Women Losing Trust in Political Leaders Shows New Swinburne Research
Australian Leadership Index shows women’s perception of federal leaders took a steep dive from the end of 2020 to the first quarter of 2021.
Australian Leadership Index shows women’s perception of federal leaders took a steep dive from the end of 2020 to the first quarter of 2021.
In 2020, COVID-19 created a strong focus on leadership, placing increasing pressure on leaders to make decisions for the public interest, particularly at federal and state government level.
When the dust from the election finally settles, Republicans will be faced with the challenge of finding a replacement leader for Trump and the question of how to position their party more broadly. The temptation will be to find a Trump 2.0, another anti-establishment, populist leader with broad appeal to Trump’s base.
The year 2020 will be remembered as one of Australia’s most turbulent. The first months of the year saw many communities devastated by the bushfire crisis. With little respite, Australia soon faced the COVID-19 pandemic, leading to a major disruption to the economy and people’s lives. Leadership across all sectors and institutions has been tested as it never has been before.
Before the COVID-19 pandemic worsened in Australia in March, public perceptions of the federal and state governments were consistently poor. Political leaders were seen to be serving themselves and other vested interests, rather than the public interest. However, since the start of the pandemic and the establishment of the National Cabinet in March, this has begun to change.
Overall, our 2019 annual report findings show a significant gap between public perceptions and expectations across all indicators of leadership for the greater good across government, public, private and not for profit sectors. Australian institutions are not living up to the expectations of the general public.
Since we started tracking public perceptions of leadership for the greater good, the Australian Leadership Index has never recorded a positive ALI score. During the COVID-19 pandemic, public perceptions have changed dramatically, shifting the ALI score from -13 in March 2020 to +8 in June 2020.
In the space of six weeks, the threat posed by the COVID-19 pandemic and the sudden absence of partisanship from the political landscape have ushered in a focus on leadership for the greater good, the likes of which we haven’t seen for years.
The March 2020 quarterly report comes at the end of the bushfire crisis of 2019/2020 and the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, which was in its infancy at the time of data collection. This quarterly report describes the key findings from the March 2020 Australian Leadership Index.
Most Australians have had enough of the opportunistic point-scoring that characterises politics today and want leaders who put the public interest first. With the election a month away, many Australians have little faith the winners will be able to provide the type of leadership that can change the country in a meaningful way.
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