Politics is part of the problem – but it can also help pave a pathway out of loneliness and isolation

Loneliness has suddenly become a political thing. Well maybe not suddenly, but rather surprisingly, as it is one of the last taboos.
Earlier this month New South Wales joined scores of other governments around the world determined to investigate the causes and consequence of loneliness and consider solutions – and maybe do something. Maybe.
Even before the pandemic lockdowns, a quarter of Australians reported feeling lonely.
It has since increased, especially for the young, disadvantaged people and those living in remote areas. Lonely people are less healthy, more likely to suffer from chronic disease, depression and anxiety, and they are less productive at work, more likely to be addicted to social media and detached from public life. Loneliness can be an intimate, social or collective experience.
Lonely people often blame themselves, feel ashamed, consider themselves failures. The inability to talk about it makes it worse.
Becoming lonely and socially isolated is often a creeping experience, as loved ones die, friends move, jobs evaporate, opportunities disappear, the cost of living feels insurmountable. Likewise, the need to address loneliness has only slowly crept on to the policy agenda.
That it is there now, in words at least, is surprising, not least because in political science circles it is something that has been discussed and analysed for decades.
The grandfather of this research is Harvard’s Robert Putnam, whose book Bowling Alone influenced a generation of social democrat politicians. You can see references to him in speeches by countless policymakers throughout this century.
His central observation, that Americans were joining fewer clubs and were less likely to participate in shared activities, meant the social capital that held a diverse society together was fraying. The rise of the Trump phenomenon, with its angry determination to foster division, and its echoes in other countries, proved this dire prediction true. Putnam says he is sometimes described as “an Old Testament prophet with charts”.
And he has plenty of charts and data points to cement observed experience into fact that can be plotted on a graph to reveal its dastardly pattern.
Putnam’s most recent book, co-written with Shaylyn Romney Garrett, The Upswing, pushes his earlier research into new, more troubling but potentially positive territory. It describes a giant U. Over 125 years a pattern emerged across four areas: political polarisation, inequality, social fragmentation and cultural narcissism. These were all high in the 1890s, as they were in 2020. Putnam describes it as America’s “I-we-I” century.
But in between there were enormous changes. A shared sense of “we” grew, wealth was shared, rights extended, the light of possibility shone bright.
Federal Labor MP Andrew Leigh has replicated some of the work of his former employer and found similar patterns of disengagement in Australia, in volunteering, organised sports, unions, political parties. Last year, as assistant minister for competition, charities, treasury and employment, he launched Social Connection in Australia. Leigh joked that the parliamentary friends group who facilitated the report would be better called Parliamentary Enemies of Loneliness, but “we’re not really into parliamentary enemies groups”.
From outside it looks as though they are.
Ever since Pauline Hanson was elected in 1996, conjuring enemies has become a political bloodsport. Conservative politicians repeatedly embrace fear and blame, us and them, rather than accentuating positive connections in an increasingly diverse society.
Leigh challenges this image of public life and instead adopted his mentor’s language to ask “whether Australia is a nation of me or a country of we”. A graph of Australia’s trajectory would look different; many of the progressive ideas America adopted in the early 20th century were trialled here first – universal suffrage, free secular education, a living wage, pensions. The “we” was white and male, but it was collective.
Breaking this spirit was foundational to neoliberalism. As Margaret Thatcher said: “Economics are the method. The objective is to change the heart and soul.” John Howard pursued this desire to elevate the individual in almost every area of life.
In an aggressive public sphere, where the individual is the winner (or loser), it is little surprise that people retreat. They cease to engage with public forums, they stop writing to MPs, joining community organisations, participating in campaigns, even talking to neighbours.
It is all about yourself. Often when I hear the punctuation of distressing news stories, if this has affected you or anyone you know, call the number on the screen, I wish there was also another line. If this has made you angry or sad, write to your MP, join a group, sign a petition, get off your couch. Or as Michelle Obama says, “do something”.
A recent international survey of loneliness policies in 52 countries found most focused on individuals and their immediate community; few put politics in the frame. But the angry external environment, the stripping of public resources and the encouragement of division, offers no pathway out of loneliness and isolation.
A few days before Kamala Harris became the Democrats’ presidential candidate, the New York Times published its interview with Putnam. He reflected on how he had worked with others to address division and isolation in countless communities. The despair of American polarisation and growing inequality weighed heavily. He said: “Has that [my work] made a difference? I don’t know. I’d be hard-pressed to make the case.”
This week it is an easier case to make. The joyous Harris/Walz campaign has tapped deeply into these diverse yet connected communities and suggested a pathway out of loneliness and isolation.