By 2050, a new generation of Australian Muslims will be shaping the country’s institutions, communities and public life, confident in their identity, belonging and contribution to Australia’s future.
When I think about Muslim Australia in 2050, I do not think first about numbers. I think about a young Australian Muslim studying at university, running a business, working in a hospital, teaching in a school or helping shape the country’s future.
She may be the third or fourth generation of her family in Australia. Her grandparents may have been born here, while her great-grandparents arrived from another country. She may know her family history and speak her grandparents’ language, but Australia will simply be home.
She will not need to explain that she is both Muslim and Australian. For her, there will be nothing unusual about it.
That is the Australia I imagine in 2050. Not simply a larger Muslim community, but a community with its own Australian character.
I came to Australia as a migrant in 1992, when the Muslim community was much smaller. Many of us were finding our way, building families, establishing businesses and creating places to pray and maintain our traditions.
Much has changed. By the 2021 Census, Australia had around 813,000 Muslims, or 3.2 per cent of the population. If current growth continues, that number could reach around 1.5 million by 2050.
The more important question is what happens when their children and grandchildren begin shaping the community.
A community finding its Australian character
The third and fourth generations will have a different relationship with Islam and Australia from their grandparents. Some will be deeply religious, others will practise quietly, while some may have little interest in organised community life. Some will speak their grandparents’ language, others will not. Some will marry within the Muslim community, others outside it.
Each generation decides what it carries forward, what it changes and what it leaves behind. The community will also become more diverse, encompassing Australians from many backgrounds. They will not always agree, and I hope they do not. A confident community does not require everyone to think alike. It needs people who can disagree without allowing differences to become division.
I saw this when I was president of the Canberra Muslim Community and led the development of the Gungahlin Mosque, which we opened in 2017. More than 40 ethnic communities came together to make it happen. We did not always agree, but we shared a common purpose.
The mosque of 2050 will reflect this changing community. It will remain a place of prayer and religious education, but I expect it to become an even stronger community hub, supporting young people, families and older Australians through education, counselling, disability support and other services.
As the first generation ages, loneliness and social isolation will also become more significant. Technology will change how we communicate, but it will not replace human connection. Older people will still need someone to visit them, share a meal and listen.
Muslim women will also play a much more visible role in Australian life.
By 2050, I expect Muslim women to be judges, ministers, senior executives, philanthropists and leaders across Australian institutions. Just as importantly, a Muslim woman leading a mosque, serving on a board or heading a community organisation should be unremarkable. Their leadership should be valued for what they contribute, not treated as something unusual because they are Muslim women.
My advocacy for female-only swimming sessions taught me that inclusion can sometimes be practical rather than ideological: it means creating opportunities for people to participate without requiring everyone to want the same arrangement.
From building institutions to building capital
For decades, much of the community’s energy went into building the foundations: mosques, schools, community organisations and support networks. Those foundations remain important. The next stage should be about building lasting social, economic and civic capital.
By 2050, I envisage waqf and other endowments supporting scholarships, education and research, affordable housing, aged care, disability care and retirement living. Instead of continually raising money to meet immediate needs, communities can build assets that create benefits across generations.
The question should shift from “what does the Muslim community need?” to “what can the Muslim community contribute?”
From the margins to the mainstream
By 2050, I expect third and fourth generation Muslim Australians to be prominent across government, business, universities, the professions, community organisations and public life.
Perhaps the biggest change will be the movement from the margins to the mainstream. Not because Muslims become less Muslim, but because they become increasingly present in every part of Australian life.
The Muslim story in Australia goes back further than many realise, from contact between First Nations peoples and Muslim visitors from Makassar to the cameleers and later generations of migrants. My generation is one chapter in that story. The third and fourth generations will write the next.
We cannot know exactly what they will write. Our responsibility is not to tell them what Muslim Australia should look like in 2050, but to give them strong foundations, good education, confidence in who they are and the freedom to make their own contribution.
There will still be difficult conversations about religion, identity, migration and social cohesion. Muslims will not always get everything right, and there will be setbacks. But Australia has never been a finished product. It has always been built by First Nations peoples and generations of people who came before us, each contributing in their own way.
My hope is that when the young Muslim Australian of 2050 looks around, she will not ask whether she belongs. She will know she does.
Her success will not be measured by how different she remains, but by how fully she participates, contributes and helps strengthen the society she calls home.
That is the Muslim Australia I envisage in 2050. Not simply finding a place in Australia, but helping shape the Australia we become.
Mainul Haque
Mainul Haque OAM is an economist and former senior Australian public servant with nearly 30 years’ experience shaping and analysing policy across government, academia, and the not-for-profit sector. He is a community leader, board member and non-executive director, and former ACT Multicultural Ambassador. He writes on social cohesion, migration, and public policy, grounding his analysis in practical experience.Mainul has held numerous board and advisory roles across Canberra’s community, education and multicultural sectors, and was awarded the Order of Australia Medal for his significant contribution to the ACT community.