Organising Australian far-right parties: Pauline Hanson’s One Nation and Fraser Anning’s Conservative National Party

ABSTRACT

This paper analyses the organisation of two Australian far-right political parties: Fraser Anning’s Conservative National Party (FACNP) and Pauline Hanson’s One Nation (PHON). Based on semi-structured interviews with election candidates and office bearers and an analysis of official party documents, I examine how these parties manage their internal organisation and cope with problems of collective choice. I argue that their organisational practices are characterised by disorganisation. Namely, a lack of meaningful organisational structures and procedures, a core of socialised activists, andcoherent decision-making processes. By focusing on campaign mobilisation at the expense of party building, I argue that their disorganisation is inseparable from their muted electoral performance at the 2019 Australian federal election.

本文分析了两个澳大利亚极右政党的组织状况。一个是弗雷泽·安宁的保守国民党，一个是保林·汉森的一国党。笔者通多对选举候选人及当选公职人员的半固定访谈以及对 党的正式文件的分析，考察了这两个党如何经营其内部组织并应对集体选择的各种问题。笔者认为，这两个党的组织实践均以非组织化为特征，即缺少有意义的组织结构及程序，缺少核心的社会化积极分子以及清楚明白的决策过程。其选战动员不顾党的建设，这种非组织化与2019年联邦选举中的默默无闻是分不开的。

KEYWORDS:

• Political parties
• party organisation
• far right
• Pauline Hanson
• Australian politics

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Glenn Kefford for his supportive feedback on an earlier version of this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Jordan McSwiney

Jordan McSwiney is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance at the University of Canberra. His research focuses on the far right, with a particular focus on the organisation of far-right parties and movements, and their use of social media.