Rejecting Populism: Rebuilding Society Through “Intercultural Democracy”

Recently, support for One Nation has continued to rise, even beginning to surpass that of the Liberals and Labor. This must all be traced back to the rise of anti-immigrant sentiment, which party leader Pauline Hanson has precisely exploited to advance her political agenda.

This was strongly reflected in Hanson’s speech at the National Press Club. Although her discriminatory arguments subsequently drew fierce criticism, she has successfully seized upon the political narrative that most easily attracts voters: generalizing all issues and blaming the housing crisis and other social problems entirely on immigrants.

However, the challenges Australia faces are far more complex than simple immigration issues. While commenting on One Nation, we also need to reflect on how Australia’s multiculturalism should be reformed and perfected. By referencing the successful experiences of other cities and nations to explore how to foster mutual understanding and participation among different ethnic groups, we can establish a more inclusive society and chart a long-term direction for the development of intercultural democracy.

The Revelation of Immigration History: The Issue is Not Immigration, But Governance

Australia’s modernization process has inherently been a continuous history of immigration and collaboration. Beginning with the post-WWII national policy of “Populate or Perish”, millions of “New Australians” brought in the labor and skills required to rebuild the nation. From infrastructure development to critical technical inputs in healthcare, engineering, and higher education, immigrants have always been the core driving force for maintaining Australia’s international competitiveness and alleviating the pressures of an aging population, transforming Australia from a closed colony into a global model of multicultural co-prosperity.

The “social pressures” currently felt by voters are indeed real, but the housing crisis, traffic congestion, and strained medical resources are not caused by immigrants. Instead, they stem from systemic failures in institutional design and long-term planning by federal and state governments. When setting high immigration quotas, governments have long adopted an “economy-first” approach, yet failed to simultaneously incorporate infrastructure, public housing, and community integration planning into their supporting packages.

The core of the housing crisis lies in rigid zoning restrictions, tax loopholes that encourage property speculation, and a long-term lack of investment in social housing. Governments refuse to shoulder their fundamental responsibilities as service providers, which leads to a sense of resource competition among different groups, allowing populist politics to thrive.

The history of Hong Kong provides a powerful counter-evidence to this. From the 1940s to the 1970s, Hong Kong absorbed a massive influx of mainland Chinese immigrants in a very short period, with its population multiplying over 30 years. According to Hanson’s logic, such a vast influx of outsiders with vast background differences should have led to societal collapse. However, facts proved that this group of immigrants propelled Hong Kong to jump-start as a global financial center and manufacturing powerhouse. This success lay in Hong Kong’s utilization of a shared public space for discussion, universal education, and civic participation to transform a fragmented background into a unified economic and social engine.

The current issue in Australia is not the “number of immigrants,” but the “lack of an integration mechanism.” We do not need an Australia that attempts to regress into a monoculture, as that no longer aligns with the reality of a modern democratic nation. What we truly need is a brand-new framework of “Intercultural Democracy”: recognizing the reality of diverse backgrounds while establishing a stronger framework for civic participation. Transforming immigrants from “passive recipients” into “co-builders” is the only correct answer to Hanson’s challenge.

The Hong Kong Experience: “Immigration as Capital”

If we are to examine whether Hanson’s warning that “immigration leads to societal collapse” aligns with reality, Hong Kong undoubtedly serves as an excellent historical mirror. During those turbulent three decades, Hong Kong’s population skyrocketed from around 600,000 after World War II to over 4 million. They brought different dialects and different hometown customs, and the vast majority arrived with almost nothing to their name. According to the logic advocated by One Nation, an influx of immigrants of this scale within a short timeframe, coupled with a lack of homogeneity, should have instantly paralyzed Hong Kong’s infrastructure and completely dissolved its social order.

Yet, historical developments completely overturned this narrative. In an era lacking social security, this group of immigrants rebuilt charity and mutual assistance networks — such as the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals — and subsequently leveraged the industrial skills they brought from their hometowns to transform Hong Kong from an entrepôt into a world-renowned manufacturing powerhouse, ultimately paving the way for the city to become an international financial hub. Hong Kong’s success at the time proved that immigration is not the beginning of a societal disaster, but a highly potential asset. As long as appropriate transformation mechanisms are in place, these workforces from diverse backgrounds can be converted into vital drivers of national development, securing Hong Kong’s status as the “Pearl of the Orient.”

The upper limit of a society’s development is never determined by its population size, but by its capacity for “transformation and integration.” When we blame all pressures on immigrants themselves, we are merely finding a scapegoat for governance failures. The real question is not “how many people have entered,” but whether we can establish an effective framework where people from different backgrounds do not just reside in Australia, but jointly invest, participate, and build in Australia. This is the core reason why we must move past the old multiculturalism of “parallel development of various ethnic groups” and instead embrace “intercultural democracy.” Only by shifting our focus from “ethnic segregation” to “civic participation” can we ensure Australia’s future finds forward-moving consensus amid diversity, just as Hong Kong did in the past.

The Roots of Anti-Immigration Sentiment: “Institutional Neglect”

When we shift our perspective from history back to the present, we find that Australia and Hong Kong share similar and complex social challenges when facing immigration issues. In recent years, negative sentiment toward immigrants — especially new arrivals from mainland China — has become prominent in Hong Kong society. This sentiment stems not only from anxieties over resource competition brought by population inflows, but more deeply reflects citizens’ unease and anxiety regarding changes in the political environment, structural transformation of society, and the gradual alteration of identity and lifestyle following the implementation of the National Security Law. Similarly, the anti-immigration wave whipped up by One Nation essentially capitalizes on the public’s collective panic over economic uncertainty and institutional dysfunction.

Whether in Australia or Hong Kong, existing major political parties have demonstrated a considerable degree of short-sightedness when formulating population policies. Almost no mainstream party has integrated “how to assist new immigrants in adjusting and integrating into a new environment” into core institutional designs. Governments are only responsible for issuing visas or driving population numbers up to embellish economic data, yet they are completely absent from subsequent community interaction, language transition, and cultural adaptation. They leave old and new residents to experience friction in unguided public spaces, eventually causing xenophobic and anti-immigrant sentiments to heat up. The spread of such sentiment not only tears apart the foundation of community trust, but also distorts public policy debates into black-and-white ethnic confrontations. The correct way to manage this is absolutely not to bow to populism and close borders; rather, governments must take responsibility and establish an active, systematic social integration mechanism to steer through and dissolve the anxieties of resource competition.

Xenophobic sentiment is a warning sign of institutional failure, not the answer to solving problems. When mainstream parties are generally absent from promoting immigrant integration, what we need is not a retreat into isolation, but the establishment of new institutions capable of sustaining diverse transformations.

The Causes, Manipulation, and Long-Term Risks of Anti-Immigration Sentiment

To truly eradicate and respond to current anti-immigration sentiment, we cannot simply stand on the moral high ground to accuse or slap on “racist” labels. We must dissect the deep-seated causes behind this collective anxiety.

The rise of anti-immigration sentiment is superficially interpreted as the result of the gradual dismantling of cultural homogeneity. However, its deeper essence is actually a direct projection of the public’s stress regarding economic uncertainty and resource competition. When grassroots citizens face stagnating wages, skyrocketing living costs, surging rents, and public healthcare and transport infrastructure that are increasingly paralyzed, their daily sense of security drops to freezing point. In this high-pressure environment, the major political parties’ long-term “institutional neglect” and governance failures in land planning, housing taxation, and infrastructure support have led to highly strained public resources. Populist politicians like Hanson precisely exploit the government’s absence in governance, attributing structural issues arising from inadequate policy support to new immigrants, and converting mainstream societal anxiety into hostility and fear toward outsiders.

This populist discourse, which simplistically attributes complex social issues to immigration, poses long-term risks to the institutional development of Australia and Victoria, compressing what should be rational public discussion into a zero-sum, either-or confrontation. When society is dominated by a divisive narrative of “old residents” versus “new immigrants” fighting over housing, healthcare, and education resources, positive cross-ethnic interactions will be weakened or even disrupted, further solidifying and isolating parallel communities and undermining the nation’s international competitiveness and core development momentum over the long term. If anti-immigration sentiment evolves into radical administrative policies that attempt to regress back to a monoculture through forced cultural assimilation or one-size-fits-all cuts and restrictions, it will send a closed, xenophobic signal to global tech talent and multinational capital, causing Australia to lose its strategic edge in global competition.

Most alarming of all, anti-immigration sentiment provides the most convenient political scapegoat for systematic government failures. When public anger is fully directed at immigrant groups, federal and state governments are able to evade their responsibilities as providers of public infrastructure and services, avoiding the need to confront structural issues such as rigid land zoning, imbalanced property speculation tax systems, and long-term underinvestment in social housing and intercultural integration. This type of populist, xenophobic discourse may seem to respond to public opinion, but it is akin to drinking poison to quench thirst; it fails to solve housing or cost-of-living issues, and instead erodes the social value of a “Fair Go” that Australia has long prided itself on.

Intercultural democracy resolutely opposes such acts of exploiting fear. Through institutional design, it guides public anxiety away from “resource exclusion” toward “common participation,” making everyone realize that the core to breaking through the dilemma lies in strengthening governance and deepening integration.

Establishing Fair Transition and Adaptation Mechanisms

We must first clarify that Australia does not need “special treatment” policies based on ethnicity. Any extra perks targeted at specific groups could trigger a sense of imbalance in mainstream society once immigrants gradually integrate, improve their economic and living situations, and even create misconceptions or perceptions of unfairness. What intercultural democracy pursues is not privilege, but fairness in the process, ensuring that the system honestly addresses the actual needs of immigrants during their settlement process—providing reciprocal support in employment, legal awareness, and language adaptation, thereby preventing marginalization due to institutional barriers.

In modern-day Australia, any attempt to return to a monoculture is practically unfeasible. We cannot demand through administrative or political means that all residents who have legally settled and made a life here abandon their own cultural backgrounds in an already highly diverse modern society, nor can we tolerate any form of institutional discrimination. The main shortfall of current government policies lies in the failure to establish an overarching strategy that truly connects “immigrant transition needs” with “national diversity advantages.” Diversity should be utilized as a transformable national asset, rather than attempting to fit everyone into a single, traditional cultural framework.

Taking the Muslim community — which is frequently overgeneralized by the outside world — as an example, the perspective of intercultural democracy reminds us that this group is not actually a single monolith. Muslims from Southeast Asia who have democratic and secular traditions (such as Indonesia and Malaysia) possess significant differences in cultural habits, understandings of public life, and social adaptation needs compared to Muslims from the Middle East who come from backgrounds of geopolitical turmoil. If policies remain stuck in single-label thinking, it will be difficult to accurately respond to the practical needs of different communities.

What is “Intercultural Democracy”?

To truly counter One Nation’s populist narrative, we need to establish a new governance model for Australia’s future. This model neither advocates for an unrealistic “return to monoculture” nor maintains the old multicultural state where various groups are fractured from one another and lack exchange. The core of “Intercultural Democracy” does not use the number of immigrants as a starting point for discussion, but rather looks at whether the system can effectively enable every resident to participate in public life and jointly construct this society.

The core spirit of intercultural democracy is this: we do not ignore the real challenges facing social cohesion, but at the same time, we firmly maintain that in a modern democratic nation, the practice of universal values and a high degree of cultural diversity can run in parallel and coexist harmoniously. Past multicultural policies often stayed too much on the surface of ethnic harmony, allowing different groups to live in the same city but inside completely isolated information and cultural cocoons. In contrast, intercultural democracy shifts the policy core entirely from “cultural celebration” to “civic participation” and substantive, intercultural spaces for public dialogue.

We do not ask any group to give up their cultural identity, but we must share civic responsibilities. Citizens of all backgrounds must enter the same public space for discussion, engaging in equal dialogue and negotiation on substantive policies such as housing, education, and environmental protection under the framework of universal values like democracy, the rule of law, and gender equality. When people of different backgrounds no longer just coexist under the same postcode, but work side-by-side and participate together for the well-being of the same community, the resource competition anxieties originally caused by a lack of mutual understanding will be transformed through interaction into collective social capital.

Why Has “Intercultural Democracy” Become a New Selling Point in Australian Politics?

In the current black-and-white political deadlock, the greatest advantage of intercultural democracy is that it offers a “Third Way.” It neither advocates for the outdated and extreme “monocultural assimilation theory” nor allows old multiculturalism to slide into a parallel society of community fragmentation. For centrist voters weary of partisan confrontation and populist slogans, this framework holds four substantive attractions:

A True Solution for “Social Cohesion,” Rather Than Populism’s Poisoned Chalice 

One Nation and traditional conservatives constantly instill fear into voters that “diversity inevitably leads to division.” However, intercultural democracy openly acknowledges mainstream society’s genuine anxiety over declining social cohesion and proposes a concrete solution mechanism, shifting the focus from “ethnic isolation” to “civic participation.” When Chinese, Indian, Arabic, and Anglo-Celtic Australians stand side-by-side under the universal framework of democracy and the rule of law to participate in community building for housing, education, and the environment, the resource competition anxieties born of a lack of understanding will be transformed into resilient collective social capital through substantive interaction. This can effectively soothe the identity anxieties of conservative voters.

Pursuing “Procedural Fairness” to Eliminate Prejudices of Ethnic Privilege 

Any policy that attempts to give new immigrants special labels will trigger psychological imbalance in mainstream society as immigrants’ lifestyles shift, thereby manufacturing new misunderstandings and discrimination. The key selling point of intercultural democracy lies in “Procedural Fairness” and “transitional support,” honestly confronting the actual turning points immigrants face during settlement: such as eliminating language barriers, providing reciprocal employment adaptation, and strengthening cognitive support regarding Australian democracy and the rule of law. Equal treatment for everyone before the system is the true practice of the Australian spirit of a fair go.

Transforming “Cultural Diversity” into a Core Strategic Asset for the Nation 

Traditional multicultural policies often view immigrants as disadvantaged groups needing special care or as passive welfare recipients, while One Nation portrays them as a burden competing for resources. Intercultural democracy takes the opposite view: immigrants themselves are a potential form of social capital. From Hong Kong’s historical experience of absorbing a large population over thirty years to leapfrog into an international financial center, to Singapore’s reality of blending diverse cultures under a democratic governance framework to establish a solid national identity, all demonstrate that diversity itself is a major source of national competitiveness.

The advocates of intercultural democracy further emphasize that strategic investments should be made in culturally and linguistically diverse media (CALD Media) and community broadcasting (NEMBC), upgrading them into intercultural public discussion platforms. Through institutional design, this releases the potential of communities from different backgrounds in fields such as international trade, diplomacy, technology, and culture, enabling Australia to maintain its competitive edge.

Empowering the Role and Value of Independent Political Forces as Bridges 

The time is now for independent ethnic minority candidates who do not belong to any major political party faction to participate across all levels of Australian parliaments; intercultural democracy must become their most recognizable political calling card. Free from party whips and without needing to compromise with specific interest groups, they can adopt a pragmatic, objective stance to act as “bridge builders” between mainstream white society and immigrant communities.

Regardless of whether Labor or the Liberals govern in the future, this framework can drive genuine bipartisan cooperation to fix and perfect existing population and community policies. In the current political landscape of Victoria and across Australia, this independent, rational, and constructive third-party voice sits in a scarce and highly attractive “golden position.”

Toward the Multi-Governance of “Intercultural Democracy”

To break the current deadlock held by mainstream parties over immigration and social cohesion issues, a truly rational, independent voice needs to be injected into Australia’s political spectrum. An independent candidate with an immigrant background who does not represent any major party faction often holds an advantage over politicians bound by party lines and factional interests. No matter whether a Labor or Liberal government is in power in the future, independent forces can collaborate across party lines with the governing administration in an objective, pragmatic manner to revise and refine loose population and community policies, ensuring that people from different cultural backgrounds are treated reasonably as they undergo life transitions in Australia.

This is the very core spirit of “Intercultural Democracy”: we do not ignore the practical challenges facing social cohesion, but we simultaneously insist that the implementation of universal values and a high degree of cultural diversity can completely coexist within a modern democratic state.

The success of Singapore is an inspiring example. Although its geographical scale and the complexity of its cultural diversity differ from Australia’s, Singapore has still woven the social responsibility and collective harmony emphasized in Confucian culture into a Western democratic institutional framework, successfully constructing a solid, shared national identity while maintaining its multicultural characteristics.

Similarly, Hong Kong’s past journey to becoming the “Pearl of the Orient” never relied on a single, pure, homogenous culture. Instead, its prosperous foundation was gradually forged through high levels of interaction and integration within public spaces among Cantonese people, immigrants from various provinces of China, returning overseas Chinese, and Western culture.

The Australian government should draw insights for institutional design from these experiences, activating civic participation through institutional innovation to truly realize the long-term values pursued by intercultural democracy.

Upgrading Victoria’s Multicultural Policies

Victoria has long prided itself on being a pioneer of multiculturalism. From the long-standing Victorian Multicultural Commission (VMC) to various annual multicultural festivals, the government has invested significant resources into “respecting differences” and “cultural showcases.” However, the current model often still stops at the superficial presentation of ethnic harmony — such as tasting foods from different cultures or enjoying traditional dances on “Harmony Day” — yet fails to truly transform cultural diversity into a substantive force for democratic participation and public decision-making. This is precisely what gives One Nation an excuse to oppose multiculturalism.

We do not need more ceremonial festive carnivals; we need substantive intercultural public dialogue spaces. The government should make strategic investments in language services, ethnic media, and platforms like the National Ethnic and Multicultural Broadcasters’ Council (NEMBC), upgrading them from one-way information translation tools into “intercultural media platforms” where different groups jointly discuss public issues. Only by letting Chinese, Indian, Arabic, African, and Anglo-Celtic Australians engage in dialogue and consultation on substantive policies like housing, education, and environmental protection within the same public space can multiculturalism shed its isolated labels and coalesce into a resilient Victorian civic culture.

The reason One Nation has successfully stirred up voters is that it simplifies the housing crisis and rising living costs into a “zero-sum competition” narrative between mainstream society and new immigrants. To effectively dismantle this populist framework, intercultural democracy advocates establishing interaction mechanisms at the community level centered on “Shared Responsibility.”

However, a key deficiency in current policies is the lack of substantive day-to-day contact between different ethnic groups: Chinese people primarily engage with Chinese-language media, the Muslim community remains active within its own social circles, and the mainstream white community relies on English mainstream media. Despite living in the same city, different groups are segregated within isolated information and cultural cocoons.

Therefore, future community development policies should encourage residents from across different backgrounds to jointly participate in local, demand-driven public projects—such as cross-cultural volunteer networks, community safety collaborations, environmental actions, and elder care programs—thereby rebuilding trust and connection between different groups.

When people from different cultural backgrounds no longer just coexist in the same locality, but work side-by-side for the well-being of the same community, the resource competition anxieties originally caused by a lack of mutual understanding will be converted through interaction into collective social capital. Through common participation, no matter where we come from, we owe the same responsibility to Australia’s future and share the exact same future.

Conclusion: Not Less Immigration, But More Participation

Faced with the anxieties brought by housing pressures, soaring living costs, and declining social cohesion, the major parties either adopt a short-sighted economic logic, blindly expanding the population scale without supporting planning, or resort to populist xenophobia and slogans of returning to a monoculture, attempting to alleviate problems by drinking poison to quench thirst. However, history and reality have proven time and again that Australia’s future cannot be built on isolation and discrimination.

This is not a numerical debate about “reducing immigration” or “increasing immigration”; it is about “how we become Australians together.” One Nation believes Australia’s challenge lies in diversity, but I deeply believe Australia’s dilemma lies in a lack of interaction. As an independent political force, we will dedicate ourselves to transcending the interests of party factions within parliament to drive this institutional transformation oriented toward the future.

We do not need privileges, but we demand fairness in the process; we do not ask to abandon cultural identities, but we must share civic responsibilities. Let us stop blaming and start building. What we need is not a black-and-white blueprint of exclusion, but an intercultural Australia where diversity is transformed into national competitiveness and where everyone can deeply participate. This is intercultural democracy, and it is the shared future we promise to the people of Victoria and Australia.