The Australia media by and large has turned the ‘race’ for Canberra into a race of personality and entertainment, refusing along the way to give us any detailed, high-level debate on policy and party differences. The Australian people are being robbed of something highly significant and we’re standing by and letting it happen.

You could pick up a daily paper and be forgiven in thinking that there is an election about to happen between two people: Rudd and Abbott. The personality cult of some of our media outlets leads you to think that there will be 10×8 glossies of these two men on our voting papers, so we can vote on who is the better looking or the more intelligent-looking (depending on your preference of brain over brawn or vice versa) and who looks the best in myriad photo opportunities.

It’s not entirely the media’s fault. As Lindsay Tanner has pointed out in his book ‘Sideshow’, the interaction between the media and the politician is a game that both play. The media demands something ‘saleable’ and the politician—longing for some exposure—bends over backwards to provide the same. In the process, the nation gets left behind and we get robbed of high level, intelligent, reasoned debate on matters like what sort of a nation we want to be, what type of leadership we look for and how we want to spend our wealth.

These debates used to be called policy debates. They were good because they let us know what the major and important differences were between the parties, something much more important than agreeing that Abbott can swim better than Rudd or that Rudd spends more time in the library. However, in an article by George Negus recently we are taken deeper into the debate we should be having. Negus suggests we need to be looking for ideologies that cause the major parties (all three of them) to stand out from each other. According to my online dictionary, an ideology is a system of ideas and ideals, especially one that forms the basis of economic or political policy, giving us the ideas and manner of thinking of a particular group. Sounds like a great idea to me.

In his article, Negus states that Australians need to start voting for ideologies rather than leaders and that our elections have sunk to a popularity contest. He says it is time to get rid of personality politics. I couldn’t agree more. He further questions, tongue in cheek: ‘Ideological differences? What are they? Oh, nothing important – other than arguably the fundamental reason we have political parties, and therefore elections. Is it possible that, as a direct result of our learned fixation with personality politics, we’ve managed to de-politicise the nation’s political debate beyond repair?’

‘Learned fixation’ he says. So the blame for this lies not only with the media nor the game that media and politicians are playing, but with us as well!  OK then, it’s time we said ‘Enough! We demand better!’.

This is very serious. The Australian Electoral Commission tells us that there are over 1.4 million eligible voters in Australia who are not registered and that most of these are people in the 18 to 25 age range. Anecdotally we discover that a predominant reason for this is a sense of disillusionment with democracy and the political process. I wonder if ‘personality politics’ has a lot to do with this. Disengagement is a natural outcome of disillusionment.

What is the voice of wisdom calling out in the public square on these issues? Let’s look to one of those sources of wisdom—the Bible—to see how it addresses the problems encountered.

It is possible that personality politics were at play when Israel chose Saul to be their King (1 Samuel 10:23-24). It was certainly in the people’s thinking when Saul’s successor was being discovered, as Samuel is told that God doesn’t look on outward appearance but on character (1 Samuel 16:7). Much later in Israel’s history, the Apostle Paul laments the fact that people were choosing one personality over another and following their ‘favourite’ (1 Corinthians 1:11-12). In these and many other Bible passages we get the sense that it is unwise to be fixated with personality politics. The Bible and George Negus are in agreement. Wisdom says that character is much more important than a person’s entertainment value when it comes to good leadership.

What about ideology? Jesus is the best example I can think of in this regard. Right from the start he lets people know of his dominant values and what will be driving his mission, his ideology (Luke 4:17-19; Matthew 5-7). Later, when the people want to make him King because of his popularity (and his ability to provide a free lunch!), he shuns the popularity poll and retreats. He later speaks truth to the people, helping them to grasp his ideology, and they leave him. I guess that’s the danger of a leader being true to his dominant values!

Jesus turns to those who have been following him from the start, who are beginning to understand his ideology and how it works out, and they further pledge their allegiance to him (John 6). It is clear from these Bible passages (and many others like it) that wisdom calls out for ideology and for clear annunciation and expression of that ideology in our leadership. George Negus and Jesus agree. Good one George!

Where to from here? We need to find out what the ideology is for each party running a candidate in our local electorate and then seek to discover the character of the ‘would be leader’ representing that ideology and her/his ability to carry that ideology no matter what.  And we need to encourage young people to register to vote and become engaged in the process of discovery and then voting. It takes more time and commitment but if we are going to spend time complaining then we really need to spend time trying to rectify the problem. I’m sure there’s some Biblical wisdom on that somewhere!

Food for thought.

David R Wilson is Director of Sophia Think Tank, a Bible Society Australia initiative. 

Featured image: Troy Constable Photography (for Toby Abbott image) and Nic MacBean (for Kevin Rudd image) – both CC Licences on Flickr.