Global powers and world leaders
Trust in global powers
As various countries around the world have coped with the pandemic in different ways, Australians appear confident in their own country as one of the safest, most prosperous and trustworthy. For the first time, the Lowy Institute asked Australians in 2021 about their level of trust in Australia to act responsibly in the world. Australians give their country top marks, with almost all (92%) Australians saying they trust Australia ‘a great deal’ or ‘somewhat’ to act responsibly in the world.
Despite large disparities in response to the pandemic abroad, the majority of Australian adults trust Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States and India. Conversely, Australians’ trust in China has continued its steep decline in 2021.
Australians reserve their highest levels of trust for other liberal democracies across the world. An overwhelming majority of Australians say they trust Japan (87%, up 5 points) and the United Kingdom (also 87%) to act responsibly in the world.
Trust in the United States has rebounded in 2021, but there remains a gulf between Australian views of the United Kingdom and Japan, and trust in the United States. Six in ten Australians (61%) say they trust the United States, an increase of 10 points from last year. However, this level of trust remains 22 points lower than the high point for trust in the United States that was recorded during President Barack Obama’s administration.
There remains a significant generational divide between Australians on the issue of trust in the United States. Only 40% of Australians aged 18–29 trust the United States, compared with 66% of Australians aged over 30.
Most Australians trust the liberal democracies of Japan and the United Kingdom
In a remarkable shift since 2020, Australians’ trust in India is on par with trust in the United States. Six in ten Australians (61%) say they trust India a great deal or somewhat, an increase of 16 points since 2020. The fieldwork for the Lowy Institute Poll (15–29 March 2021) took place prior to the resurgence of Covid-19 in India in April 2021.
Past polling has shown that Australians tend to be divided when it comes to our largest neighbour, Indonesia. In 2021, there has been a notable lift in trust, with almost half (48%) say they trust Indonesia, an increase of 12 points in the past year. Only 26% of Australians say they trust Russia, steady from 2020.
For the second year in a row, China is the least-trusted country on the list for Australians. Only 16% of Australians say that they trust China a great deal or somewhat to act responsibly in the world, a 7-point decline from 2020. The number of Australians holding positive views of China’s trustworthiness has plummeted in three years, halving since 2019 and now at a third of the level in 2018 when a majority of Australians (52%) said they trusted China.
Confidence in world leaders
The continuing decline in Australians’ trust of China corresponds with record low levels of confidence in China’s President Xi Jinping. Only 10% of Australians say they have ‘some’ or ‘a lot’ of confidence in President Xi to ‘do the right thing regarding world affairs’. This is less than half the confidence that Australians expressed in President Xi in 2020 (22%) and has fallen 33 points since 2018.
In 2020, then-President Donald Trump inspired confidence in only slightly more Australians than President Xi (30% confident in Trump vs 22% in Xi). However, US President Joe Biden receives far higher marks from the Australian public. Seven in ten Australians (69%) express confidence in him to do the right thing regarding world affairs. This is a striking 39 points higher than Australians’ confidence in former President Trump in 2020.
New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern tops the list of global leaders again, with 91% expressing confidence in her (up 4 points from 2020). This aligns with New Zealand’s retention of its traditional place at the top of the annual ‘feelings thermometer’, ranking again as the country about which Australians feel most warmly. Australians also hold high levels of confidence in German Chancellor Angela Merkel, with 67% saying they have some or a lot of confidence in her.
The majority of Australians are confident that both Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Opposition leader Anthony Albanese will do the right thing regarding world affairs, although Albanese falls 11 points behind Morrison on this measure. Seven in ten Australians (67%) express confidence in Morrison, a 7-point increase from 2020. The number who are confident in Albanese is steady this year at 56%.
Unsurprisingly, there are significant partisan divides on this question, although a majority of both Coalition-leaning and Labor-leaning Australians of voting age are confident in Morrison (95% Coalition and 56% Labor). In contrast, 74% of Labor-leaning Australians have confidence in Albanese, compared to 44% of Coalition-leaning Australians.
Australians’ lack of familiarity with regional leaders has been a persistent feature in Lowy Institute polling over the years. A significant proportion of Australians have responded in 2021 that they ‘do not know who the person is’ for several key leaders in our region. Close to one in five Australians say they do not know of Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Indonesian President Joko Widodo.
Six in ten Australians (61%) have confidence in Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, 12 points lower than for his predecessor Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in 2020, possibly reflecting the recency of Suga’s tenure and Australians’ unfamiliarity with him as Japan’s leader. (Prime Minister Suga was elected in September 2020, and 15% of Australians say they do not know of him.) More than half (59%) say they have confidence in UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, 4 points higher than in 2020.
Although trust in India increased significantly in 2021, only four in ten Australians (38%) express confidence in Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to do the right thing regarding world affairs. Similarly, although Australians’ trust in Indonesia has improved in the past year, only a quarter of Australians (26%) say they have confidence in Indonesian President Joko Widodo.
Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un continue to elicit very negative opinion among Australians. Only 16% of Australians say they have a lot or some confidence in President Putin. Almost no Australians (5%) say they have confidence in North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un. Kim Jong-un is the only world leader on the list in 2021 who receives fewer votes of confidence than China’s President Xi Jinping.