The Post: Understanding the forces that bring authoritarian populists to power

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The day after Donald Trump got re-elected, lecturers in at least one American university –the New York Times reports – told students, “we’re actually cancelling class today because of the election”.

The academics’ inability to cope is understandable in part: Trump, as has been exhaustively documented, is a serial liar, an abuser of women and an attempted over-turner of legitimate elections. But as Laura, the 20-year-old student who conveyed her lecturers’ remarks to the Times, said, “I was shocked because [they were] completely blocking off the idea that someone might support someone other than Harris”.

Surely, after nearly a decade of seeing “The Donald” in public life, we have passed the time for bewilderment, and reached the point of addressing the forces that bind people to such authoritarian populists. This is not some far-distant concern: Trump’s support here seems to have more than doubled from 9% in 2016 to 21% this year. That figure rises to 31% among Kiwi men.

Hypothetical polls (“how would you vote in another country’s election?”) may, admittedly, be unreliable, or just reflect Trump’s greater familiarity. But they are consistent with a vote share of around 15% for New Zealand First and ACT, parties that increasingly foment a similar divisiveness.

In the last decade, of course, countless columns have been written about authoritarian populism. But as can be deduced from the shocked American lecturers, and from the equally shocked Kiwis in left-wing circles, those of a more liberal bent have still grasped neither the drivers of Trumpism nor its solutions.

The first step, I think, is to isolate the valid from the invalid drivers. The latter sometimes consist of outright bigotry: racism, sexism, the wider pushback against a more diverse world. Those impulses can only be confronted head-on, as the hīkoi to Parliament is currently doing.

But there are also people who, in every nation, have valid reasons for anger. No-one, in my view, has ever bettered the analysis of Trump voters offered by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Kathy Cramer, who, after years spent interviewing rural Americans, reported that they felt they weren't getting their fair share of three elementary things: income, respect, and political power. Globalisation had wrecked their livelihoods; elites looked down on them; and political decisions were made in faraway urban centres.

The question of respect is complex, because not everything in those lives deserves validation; but the two other complaints are more straightforwardly true, in New Zealand as elsewhere. Since the 1980s, the number of families in poverty here has nearly doubled, and most of them feel they are locked out of the political system.

A 2022 survey, carried out by the OECD, found that although nearly 60% of financially secure New Zealanders say they trust Parliament, that figure falls to just 40% for people who struggle to pay their bills. Similarly, just 35% of the poorest Kiwis feel they “have a say” in political decisions.

Rural dwellers likewise report very low levels of trust. And since 2022 the figures may well have worsened.

What’s driving this disenchantment? Although the Official Information Act needs reform, nearly eight in 10 Kiwis think “information about administrative procedures” is easy to find. The problem is less about what government puts out, and more about what it doesn’t take in.

Fewer than half of New Zealanders – 48% – feel they have enough opportunities to voice their views, and only 37% believe that if they did speak up, state agencies would listen. As a recent OECD report put it: “People need to feel trusted by the government in order to trust it.”

What would it take to turn this situation around? An effective state, able to deliver core services well, is crucial: competence plays a central role in enhancing trust.

Addressing hardship is likewise vital. If lifted out of poverty, hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders would be more likely to vote. And to ensure their voices weren’t still drowned out, we could clamp down on the political donations and vested-interest lobbying that convert wealth into power.

But at the heart of any reform programme must be a determination to do politics differently. The most trust-enhancing reforms are, according to the OECD’s evidence, those that ensure citizens’ voices “will be heard”.

Top-down, one-way politics is a 20th-century hangover. We need more opportunities for ordinary people to come together, share their collective wisdom, and play a meaningful part in decision-making.

That requires, in particular, greater outreach to marginalised New Zealanders. State agencies should ditch their cosy habit of consulting “selected stakeholders”, and get out there – in malls, sports clubs and community centres – to engage people where they are.

We have the chance, if only our public service can grasp it, to restore a more cohesive society.

The perils of the alternative path – divisiveness, polarisation and a breakdown of trust – are plain to see.