liberation

NZ Politics Daily - 7 November 2013

The main issues in NZ politics today are the 'Roast Busters', the Labour Party, National Party retirements, the GCSB reforms, SkyCity, UFB/Chorus, and inequality and poverty. [Read more below]

Budget 2011 images and cartoons

To understand a political event or issue, often the images and cartoons that are published about it can be very insightful. Obviously they present a very distorted and simplistic view of any event or issue, but nonetheless by looking at a wide selection of images and satorical views, you can at least obtain some sort of view of how the public is thinking - or are being told how to think - about something. Below is a collection of about 60 such images collected over the last week or so, that pertain the National Government's Budget 2011. If I've missed any, please let me know. [Read more below]

 

National, Act, Brash and Orewa

Orewa, the name of a small seaside town north of Auckland, has been part of the New Zealand political lexicon ever since January 2004. Now, with Don Brash’s attempt to take over the Act Party, it has again surfaced in the news. Is there a connection between Orewa and the decline of Act? Will Brash take Act back to Orewa to breath life back into the party? This guest blog by Geoffrey Miller investigates these questions. [Read more below]

 

 

Don Brash’s move from National to Act

Don Brash’s current bid for the leadership of the Act Party is viewed as a National Party takeover of the minor party – because Don Brash is an ex-leader of National.  However, in reality Brash has always been seen as more aligned with the ideologies of Act - after all, when he was a National MP he was dubbed 'Act’s tenth MP’. So, is Don Brash naturally more of an Act Party politician than a National Party one? And if so, why didn’t he join Act in the first place, and not National? And just what is the relationship between Brash and Act? In this guest blog post by Geoffrey Miller, attempts to answer these questions, suggesting that much might be explained by the personalities of Michelle Boag and Catherine Judd. [Read more below]

 

A leftwing perspective on asset sales

Some political commentators – and Labour and National party activists, too – are suggesting that this year’s New Zealand general election will present voters with a genuine ideological choice: between a radical leftwing Labour Party that favours nationalised industry and a radical rightwing National Party that wants to privatise everything. Any such description is hugely inaccurate, and a proper examination of the situation would show that the positions of both parties on the issue of state owned enterprises are actually remarkably similar. Once the rhetoric from Labour and National is put to one side, it obvious that both parties favour a mixture of state and private ownership of industry, with only degrees of difference in how much should be owned and which direction should be taken. But given that there is at least some differences opening up on the issue of asset sales – and that this is set to be some sort of election issue, I hope to write a few posts in the near future examining it all in detail. This initial blog post merely raises the question – from a leftwing point of view – of whether there is actually anything progressive about the state owning businesses. It argues that the New Zealand left have developed a nostalgic and false idea that the government ownership of businesses like TV2 or NZ Post is something wonderful. [Read more below]

Who will dominate New Zealand politics in 2011?

Today the Herald on Sunday published my predictions of which politicos will dominate New Zealand politics in 2011. Putting aside the various party leaders who can be assumed to be constantly in the news and making a big impact, I gave the newspaper a list of five politicians and powerbrokers who, despite not necessarily being household names, will be extremely important in shaping how we think about parliamentary politics during the year: Steven Joyce, Hone Harawira, David Cunliffe, Guyon Espiner, and Kevin Taylor. You can see my explanations within the article Crystal ball gazing into 2011 on the Herald website, or else in the blog post below, which includes the full text that I submitted, along with some details of those ‘influentials’ that I considered but kept off the list. [Read more below]

 

Pansy Wong’s dubious solicitation of political funding

Although Pansy Wong has survived the investigation into her use of travel perks, the NBR is today reporting another political finance potential scandal based on her fundraising for the National Party. It has been revealed that Wong has raised large amounts of money for the National Party in 2007, including $200,000 from one fundraising event where apparently one Chinese businessman paid $50,000 for one of John Key’s ties. All of this money presumably was passed onto the head office of the National Party. Yet the funds are not easily identified in the donations declared by the party to the Electoral Commission for 2008. Why not? Matt Nippert’s article in today’s NBR quotes me discussing the issue. This blog post elaborates on the issues. [Read more below]

 

Review of New Zealand politics in 2009

 

The year 2009 was a hectic one in New Zealand politics, partly because it was the first year of the new National Party Government’s term in office. At a general election in November of the previous year, National had ousted the Labour Party from its three-term tenure in office and formed a single-party minority government with support agreements with the Act Party, the Maori Party and United Future – all of whom gained ministerial roles outside the cabinet. In this first year, the new administration was both ideologically centrist and highly popular, being challenged only on difficult issues relating to the economic recession, political finance controversies over MPs’ expenses and various race relations questions. The following blog post examines these issues via a ‘Review of New Zealand politics in 2009’ which has just been published as a peer-reviewed journal article in the top political science periodical, the European Journal of Political Research (in the December 2010 edition). As well as looking at how the National Government fared in 2009, it also briefly analyses the main issues in politics (such as the economy, social issues, political finance scandals) and the changes in the other parliamentary political parties. [Read more below]

Don Brash’s return to Orewa – opening up divisions in National

Don Brash’s return to Orewa on Saturday to give his fifth ‘Orewa speech’ is remarkable – not just because it attempts to reawaken the spirit of previous populist and landmark speeches that ignited political debate – but because Brash is actually focusing his firepower against his own party, National. The speech by Brash is a thinly veiled attack on the John Key-led National Government, and thus represents the opening up of divisions within the National Party between the moderates and the radicals. In this divide, Brash is clearly taking up the leadership of the rightwing radical faction of the party that would like to see its own government be more courageous and principled in issues of economics and ethnic affairs. Essentially Brash is asking National to go back to being a ‘true blue’ National Party in government instead of a Labour-lite one that continues to govern with most of the same policies as the Labour-led government that it replaced. Quite validly, Brash argues that ‘our Party fought for the right to govern and to lead, not simply to hold office’. This blog post constitutes the analysis that I made of the speech and gave to the NZ Herald, which reports some of my thoughts in this article by Rebecca Lewis. [Read more below]

 

Crime and punishment in the Public Square

“For over a decade now, the Labour and National parties have been using law and order as an electoral weapon – both have been trying to outbid each other to be the most reactionary in terms of crime and punishment. This has meant that under the Clark Labour Government the prison population virtually doubled, and now National seem to want to keep it escalating. So in the 2011 general election, what are you going to do – and what can we do – to stop law and order policy being a cynical electoral weapon of the political parties?” – That’s the question that I asked last week at a ‘Public Square’ forum on Crime and Punishment at the University of Otago. The issues of crime and punishment have become central drivers in electoral politics, so the topic is worth considerable examination. [Read more below]

Halfway through National’s term in office

The Sunday Star Times ran an article by Anthony Hubbard in the weekend about the state of the National Government which quoted me a bit – see Under-mining rich seam of popularity? (My comments also featured in an additional sidebar article which is not online, but is viewable on the right). In the blog post below I outline in further detail the analysis that I offered to the Sunday Star Times about National’s first year and half in office and about where it is going now. I argue that the National Government has been a relatively mild centre-right government so far, without any strong ideological momentum or sign of conviction. While it might not exactly be the friend of the working class, its also not the demonic, radical rightwing, reforming government that the left in New Zealand make the mistake of trying to portray it as. [Read more below]

Key to victory – Joyce on National's 2008 campaign

The National Party’s election campaign of 2008 was notable for its relatively non-aggressive attitude to Labour, as well as its boring political advertising. Unlike in 2005 when National posed itself in starkly different terms to Labour via its iwi/Kiwi style contrast billboards, in the next election it decided to play down differences, remove humour from its ads, and to lay off criticising Labour. Campaign manager, Steven Joyce, explains why in his chapter on the National campaign in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts. The blog post briefly relays Joyce’s insights into the National campaign. [Read more below]

Key to Victory – Colin James on the 2008 election

Why was Labour turfed out of office in 2008? Colin James puts down the Government’s electoral decline to Labour’s ‘failure of political management’ in areas such as the Electoral Finance Act and the so-called anti-smacking bill, as well as generally being punished for pushing a heavy socially liberal agenda. Labour also lost the electoral fight to show that it was the toughest on law and order. James says that the victorious National Party got there due to John Key’s ‘bland leading the bland’ strategy, which now results in a managerial ‘government by MBA’. James writes about these issue and others in a chapter entitled ‘2008: The last baby-boomer election’ in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 (edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts). This blog post highlights some of the salient points made in this chapter. [Read more below]

The public funding of boozy political party conferences

The most interesting and bizarre part of the Auditor-General’s report on Phil Heatley’s crooked expenditure of public money has been the declaration that the public should pay for politicians to attend and drink at political party conferences. This is a significant line in the sand being crossed – that the costs of parliamentarians attending extra-parliamentary party events should be funded by the public. This shows just how dodgy the parliamentary rules are. And more than this, the rules have been shown that they are so lax that they can be legitimately interpreted to say that the public should pay the bill when politicians buy fellow party members bottles of alcohol. The only problem that the Auditor-General seemed to have with public money spent on such activity is that Heatley paid for it with the wrong account. [Read more below]

Key to Victory – Jon Johansson on political change in the 2008 election

Although the 2008 New Zealand general election led to a change of government, it wasn’t exactly a big-change election. Rather than heralding a complete change of policy direction, the election mostly offered more of the same. These points are well made in a chapter entitled ‘Leadership during transition’ by Jon Johansson in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 (edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts). Johansson also looks at the question of ‘What drives political change in New Zealand?’ and whether there has been any sort of generational shift in political leadership. [Read more below]

Key to Victory – Media coverage of the 2008 NZ election

Commercialism Vs Professionalism. That’s the tension present in modern media coverage of politics according to Babak Bahador, who’s written a very good chapter entitled ‘Media coverage of the election’ in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 (edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts). Bahador asks, ‘So how did the New Zealand media balance these forces during the 2008 election? Did they follow commercial trends in other Western democracies towards increasingly partisan, negative, presidential and superficial coverage? Or did they maintain a reasonable degree of professionalism in their coverage and fulfil their democratic duty?’. He attempts to answer these questions with a comprehensive content analysis of the New Zealand Herald, Dominion Post, the Press, and TV1 and TV3 evening news. He comes up with some very interesting results. [Read more below]

Key to Victory – Political imagery in 2008

The Labour Party thought that the 2008 New Zealand general election would be won on the issue of trust (i.e. voters becoming suspicious of ‘slippery John’ and his ‘hidden agenda’), whereas National thought it would be won on the issue of leadership personality and engagement with voters (i.e. the idea of Helen Clark being an out-of-touch elitist vs ‘common John’ who could relate socially to ordinary Kiwis). In the end, Labour was wrong and National was right, and critical ‘image events’ helped determine National’s win according to Claire Robinson’s chapter entitled ‘Images of political leadership in the campaign’ in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 (edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts) In fact, National effectively won the election back in mid-2007 by fighting and winning on the issue of leadership personality. [Read more below]

The Heatley scandal and the parliamentary culture of entitlement

Political finance scandals continue to plague New Zealand parliamentary politics in an entirely corrosive yet illuminating way. The latest scandal – the fall of Housing Minister Phil Heatley – once again helps the public understand the nature of the political Establishment in this country. It shows that the ‘class’ of people that run our society are infected with a ‘culture of entitlement’. Each new scandal and revelation shows that, as Matt McCarten has put it, there is ‘an ethical sickness’ in our Parliament. This blog post elaborates on this ethical sickness, by showing how politicians like Heatley epitomize a ‘born to rule’ and hypocritical elite that now pervades Parliament. [Read more below].

Key to Victory – Therese Arseneau on National’s winning strategy

Was Labour’s election loss in 2008 a ‘benign dismissal’? Therese Arseneau is not so sure that it was. Certainly National’s 2008 win was the result of a much cleverer and pragmatic electoral strategy than in 2005. Furthermore, although not unexciting, the campaign was rather lackluster, without any significantly defining issues, polarisation or passion. This is what Arseneau writes about in her chapter in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts. [Read more below]

Key to Victory – The YouTube campaign in 2008

The National and Green parties won the battle of YouTube in the New Zealand general election of 2008 according to a chapter entitled ‘2008: The YouTube campaign’ by Rob Salmond in the new post-election book Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008 edited by Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts. The chapter looks ‘at the different ways in which political parties used YouTube to communicate with New Zealanders’, and argues that successful strategies involved putting positive-themed political advertisements on television and using YouTube for the negative, attack-advertising. Unsurprisingly, twice as many YouTube clips were negative, and on average these were watched by 2.5 times more than positive videos. [Read more below]

Key to victory – Levine and Roberts' new book

New Zealand’s preeminent psephologists – that is, political scientists that study and explain elections - Stephen Levine and Nigel S. Roberts have just published their latest book, entitled Key to Victory: The New Zealand General Election of 2008. This edited collection is their ‘eighth in a series of New Zealand post-election books that have followed on from conferences held shortly after each general election’. The book attempts, they say, to provide ‘an overall perspective of what occurred and why’. As well as editing the book, Levine and Roberts wrote two chapters and a preface, which are discussed in this blog post. This work explains some of the factors shaping voting behaviour, making use of a pre-election voter survey that they commissioned – which they’ve done in every election since 1984. The results show, for instance that the Greens were the least liked party in the 2008 election, and that Helen Clark was no match for John Key in what was a two-horse leadership race [Read more below]

Vowles on why National won the 2008 NZ general election

In the 2008 general election, half of voters (51%) thought there were only ‘minor differences’ between the parties during the campaign, while only 38% thought there were actually major differences between the parties. Furthermore, when survey respondents were asked to place the parties on the left-right spectrum, ‘A third could not place Labour or National’. These findings from the New Zealand Election Survey surely reflects the policy convergence of the parties, and are detailed in Jack Vowles’ new academic chapter about the election. Entitled ‘The 2008 Election: Why National Won’, Vowles’ chapter is in the just published fifth edition of New Zealand Government and Politics, edited by Raymond Miller. Vowles provides many other interesting statistics about voters and the parties. This blog post highlights some of these things. [Read more below]

Levine and Roberts on the 2008 NZ general election

National won the 2008 New Zealand general election because it ran a relatively conservative election campaign, promised little real change, but most importantly, it was an attractive option because it would be ‘a government not led by Helen Clark’.  The whole campaign fight was largely about Clark and the unpopular perception of the politically correct regime she had established. The result was a new National Government that is spectacularly diverse in its makeup. This is what Victoria University of Wellington political scientists Stephen Levine and Nigel Roberts say in a new academic chapter about the election. Entitled ‘The General Election of 2008’, Levine and Roberts’ chapter is in the just published fifth edition of New Zealand Government and Politics, edited by Raymond Miller. The chapter is also notable for uncovering some interesting facts about the 2008 election campaign and the resulting Parliament. This blog post highlights some of these things. [Read more below]

Rebranding National – an academic view

How is it that a political party like National – deeply discredited by its extreme embrace of neoliberalism in the 1990s – could have so successfully found its way back into office last year? The answer is found in a recent conference paper given by André Broome of the University of Birmingham, entitled ‘Rebranding the Right? Political Baggage and the Redefinition of Party Identity’ [Download Broome]. Using the New Zealand National Party as a case study, Broome argues that rightwing parties rebrand to create distance from associations with previous – and unpopular – neoliberal terms in government. This excellent academic paper also explains why political marketing and branding have become such a central part of modern politics. It also argues that in countries like New Zealand, there is a very discernable shift towards policy convergence in elections, and a similar decline in the salience of left/right politics matched by an increase in postmaterialist competition. [Read more below]

Who runs New Zealand in 2009?

The 6th annual Listener ‘power list’ is out this week – seeking to shine a light on who makes up the modern New Zealand Establishment. This blog post offers an extensive critical summary of, and commentary on, the Listener’s list. Highlights include:

• Politicians do well on the power list. Although there are only 12 MPs in the whole list, 4 out of the top 5 are politicians. New entries include Simon Power, Judith Collins, Tony Ryall and Nick Smith.
• The Listener sure to do love John Key – although he’s too managerial and not rightwing enough
• The A-list ‘Top 10’ has been expanded by the peculiar inclusion of Phil Goff in the #11 position!
• One significant change in the A-list is Rodney Hide’s elevation from #7 to #4,
• Notably, Rightwing Treasury boss John Whitehead jumps into the A-list at #9
• Air New Zealand’s Rob Fyfe’s sudden inclusion at #6 of the A-list is a bit trivial
• The Listener heralds the inclusion of the country’s senior receiver, Michael Stiassny at #7, as ‘the most telling detail about this year’s Power List’
• Tariana Turia, is the only woman in the Top 10 power list at #8
• There are seven women on the power list this year; there are seven Maori
• The Environment category is distinguished by the arrival of five completely new environmental power listers – including Gareth Morgan. Nick Smith surges into the #1 spot from nowhere
• Four of ‘Business & Economy’ places go to either new entries or re-entries on the power list
• All five of last year’s Maoridom power listers have been delisted from this category in 2009; Pita Sharples is #2, transferring from #6 on the 2008 A-list, and coming in for criticism from the Listener
• In the Media category, John Armstrong of the New Zealand Herald is #3. And David Farrar has finally made the power list.

[Read more below]

The changing nature of ideological conflict in New Zealand electoral politics (1996-2008): The rush to the centre & the rise of post-materialist issues

To what extent does the left-right political dimension still structure political party competition in New Zealand politics? Where do the parties sit on that spectrum? What other political dimensions now underpin our electoral politics? This extensive blog post presents the findings of a regular survey of New Zealand political scientists about party ideological conflict that has been carried out for the three MMP general elections of 1996, 2002, and 2008. Explaining the results, and drawing on some previous blog posts, it argues that the left-right spectrum is of declining importance in New Zealand politics, and that ideological conflict is cohered to a greater degree by post-materialist issues. The major political parties in New Zealand now all agree on the basic post-Keynesian economic framework that dominates discourse and policy formation. No party fundamentally challenges the paradigm shift that occurred with the neoliberal revolution that occurred from 1984 onwards. All parties now agree, explicitly or implicitly, that the market is the best mechanism for generating wealth and distributing good and services. Within this ‘new policy consensus’ there is, of course, room for some limited discussion of when and where the state should intervene to correct market failure, but because there is essentially no debate of any substance around material/economic issues, what might be called ‘postmaterial issues’ now represent the arena for ideological and political conflict in parliamentary politics. Furthermore, within this post-reform era political conflict is underpinned by a strong pragmatism rather than principle. Some explanations are proposed for the rise of the new consensus, the decline of left-right conflict, and the increasing salience of societal issues in electoral competition. [Read more below]    

Bill English, the Auditor General’s report, and corruption management

Bill English has clearly been absolved of the allegations against him in terms of whether he has broken the rules. But there are two wider issues that are raised by a reading of the Auditor General’s report – whether English has acted ethically, and how Ministerial Services came to have such defective rules. I’d argue that that a system of ‘corruption management’ has essentially led to this situation, whereby all political parties – rather than just Bill English – are using the financial resources of the state to maximize their personal and political advantage. [Read more below]

National’s 2008 election campaign

The National Party’s 2008 general election campaign strategy was widely criticised for being conservative and uninspiring. There were three main integral elements that contributed to this blandness: an ideologically-centrist election platform, a relatively policy-free approach, and a general ultra-cautious attempt to avoid mistakes or cause offence to any voters. These are the issues that I focus on in the section on the National Party within my chapter entitled ‘Party Strategy and the 2008 Election’ which is part of the recently published book Informing Voters? Politics, Media and the New Zealand Election 2008 (edited by Chris Rudd, Janine Hayward and Geoff Craig). This blog post is the seventh of a series of explorations of the chapters from the new book, and it constitutes the original draft section about National that I wrote for my chapter. Subsequently this draft was substantially reworked, edited, and condensed for the final book, so please see the published book for the final and ‘authoritative’ version. [Read more below]

Political advertising in the 2008 NZ election

Which political parties had the best advertising in the last year’s general election? How come the Greens’ had such good advertising but did relatively poorly? What was wrong with Labour’s advertising? What was right about National’s advertising strategy? Did New Zealand First lose representation because of, or despite of, its election advertising and strategy? Did the Electoral Finance Act properly define and understand what a political advertisement is? Claire Robinson answers these questions in her chapter entitled ‘”Vote for me”’: Political Advertising’, published in Informing Voters? Politics, Media and the New Zealand Election 2008 (edited by Chris Rudd, Janine Hayward and Geoff Craig of the University of Otago Politics department). This blog post is the fifth of a series of explorations of the chapters from the new book (which I also have a chapter in). [Read more below]

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.

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]

Axing the electoral & political finance review

Alongside axing the awful Electoral Finance Act (EFA), the new National Government has also axed the supposedly more credible electoral and political finance review, which included a so-called Expert Panel and Citizens’ Forum. This blog post examines what was behind the review, and why the exercise was always going to be more about window dressing than democracy. Although expert panels and citizens’ forums are not without merit, when compared to similar exercises carried out elsewhere, the planned Labour-Green model for New Zealand was designed to be incredibly weak and undemocratic. What’s more the process by which it was brought about was just as poor as the one that produced the EFA. The National Party campaigned on axing both of these, and is now well within its right to do that. [Read more below]

Trotter on: Key vs English

Apparently John Key is a policy entrepreneur and engineer, while Bill English is an ideological passenger – and which of these two controls the direction of economic policy as the country grapples with the economic crisis will strongly decide the fate of New Zealand. In this week’s Independent Financial Review column, Chris Trotter characterises the future of the New Zealand economy as being determined by the natural ideological schism between John Key as prime minister and Bill English as finance minister, and whose vision wins out. English is painted as being conventional and Key as risk-taking and bold. Trotter clearly hopes that Key wins out, but suggests that this is unlikely. [Read more below]

Election analysis from the left

There’s been very little insightful or interesting analysis of the New Zealand general election results from the left of the political spectrum. This is partly because much of the left is so strongly tied to either the Labour Party or the Greens – both losers in the election.  However, John Braddock’s socialist analysis is fairly solid. Writing on the World Socialist Website, Braddock’s article Labour government dumped in New Zealand elections is a hard-hitting explanation of Labour’s loss, which he explains as a clear ‘clear repudiation of Labour and its pro-business orientation by significant layers of the working class’. [Read more below]

[NZ First party history] 18: People’s Treasurer or Treasury Poodle?

As the Treasurer in the National-NZ First coalition government, Winston Peters dubbed himself ‘The Peoples’ Treasurer’. Virtually all commentators, however, preferred the title of ‘The Treasury Poodle’. There is no doubt that, upon becoming part of the government, New Zealand First had to accept further elements of the new economic orthodoxy. While of course compromises have to be made in any coalition, ‘Peters in his role as Treasurer has not just compromised, he has become an enthusiastic convert to the National economic world view' (Laugesen, 15 Feb 1998: p.F1-2). Peters' role as Treasurer underlined NZ First’s further shifts to the right in economic ideology. His decision to take this portfolio was also a serious error for the party [Read more below]

Once were farmers… but now the political class are lawyers

When the 4th National Government came to power in 1990, the makeup of its Cabinet indicated that the National Party was still tied to its rural roots. Thirteen former farmers were appointed to the twenty-MP cabinet, together with a further three MPs from rural or provincial areas, while there was only one MP included from a metropolitan Auckland seat. The makeup of the new 5th National Government suggests that the party has qualitatively changed. In stark contrast to the old 1990s rural-based Bolger Cabinet, lawyers now outnumber farmers 8 to 2 in the Key Cabinet. [Read more below]

[NZ First party history] 2: Fourth National Govt & expulsion

The National Party’s 1990 general election campaign and manifesto essentially represented a hybrid between the Winston Peters and Ruth Richardson factions. At the same time that the party promised some sort of continuation of Rogernomics-style economic management, it also posed reassuringly as the party of stability and integrity with policies such as its promise to halve unemployment by 1993. Therefore, while Peters’ own economic ideology was now clearly out of step with that of the leadership, it was not necessarily inconsistent with the party’s election campaign. [Read more below]

[NZ First party history] 1: Origins

In light of the defeat of New Zealand First at the recent general election, the following blog post series focuses on the history of the party. Little academic research has been published on the Winston Peters phenomenon, despite the fact that he and his party have been central to parliamentary politics in New Zealand since the 1980s. This series – which focuses on the early history of the party – attempts to help fill this gap. This first post concentrates on the origins of the New Zealand First party, which can be traced back to the Muldoonist milieu in the National Party of the early-to-mid 1980s – both in personnel (the “Rob’s Mob” party members and the centrist MP Winston Peters) and ideology (economic and populist nationalism). This milieu was more characterised by its adherence to the ideology and political style of Muldoon than it was typical of the National Party tradition. [Read more below]

Issues in New Zealand politics in 2007

It might seem a bit odd to have a blog post about issues in NZ politics in 2007. But every year the European Journal of Political Research publishes a yearbook looking at what’s happened in the previous year in politics of 20+ western democracies. For the past decade or so, this has been written by Jack Vowles, but this year I’ve given it a go because Prof Vowles is no longer in the country. And the latest Political Data Yearbook (Volume 47, Issue 7-8, 2008) has just been published. You can read this in university libraries, and some universities will have online access to it here. But for those that can’t, below is the text that I submitted to the yearbook.  Although it pertains to last year, hopefully what I’ve written is actually a useful context for understanding the current election campaign. The extensive analysis includes discussion of all the major issues from an action-packed policy year involving the ‘anti-smacking’ law, the Electoral Finance Act, extensions and enhancements to KiwiSaver and Working for Families, the terrorism raids, scandals about Air NZ in the middle east, employment and politicisation in the public service, and the charging of Labour MP Phillip Field with corruption and bribery. There was also the rise of John Key and the attempted revitalization of Labour. I argue that although it appears contradictory, political consensus and conflict increased in tandem during 2007. [Read more below]

National goes politically correct

Has the National Party become politically correct? Its 2008 election candidate list suggests so, and in a sense it’s been rather PC for some time. Now the party is attempting to diversify itself by becoming ethnically-diverse and more gender balanced to reflect the modern face of New Zealand society. While of course there is absolutely no attempt to make the National caucus reflect the class nature of New Zealand society (which is overwhelmingly working class), it should be questioned whether this form of identity politics borrowed from the liberal-left is anything more than window dressing that obscures more important elements of what the National Party represents. [Read more below]

Business says to Labour: “go” but is indifferent towards National

The business community has lost confidence in the Labour Government, yet isn’t convinced that the National Party will carry out the necessary changes that they support. That’s the message from the Independent Financial Review’s triennial pre-election business survey.  In many ways it mirrors the Independent’s pre-election business survey that preceded Clark’s Labour Party coming to power in 1999. That survey of employers reported that they believed the National government should be voted out and that the Labour Party was then the preferred choice of business. [Read more below]

National’s policy vagueness – learnt from Labour

One of the main observations and complaints made about the Opposition National Party in recent months has been that it is not releasing policy and is incredibly vague about what it will do if it comes into government this year. These are fair questions and challenges to National, but... [Read more below]

[party membership] 7: The National Party

The National Party was previously the largest voluntary organisation in the country, and relative to population, was allegedly once the largest mass membership party in the Western world. [Read more below]

[political party social bases] 5: National Party

The National Party has traditionally been most strongly supported by farmers and wealthy urban dwellers. But as with the Labour Party, National has been highly affected by class dealignment in New Zealand politics. Studies show that National’s withering employer support is being steadily replaced by voter support from across the socio-economic spectrum. [Read more below]

[Third parties] 8: The decline of party linkages

Throughout the twentieth century it was commonplace for New Zealand’s political parties to be backed by various organised sections of New Zealand society (now often termed ‘third parties’). Parties parties were heavily anchored in societal organisations such as interest groups, community organisations and businesses. Towards the end of the century there was a blurring of this support, and these days societal organisations that might be expected to be on friendly terms with National can be found on good terms with Labour, and vice versa. But more than anything, such institutional-party relations have withered. [Read more below]

[Third parties] 2: National’s links

Norman Kirk famously described Federated Farmers as ‘the National Party in gumboots’, and Austin Mitchell pointed out that Federated Farmers and National Party branch meetings often appeared to be ‘the same people sitting in different rooms at different times’. However, National’s relationship with organised farming and business interests has definitely dwindled since then. Similarly, although traditionally the party was allied to many powerful institutions in New Zealand society, National’s deep connections with civil society has been replaced by an organisational professionalism. This post looks in detail at the National Party’s various third party linkages over its history. [Read more below]

Why the Maori and National parties fit together

Most on the left struggle to see how the Maori and National parties could ever coalesce or even how the Maori Party could help National into power. ‘Surely the parties are mortal enemies?’ they say. This fails to understand the political nature of both parties. These two nationalist parties have much more in common than most realise, and this means that their current repositioning could yet yield a closer working relationship or even a coalition agreement – especially if a repeal of the Foreshore and Seabed Act is involved. [Read more below]

National’s U-turns; Labour’s disorientation

There’s no doubt that National’s latest announcement that it’s adopting Labour’s interest-free student loans is a policy U-turn. In fact it’s just one more chapter in a whole series of U-turns. National’s been ‘swallowing dead rats’ for the last few years on: KiwiSaver, Working for Families, industrial relations, Treaty claims, retention of the Maori Seats (in the short-term), anti-nuclear policy, non-market rents, the Cullen Superannuation Fund, four weeks annual leave, among others. Meanwhile, Labour and its partisan bloggers don’t know how to deal with National’s shift to the centre. [Read more below]

Key’s law & order: 'Labour Party policy with a blue ribbon'

Justice Minister Annette King has provided the most accurate and concise analysis of John Key’s newly announced law and order policy for National by labeling it as ‘Labour’s policies with a blue ribbon’. The opening election campaign speeches by Key and Helen Clark have indeed shown just how bland and similar the two main parties are. Furthermore, they’ve reiterated what was argued on this blog in August last year – Law & order: the new political battleground - that law and order issues are shaping up to be one of the main areas of political debate in New Zealand due to the decline of economic differences in the parliamentary parties. [Read more below]

National tries to be squeaky clean; the Greens want to believe otherwise

The National Party has announced that it will not be endorsing any third party anti-Government advertising campaigns. Their announcement is mainly in response to the appearance of a marginal campaign group entitled 'Give NZ a Fair Go'. National’s statement is somewhat of a damp squid in the sense that National is simply announcing that they will be doing what they always do – which is not to endorse other interest groups or campaigns. Political parties generally don’t. But what the statement does point to is just how ultra careful and open the National Party are attempting to be. National’s campaign course is clearly all about safety. This year’s general election is their election to lose. So they won’t be taking any risks at all, and they’ll be doing everything they can to appear squeaky clean. No party – especially National – will want to be seen as being involved in anything untoward or covert. They’ll play the game by the book. And they’ll do their best to disassociate themselves from anyone seen as extremist. Instead of a bitter campaign – I think the parties will be falling over each other to be seen as nice. Negative advertising may actually play a more limited role than in other recent elections. I was briefly interviewed about this on Radio NZ National this morning. You can listen to the MP3 podcast of that here – I’m about half way through the item. For an alternative view read the Greens’ Russel Norman’s attempt to make logic fit his view that National will indeed be associating themselves with religious extremists. The post suggests that the Greens are stuck in 2005 and have failed to actually comprehend the huge damage that the Exclusive Brethren campaign had for National.