Fading Loyalties: The Australian Labor Party and the Working Class

The Australian Labor Party's political direction since the mid-1960s has started from the premise that the party must appeal to middle-class voters in marginal seats. In an important re-assessment of who ALP supporters are, Andrew Scott argues that this premise is wrong. Andrew Scott's original research reveals that ALP membership has declined since the Second World War because the party has lost its appeal for the working class. For the first time in its one hundred year history, Labor's activists have in recent decades been drawn disproportionately from professionals. People in less well-paid jobs still make up the majority of the workforce and the core of the ALP's electorate, but they are now drastically under-represented in party branches and positions. Fading Loyalties presents convincing evidence that this loss of working-class input has left the ALP out of touch. Andrew Scott argues that unless there is a major shift in political direction, the ALP's voting base will shatter.