Where is Australia's Zohran Mamdani?

I've seen this question asked a few times, so I thought I'd have a crack at it. I see two ways of answering it: one is the literal, why doesn't Australia have an influential Mayor like Mamdani? And two is why doesn't Australia have a Mamdani anywhere?

For the uninitiated, Zohran Mamdani is a full-blown socialist who believes that government should seize the means of production. He is a member of the US Democratic Party, and as of November 2025, Mayor of New York City.

Where is Australia's Mayor Mamdani?

Local government mayors are far less important in Australia than they are in the US. That's partly due to scale: Mamdani's New York City boasts more than 8 million residents, while Australia's largest council is Brisbane City, with a population of just 1.32 million.

But the main difference is power. Politicians derive power from the ability to tax, spend, and regulate. Unlike local governments in Australia, New York City has that in spades: it can levy income, property, and sales taxes; and all services, public property, police, fire, and public agencies (e.g. education) are under the control of the Mayor, as is the enforcement of all city and state laws.

As a result, Mamdani's City of New York spends around US$13,500 per resident each year, compared to Brisbane City's mere A$2,500. If you're a self-avowed "socialist", that difference matters: you just can't tax, spend, or regulate enough as a Mayor in Australia to make similar headlines.

Australia probably does have a Mayor, somewhere, with political views similar to that of Mamdani. But you're unlikely to hear about them because they don't have all that much power to enact those ideas.

Where is Australia's state or federal Mamdani?

This is probably the more relevant question for Australia. I think the reason Australia doesn't have a well-known, socialist Mamdani-type politician is relatively simple: Mamdani won election in New York City for reasons that don't apply at the state or federal level in Australia.

First, the US primary system allows relative outsiders to capture the party's ticket in a way that Australia's party pre-selection process avoids. New York City is a "blue" district, with the opposition Republican party getting just 7% of the Mayoral vote in 2025. To become Mayor, that means you don't need to convince the median voter; you just need to convince the median registered Democratic voter who turns up to the optional closed primary held in June of an odd year. In the City of New York, that's 573,169 out of the 7 million adults who live there.

In Australia, a rebel like Mamdani would have to bide their time in the party machine to earn pre-selection, abide by its constitution, vote the party line, spend years fundraising, and so on. It's why they're more likely to find themselves in minor parties like the Greens. Outside of the odd inner-city electorate they aren't meaningfully contesting seats in the House where the median voter and preferential voting tends to turf them out early. But there's always room in the Senate for such parties, because you don't need to appeal to the median voter to win a seat there, just the ~14% of the voting population on the left fringe.

That doesn't mean Australia hasn't come close to finding itself with a Mamdani in power. The two modern Australians who hold views most closely aligned to Mamdani's vibes-based socialism are Bill Shorten at the federal level and Steven Miles at the state level. Shorten was all about taxing capital and wealth (he lost the "unlosable election" because of it) and as a Minister was a key architect of the centralised NDIS, which is now rapidly sending Australia broke.

As for Miles, during his brief stint as Premier of Queensland he rolled out everything from state-provided lunches at schools to 50c bus fares. He also wanted, but never got the opportunity, to roll out a dozen state-owned petrol stations. You don't get much more Mamdani than that.

No Australian Mamdani? Probably for the better

Mamdani has no shortage of potentially costly policy ideas, so while Australia's political landscape might be more boring, the ability for a leader to cause serious damage is also more limited (at least in the short-term).

Mamdani may well end up as a case study of how wrong it can go when an outsider assumes a position of power. Sure, he hits enough of the right political notes – he has the right policy vibes, as the kids might say – but it's the execution that's left wanting. For example, Mamdani correctly identifies that housing affordability is a major issue. But he's no YIMBY, and his rent freeze will do considerable harm to many of those he intends to help (economist Assar Lindbeck famously wrote that rent control is the most efficient technique to destroy a city, except for bombing).

Then there's his pension "reform" to "fund" billions in new spending, which basically amounted to the government holding back contributions because over the last 15 years, the share market has produced above-average returns, so why bother? This is nothing but an irresponsible bet with public livelihoods that assumes markets will only ever go up.

Finally, there's his just-announced plan for five government grocery stores. Supposedly, these stores will fix prices at 30% less than the going rate elsewhere, updated monthly. This is a textbook heavily subsidised public enterprise: a great deal for the few people who can get there before the queues form and the shelves empty, and a terrible deal for the taxpayers subsidising what will inevitably be large losses.

Australia doesn't have a Zohran Mamdani precisely because Australia's institutions work against such extreme personalities achieving high political office, keeping them out of positions of significant power. That's a feature, not a bug.