Politics, Policy & People: When Democracy Feels Fractured

Shane Warren
Aug 28
8 min read

Those who have worked with me know I carry a deep fascination with politics. Not in the shallow theatre of who “wins the day,” but in the deeper way policy shapes how we live, how we feel, and even how we connect with one another. Politics, at its heart, is human psychology in action. And if we take a moment to look honestly at what’s happening in the world today, it’s hard not to feel a little unsettled.

Because when institutions wobble, when decisions feel unjust, and when those in power appear to serve private profit over public wellbeing, we all feel it. In my consulting rooms I see the echoes: clients anxious, restless, cynical. When societies fracture, so too does the sense of personal safety and purpose.

The US: When Systems Solve Nothing

Take the United States. Homelessness is one of the most glaring moral and policy failures of our time. We know what works. Finland, in 2008, adopted a “Housing First” approach: provide people with stable housing before you address job training, addiction, or case management. Within years, homelessness dropped by 65%. That’s not theory, it’s evidence.

Yet, in many U.S. cities, the dominant approach remains militarised sweeps: bulldozing tent encampments, spending millions of dollars policing poverty, only for camps to reappear weeks later.

This doesn’t solve homelessness. It traumatises people already vulnerable and pours money into the most expensive, least effective systems - police, prisons, and overstretched emergency departments.

The same is true of crime. Austin has shown that jobs, mentoring, and healthcare reduce street crime more effectively than crackdowns. Glasgow in the 2000s created a Violence Reduction Unit, treating violent crime as a public health issue. Within a decade, violent crime dropped by 60%. Contrast that with U.S. cities still pouring billions into incarceration, often for private profit. The outcomes speak for themselves: one heals, the other punishes without end.

Australia: A Mirror We Don’t Want to Look Into

Australia likes to believe it’s different. But scratch the surface, and we too often follow the American script. Housing policy here treats homes as speculative assets rather than human rights. Renters face insecurity, public housing continues to dwindle, and corporate landlords - often backed by foreign investment funds - are allowed to buy up vast swathes of housing stock.

One common strategy is chilling in its simplicity: a developer buys a block of land, releases new dwellings at a drip-feed pace, then sells a handful at inflated prices to entities they themselves control. Those artificial sales set the “market price” for the rest of the development, which in turn sets inflated rent benchmarks. The result? Housing becomes less about shelter and more about subscription: pay forever, or be locked out.

For ordinary Australians, the consequences are real and painful: rising anxiety, delayed family formation, financial stress, and a growing sense of being trapped in a system designed to extract wealth rather than build community.

And it’s not just housing. Across industries - energy, retail, food, even care - large corporations pay minimal tax, squeeze workers through wage theft and unpaid hours, and funnel money into politics to protect their interests. Their stories are well documented: fined for exploitative practices only to continue much the same, knowing workers are often too dependent on their jobs to challenge the system. These aren’t abstract names on a stock exchange, they are brands in our kitchens and lounges, woven into daily life.

With our superannuation tied to the success of hedge funds and listed giants, we have allowed shareholder profit to overtake the very purpose of society: that being to take care of each other. And that erosion of fairness and belonging feeds directly into the anxiety, distrust, and hopelessness that I see so often mirrored in the therapy room.

Global Lessons in Doing Better

But there is hope. For all the fractures we see, other countries are showing us that there are alternatives. Not theories, not vague promises, but real-world models already tested, measured, and proven with policies that both improve lives and heal the social fabric.

Finland: Housing First, Not Policing Poverty

In 2008, Finland made a radical choice: it decided that homelessness was not a moral failing, but a policy problem. Instead of requiring people experiencing homelessness to prove they were “ready” for housing by resolving addiction, securing employment, or undergoing treatment, Finland flipped the script. It provided housing first and then wrapped holistic services around that stability - addiction treatment, mental health care, job training, and case management.

By 2020, long-term homelessness had dropped by more than 65%, and the number of rough sleepers fell to fewer than 1,000 in the country. Compare that to the U.S., where militarised sweeps bulldoze tent encampments at enormous cost, only for them to reappear weeks later. Psychologically, the lesson is obvious: you cannot heal when you are in survival mode. Housing provides safety, dignity, and the foundation from which purpose and belonging can grow.

Glasgow: Violence as a Health Issue

In the early 2000s, Glasgow was labelled “the murder capital of Europe.” Knife crime and gang violence were rampant. Yet in 2005, Scotland pioneered the Violence Reduction Unit (VRU), treating violence not as a criminal justice matter alone, but as a public health issue. Mentorship programs for young men, jobs initiatives, and healthcare interventions were introduced alongside policing.

Within a decade, Scotland’s homicide rate had fallen by nearly 60%, with Glasgow recording its lowest level of violent crime in 40 years. The psychological insight here is profound: violence thrives where there is exclusion and hopelessness. It declines when people are offered inclusion, dignity, and opportunity.

Iceland: Redefining Work and Wellbeing

Between 2015 and 2019, Iceland trialled a four-day work week with no reduction in pay, covering more than 2,500 workers (about 1% of the national workforce). Productivity not only held steady but often improved. Workers reported lower stress, greater wellbeing, and stronger family connections.

Following the trial, 86% of Iceland’s workforce has either transitioned to shorter hours or secured the right to negotiate them. The lesson? A healthier rhythm of life doesn’t weaken economies, it strengthens them. Psychologically, less stress means less burnout, and more connection means greater resilience.

Canada: Dignity Through Legal Protections

Canada has also shown the power of enshrining dignity in law. Over the past two decades, LGBTQ+ protections have been steadily strengthened: marriage equality was legalised in 2005, and gender identity and expression were added to the Canadian Human Rights Act in 2017.

The impact goes far beyond symbolism. Studies show that LGBTQ+ Canadians in provinces with stronger protections report lower levels of depression and greater psychological safety. In other words, legal protections don’t just defend rights, they promote belonging. Contrast that with Australia’s culture wars and uneven protections, which continue to leave queer young people disproportionately vulnerable to poor mental health outcomes.

France: Accountability at the Top

And then there is accountability. In 2021, former French President Nicolas Sarkozy was sentenced to prison for corruption. Before him, Prime Ministers François Fillon and Alain Juppé were also convicted of misconduct. These cases matter not simply because leaders were punished, but because they demonstrate that in France, even the most powerful are not above the law.

From a psychological perspective, accountability is essential to trust. When citizens see elites held to the same rules, faith in democracy strengthens. When corruption is tolerated, cynicism grows, participation declines, and societies unravel.

Bringing It Home: What Could This Mean for Australia?

So, what might it look like if Australia truly paid attention to these lessons? Imagine if Sydney or Melbourne embraced a Housing First model like Finland’s where, instead of police clearing tent cities, we offered homes as the starting point of recovery. Imagine if we trialled a Violence Reduction Unit in Western Sydney, treating youth crime as a symptom of exclusion rather than a reason for punishment. Imagine if our workplaces seriously experimented with four-day weeks, valuing health and family as much as output. Imagine if our parliaments enshrined protections that gave every LGBTQIA+SB Australian the same dignity Canadians now take for granted. And imagine if our leaders, like in France, faced genuine accountability when corruption was proven, restoring some faith that fairness still applies at the very top.

These are not fantasies. They are models that already exist, with data, outcomes, and human stories to back them. Yet too often, Australia clings to outdated, punitive, or extractive systems that protect wealth rather than people. The evidence is in front of us, and the psychology is clear: when we build systems rooted in dignity, fairness, and hope, individuals thrive, and so do societies.

The Shared Thread

What ties all of these examples together is deceptively simple, yet profoundly important: policies grounded in dignity work.

Give people housing and homelessness falls, because stability is the soil in which recovery and growth take root. Treat violence as a public health issue and crime drops because exclusion is the true incubator of violence, not some innate criminality. Value rest and balance in working life and productivity rises because humans are not machines, and a rested mind is infinitely more creative than an exhausted one. Enshrine legal protections for marginalised groups and belonging flourishes because dignity is not a privilege, it is a birthright. Hold leaders accountable, and public trust deepens because justice must be seen to be for everyone, not just for those without power.

The evidence is there. The psychology is clear. These are not radical dreams; they are tested realities. The question is whether we have the collective courage to learn.

The Psychology of Living in Fractured Systems

And this is where psychology matters most. When governments bulldoze tent cities rather than build homes, when corporations extract wealth without contributing to the common good, when media narratives are reduced to the interests of a narrow few, the message to ordinary people is unambiguous: you don’t matter.

That message, repeated over years, corrodes the very foundations of mental health and social trust. Humans, like all social beings, rely on three psychological anchors to feel safe in the world:

Predictability — the sense that tomorrow will not collapse under you, that your basic needs can and will be met.
Fairness — the belief that the system, however imperfect, treats people with dignity and some sense of equality.
Belonging — the experience of being seen, included, and valued in community.

When these three falter, individuals slip into survival mode. Some lash out politically, fuelled by rage. Some withdraw, retreating into isolation. Some numb themselves with distractions - screens, substances, consumption. Others cling to extremes or strongman figures, hoping someone else will deliver certainty. These are not signs of resilience. They are the symptoms of societies living in trauma.

And just as unresolved trauma in an individual warps behaviour and limits growth, unresolved fractures in a society corrode democracy itself.

What Do We Do?

The temptation, in such moments, is despair. To shrug and say: this is just how the world is now. But despair is the luxury of those who have stopped believing change is possible.

Hope, by contrast, is radical. Hope is not blind optimism. It is the conviction that systems can change because people can change. Hope is remembering that human history is full of reinventions, breakthroughs, and acts of extraordinary courage often born from moments of deep fracture like the one we find ourselves in today.

So then, what does hope look like in practice? I'd assert, from the safety of my comfortable lifestyle, that hope has many forms... It looks like demanding regulations that genuinely regulate rather than rubber-stamp corporate power. It looks like insisting that corporations contribute fairly through taxes, through wages, through genuine community investment, instead of extracting endlessly. It looks like declaring housing a right, not a speculative commodity. It looks like leaders legislating with the most vulnerable in mind, not the most powerful.

Above all, hope looks like everyday citizens refusing to numb themselves into apathy, instead choosing to stay engaged, awake, and willing to demand more.

A Closing Reflection: Falling Forward Together

Right now the world is unsettled, but unsettled times have always been the birthplace of renewal.

We have the evidence. We know that Housing First policies reduce homelessness. We know that treating violence as a health issue reduces crime. We know that unchecked corporations corrode democracy. We know that countries with stronger protections for dignity and fairness nurture healthier, more resilient citizens.

The question is not whether the answers exist. They do. The question is whether we are willing to face the discomfort of change, to learn from what works elsewhere, and to reimagine our own systems through the lens of dignity rather than profit.

So let us not look away. Let us not retreat into cynicism. Let us not assume the fractures are too deep to be healed. Let us instead fall forward with courage, with compassion, and with the stubborn belief that society still means something.