and will continue to be important as the party moves towards its next phase of development. It is important, therefore, to examine their views as they will highlight the changes within the party, particularly on historically difficult questions for green parties, including what direction members think the party should move in.
Notes
1 See Brown & Singer, The Greens; Buckman, Tasmania’s Wilderness Battles, and Pybus & Flanagan, The Rest of the World is Watching, for extended discussion of the UTG and Franklin Dam.
2 Ladner & Brändle, Switzerland; Sara Parkin, Green Parties, incorrectly identifies this as December 1972, as the party timeline she outlines indicates a repeated typographical error.
3 The Brisbane Greens never registered with the AEC as a party, although members went on to be involved in the Queensland Green Network and the Queensland Greens. Hutton, in the edited collection Green Politics in Australia, traces the emergence and convergence of movements in the pre-formation of the Greens.
4 Percy, Resistance, provides a good overview of radical Trotskyist politics of this period, while Warhurst, ‘The Nationals and the Democrats’, provides a history of the Australian Democrats. Warhurst has written extensively on the thirty-year parliamentary history of the Democrats.
5 The UTG charter lists their key demands and reflects the development of a post-Marxist environmental thinking. See also Rainbow, Green Politics.
6 Harris, Basket Weavers and True Believers, recounts both the shifts in Sydney’s inner west around Balmain, as well as the formation of the first registered Green Party in Australia and the thinking and processes that led to the registration of so many local parties.
7 Mundey, Green Bans and Beyond, provides a clear outline of the issues and concerns of the BLF at that time, which Brown & Singer in The Greens acknowledge as instrumental in early Green thinking. Salleh, ‘A Green party’, then charts the influence of Kelly and others in providing the impetus for an actual ‘Green’ party.
8 Quoted in Parkin, Green Parties, p. 120.
9 For discussions of the German Greens, see Poguntke, ‘The organization of a participatory party’, ‘Party activists versus voters’, ‘Unconventional participation in party politics’, ‘Goodbye to movement politics?’ and ‘Basisdemokratie and political realities’; Hulsberg, The German Greens, and Kitschelt, The Logics of Party Formation, among others. On the French Greens, see Faucher, ‘Party organisation and democracy’; Drugan, Les Verts; Faucher-King, Changing Parties and ‘Comparing parties’; and Villalba, ‘The French Greens’. On the UK Greens, see Rudig, Bennie & Franklin, Green Party Members; Bennie, Understanding Political Participation; Carter, The Green Party; and Frankland, ‘The evolution of the Greens in Germany’. For other European Green parties, see Rudig, Green Politics One 1990, and Frankland, Lucardie & Rihoux, ‘From amateur-activist to professional-electoral parties?’. For discussions of Green philosophical theorising, see Bahro, From Red to Green and Building the Green Movement; Porritt, Seeing Green; Kelly, Fighting for Hope and Thinking Green!; Spretnak & Capra, Green Politics; McKibben, The End of Nature; Eckersley, Environmentalism and Political Theory; Pepper, Eco-socialism; and Dobson, Green Political Thought.
10 Hulsberg, The German Greens, and Poguntke, ‘Party activists versus voters’, both provide a good background to the basis of the factional divides within the German Greens.
11 Hulsberg, The German Greens, pp. 145–52. Poguntke, ‘Party activists versus voters’, pp. 32–4.
12 See Lucardie & Rihoux, ‘From amateur-activist to professional-electoral parties?’, and Frankland, ‘The evolution of the Greens in Germany’, for a discussion of the shift from amateur-activists to professional party. Poguntke, ‘Basisdemokratie and political realities’, provides some words of caution on where this shift has led to collapsed votes and internal division.
13 Carter & Rootes, ‘The environment and the greens in the 2005 elections in Britain’, and Lambert & Jansen, ‘Party building by a state dependent party’, provide good background on problems with Westminister-based systems. Kitschelt, ‘Left-libertarian parties’, discusses at length the different political opportunity structures available during the 1980s.
14 Almond & Verba, The Civic Culture, provide a classic view of national political difference, while Elkins & Simeon, ‘A cause in search of its effect, or what does political culture explain?’, provide something of an antidote to underlying assumptions of what political culture might be. See also Fielding & Tanner, ‘The “Rise of the Left” revisited’, and Fielding, ‘Activists against “Affluence”, on the context of changes within the British Labour Party from the 1950s to the 1970s; Kolinsky, ‘Political participation and parliamentary careers’, and McKay, ‘Women in German politics’, on women in German politics, or Hooghe, Stolle & Stouthuysen, ‘Head start in politics’, on youth recruitment in Belgium.
15 Faehrmann, ‘Greens won’t get much further if we repeat poll blunders’, and Kerr, ‘Greens received $27 000 overseas donation before banning overseas cash’, are two examples of public commentary on internal party matters.
16 Faucher-King, ‘Comparing parties’, describes ‘tea-drinking’ in the Oxford Greens but, rather than defining it as a UK Greens-specific cultural practice, defines it more broadly as participation in an English cultural phenomenon.
17 Lange, ‘Being Green’.
18 Lange, ‘Being Green’ utilises the social movement theory of Melucci, Nomads of the Present, to describe this process.
19 Lange, ‘Being Green’.
20 Vromen & Turnbull, ‘The Australian Greens’; Australian Greens, ‘Schedule B—The Charter and Constitution of the Australian Greens’. See also Miragliotta, ‘Minor organizational change in Green parties’, for a discussion on organisational change within the Greens (WA).
21 Cahill & Brown, ‘The rise and fall of the Australian Greens’.
22 Cited in Vromen & Turnbull, ‘The Australian Greens’, p. 462.