I like this piece in The Guardian because it reinforces a few things I’ve been thinking.
Technology (esp mobile phones and the internet via social networks) can influence and drive political change, but they are a medium not an end.
If political parties behave like marketing companies and treat voters as shoppers, and their policies as slickly packaged products they’ll fail.
The overlooked lesson of Obama’s campaign is that it treated voters as citizens with active roles in a democratic society rather than passive consumers swayed by party marketing.
Couldn’t say it better myself.
PS: Oh and hat tip to Tom_Watson (via twitter)
Good stuff.
Well thats one of the problems with democracy. Some voters act like shoppers and are just looking for whats in it for them.
Less and less people today care about ideologies and care more about whats in it for them, which is why tax cutting is such a popular policy today, its promising people more money in their pocket.
You can say its the parties fault for acting like a market, but the people still vote for them. I think something like this has gone on with our last election and obviously with previous american ones, and probably in alot of other countries too.
‘Democracy is the WORST SYSTEM except for all the others’, it is the best choice but it is not perfect, this is one of its many flaws
p.s obama won coz he was black everyone knows that
@Dylan
It would sort of work….
If each person were to vote on their best interests then we should get representation within parliament based upon the needs of the population.
The problem is, we have a 2 party system. A majourity of people think that voting for the lesser parties is a waste of a vote. Add to that the fact that smaller parties seem to be able to hold an inordinate amount of power (look at NZ First, ACT and the Maori Party) despite the number of seats they hold.
Oh and about your p.s. I don’t think that’s at all true. America seems to have a certain momentum. We got the extreme right. It was time for the extreme left. The fact that it came down to a choice of 2 firsts – a woman or a black man – is indicative of what America needed. Better yet, it was more aligned with what the world needed from America.
@Clare
Amen to that. How do you propose to get people involved in politics rather than being passive shoppers during election time? Can the Internet do the same for politics as it did for journalism? What I mean by this is, can it break down those barriers and have people involved rather than sitting back on their heels and complaining about politics? One of the big things with any sort of online presence is that your participants need to feel some sort of value in participating.
So we’ve got a step – how do we proceed?
Less and less people today care about ideologies
Which I wholeheartedly endorse and support.
The old ideological battles are over. In particular, they’re done and dusted on Markets-vs-Centralisation and Class-Warefare (final score; 1-1).
@Nyven First of all I think you have a smart brain but how many zeitgiest films have you watched lately? Secondly Obama is no no way the extreme left!?
Anyway, your right saying the two party system is a big problem, but I think the main problem is, speaking generally, one is left leaning and one is right leaning, e.g labour/national, and to get more votes either party tends to learn towards the center to try and grab voters from the other side, so over time either party tends to look more alike.
I mean, labour in the 1930s was building state houses and a welfare state, in the 1980s they cut the farmers subsidies, in the 2000’s they were sitting on their asses not doing much at all with a big fat pay which is pretty much as right wing as you can get (please excuse my very broad and generalised timeline, we can sort that out in a later post)(seriously though, the last labour government didn’t seem to get much done, in comparison to what they used to, if you think you can proove me wrong then PLEASE DO BECAUSE BELIEVE ME I WOULD LOVE TO HEAR ABOUT LABOUR ACTUALLY DOING SOMETHING RECENTLY I’VE TRIED TO LOOK IT UP CAN’T FIND JACK PROOVE ME WRONG FOR THE LOVE OF GOD)
I think there are two main steps to solving this.
1. Get some men in the labour party who aren’t weak passionless sod’s and who have no rhetoric and who think they have to add a joke to every political statement they make and who has the strength to remind the country of what they need and to make labour what it used to be. (what this country needs, is in another post I hope you are ready for a big convo)
2. Make a party constitution setting down solid unchangeable values and requirements to make sure labour does not drift from its roots again.
@Phil, the battle will end when the struggle ends.
And also Obama is becoming increasingly unpopular. I mean, hes trying to centralise health care. Do you know how anti american that is? Public opinion of that bill is incredibly low in america. It’s a right wing nation, it always has been and may always be, they thought it might be cool to vote in a black guy ignoring how left his policies were, and now that hes in and trying to bring about left wing policies he is becoming increasingly unpopular.
More engagement with voters will get more voters and, hopefully, better policies. The problem is that some people wilfully don’t engage. This is seen with AGW and CCDs. The CCDs aren’t engaging instead they’re going out and finding authorities that agree with their prejudices and start quoting them as fact even after they’ve been shown that those authorities don’t actually know what they’re talking about and are, possibly, outright lying.
The better policies can occur but it means that people are going to have to become better informed and also to accept all facts even if they don’t like them.
No, actually, they aren’t. If anything, they’re about to start up again as the capitalist-market is a failure for the majority of people.
@ Dylan
Pundits before the election questioned whether it was politically possible for a black man to become President, so to dismiss his achievement like this is disingenuous.
I also get tired of people suggesting that our current representational democracy is the best we can expect. We could easily improve things by changing the mechanism around select committee; that is conducting a more egalitarian approach with participation possible over the Internet.
The politicians are not superhuman, we should stop expecting them to have all the answers. By having a system similar to scientific peer review it might be possible to develop policy and bills through an evolutionary and somewhat more inclusionary approach.
I’m not talking about a consensus based system; there will always be trade off’s; and the final call should remain in the hands of parliament. We can do better than a process where a group of MP’s pass judgement in a court like atmosphere that is geographically limited.
I’m not talking about developing policy in a chaotic forum either; there needs to be analysis and critical peer review. Considered reason and evidence should play the central role over the top of political ideology or dogma.
This would potentially lead to more stability rather than the current situation which lurches “left” and “right” every time the Government changes. I propose nothing less than a tyranny of reason.
@Peter
An EVEN MORE egalitarian approach? Even more time spent debating over issues? Even more time wasted on talking instead of action? Giving each seat an even more equal say so they get to spend even more time ranting?
Participation over the internet? I dont want to have grown a beard inbetween the time I see a debate arise and finish followed by action!
We don’t need a tyranny of reason. We need a tyranny of… well. We don’t need a tyranny of anything, but we do need more action.
Elections are important as they seem to be the only barrier to political corruption, but during a parties rule I think we need just the opposite to an egalitarian approach. There needs to be people there to put their foot down. A government can’t function properly unless it can make decisions surely, quickly effeciently. It needs to know its goals from election time and have nothing in its way until the next election.
Otherwise you get the mess you see on t.v with our politicians spending all their energy shouting at each other and screaming and arguing all day and at the end nothing comes out of it.
And also respect to Draco for saying the free market is a failure. It is those kinds of comments that labour needs. Because it’s what our country needs. We New Zealanders are a poor people. It’s bloody true. Take a look at our banks. They are all owned by foriegners because no new zealanders can afford to buy them.
Except one, Kiwibank, and thats owned by the state. Why are there none privately owned by any new zealand people? BECAUSE WE CAN’T AFFORD IT. And so the huge profits made by the banks float overseas. Except our state owned kiwibank. Now apply that theory to the whole damn economy. There are too many foreign investors coming in and reeling the profits made from our labour and consumption spending out of our country. And we are suffering for it.
There is one body in new zealand that has the wealth to keep our industries new zealand owned, to protect our economy from economic imperialism, to build and fund the projects the new zealand people need. And it is not a private body my friends, it is, and always has been, the state. And this was a value Labour was built upon. And I believe it is a value that labour is forgetting.
And it is not a private body my friends, it is, and always has been, the state.
That depends on how much power one wishes the state to have, I guess.
@ Dylan – “Well thats one of the problems with democracy. Some voters act like shoppers and are just looking for whats in it for them.”
Agreed – and thats why we have the current mess.
As for using various media to get the message out – its a good thing – but its only one thing in a box of tools that are needed to make sure that the people get the information they need, and the policies need to be real. Too often there is not enough consultation with relevant sectors on what is actually needed for a particular sector – instead, and I am loathe to wax lyrical on this as I am sure I have on a previous topic – a particular party whips up some policy (often as a knee jerk reaction to something – education is full of examples)and blink, its put into place with no due regard to the sector that must implement it.
As I see it (and have said before) there needs to be wider engagement with people – esp those that are unlikely to vote – and a real effort made to discover what needs to happen. Strategic vision is critical – and if done correctly, and here is where technology has a place – it will unite groups for a common reason. Unfortunately it does not happen often enough.
Oh and Dylan – more men needed? Surely more competent people full stop…
As an aside – how does the Nat party get away with their blatent advertising (its not an election year) with the full on phamplets that were delivered at the end of 2009 saying how wonderful they were and all the great things (or so they say) they did in their first year – can one of the labs tell me if they can do that? IF they can – and I saw two MPs versions – then is Lab also able to say what they achieved in the last year? Seems blatent PR and vote grabbing to me. If the nats can then I would have liked to have seen one from the labs in my letterbox too!!
@Dylan
Obama is extreme left in relation to America as you said in another post. Take the American’s fear of anything socailised and you’ve got a great big mess on your hands.
My big thing for Labour’s last term was that it was draconian. As far as I could see only the top couple of politicians seemed to have any sort of power at all. It seemed to be becoming more of a nanny state. It was on that basis alone that I really didn’t want to vote Labor. I think with that top heaviness gone and if Phil Goff can make Labor at the very least look to be cohesive and trusting of all of their ministers in parliament, they’ll have an advantage. If they can get back to their roots and focus on the people on New Zealand, they’ll be doing well. If they’re going to be signing free-trade agreements and the like, then they must also show how these agreements benefit the people of NZ. If copyright measures are to be put in, the same thing. On these foundations I believe Labor has the potential to be the idealist party that we so sorely miss.
@Peter
While not seeking a consensus system, I am definitely looking toward a more… engaging process. Very few people I know have attempted to have a voice heard other than signing the odd petition or sending their politician an email (which always seems to get the same old generic response which sidesteps any question you might have posed). Instead there’s more politics happening in the pubs where people are grumbling about the state of things.
Add to that the one time a petition had the potential to make a difference and the news jumps on the fact that it cost a crapload of tax payers money and politicians seemed to be making noises of removing that important part of the democratic process. If that money was to be spent, I would have preferred some of it went towards phrasing the question a little better (”as part of good parenting”?? wtf?!?).
@Dylan
A voted in party should have nothing in it’s way? Are you nuts? This is reminiscent of those capitalism pundits who are also claiming that the market will regulate morality itself and to leave it to do it’s thing. Need I say anything about the pay rates of those working in sweat shops throughout the world?
To me, the most important part of the democratic process is debate. If politicians weren’t to hear from industries and people, nothing would be done in their interests. Instead, you’d be further separating politicians from the people they’re representing. If we look back, S92A, the select committee had taken out that particular clause. This was an important part of the process. The fact that the process was sidestepped and that clause put back in without a thought as to why it was taken out in the first place is an indication that these processes need to exist. I’m not sure if more of these processes need to exist, but I’m with Peter when he says more avenues to do the same processes need to exist. i.e. The Internet used for select hearings.
@Dylan – about economics
Oh this is just messy. Whole other discussion. If we look at it, New Zealand is a cash cow. Take health care for example. If I want to go to a dentist, I look to see if I have the funds to go to Thailand. Why? Because we’ve got this horribly over inflated idea of costs of health care in New Zealand. My mother will go over to India if she suspects anything majourly wrong. She is quite happy to pay and not use the socialised healthcare over there as it’s still far cheaper over there. That and if she asks for a test, they’ll do it so long as she’s willing to pay.
We have fees on our bank transactions which I’m lead to believe don’t exist anywhere else. We have data caps on our Internet. We’re taught to live in debt and seem to believe it’s normal.
I don’t think foreign investment is the issue though. The issue is, we roll over and take it. Think about it. If you have a bad haircut, do you complain? Or do you walk away grumbling about the haircut and never return? Same with food. If we’re unsatisfied with the way things are, we should be making some noise. Let whoevers responsible know we’re not satisfied. Jetstar seem to add Insurance charges to every flight you take with them, which means their costs are almost as much as the “more expensive” airlines and have lousy customer services – such as closing check in counters early. If we made some noise, Jetstar may reconsider their position. But we don’t object. It’s within our power to make this better. If we don’t like the charges, well banks couldn’t survive without our money. Buy a safe or a safety deposit box and put your money in there.
As for state owned assets. I’ve been thinking on this one. Someone said to me that they don’t pay taxes in Dubai. Why? Because they have enough assets to generate the income needed by the government.
And again, we’re cash cows. Taxes and rates go up and we do nothing about it. I have a relative who works in the Auckland City Council, and I’m sure this is the same all around the country. He has said to me on more than one occasion that he has to spend x amount every week for the next x weeks. In otherwords, they don’t want to lessen their budget and so spend everything allocated to them. Meanwhile, rates continue to go up as it appears that every department needs what they had the previous year and then some. In otherwords, we even see ourselves as cash cows…
@Peter
It’s not only a matter of getting knowledge across, and getting the message out to people to vote for the right party, but you have to motivate them and inspire them too. National and labour have gotten their messages out with various media tools and people have gone out to vote, and yeah maybe they need to do more at that, but looking at most of the men and women I see in those parties I don’t think they could inspire a fly on cocaine to fly 1 meter to the worlds biggest rubbish tip. (like my metaphor? I just made it up)
In fact many western politicians seemed to have adopted the style of only having one expression (an extrodinarily weak smile) wearing a plain suit and talking in a monotone… To get as many good votes as possible you not only have to fill the peoples minds with thoughts and ideas, but you have to electrify them, you have to make them want to do something about the ideas you’ve put in their head.
@Nyven
Your talking about Labour’s general policies in their last term but to me it still sounds like a time void of many great events.
Sadly I was not around to see the other Labour, I am only young, I did not get to see the so called land of milk and honey, but I can see my parents and grandparents and practically my whole family as you say ’sorely missing’ that Labour and that New Zealand and that is why I want to see it come back.
You are right that debating is an important part of politics but you can have too much of it. Too much debate means an unresolved issue, thats all I am saying.
Cash cows, what exactly do you mean by that term? And reduced taxes is one of the many benefits of having a strong base of state assets (that is, state owned enterprises and not government organisations). I hope you don’t mind me using Cuba as an example for this but basically their entire country is run as a government organisation (all the buisnesses are for the welfare of the people and not profit), and the people dont pay any taxes. So where do they get their money from? They fuel the entire country on one state owned enterprise, the tourism industry. They treat it like a private enterprise, make billions of dollars for the state and the whole country runs on it.
(I’m not saying Cuba is an ideal country, I was just using them as an example this one time).
We could do something simular here. If we nationalised Tourism, we could deliver a Monster tax cut to the people and the public sector wouldn’t have to suffer for it.
Someone said to me that they don’t pay taxes in Dubai. Why? Because they have enough assets to generate the income needed by the government.
Possible because the government doesn’t need much income.
@Dylan
“To get as many good votes as possible you not only have to fill the peoples minds with thoughts and ideas, but you have to electrify them, you have to make them want to do something about the ideas you’ve put in their head.”
Lew at Kiwipolitico.com has written a bit on this quite recently if you’re interested:
The modern left’s obsession with facts and figures, expected utility and measurable outcomes should, in a rational world, grant them a strong advantage in any political contest. Indeed, the classical analysis is that democratic political systems which apportion votes by population rather than by wealth are inherently biased toward the working classes who are more numerous by definition. Given the assumption that Labour’s policies objectively provide greater material advantage to a larger number of electors than National’s policies, they should win that horserace every time
http://www.kiwipolitico.com/2010/01/the-riddle-of-keys-incredible-popularity/
Well its simple maths that state owned enterprises can reduce tax but your right we should look up weather they have a big govt expenditure.
Cuba would seem to be an extremely bad example of any done well that involves money.
@Dylan
Firstly – pet peeve – it’s Nevyn. NOT Nyven. Please don’t use Nyven again. It’s very rude.
A cash cow is an economic term. Basically you “milk” whatever for as much cash as you can possibly get.
Say you’re an oil company and you develop an electric car which is cheaper to produce and run. Now oil becomes your cash cow. You wouldn’t release that car right away. You’d increase the price of oil and get as much cash from it as humanly possible.
In the context I was using the term, we seem to accept a whole lot of charges (ways of milking us for cash) that people in other countries won’t accept. We carry on paying those charges and never kick up a fuss. So the better product is what can be seen overseas.
Oh and I wasn’t really old enough to see Labors term before their last time either. Or not comprehend it properly at least. My Grandfather used to drink with David Lange and Robert Muldoon but that’s about as close to politics that I got. Labor are known for state housing and all sorts of other things that generally help people. We’re a welfare state (i.e. we help people when they’re down on their luck which is also why I think those ads in Auckland about supporting the Auckland City Mission is really inappropriate).
I accredit much of this to Michael Joeseph Savage – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Joseph_Savage
@Stephen
The fact that cubas so terrible with money was kind of a part of my point, they have one of the worlds lowest GDPs but they still manage to survive, the little they have achieved is thanks to one SOE. That’s all I’m sayin, them having one SOE lets them survive and lets them pay for one of the best education/health care systems in the world while having no taxes because the people wouldn’t be able to afford to pay sufficient taxes to have any public services at all no matter what system they had, they have always been a poor people.
@Nyvynen
John Lee was also quite responsible for the state housing scheme, although him and savage ended up fighting with each other both were quite responsible for labours achievements in that time period.
And Muldoon… was one of the men responsible for destorying what labour had built new zealand into for decades in just a few years, with the whole Think Big project and it’s failures which led to the debt we owed and us having to sell our state assets and even some monopolies coming out of it in the process (telecom), sad that your granddad was drinking with him mine would have strangled him if he got the chance.
And so you mean we are cash cows as in the government uses us for tax? I dont know what to think of that statement as most of our taxes come back around to us.
@Dylan
Something wrong with you? Can’t spell a simple name??! Seriously dude. Some courtesy or stop talking to me.
The reason I see tax as using us as a cash cow is because the government seems to see us as their sole source of income. No investments. In fact, National do a pretty good job of selling off any state assets. Labor seem pretty good at making a loss on state owned assets (rail services for example before they sold ‘em).
Look at the “surplus” that Labor had in their budget for most of their last term. Even though there was money there, that money wasn’t spent in acquiring assets that could help the State reduce it’s dependence on taxes.
Face it, you’re being milked.
@Nevyn (sorry bro I was just kidding… I got a problem with grammar Nazis thats all)
Yeah your right. The state Can get their own sources of income with SOEs. And they should. nuff said
OH MY GOD I JUST REALISED SOMEHTING SO IRONIC!!!!!!!!
ARE YOU READY FOR THE MOST IRONIC THING YOU WILL EVER HEAR???
National voters are right wing and want less tax…
So they vote for national…
But national has a habit of selling off state assets..
WHICH MAKES THE GOVERNMENT NEED A GREATER AMOUNT OF TAX…
National and the NZ right wing try to reduce tax Whilst trying to sell state assets! Is that terrible economics or what!?