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DemocracyDemocracy
About the author
Ryan Neelam
Ryan Neelam was Director of the Public Opinion and Foreign Policy Program at the Lowy Institute. He led the flagship annual Lowy Institute Poll, was project director for the Global Diplomacy Index, and wrote about climate diplomacy and multilateral policy.
A large majority of Australians (72%) see democracy as preferable to any other kind of government, remaining near a record high set in 2022 (74%). The number who say ‘in some circumstances, a non-democratic government can be preferable’ remained steady at 18%. Fewer than one in ten Australians (9%) continue to say ‘it doesn’t matter what kind of government we have’.
A longstanding age gap in answers to this question has widened slightly again over the past two years. Younger Australians aged 18–44 (65%) are less likely than older Australians aged over 45 (79%) to say democracy is preferable to any other kind of government — a 14-point gap that has widened by five points since 2022.
