Insights

‘Insights’ is the weekly newsletter of The New Zealand Initiative. Every Friday it provides comment pieces on domestic and global policy issues and the state of the world as such. It is a newsletter serious enough for a think tank – and lighthearted enough for an enjoyable Friday afternoon read. Please subscribe to ‘Insights’ by visiting the website of The New Zealand Initiative: www.nzinitiative.org.nz

Insights

Government’s growing appetite

30/08/2013
Governments have expanded in times of crisis, and they have done so to meet the public’s growing expectations of social services. In effect, government growth is really the growth of the redistributive state. It’s the state that robs Peter to pay Paul – and often it also robs Peter to pay, well, Peter.

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Insights

Size is not the same as efficiency

09/08/2013
Many Wellington local politicians are pushing this ‘super city’ idea, but is it really good for local government? Or is it simply the tempting, less democratic prospect of being the mayor or councillor of an engorged Wellington?

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Insights

Tough but fair debates

02/08/2013
Not every proposal is automatically dubious just because it originates from your political opponents. A more civilised discourse that is tough but fair is what New Zealand lacks.

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Insights

The global importance of local government

26/07/2013
Throughout most of human history, cities were the dominant force of political affairs. From the very first cities of Mesopotamia in the seventh millennium BC, to Athens and Rome, and the city states of the Middle Ages, cities drove the development of political affairs, of culture, of democracy, of finance, of the arts, of education. History was made in and by these cities.

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Insights

Cash no longer king?

19/07/2013
Recent news about government agencies’ regular surveillance activities makes you appreciate the areas in which our lives cannot be monitored. Cash may no longer be king, but it is a little piece of freedom we carry in our wallets.

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Insights

In terms of badly used English

05/07/2013
A few years ago, my pet hates in the English language were narrowly defined. They were the handful of words and phrases football star David Beckham typically uttered when reporters courageously interviewed him. ‘You know’, ‘like’ and my personal favourite, ‘like, you know’ were chief among them.

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Insights

The return of “psychopath” Rudd

28/06/2013
Rudd’s second premiership may turn out to be short-lived because Australian Labor, divided and exhausted, lies in tatters. Only someone like Rudd could not care about that. After all, he never cared for anyone or anything other than himself. The kindergarten of Australian politics has finally turned into a farce. It is the Australian people who will have their say on it in the forthcoming elections.

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Insights

What if there’s no exit?

07/06/2013
The global economy may appear to have calmed somewhat since those stormy days when Lehman Brothers collapsed in late 2008. But it’s just the calm before an even fiercer storm.

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