Lot's Wife Edition 1 2016

SOCIETY
to work for the seat they serve; what would happen
if people in the electorate overwhelmingly disagree
with the view that the Flux member must vote
for? Where does the loyalty lie: to Flux or to the
electorate? What if a Flux member in Parliament or
in the Senate goes rogue?
Can we really rely on members of parliament
to be bridled in this way?
Other surprising aspects of Flux include
their allowance of its members being a member of
another political party simultaneously. “We haven’t
talked to any other parties about our multi-party
policy,” Kaye explains, “it comes down to the AEC
rules for registration. As long as someone hasn’t
helped another party register recently, we’re happy
to have their support I don’t really see it as anything
different to, say, dual citizenship.” Flux is also
incredibility ambitious, or at least speaks in an
ambitious way about their aims. Terms like ‘upgrade
democracy’ and ‘democracy reimagined’ have
featured in their advertisements and their website.
Kaye tells me that he and Spataro “...believe Flux
has an incredible potential to help humanity. Not
only is good democracy hard to implement, even
the highly regarded democracies suffer from low
approval ratings and constant dissatisfaction. We
want to create a democracy that doesn’t suffer from
the same diseases. Because of the potential for
good Flux presents, it is a challenge we are unwilling
to postpone.”
So who exactly is joining Flux, and what issues
are these early members beginning to bring up?
“Most of our members are Gen X or older,
so if anything this slightly confirms the myth that
millennials and students are largely apathetic and
disenfranchised,” Kaye explains. “This also lines
up with my personal experience. We hope that Flux
can offer them an outlet to help reinvigorate real
political interaction instead of sideline activism. That
said, there’s also a lot of emotion in student political
groups, as if political motivations are really unevenly
distributed. This leads to a dichotomy, which either
promotes apathy, or almost extremism to the point of
violence, neither of which are healthy in the long run.
I really hope that means both groups are just looking
for a way to express themselves, and so far haven’t
found it.”
The issues that are being brought up: “Some
are disenfranchised Liberal National Party voters
[that have expressed interest] in a National Disability
Insurance Scheme, some are far left and express
concerns about human rights and refugees, some
are IT specialists and are dismayed at the quality of
legislation around the internet and cryptography.”
Kaye reiterates: “We really have had an incredibly
diverse set of people respond. There is one thing
they all have in common though: the current system
isn’t good enough.”
If there is anything that particularly surprises
me about Flux, what really makes it interesting,
is that it’s experimenting with new ideas, and it’s
hopeful. Yes, it may not happen this election year,
there’s no guarantee that these ideas will work in
action. But it feels like a reaction to the last 6-7
years of turbulent Australian politics, where voters do
not feel like they have power over who is running the
country. Max Kaye says this volatility is a symptom of
a larger problem.
“Volatility in itself isn’t a problem in the
same way as, say, CFCs and the ozone layer were
a problem. Rather it is a problem in the same way
that UV rays are: it’s harmful but simply making it
go away isn’t how we can solve the problem. The
problem of bad governance has never been solved
before, and thus we need a solution that hasn’t been
tried before: Flux is that solution.”
20 | Lot’s Wife