ABSTRACT
The increasing political and electoral success of right-wing nationalist populist parties internationally has significantly challenged existing welfare state policies and programmes. Academic commentators have coined the term ‘welfare chauvinism’ to describe an approach which proposes generous support for favoured citizens, but proposes to exclude recent migrants and other minority groups from citizenship rights due to their cultural or ethnic background. To date, however, there has been no examination of the views of the Australian right-wing nationalist populists on social welfare policy, and whether or not they reflect a welfare chauvinist approach. This study addressed this knowledge gap by analysing two major aspects of the Australian welfare state, encompassing support for refugees and asylum seekers and Indigenous Australians, within one established right-wing political party. A data mining method was used to examine key policy documents and statements issued by Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party from 1997 to 2019. The study found that One Nation adopted a welfare chauvinist approach to refugees and asylum seekers (particularly those of Muslim faith), who were regarded as undeserving of assistance. However, their negative attitude to Indigenous Australians seemed to be more influenced by neoliberal hostility to the welfare state, than by welfare chauvinism per se.
