Bob Hawke, a political superstar, was a social democrat. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, an up-and-coming star today, is a democratic socialist. While the vernacular has changed, the focus remains on the “social” part of the equation rather than the “democratic” one. The social bias draws support and condemnation in equal measure.

Yet perhaps the left misses a trick when it allows the democratic aspect to be downplayed. Almost all in the broader left accept that you can’t implement a social program if you can’t build a democratic mandate for it.

In a functioning democracy, the voters are never wrong. And around the world, the left has failed to do build a mandate for several election cycles now: in Australia, the US, Germany, France and the UK, conservatives have won elections, usually with a dash of populism in the mix. Only New Zealand and perhaps Canada buck the trend.

We're not just mourning Bob Hawke – we miss purposeful leadership and big ideas | Lenore Taylor Read more

For Labor and the broader progressive movement in Australia, this is particularly painful. After losing an unlosable election, Labor is now asking itself how it failed to assemble a democratic majority and how it moves on from here. Anyone who claims they knew the answer beforehand is having themselves on. With hindsight, though, two critical ideas stand out. In turn, these suggest a path forward for Australian progressives.

Firstly, the left must find ways to build areas of consensus in an increasingly fragmented electorate. And secondly, it must never forget the importance of the hip pocket.

Let’s deal with each in turn. Assembling an electoral majority is harder than it used to be. Political scientists once espoused the “median voter theorem”, a simplified model in which all voters line up along a spectrum of choice – say, left to right. In a two-party system, the one that can capture the voter on the midpoint of the spectrum wins the election because it also captures all the support on its side of that voter. So both sides pitch their offers at the median voter.

If only it were so simple. Like ice cracking on a frozen lake, our public debate is now riven with multiplying divisions pitting different social groups against one another. There is no longer a single dimension along which voters divide; there are dozens. Boomers versus millennials; inner cities versus the regions; casualised workers versus business; secular versus religious; owners versus renters; climate activists versus mining workers.

And most of us fit into more than one category. Retirees who are concerned about franking credit refunds may also worry about the impact of climate change on their grandkids’ future.

A news.com.au profile of the Hunter Valley town of Cessnock shows how deep these divides run. Although it hasn’t been in power for years, voters still blame Labor for abandoning working towns such as theirs: “The last time they actually built something here was the Tafe college back in 1959 and since then it’s just been let-down after let-down,” one said.

The challenge for political parties is to build a program that attracts a winning coalition of voters across these divides. This is hard. It becomes even harder when, as Labor did, the party offers a “big target” program that necessitates clear winners and losers between each of these divides. Since people feel losses more keenly than gains, that approach creates a lot of disgruntled losers.

The proposed losers feel even worse when their noses are rubbed in it, no matter how well-meaning the messenger. Anyone who’s watched a game of State of Origin could have told you how Queenslanders would react to a convoy of southern state activists driving from Hobart to Mackay to tell them their jobs were no good. You might as well have shown them a big middle finger.

But what should progressive politics do instead? Here’s where Bob Hawke’s legacy offers some hints. Hawke’s commitment to democracy compelled him to build across divides rather than choose between them. As his close adviser Ross Garnaut wrote: “Hawke was a democrat. For him, carrying broad community support for reform was a necessary condition for change, and an objective in itself.” As it rebuilds, Labor should seek out opportunities for consensus in the way Hawke did. I’ll offer some specific suggestions below.

Another aspect of Hawke’s legacy resonates. Hawke believed Australians loved him because he didn’t believe he was any better than them; he was one of them, an equal. The simple lesson here for progressive politics is not to be judgmental about others’ positions and interests but to seek common ground with them.

This leads to a second observation. Progressive politics can’t appear to ignore economic wellbeing in pursuit of ideological values; it must balance hip pocket issues with broader social ones. Conservatives like to decry “virtue signalling”, implying that virtue is necessarily boastful or intrinsically unworthy. It’s neither. But that doesn’t mean progressive politics can succeed on the basis of virtue alone.

Empathy is more useful than fear in the fight for progress | John Falzon Read more

Progressives can’t win government by asking large numbers of voters to accept changes that will leave them worse off, no matter what the quid pro quo. Arguably this is what Labor did at the 2019 election, proposing changes to franking credits, negative gearing and capital gains tax. Yet the ground could not have been more fertile for Labor on the economy. Australia is in a per capita recession, with wages and consumption anaemic, and public debt spiralling.

Labor made its task more difficult by leading with its tax package, drawing more attention to what it would take from voters rather than what it would give them. But there is a bigger problem, one that has bedevilled Labor for some time. Voters see the Coalition as the better economic manager and Labor is unwilling to aggressively challenge that perception.

This despite the fact that Labor’s macroeconomic record is far better than the Coalition’s, setting the foundations for the 28-year expansion and being the only rich-world government to successfully navigate the global financial crisis.

Yet, along with asylum seekers, economic management is Labor’s third rail. With few exceptions, notably Wayne Swan, Labor politicians avoid fighting on this terrain. This must change. Labor must make it a critical priority to own and champion its impressive economic track record.

• Sign up to receive the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning

What concrete steps can progressive politicians take to build consensus positions and convince voters they understand their material concerns? A number have been suggested already: my Per Capita colleague Emma Dawson has outlined the case for a full employment policy. Others have argued for a green new deal or a jobs guarantee. What’s common to these and similar proposals is an overdue return to a formal industry policy in which Labor embraces the role of government in supporting specific industries, particularly in the regions.

That will need to wait for the next election. In the meantime, two specific ideas for consensus policies lie available. On the economic front, progressive leaders should work with the Coalition government to deliver a meaningful increase in Newstart. Institutional support for this change is near universal. And on the social front, they should seek to build cross-party support for constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians.

Some will argue that the Coalition might not cooperate on either initiative, but the marriage equality debate showed that there are principled people across the parliament who will put issues of national importance above narrow party demands. Australia needs such demonstrations to begin to rebuild trust in politics. And, over the next three years, the progressive movement needs a new galvanising mission.