Guns, God and bigotry: Australians grow cool on the US

There’s a dissonance between the enthusiasm with which Australia’s political elites have embraced the country’s latest shiny military pact, and how Australians view the nation central to that pact — and how we suspect that nation sees us.

Two recent polls — one Australian, one American — suggest our estimate of what we think about the US is largely wrong. Rather than an impassioned welcoming of the global pax Americana, Australians are cautious, even sceptical. 

One poll, from the Australian foreign policy establishment’s think tank of choice, the Lowy Institute, takes its annual dive into what Australians think about our foreign policy challenges. The other, a Pew Research poll, compares the way 23 countries, including Australia, see America.

Pew added Australia to the mix only in 2020 (which itself says something about how — or how often — Americans think about Australia). But we’ve already distinguished ourselves as among the most sceptical about the US and its power.

On guns, God and bigotry, Australians mark down the US. There’s a narrow lean to a “favourable” view, with 52% thumbs up and 47% thumbs down. This is almost good news: last time around, in the depths of the Trump era, it was 70% unfavourable.

A look at attitudes in neighbouring countries challenges something else we think we know about our place in the world. Rather than being the faithful deputy sheriff, our scepticism is at odds with the far more favourable views of the US in Indonesia, India, Japan and South Korea.

And despite all the overheated rhetoric about China’s growing sphere of influence, Australians are the only people surveyed in the Asia-Pacific who reckon China is already the world’s leading economic power. People in Indonesia, India, Japan and South Korea all still pick the US. 

We’re more sceptical than others in our region about America’s contribution to peace and stability — 38% of Australians think the US doesn’t contribute compared with, say, just 22% of Indonesians. And in countries such as India and South Korea, Pew says younger people are more trusting of America.

Back before Trump, in 2014, Lowy says the US was the majority pick as our “best friend in the world”. When they asked again last year, we overwhelmingly picked New Zealand — only 26% stils thought it’s the Americans.

The Trump shift has moderated, but endured. Pew shows Australians are among the least confident that US President Joe Biden will do the right thing on foreign affairs (maybe we can blame the warmed-over Fox commentary across the Murdoch media). The Lowy poll shows 38% have “not too much” or no confidence in Biden, well behind the confidence in France’s President Emmanuel Macron or the UK’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

What’s caused the change? Pew says Australians overwhelmingly think the US is less politically stable, more dangerous, more religious and less tolerant than “other wealthy nations”. We also don’t think much of its standard of living — only 21% think the US is better than average. (Although we do love its television and music.)

But here’s the dissonance: both polls have good news for the military alliance. According to the Lowy poll, both the trilateral AUKUS with the US and UK, and the Quad with Japan, India and US, remain broadly supported. So, too (although less definitively), is the nuclear submarines deal.

Maybe we just like being noticed. In Pew’s pre-AUKUS June 2021 poll, only 23% of Australians thought the US took us into account when making foreign policy decisions. This year’s post-AUKUS polls show the number up to 40%, although 59% are more hard-nosed: nah, they don’t.

The Lowy numbers show, too, that Australians grasp the quid pro quo at the heart of the US relationship: yes, Australians think, it makes us safer. And yes, it makes it more likely we’ll be dragged into a war in Asia. There’s a limit though: given a range of options for support of Taiwan in the event of an invasion by the People’s Republic of China, an Australian majority ticks all the boxes — except putting troops on the ground.

So what’s going on? Maybe we’re too influenced by the catastrophist manner in which news out of America is reporting to Australians. Maybe it’s because Sky — amplified on YouTube and Facebook — has become a cultural feeder for Fox’s peculiarly dark vision of America. 

Or maybe, as Freud saw, it’s just the “narcissism of minor differences” that demands we build up our own identity by tearing down an otherwise deeply similar other.