Survival modelling of Australian politicians

ABSTRACT

Are Australian political leaders an endangered species? A survival analysis of Australian politicians shows that modern leaders are having almost as tough a time as leaders were in the early days of Australian politics. This article examines the tenures of Prime Ministers and Federal Opposition Leaders to show that while the leadership turnover of the last decade has been high, the modern era is not unlike the Australian parliament after 1901, albeit for different reasons. The parliamentary tenures of members of the House of Representatives and the Senate, male and female members of both houses, and Labor and Liberal leaders have been compared using the survival analysis technique, and while simple statistical tests and descriptors may show little overall difference between the various survival curves, there are often intriguing differences in the detail. For instance, there is evidence supporting the notion that women have historically not been preselected in safe seats. The differing electoral cycles are apparent in the Senate and House of Representative data, as is the historical under-representation of women. Labor leaders tend to have had a higher survival rate, at least in the short term, than their Liberal counterparts, while longer time periods are influenced by long-serving Liberal Prime Ministers.

KEYWORDS:

• Survival
• survival modelling
• Kaplan-Meier
• prime minister
• opposition leader
• Australian parliament
• government

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author, [BK]. Additionally, the authors confirm that the data sources supporting the findings of this study are all referenced in the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was not funded by any funding body.

Notes on contributors

Marc West

Marc West: Marc is a senior Operations Researcher and Science Communicator, and has worked at Defence Science and Technology Group, and in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge.

Bernard Kachoyan

Bernard Kachoyan: Bernard led a distinguished career in Operations Research at the Defence Science and Technology Group becoming Head of Maritime Mathematical Studies, and is now an Adjunct Professor, and on the Advisory Board, to the School of Mathematics and Statistics at the University of New South Wales. He is also a consultant for MidSpar Systems.