The China Divide: Why So Many on the Left Struggle to See the Threat, and May Welcome It
A fresh Newspoll has captured something important that many have quietly observed for years. While most Australians increasingly view China as a serious strategic and security threat, a significant portion of Left-leaning voters remain far more relaxed about Beijing's intentions and influence. The gap is widening, and it reveals deeper currents in how different parts of Australian society understand power, ideology, and national interest.
This should not come as a surprise. For a certain segment of progressive opinion, scepticism toward China's authoritarian system collides with a long-standing ideological reluctance to view communist regimes as inherent threats. Decades of framing Western liberal democracies as the primary source of global problems has made it difficult for some to acknowledge that a rising, aggressively nationalist, one-party state with expansionist aims and a vastly different value system poses real risks to Australia's sovereignty, economy, and way of life.
The Chinese Communist Party makes no secret of its goals. It pursues military modernisation at breakneck speed, conducts grey-zone operations in the South China Sea and around Taiwan, engages in influence operations across diaspora communities, universities, and politics, and uses economic coercion when challenged. It runs one of the most sophisticated surveillance states in history and maintains a system of internal control that treats individual rights as subordinate to party power. These are not abstract concerns, they are documented in official white papers, defence assessments, and repeated public statements from Beijing itself.
Yet for some on the Left, acknowledging this reality feels ideologically uncomfortable. There remains a lingering tendency to see criticism of China as "Cold War thinking," xenophobia, or a distraction from domestic issues. Historical patterns of useful idiocy, the willingness of some Western intellectuals and activists to downplay or excuse the crimes and ambitions of communist regimes, echo across generations. From the Soviet Union to Mao's China to today's CCP, the pattern repeats: authoritarian regimes are often given the benefit of the doubt, their faults rationalised as responses to Western aggression or growing pains on the path to a better system.
Australia's position makes this complacency especially risky. We are a resource-rich, sparsely populated democracy in the Indo-Pacific, deeply integrated into China's economy but strategically aligned with the United States and other liberal democracies. Our prosperity depends on open sea lanes and a stable regional order. A more assertive, revisionist China that seeks dominance in our region directly challenges that order. The idea that some would quietly welcome, or at least not strongly resist, greater Chinese Communist influence, reflects a profound misreading of both history and human nature, the belief that authoritarian power exercised by "the right people" (non-white) or the "right system" will somehow produce benevolent outcomes.
Public opinion data increasingly shows this divide. Mainstream Australia, across much of the centre and Right, and many working-class voters, has hardened its view of China in response to events like the pandemic origins debate, trade sanctions, military posturing, and interference attempts. Large parts of the Left-leaning commentariat and voter base have been slower to shift, often framing concerns about China as overblown or driven by American interests.
This split matters. National security cannot function effectively if a large ideological bloc instinctively downplays the primary strategic challenge of our time. Effective policy requires broad public consensus, not partisan denial. Australia has every interest in stable, constructive relations with China, but that requires realism about the regime's nature, not wishful thinking.
The Newspoll is a reminder that ideological blind spots persist even as the evidence accumulates. History tends to be unkind to useful idiots, those who, out of naivety, ideological commitment, or simple refusal to see, enable the ambitions of authoritarian powers. Australia's best defence remains a clear-eyed public that understands both the opportunities of trade and the realities of power. Pretending the threat does not exist, or that it can be wished away through better diplomacy alone, serves neither peace nor prosperity.
