The Greens want to catch the Mamdani wave. But can the minor party really become ‘unashamedly populist’?

These sceptics emphasise that Mamdani captured the imagination of metropolitan voters in one of America’s biggest and most diverse cities, not the United States at large. And while Polanski made a strong surge earlier this year, regularly polling between 17 and 20 per cent, that was when then-prime minister Keir Starmer was flailing.

The UK Greens are since polling back at 10 per cent under UK Labour’s Andy Burnham. “It’s got nothing to do with the performance of Polanski,” says one observer. “When you’re not a major party, you don’t have the money or a megaphone. You are subject to political currents that are sometimes in your favour, and sometimes not.”

Another person in the state party says holding steady is good. “We need to appeal to soft Labor people. It’s tricky always trying to straddle two worlds,” they say.

But in the federal party, there’s a sense the small target approach is a wasted one. “Trying to pretend it’s good to be sitting on 12 per cent forever is wrong. We should be a natural option for disaffected voters,” one staffer says.

The other question is whether Shoebridge is the person to lead that project. Many think he has the energy the party needs. The smart and strategic former barrister from Sydney, who is renowned in parliament for his no-holds-barred approach to interrogation, beat both Hanson-Young and NSW senator Mehreen Faruqi to the leadership this week.

“People have their own ideologies and views, but everyone wants to feel like there’s someone with their hands on the reins who can drive something new,” says a Greens insider. “David is quite hungry for it, and has more appetite for risk and novelty and controversy.”

But some are concerned his elevation sends the wrong message for a party seeking to speak to a young, diverse and multicultural electorate. “There is a part of me that wishes he wasn’t a straight white man from Woollahra,” one state MP tells this masthead.

“Identity politics is destructive, but we already have the inner city, latte-sipping elites image,” says another staffer. “We want to appeal to a worker population. Hearing from some rich white dude who was a barrister is not that compelling.”

Faruqi, who said she would now be free to act “outside the constraints of the leadership team” on Wednesday, has often called for more diverse representation in the Greens. She has previously described them as “still a very white party”. This week, a clip re-emerged of her speaking about experiencing racism within the Greens during a 2023 press conference.

One staffer points to the defections of Indigenous senators Lidia Thorpe and Dorinda Cox in recent years, which left no Indigenous representation in the parliamentary party. “When the two other women of colour have left the party and the third has been a competent and able deputy leader that is never considered for the leadership, it’s not a great look for a party that’s whole thing is being progressive, welcoming and diverse,” they say.

Still, others think that progressive politics is trending towards a firmer focus on economic issues. “It’s not papering over issues of racism, but acknowledging the primacy of class as the frame that unites everyone, and has been proven to win or come close to big victories. It’s not talking about identity politics, it’s talking about inequality,” one person says.

Will it work? Resolve pollster Jim Reed says the Greens are typically viewed as a niche progressive-left option. “They’ve always faced a dilemma. Do they stay true to their environmental or progressive values and remain a minority force that occasionally wins seats and tries to influence Labor, or do they grow and try and replace Labor by becoming more mainstream?”

He says polling trends have shown the Greens either losing ground – in the last federal, Queensland and ACT elections – or standing still. “Our polling tells us this is a consequence of their metamorphosis from an environmental movement to one of international causes, like Gaza, spreading them too thin,“Reed says.

“With the exception of Bob Brown, most Greens leaders we’ve tested over the years have failed to cut through outside their core base, but it’ll be interesting to see if Shoebridge’s vim and vigour allow him to compete with some big personalities in politics right now.”

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