liberation

Ministry of Justice political finance submissions due

The Ministry of Justice is inviting public submissions on its ‘Electoral Finance Reform Issues Paper’, and the deadline is tomorrow (Friday 26 June). The Ministry has a poor record of involvement in political finance issues, and this latest exercise continues in that fashion. The Issues Paper is rather substandard in quality, displays a poor understanding of the issues, and is not a particularly adequate basis for beginning an attempted programme of reform. I’ll outline some of the problems with the Issues Paper in a future blog post. I’ll also upload my submission on the paper once I’ve written it – I’ve only just had a chance to read the paper. You can download a PDF of the Issues Paper here, from the Ministry’s Electoral Finance Reform sub-site. Not surprisingly, however, the Ministry don't make it entirely clear that they want submissions to be made in a special purpose submission form and it hasn't exactly been easy to find the actual form - a Word version of the submission form is here.

‘A far-left social libertarian’

As someone who is highly interested in political ideology and ways of conceptualizing and explaining politics, I’m an enthusiast for the various online political ideological spectrum tests around. Although hardly perfect, they are useful mechanisms for helping us understand politics and comparative political issues – especially because they often allow for more complexity than just the simple – yet important – left-right dimension. I recently took the test at the gotoquiz.com’s Political Spectrum Quiz, and it turns out that I can be categorized as ‘a far-left social libertarian’ - Left: 7.7, Libertarian: 7.11. [Read more below]

A critique of the Greens’ political finance disclosure

The Green Party has long posed as the ‘party of political honesty’ and of political finance transparency. Green politicians love to repeat the metaphor that ‘sunlight is the best disinfectant’ for political finance corruption. Yet although they have often demanded somewhat draconian transparency when it comes to the private finances of other parties, when it comes to their own sources of public finance – particularly their reliance on backdoor parliamentary state funding – the Greens prefer opaqueness and obfuscation. It should not be surprising therefore that the Green Party response to increasing public concern about the use by politicians of taxpayer resources and expenses has been worse than useless. Rather than helping ‘open the books’ as the party promised, the Greens have disingenuously attempted to limit public knowledge of MP expenses and parliamentary budgets. Not only has the party only provided very limited information about its use of parliamentary funding, but the model that the Greens have put forward for disclosure actually attempts to quell the growing public concern about political corruption while also confusing the issue and robbing the public of their right to know how politicians spend public money on themselves. The following critique of the Green Party’s recent political finance disclosure argues that there should be maximum transparency for the use of parliamentary funding and that the reason the Greens are doing their best to limit the books being opened is because that party has the most to lose from parliamentary transparency. [Read more below]

The politics of Chris Knox

The news that New Zealand artist and social commentator Chris Knox has suffered a serious stroke is incredibly sad to hear. As a sort of tribute to Knox, I thought I’d post the responses that he wrote to a political questionnaire that I asked him to fill in about 15 years ago for a leftwing magazine. The content is a bit dated now, of course, but gives a good idea as to the interesting politics of this important leftwing New Zealander. Although in recent years, Knox has been rather soft on the Labour Party, his answers to the questionnaire indicate a rather critical and politically sophisticated punk. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 26: Conclusions (and bibliography)

The formation of the NLP appeared to represent the beginning of a radical or left-orientated realignment in the New Zealand political landscape. Rather than being merely a product of Jim Anderton’s personal dissatisfaction with the course of the Fourth Labour Government — as the media tended to portray the NLP — the establishment of this new party represented the rejection of neoliberal economic policies by a section of traditional Labour voters, and elements of both the far-left and new social movements. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 25: The cross-class basis of the Alliance and its consequences

The rightward shift of the NewLabour Party (NLP) that — as I have described it in the previous blog posts, mirrored a similar evolution of the Labour Party  — is closely linked to a shift in class orientation, which is a process that again mirrored Labour’s own. In the case of the NLP, the watershed point was the formation of the Alliance, a multi-class electoral coalition. Thus, policy evolution, to an important degree, reflects class orientation. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 24: Resistance to party change

Just as in the 1980s, when some members of the New Zealand Labour Party resisted what they saw as the corruption Labour’s traditional ideals and the rightward transformation of the party under the parliamentary leadership of the Fourth Labour government, substantial numbers of NewLabour Party (NLP) members attempted to resist the NLP’s shift towards the right in the ideological spectrum. To do this they had to fight against the attempts to suppress dissent, and had to choose between tactics of 'voice' or 'exit'. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 23: The Alliance oligarchy

In the short history of the NewLabour Party (NLP) and Alliance, the conservative and rightward political developments were paralleled by comparative organisational tendencies towards oligarchy. During their short existence, both parties undoubtedly displayed a concentration and consolidation of power within the leadership, as the Anderton group came to dominate both. As one senior member of the NLP said about working inside the Alliance: ‘Its just like in the old Labour Party again. People get power and they want more of it’ (Interview). According to Robert Michels, the writer of Political Parties: A Sociological Study of the Oligarchical Tendencies of Modern Democracy, an influential book about the Social Democratic Party of Germany, the rightward drift of parties usually goes hand-in-hand with organisational tendencies towards an increasingly narrow distribution of internal political power. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 22: The Alliance’s orientation to the economic system

Social democratic parties have traditionally occupied an ambiguous position in relation to the economic system. While maintaining various degrees of opposition to the consequences of capitalism, they agree to work within the framework of capitalism and bourgeois democratic institutions. Such ‘State socialists imply that although class conflict, economic crisis, exploitation and poverty are consequences of capitalism, they can be eliminated (through state action) while capital remains’ (Allen et al., 1978: p.24). Operating within this framework, such parties continually adjust to the constraints of that environment. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 21: A shift to the right in economic policy

After the formation of the Alliance, the NewLabour Party’s (NLP) speed in policy moderation increased substantially. This was largely a result of two processes: first, the pressure applied by the other Alliance partners for the NLP to drop its own more radical policies, and second, the NLP’s desire to keep the coalition together, which inevitably meant compromising on its own policies. Furthermore, involvement in the Alliance now gave the Anderton group in the NLP more power and influence through uniting with their more conservative allies in the other Alliance parties against the NLP leftwing. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 20: The success of the Alliance

During the early formation period of the Alliance, public opinion polls gave the as-yet-unformed coalition percentage ratings in the mid-30s. These results were largely illusionary, as some sections of the public which were probably outside of the Alliance’s potential support-base simply flirted with the novelty of the new coalition. Yet it still indicated that the Alliance was likely to be a substantial political force in at least the short-term future. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 19: Principle and pragmatism

The NewLabour Parry (NLP) was born out of a rejection of political expediency. The people who formed the party perceived the old Labour Party to have given up its social democratic principles and traditions and implemented policies for which it had no mandate. Therefore the early NLP party organisation placed a strong emphasis on the fact that it would not be tempted by the methods of expediency and that it would strongly guard its original principles. But Anderton and the NLP constituted a peculiar contradiction – they claimed to be principled; they rejected expediency, yet they also claimed to be pragmatic and attempted to reject an image of idealism and of being ideologues. [Read more below]

Sue Bradford - the Greens' futile left option

The Green Party contest for its next female co-leader is essentially an ideological decision between two candidates from the left and right factions of the party. Sue Bradford is undoubtedly the left option in the contest – which is partly why she won't be elected. As pointing out in the blog post on Meteria Turei, Sue Bradford is incredibly unlikely to win the contest for the Green Party female co-leader – mostly due to the fact that she is - for better or worse - very strongly associated with the so-called anti-smacking bill, an elitist style of process for pushing forward this social change, and has been typecast as a radical ‘extremist’. In fact, the decision of who to select to replace Jeanette Fitzsimons will effectively decide the ideological trajectory of the party over the foreseeable future. Bradford is the choice of those that are uncomfortable with the party's very deliberate shift towards the centre of the political spectrum under Fitzsimons and Russel Norman. This blog post takes a look at Sue Bradford's past, suggests that the left option in the Greens will lose and the party will hasten its shift not only towards greater independence from the Labour Party, but also towards the right. It also tries to unpack the history and politics of Bradford, attempting to get beyond some of the simplicities and myths projected about this unique but also rather ordinary politician [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 18: Political differences within the Alliance

The establishment of the Alliance, was a major turning point for many of those who remained in the radical left faction of the NLP. While some of the radical left capitulated to the swell of enthusiasm for an Alliance, others were concerned with the opportunism which they perceived in the NLP’s involvement in the Alliance. After all, membership of the Alliance depended less on what a party stood for, than what it stood against. Hence all five Alliance parties stood for distinctly different politics when they joined, but claimed a commonality in what they opposed — neoliberal economic policy. [Read more below]

MP expenses and corruption in Mt Albert?

In light of the huge scandal in the UK over MP allowances, it’s worth looking at how politicians in New Zealand are misusing their parliamentary entitlements. While much of the British scandal has focused on the pecuniary gain of MPs, in this country it’s more likely that MPs and their political parties misuse their parliamentary allowances more for political gain – essentially converting parliamentary funds into a form of ‘backdoor state funding of political parties’. All the parties in Parliament have access to millions of dollars of taxpayer-funded resources and budgets that they use for party political electioneering. Of course this is especially the case when there’s an actual election going on – as there is currently with the Mt Albert by-election. Hence all the political parties in Parliament will be siphoning off taxpayer resources to Auckland at the moment. Therefore it has to be asked, are all the non-Auckland MPs that are currently flooding into the Mt Albert electorate, doing so via taxpayer funding? Is the Green candidate, and Wellington-based MP, Russel Norman really paying his own way to Auckland and finding his own accommodation during his campaigning? [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 17: Formation of the Alliance

The formation of the Alliance in 1991 was a watershed in the NewLabour Party’s (NLP) development, especially in that all four of the party’s Alliance partners were considerably to the right of the NLP on most economic issues, and largely unsympathetic to the NLP’s strong ideological emphasis on working class interests. Thus the NLP’s semi-merger with the Greens, Democrats, Liberals and Mana Motuhake contributed to the NLP leadership’s rightward movement. Politically, this project led to a watering-down of the policy and principles that the NLP has worked for. Organisationally it led to the NLP, especially its branches, being subsumed into the larger Alliance structure. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 16: Post-election internal reactions

Following the NewLabour Party’s (NLP) 1990 general election campaign, some type of post-election evaluation period was made inevitable by the rushed nature of the pre-election preparations and the less than hoped for election result. The party finally had real time to take stock and for some to take a broader view of the direction of the party as an organisation and a political force. The post-election period was therefore a time for members to consider some fundamentals of the party: structure, organisation, political and activist orientation, and the decision-making process. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 15: The 1990 general election

The general election of 1990 was the first real test for the NewLabour Party (NLP). The existence of elections every three years serves to intensify the selection and refining of a party’s particular policies and political positions. The election acts to test these policies as well as the party’s organisation structure including its ability to mobilise activists for the event. Elections also reassert the importance of the party’s leadership, as they shift the emphasis to the idea of particular members of the party potentially becoming representatives in the national legislature. Furthermore, because elections test the success of the organisation, they automatically lead to some sort of internal party evaluation of the many decisions that were made prior to the election. This means that elections are often substantial turning points in the nature of political parties. This was certainly the case with the NLP. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 14: Interclass support and social democracy

Parliamentary participation tends to require parties of the working class to seek electoral support outside a narrow definition of what might be seen as the working class. And, as can be seen in the evolution of the NewLabour Party (NLP), the compromises needed to gain this wide support had the effect of weakening the party’s original ideology. As the NLP moved beyond an attempt to appeal primarily to working people, its stated ideology and policies have shifted correspondingly. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 13: The NLP’s orientation to Parliament

Initially the NewLabour Party (NLP) membership voted against a purely parliamentary focus for the party. The 1989 Constitution stated that the objectives of the NLP ‘may include education, activity and organisation at all levels of New Zealand Society, not restricted to political electioneering’ (NLP, 1989: p.2). The NLP thus decided on a strategy that sought to put emphasis both on winning seats in Parliament and mobilising community fight-backs against the attacks on working people. As National Councillor Laila Harre contended, ‘It would be opportunist to expect people to elect you to Parliament if you’re not doing work in the community’ (quoted in CPNZ, 1991a: p.17). [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 12: Development of party policy

The pre-election exigencies that acted to centralise the NewLabour Party's (NLP) organisational structure served also to make the party’s policymaking process a less than democratic and thorough affair. As a result, the early policymaking process acted as a crude filter on the diversity of perspectives within the organisation. Economic policy, in particular, was rather conservative as a result, with an essentially middle-of-the-road Keynesian approach adopted [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 11: Structure and organisation

On being formed in 1989, the NewLabour Party (NLP) adopted an organisational structure very similar to that of the old Labour Party. It had policy commissions, party branches, electorate councils, district councils, a National Council, a National Executive, and the usual positions within this (such as leader, president, vice president, general secretary). In a sense, organisational forms and routines perfected in the old Labour Party to ensure centralised control were used as armatures to give shape and organisational form to the NLP. The influence of this established labour organisation, which had evolved over three-quarters of a century, meant that the NLP was born with a more top-down party organisational structure than might otherwise have been the case. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 10: Party ideology

In the history of the NewLabour Pary (NLP) – which this series of blog posts is covering - the question of whether the NLP would simply constitute just ‘another Labour Party’ was clearly intertwined with the struggle inside the party over its adoption of a particular ideology. The NLP was being pulled in two directions. On one side were those who wanted to re-create the NLP in the image of the old Labour Party, with its parliamentary bias, and generally Keynesianist economic approach. On the other were those in the radical left and social liberals who wanted a party concerned with bringing about more fundamental social change, or even some form of ‘socialism’. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 9: The influence of the social liberals

As well as the revolutionary-reformist divide within the NewLabour Party (NLP) discussed in previous blog posts in this series on the history of the NLP, there were other axis-lines of significant political conflict in the early organisation. Many social liberals were strongly represented at the founding conference, and were involved in several important early debates over party policy (especially about environmental and gender issues). Most significant was the involvement of activists from the women’s movement. According to Alison McCulloch, an observer at the first conference, ‘Feminists at the conference were one of the most united groups’ (McCulloch, 1989: p.13). [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 8: Elimination of the radical left

The incompatibility of the three factions detailed in the previous blog posts proved too great to allow their coexistence, and the first eighteen months of the NewLabour Party (NLP) saw the far-left groups expelled, marginalised, or dissolved fully into the organisation. The Communist Left organisation was the first to be purged, after they made clear their intention to attempt to split the party. There was some debate and dissension from party members over the expulsion (Boyle, 1989), but no one outside the Communist Left appeared to be willing to support their somewhat inept tactical manoeuvres inside the NLP. However, the expulsion of the Permanent Revolution Group (PRG) in April 1990 for unspecified acts of disruption and for unspecified incompatibility with the NLP constitutional principles and objectives was not so clear-cut and uncontentious. The PRG’s expulsion provides an interesting example of the political process of the NLP National Executive and also of the tensions inside of the organisation. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 7: Loose and fluid alliances

The existence of these three broad groups of the ‘labourites’, the ‘social liberals’, and the ‘radical left’ inside the organisation (detailed in the previous blog post), did not mean that all party members were either in one or another, but that they constituted broad divisions within the organisation. So these groups were by no means mutually exclusive — there were some overlaps in terms of membership of these groups. For example, there were, of course, many ex-radical left members moving in a rightward direction. Keith Locke (pictured on the right), for instance would probably be better described as a member of the social liberals despite his former membership of the Socialist Action League (SAL). [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 6: The development of factions

The formation of the NewLabour Party (NLP) involved not only ex-Labour Party members but also a number of leftwing groups, independent socialists, and those political activists drawn from the new social movements. Essentially there were three broad tendencies within the party: the ‘labourites’, the ‘social liberals’, and the ‘radical left’. This blog post details these broad and fluid factions and tendencies. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 5: Party formation

Although in early 1989 Jim Anderton was not yet offering a party which ex-Labour Party members could join, and nor was it completely obvious that one would eventuate, the defections from Labour continued in large numbers. Despite the fact that no major party figures or MPs resigned, Anderton did have substantial numbers of supporters transferring their allegiance to the new party. This blog post, continues the blog post series on the history of the NewLabour Party (NLP) by looking at the formation of the party. [Read more blow]

[NewLabour Party history] 4: Origins of the NLP

The NewLabour Party (NLP) was very much a ‘splinter party’, being formed from forces within the Labour Party. The fact that the Labour Party underwent such a transformation in the 1980s made it almost inevitable that some significant leftwing opposition, like the NLP, would emerge to challenge the Labour Government’s free market reforms. What was surprising was that it took so long to emerge. This blog post – in a series marking the 20th anniversary of the founding of the NLP – looks at the origins of the split, political forces emerging in resistance outside of Labour, and the rise of the NLP Jim Anderton. [Read more below].

[NewLabour Party history] 3: The New Zealand Labour Party

The origins of the NewLabour Party (NLP) are obviously closely linked to the history of the New Zealand Labour Party. Since, in a sense the NewLabour Party attempted to represent the continuation of the tradition of earlier Labour Party governments, examining the history of the Labour Party allows an insight into possible explanations for the later transformation of NewLabour. In many ways the history of the Labour Party provides a classic example of social democratic deradicalisation. Labour’s story contains both the confirmation of  social democracy’s deradicalisation trend and a partial explanation for that trend. This post continues the series on the history of the NLP, using research carried out on this political project back in 1995. [Read more below]

[NewLabour Party history] 2: Theoretical background

The NewLabour Party (NLP) was a classic social democratic labour party aimed at the pursuit of working class orientated social change through the institution of parliamentary democracy. Although it was a reaction to another parliamentary party of the left moving significantly to the right, the NLP too provides evidence of the inability of social democratic parties to maintain their initial radicalism due to their subsequent need to moderate their policy and political strategy. The party therefore provides an interesting opportunity to examine party transformation in general. This second blog post in the series on the NLP’s short history in New Zealand politics – which contains research carried out on this political project back in 1995 - therefore attempts to discuss theory in relation to social democracy’s transformation and set up some sort of framework for understanding the NLP’s short history. [Read more below]

Summary of health reforms, 1984-2008

The Parliamentary Library has just published a useful research paper on the New Zealand Health System Reforms. This 21-page report written by research analyst Peter Quinn in the Parliamentary Library, succinctly goes through all the structural changes in the system since 1984, dealing systematically with governance, primary care, secondary care, ACC, etc in each of the many structural reforms. It points the reader to other significant policy documents, and has some useful MoH organisational diagrams, such as the one on the right ('The structure of New Zealand’s health system, 2008'). The report can be read in html here or downloaded in PDF from here. And of course, more critical analysis of the state of healthcare in New Zealand can be read here.

Labour continues to be the party of big money

The Labour Party received nearly $500,000 in donations of more than $10,000 in 2008 – significantly more than National, which declared a total of about $207,000. This is according to the figures just made public by the Electoral Comission (available here), and dealt with by an article in the Herald today (see: Artists feature in Labour's $500,000 list of election donations). It seems therefore that despite the common myth of the Labour Party being financially poor and the National Party being the party of big wealth, Labour is still just as much a big money party as National. After all Labour has been the biggest spending party for the last few general elections. And if you add up all the declared donations made to the Electoral Commission since it was made mandatory in 2006, you’ll find that Labour and National have received virtually the same amounts. My quick calculations (which I’ll check and update at some stage) show that over the 1996 to 2008 period, Labour has declared donations of about $5,321,000 and National has declared about 5,484,000.

[NewLabour Party history] 1: Introduction

Twenty years ago today – on May Day, 1989 - the NewLabour Party was formed. This was a significant leftwing split from the Labour Party, and began the creation of a vital force in New Zealand politics during the 1990s – the Alliance party. To mark the twentieth anniversary of founding of the NewLabour Party (NLP), I’m publishing a series of blog posts on the early years of the NLP and the Alliance. This contains research I carried out on this political project back in 1995. [Read more below]

Deformed class war in Thailand – Part 3

In the third part of a three-part series guest blogger John Moore examines the latest crisis in Thailand. Here he asks what is the likely trajectory of the Thai crisis and argues that the anti-government Red Shirt movement needs to split along class and political lines for there to be a progressive outcome to the continuing conflict. Furthermore, he argues that although the current chapter of the Thai political crisis may have ended, deep seated political and economic divisions in this country mean we will see further examples of conflict involving mass mobilisations of people. The intransigent positions on both sides of the red/yellow divide, and the underlying clash of classes, will mean that this crisis will not be resolved through mere political maneuvering and manipulation from high. The growing republican sentiments amongst the Red Shirts also points to the escalation of divisions in Thai society. [Read more below]

Deformed class war in Thailand – Part 2

In the second part of a three-part series guest blogger John Moore examines the latest crisis in Thailand and asks why the organised working class seem absent from the recent political conflicts that have engulfed Thailand. Undoubtedly thousands of working class Thais have been involved in the current mobilisations against the government. The propaganda of the Red Shirt leaders have targeted both the rural and urban poor, calling for a defence of the social policies, including universal health care, enacted by the former Thaksin led government, and for a ‘people’s revolution’ against the ‘elite’. However, Thailand has a large and significant trade union movement that seems conspicuously absent from the current conflict and mass rallies and protests. A number of historical and political factors account for the absence of organised labour from the current events unfolding in Thailand. [Read more below]

Deformed class war in Thailand – Part 1

In a three-part series guest blogger John Moore examines the latest crisis in Thailand and argues that the conflict between the Red Shirts and the government represents a deformed version of class war. He argues that although a class war is escalating in Thailand, most western commentators seem bamboozled by the array of divisions and groups clashing against each other in the latest round of the political crisis that has engulfed this country for the last few years. Scenes of thousands of militant and defiant protesters wearing either yellow, red and now blue shirts has led many to view the current strive as irrational political squabbling. Much of the media have viewed the deepening divisions in Thailand with confusion and their reporting has lacked any analysis that goes beyond surface appearances. A careful examination of the clashing groups, and their links to antagonistic social groups and classes, offers a deeper reading of these events. [Read more below]

Review of New Zealand politics in 2008

Every year the European Journal of Political Research publishes a political date yearbook which gives a review of politics in a number of western countries. I contribute the section on New Zealand to the journal – last year’s publication on New Zealand politics in 2007 can be read here. Below is the first draft of my review of New Zealand politics in 2008. It still requires a bit of abridging and editing, and as always I’m interested in feedback and suggestions, which you can leave in the comments section or email me (edwards.bryceATgmail.com). [Read more below]

“What happens when Granny turns activist? An examination into the New Zealand Herald campaign against the Electoral Finance Bill”

“Democracy Under Attack” was the heading for the New Zealand Herald’s extraordinary campaign against the Electoral Finance Bill (EFB) before it became law in late 2007. The phrase has almost become iconic, and reflects a significant time in New Zealand politics, when political finance reform was the subject of a bitter, highly partisan and societal debate. That the Herald entered the fray so strongly to campaign against the EFB became – for some – almost as controversial as the bill itself. It’s very useful therefore that there’s been some in depth academic analysis of this issue carried out – which can be downloaded in PDF format here. This very interesting investigation was carried out last year by Hollie Hyndman, who was a University of Otago Politics honours student – and she has kindly allowed it to be uploaded to this blog. The dissertation is an excellent exploration of the dynamics of the Herald’s campaign against the EFB. It doesn’t really seek to give a definitive answer as to whether the Herald’s campaign was warranted and desirable, nor is it passing judgment on the EFB/EFA, but it does contain an incredibly useful debate about all the issues. Hollie gives a very considered account of the Herald’s campaign, applies theory about the role of the media in liberal democracies like New Zealand’s, and interviews Nicky Hager, Therese Arseneau, and Audrey Young about the topic. But importantly, as Hollie says in the abstract, ‘More broadly, the [news]paper’s stance against the EFB is used as a case study for exploring political communication in New Zealand. It provides invaluable insight into media power, the relationship between media and citizens, and the changing role of traditional media in the 21st century’. I’ve included Hollie’s dissertation on this blog because it deserves a wider audience, and because it plays an important role in chronicling and contributing to an understanding of the whole history of the Electoral Finance Act in New Zealand.

The Omaha Establishment(s)

To answer the question of “who runs New Zealand?”, it’s worth looking to the small trendy beach town on Omaha Bay in Rodney District, an hour’s drive north of Auckland. It’s here that the rich of Auckland have their multi-million-dollar holiday homes, and as Bill Ralston has observed, ‘The wealthy beach community of Omaha is to Auckland what the Hamptons are to New York’. What’s particularly insightful about Omaha is that it is a representation of more than just The Establishment in New Zealand, but instead it appears to contain three separate settlements that represent three different Establishments in New Zealand. And in understanding the distinctively different nature of these three Establishments at Omaha beach, we can better understand who now runs this country. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 29: The 2002 campaign

In the 2002 general election campaign Act was in a defensive mode – attempting to defend its 7% of the party vote. It therefore made a significant effort to rid itself of its extremist image (James, 2002i). This might have been an influence of president Catherine Judd’s Liberal Project within the party. According to Colin James, it tried ‘to present a less rednecked and less radical image than in 1999’ (James, 2002f). [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 28: The Liberal Project

Following the 1999 election, in which Act attempted to mobilise support on the basis of a socially conservative or populist platform, the more radical and policy-seeking faction of Act attempted to pull the party back towards its founding principles. Most significantly, this involved installing Catherine Judd – a Roger Douglas nominee who had not previously been involved in the party - into the party presidency. As president, Judd then instigated the ‘Liberal Project’ – an attempt to develop and reiterate Act as a party of social and economic liberalism. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 27: Act’s social conservatism in the 1999 election

At the 1999 election Act attempted to mobilise voter support on the basis of a socially conservative or populist platform. The party had moved away from its liberal and libertarian roots, and was taking on strands of social engineering. There had however always been such socially conservative elements in Act – manifested especially by Trevor de Cleene who argued at the party’s first full conference that Act should adopt harsh law and order policies. But these ideas were firmly defeated or ignored right from the beginning, leading Act to be identified as a liberal party. But by 1999 the socially conservative and illiberal element had re-emerged in Act and it was particularly concerned with issues of family and welfare. [Read more below]

Candidate expenditure in 2008

Electorate candidates in 2008 spent a combined total of $2.26m trying to get elected. They also declared receiving donations totaling $1.26m. Winning candidates spent on average $12,836 to get elected. But expenditure varied greatly: Russell Fairbrother spent $19,704 failing to win Napier, while Maurice Williamson won Pakuranga by apparently only spending $1,591. There appears to be quite a discrepancy between what some of these candidates have declared in donations and what they have official spent - for example, Pita Sharples received $35,000 in donations but only spent $8,473, and Allan Peachy received $46,250 but only spent $15,102. This blog post analyses these figures and tries to highlight some of interesting details from them. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 26: Factions and intra-party MP relations

Throughout 1997 a substantial divide developed within the Act party caucus over the general direction that the party had been taking within Parliament. The substance of the division was mainly to do with two general strategic issues: [1] the question of Act’s strategic orientation towards National and, [2] Act’s populist campaigns. In the debate over the populism, Rodney Hide and Richard Prebble appeared at one pole of the caucus, while Derek Quigley and Patricia Schnauer were at the opposite policy-orientated pole. The divide was so great, that speculation grew about Quigley looking to leave Act for National. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 25: Further economic moderation

Act’s first parliamentary caucus was by no means a homogenous group of Rogernomes. Ironically, due to the diverse range of opinions in the new Act caucus, the identity and policies of the party were narrowed and moderated. This was because, to function effectively and gain consensus, the party had to adopt a lowest common-dominator platform. Thus the caucus had to ‘agree to disagree’ on many matters and not raise contentious or unresolved issues as Act policy. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 24: Socially conservative repositioning

Early on in Act’s history, commentators were inclined to categorise Act as a new right urban-liberal party – a party that is rightwing on economic issues, but liberal on social ones, and sophisticated rather than traditional. This was certainly an image the party leadership, and in particular Richard Prebble, wished to convey. According to political analyst-satirist Dave Armstrong (writing in 1997): ‘This is the image Act are successfully portraying: they're fun-loving trendy young things with Pajeros and CD Roms. Act is the National Party without all the boring old farts who want compulsory military training, respect for the flag and a drinking age of thirty-three’ (Dave Armstrong, 1997: p.8). But in reality, the party was always somewhat less socially liberal than they might have seemed, and this was concealed only by the fact that they had initially chosen not to market themselves as social conservatives. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 23: The early National-Act relationship

It was obvious that the futures of the National and Act parties were always going to be closely linked. However there had been division within the Act over how to orientate towards the National Party, with the main question being: should Act treat National as a political ally (and therefore work with it) or as an enemy (and therefore seek to displace it)? This debate was not easily resolved and in 1996 the new Act caucus had to consider if it would be willing to play a role in a coalition government with National. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 22: Populism in Parliament

As soon as Act was in Parliament, there was a perceptible shift in the party’s activity. As the Parliamentary caucus sprung into action, the MPs looked less like Roger Douglas protégés, and more like the leader, Richard Prebble. While the Act leadership probably thought that their first year in Parliament was a time to define the party’s brand more clearly, the new MPs ended up being identified with trivia, side-issues and gossip. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 21: Act in Parliament after 1996

Having finally broken into Parliament at the first MMP election, the Act Party then largely failed to live up to its expectations as a party of ideas and radicalism. Act had already had its identity and purpose reshaped and redefined away from new ideas and radical reform, but once in Parliament it headed down an even more populist track in search of its electoral ambitions. Yet Act’s support base remained tiny, which frustrated the talented new caucus. Being a ‘captive’ party on National’s rightwing also caused problems. [Read more below]

[Act Party history] 20: The 1996 election ‘success’ and its support base

In the 1996 general election the Act Party came in at 5th place with 6.2% of the party vote. The result was somewhat victorious in the context of the fact that Act ‘had been averaging only about 2.5 per cent in the polls in the first half of 1996' (Fraser and Zangouropoulos, 1998: p.55). However, the 6% vote was unimpressive in the context of Prebble stating that Act would get 15%. Analysis of Act’s election support shows some interesting issues about Act’s support base. [Read more below]