Less than half of young Australian men believe people are free to express their political opinions, only 56.1% support democracy, and more than one in four say violence can be justified to advance a cause, new data shows.
A nationwide survey of 4,273 people, conducted by Roy Morgan in July for the 2026 McKinnon Index and released on Monday, found that 18 to 24-year-olds are less supportive of democracy than older generations, and showed huge shifts in attitudes have taken place over the past 12 months.
Overall, trust in federal politicians fell 5.4 points to 30.5%, trust in political parties fell 6.8 points to 24.4%, and trust in the federal government fell 4.5 points to 33.1%.
Satisfaction with how democracy works fell 3.8 points to 50.7%, while only 58.1% said they believe people can freely express their political opinions and ideas in Australia, down 9.8 points, and 47.6% said they were interested in politics, up 5.2 points.
The biggest changes in the data over the past year occurred in young men, whose support for democracy fell 10.3 points to 56.1%.
49.8% of young men said they believe people can freely express their political opinions, down 22.8 points. The 2026 results were the same for young women, down 13.9 points over the past 12 months.
Asked whether “extreme measures such as violence can sometimes be necessary to advance a cause you care about”, 27.5% agreed, up 8.2 points since the 2025 survey. For young women, the proportion who agreed increased from 16.9% to 22.6%.
21.8% of young men said they could not be friends with people with different political views, up from 14.2% last year. 21.2% of young women gave the same response, down from 29.2%. The overall average for all age groups and both males and females was 11.1%.
For all 18 to 24-year-olds, the proportion who feel that people like them have a say in government fell from 58.8% to 47.9%, and 54.3% agreed democracy is preferable to other systems, compared to 91.9% of those aged 65 and above, and 76.4% overall.
Former Victorian deputy premier John Thwaites, the interim executive chairman at McKinnon, told ABC News that political leaders needed to regain the trust of the Australian public.
“People need to know their voice matters. They also need to see leaders acting with integrity, keeping their promises and delivering outcomes that make a difference to their lives,” he said.
“We need to do more to ensure that all of our community, but young men here in particular, understand our democracy, understand the importance of it, and understand that their voice is important and can be heard.”
The results come after tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets in cities around Australia in August to demand freedom of speech in response to an avalanche of new “hate speech” and prohibited hate group laws brought in by federal and state governments in recent years.
Header image: Patriots at a free speech protest in Brisbane in August (Telegram).
