For example;

In Syria, opposition-baked forces have taken Aleppo city and other strategic centres in an attempt to remove Syria’s authoritarian leader Assad. Assad’s forces are resisting on the ground while Russian air forces attacked the opposition force’s positions. Israel announced it may strike Syria government munitions sites in a move to ensure opposition forces do not take possession of such weaponry.

Meanwhile, fighting has intensified on the Ukraine-Russia frontlines after:

• North Korea deployed a 10,000-strong assistance force to the Kursk region;
• Outgoing US President Joe Biden authorised Ukraine to fire ATTACM missiles deep into Russia;
• Ukraine indeed fired ATTACMs into the Russian motherland and has increased its drone attacks on military targets in cities once regarded as safe from attack.
• Also, and significantly, Russia fired into Dnipro City in Ukraine a hypersonic “experimental” Medium-Range-Ballistic-Missile – and followed up with the biggest barrage of drone and missile strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure since the conflict began.

So-called “red-lines” have been crossed and all sides appear determined to take as much territory as possible before US President-Elect Donald Trump is sworn into office in January.

Paul and Selwyn assess what we can expect to witness in the next two months, how other state actors are being drawn into conflict, and what objectives are driving warring sides at flashpoints around the world.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of our podcasts, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

In this episode of A View From Afar political scientist Paul Buchanan and host Selwyn Manning will analyse how conflicts are expanding, arguably with warring sides taking an opportunity to take as much territory, while a ‘Lame-Duck Window’ exists in the United States.

For example;

In Syria, opposition-baked forces have taken Aleppo city and other strategic centres in an attempt to remove Syria’s authoritarian leader Assad. Assad’s forces are resisting on the ground while Russian air forces attacked the opposition force’s positions. Israel announced it may strike Syria government munitions sites in a move to ensure opposition forces do not take possession of such weaponry.

Meanwhile, fighting has intensified on the Ukraine-Russia frontlines after:

• North Korea deployed a 10,000-strong assistance force to the Kursk region;
• Outgoing US President Joe Biden authorised Ukraine to fire ATTACM missiles deep into Russia;
• Ukraine indeed fired ATTACMs into the Russian motherland and has increased its drone attacks on military targets in cities once regarded as safe from attack.
• Also, and significantly, Russia fired into Dnipro City in Ukraine a hypersonic “experimental” Medium-Range-Ballistic-Missile – and followed up with the biggest barrage of drone and missile strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure since the conflict began.

So-called “red-lines” have been crossed and all sides appear determined to take as much territory as possible before US President-Elect Donald Trump is sworn into office in January.

Paul and Selwyn will assess what we can expect to witness in the next two months, how other state actors are being drawn into conflict, and what objectives are driving warring sides at flashpoints around the world.

Live Audience: Remember, if you are joining us live via the social media platforms, feel free to comment as we can include your comments and questions in this programme.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

An important (and widely commented on) book published last year is End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration, by Perer Turchin. Before reading this book I read his 2007 book War and Peace and War (see my 30 Jan 2024 article Asabiyya), Ages of Discord (2016, an application of Turchin and colleagues’ cliodynamic model to the history of the United States), and the Kindle summary of Secular Cycles (2009).

Despite the millenarian undertones suggested by the book’s primary title, this is a product of the application of statistical analysis to macrohistory; the content is mainly about United States’ history, but the model may be applied to other nation states.

The model of sweeping history was originally developed to explain big change in ‘agrarian civilisations’ of the historical world; the ‘rise-and-fall of civilisation’ kind of history that was more in vogue in the nineteenth than in the twentieth century. It is an application of the deductive scientific method (think of Karl Popper’s Logic of Scientific Discovery; 1959 in English, 1934 in German), which uses a sparse theoretical ‘model’ and tests the predictions of that model using whatever relevant data his team are able to find. For historical work, Turchin has had to make substantial use of proxy data, because rarely is the required data for a historical period actually collected in that period. Turchin’s project is a heroic endeavour, but nevertheless very effective.

The essence of the structural-dynamic model is the alternation of integrative and disintegrative long-phases of nation’s histories. And, from his earlier work, there’s a strong sense that civilisations go through three of four of these alternations before civilisational collapse finally takes place.

If we apply the model to various liberal western countries, we see similar patterns, though the historical turning-points – the short-periods in which one long-phase gives way to another – are rarely identical. Nevertheless, we can apply the model to western civilisation in general, though with slightly different transitions from one phase to another.

The central drivers of the model are demographic and economic; changing levels of inequality, and a kind of Malthusian population struggle between elites, aspirant elites, and counter-elites. The central dynamic of his model is what he calls the ‘wealth pump’; though it’s a dynamic which uses ‘wealth’ in its financial sense rather than its economic sense. (Economists would call economic growth a ‘wealth pump’, and see growth as an equalising rather than an unequalising process; for Turchin, the wealth pump represents a transfer of financial wealth from the poor to the rich.)

Key phrases in Turchin’s model are ‘popular immiseration’, ‘elite overproduction’, ‘ruling class’, and ‘counter-elites’. It’s essentially a model of class war, but not a Marxist model.

225 years of United States’ structural-dynamics

We may start with the United States after its late-eighteenth-century revolution; this start should be familiar to everyone who attended and absorbed the story of Hamilton (the Musical), which had a successful theatrical season in New Zealand in 2023.

We may date the United States’s first integrative phase from the 1790s. The first part of the phase – from the 1790s to the 1820s was characterised by low levels of class inequality, and hence a period of political consensus in which elite incomes were not excessive relative to the incomes of free workers. (While Turchin doesn’t shy away from the issue of slavery, this is understood as a ‘given’ and hence not a source of division between the elites and the free populace of an America dominated by the South.)

Things change in the late 1820s, when class-based divisions start to appear, and new elites begin to assert themselves. This is the second part of the integrative phase, the formation of elites during a period nevertheless of general economic growth. The disintegrative phase begins with the Civil War in the early 1860s, and continues through the Gilded Age into the early 20th century.

Population growth is the principal driver of phase-change. The ‘Malthusian’ argument is that elite-opportunities grow arithmetically whereas elite-aspirants grow geometrically (a less emotive word than ‘exponentially’).

The disintegrative phase begins with ‘popular immiseration’ (essentially inequality arising from the spoils of economic growth being almost entirely captured by the elites rather than by the various working classes); and when frustrated elite-aspirants form counter-elites; the context being that almost all successful revolutions in history have been instigated by counter-elites rather than by an immiserated populace.

The shift to a new integrative phase may be very violent, or may take a more enlightened form. Turchin argues that the transition happened in the United States in the first three decades of the twentieth century; starting with the middle-class ‘progressive movement’ (which, incidentally, drew inspiration from changes happening in New Zealand in the 1890s and 1900s) which peaked under the first President Roosevelt, and ending with the Great Depression and the ‘New Deal’ instigated by a second President Roosevelt. While there was much political violence in those three decades, the revolution that took place was nevertheless as peaceful as a class revolution can be.

The first and most important (relatively egalitarian) stage of the next integrative phase can be summarised as 1930s’ New Deal to 1960s’ Great Society; with the rumblings of next phase change beginning in the late 1970s, and coming to fruition in the 1980s under the presidency of Ronald Reagan (ie Reaganomics).

The period from the 1980s to the 2000s are the period of growth characterised by elite-expansion and growing elite-rivalry. In that sense, the Global Financial Crisis comes at the same stage of the secular cycle as the 1860s’ Civil War. And the 2010s’ formed an increasingly tense period in which the new counter-elites emerged; in the United States these counter-elites may be regarded as the ‘intellectual-backers’ of ‘Trump’s mob’, of Donald Trump’s MAGA transition of the Republican Party into a nationalist party pitching to the populace. Here the populace are the precarious labour class, the precarious small business class, and – increasingly – the underclass which is overrepresented by the African-American descendants of the former slave population. So, Turchin’s model points to the United States at present as being at the cusp of a revolution that could turn violent.

While Turchin emphasises the particular control of the ‘ruling-class elite’, the ‘one-percenters’, he also notes the significance of the new elites, the ‘ten-percenters’. Indeed, we may see that the present politicisation in the west as the ‘liberal’ ten-percenters clashing against a coalition of the ‘very rich’ and the new immiserated poor.

In New Zealand, we can see clear parallels with these historical dynamics. We note that the last ten years in New Zealand saw a substantial expansion of elites, especially what might be called ‘progressive elites’. Since the 2023 election, however, there has been a precipitous decline in elite income-earning positions; the result is an increasing number of thwarted elites, noting that successful violent revolutions in history have been masterminded by counter-elites.

Some nuance

Peter Turchin’s structural model is powerful in its simplicity. Other factors, largely omitted from Turchin’s discussion, may actually strengthen his conclusion; a suggestion that the whole of western civilisation may be approaching an explicable, and likely violent, turning point.

The ‘wealth pump’ has created huge amounts of poverty amidst an unsustainable plenty. And that sheer unsustainability of the elite wealth machine has informed one component of the new and young counter-elite; the Green movement, which is forming youthful alliances around geopolitical human rights, as epitomised by the persecution of Palestine and a growing awareness of its history.

So, the first of the three extra points to emphasise is the clash of elites and new counter-elites as a generational conflict. This applies as a more general feature of youth-immiseration; most deeply felt by the frustrated adult children of the expanded elites of the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s. Much of their frustration is not just Green idealism and international social justice; it’s about the practical realities of finding houses to live in, and, for at least the heterosexual young, to at least contemplate the possibility of family formation.

Turchin’s model is based on normal demographic growth. Today’s situation is supercharged by today’s exceptional demographics, which include very low first-world fertility, aging bulge generations; and economic pressures towards international economic migration, comparable with the pressures many of our ancestors faced in their homelands, but with the cruellest of nationalist barriers in place to suppress such migration and despite labour shortages in the recipient countries.

As part of his model which emphasises population growth and wages, Turchin notes immigration policy as a factor that reinforces the domestic wealth-pump. The elites favour immigration, he argues, to keep wages low.

My second extra point is to extend the definition of ‘elite’. Turchin uses an essentially financial definition; that being elite is a defined principally by income and wealth, noting that wealth gives a person or a clique power over others (as in the ruling one percenters) or at least (for the ten-percenters) enough power to resist having one’s life choices determined by others.

I would additionally define elites as subscribers to the dominant social narratives, and to a lesser extent subscription to prominent counter-narratives. Thus, to be an elite you have to conform to one or other social narrative; indeed, that’s how elite careers are structured. It means that to have a nice house and to have a family life with a sense of economic security, you may have to give up a degree of intellectual autonomy.

My third extra point is the role of interest rates in supercharging Turchin’s wealth pump. (Refer to my Is Inflation Really Too High? Scoop 23 July 2024, and The Truth in New Zealand about Price Inflation and Interest Rates, Evening Report 22 July 2024.)

In Turchin’s model, the driving force is population growth, creating excess labour supply, meaning that real hourly wages set in competitive markets fall, or they don’t rise as the economy grows. While the same applies at the elite level, people who want to get ahead in this kind of labour market look to transition from the ranks to the elites. So long as this transitioning – ‘getting ahead’ – is the vital dynamic, then the nation remains in its integrative phase.

The wealth pump, at least in the recent phases of the cycle, has predicated on positive real interest rates. These are the above-inflation interest rates which enable compound interest to do its ‘magic’; a financial alchemy which is in reality a transfer from productive poor people (workers, small businesses) to rich people many of whom must be classed as unproductive by any sensible definition of that word. Thus, the wealth pump may be supercharged by high interest rate policies. (Balanced budget low tax fiscal policies serve a similar purpose, leaving the private elites with ever more surplus wealth.)

This chart (from the Evening Report article) shows this ‘wealth pump’ norm as it was in New Zealand during the years 2000 to 2008. We can understand recent high interest rates as an attempt by the financial elites to reestablish the interest rate boost to the wealth transfer mechanism identified by Turchin.

(We may note that, when the wealth pump is turbo-charged by high interest rates, the structural-cycles pass more quickly. Turchin cites another example of an accelerated cycle; polygamous ruling classes, such as in late-medieval Egypt, which bred elite-aspirants at a much too great a pace to find elite positions for them.)

The main impact of sustained positive real rates of interest is popular immiseration; keeping the poor poor, and expanding the ranks of the poor as increasing numbers of businesses fail.

Ukraine

Peter Turchin is an American of Russian heritage. Included in his argument is an evaluation of ‘plutocracies’ as a somewhat exceptional form of nation state. In this sense, he is acquiescing in the notion that the United States is an exceptional state; a plutocracy – ruled by the rich (especially the super-rich) for the rich – rather than an administrative or military bureaucracy.

Turchin identifies Russia in the 1990s as an unstable plutocracy, which reverted in the 2000s to a militarised bureaucracy. He shows that Belarus, Russia’s ally, was never a plutocracy. And he argues that Ukraine continued to be a Russian-style plutocracy, because it never had its Putin moment. (We in New Zealand may remember that Russia’s Putin-moment happened in 1999; indeed Vladimir Putin left the Auckland APEC convention early, as the Boris Yeltsin regime was falling as Yeltsin himself faced his own mortality.)

In an insightful few pages, Peter Turchin argues that Ukraine continues to be one of the few genuine plutocracies in the world, and that Ukrainian domestic history this century has essentially been one of clashing oligarchs, with a particular demarcation between that country’s eastern and western divisions. It is this plutocratic alliance that particularly attracts United States’ interest, he argues; and one could argue that the Biden family’s former involvements in Ukraine reflect that political love affair. (Hunter Biden does remind me of a character from HBO’s award-winning drama, Succession.)

Conclusion

The West may or may not be poised on the cusp of a violent revolution, driven by counter-elites; but I’m sure it’s on the cusp of some turning point. Too much that is happening in the United States is also happening in the other countries of the western ‘first-world’ alliance. Turchin expects that the world will pass through a revolutionary turning-point by 2040; either renewal or collapse.

*******

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

Today, political scientist Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will examine: The United States and how the world is engaging with it geopolitically.

Specifically, we will analyse what has changed in this regard in 2024. And we will consider whether some leaders of global, regional, and even small powers are preparing for the possibility of a second Donald Trump presidency.

And, importantly, at this juncture, are some leaders who are central to conflict in the world today, regarding the Biden Administration as having entered a lame-duck period?

Live Audience: Remember, if you are joining us live via the social media platforms, feel free to comment as we can include your comments and questions in this programme.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

In this the tenth episode of A View from Afar for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and journalist/analyst Selwyn Manning examine the current Israel-Palestine Atrocities.

As we prepared for this podcast, representatives of Arab states have presented a united front at the United Nations, criticising the UN Security Council of doing nothing to protect civilians from Israeli bombing and missile attacks on Gazan civilians and locations.

Since then, the UN Security Council has considered two resolutions, the latter calling for a pause in hostilities to allow a humanitarian effort to enter Gaza to assist civilians.

The United States vetoed that Security Council resolution.

Al Jazera has detailed that Israel forces have targeted and bombed civilian facilities include Hospitals, schools, residential areas resulting in the deaths of thousands of people, civilians, – around one-third of the deaths are children.

It remains contested by all sides in this conflict as to who, or what, is responsible for the deadly attack on Gaza Hospital, resulting in the deaths of over 471 people.

Additional to this, Israel has sealed the borders of Gaza while it prevents food, water and medical supplies from reaching civilians – in breach of international law requirements and laws of conflict.

Israel ordered Gazan civilians, who wish to get to safety, to get out of North Gaza and move toward the south, to the border with Egypt. But as people fled south toward what appeared to be safety, Israel bombed the southern Gaza region killing more civilians and sealing off that corridor for others who sought refuge.

As a consequence of the bombing, Egypt responded by sealing the Gaza-Egypt border.

Humanitarian aid now sits on trucks, waiting, on the Egypt side of the border, while United Nations officials implore Israel and Egypt to allow medical supplies, food and water to get through to those who are injured and dying.

The Israel Defence Force strikes followed a surprise-attack on Israeli citizens by soldiers operating under the Hamas banner.

Civilians were slaughtered and others taken hostage, only to be used as bargaining chips and leverage against their enemies.

Even Palestinian advocacy groups like the Palestine Solidarity Network Aotearoa suggested that breaches of international humanitarian Law, crimes against civilians, have been committed by those Hamas-aligned fighters. But they are clear, as others are too, that crimes against humanity, war crimes, have been committed by Israel, without consequence, as we all give witness to its response which is disproportionate, brutal, and disregarding of the thousands of Palestinian lives that have already been taken.

That’s the current situation. It is likely to get much worse.

In this episode, our questions will include:

What are the world’s leaders doing to stop the carnage?

Are the world’s nations being drawn into what will be an ever-expanding war?

Are we witnessing the beginning of a war where on one side authoritarian-led states like Russia, Iran, the wider Arab states, and possibly China stand unified against the United States, Britain, Germany, and other so-called liberal democratic allies representing the old world order?

Is what we are witnessing, what happens when a global rules-based order, multilateralism and institutions like the United Nations no longer have influence to prevent war, or restore peace and stability, or assert principles of international justice and enforce the rights of victims to see recourse to the law?

Why has this slaughter become an opportunity for the US and Russia to square-off against each other at the UN Security Council – a body that was once designed to advocate and achieve peace, but has now become a geopolitically divided entity of stalemate and mediocrity?

Eventually, will humanitarianism prevail? Will the world recognise that all people, the elderly, women, children, people of all ethnicities and religions, that they all bleed and die irrespective of their state of origin, when leaders of all sides, while sitting back in their bunkers, unleash weapons designed to kill as many people as is possible?

In this episode, Paul and Selwyn examine this most grave situation from a geopolitical vantage point. It may appear as dispassionate, and as so even disturbing, but we will take this approach in an attempt to aide an understanding of why this is happening in Gaza and why it is happening now.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

The BRICS are back.

Johannesburg will this week host the 15^th annual summit of the BRICS, an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

The loose grouping may be about to become tighter – and bigger.

Some 40 countries have expressed interest in joining the BRICS, which already represent over 40 per cent of the world’s population and 30 per cent of global GDP when measured using purchasing power parity (PPP).

Potential new BRICS members span the globe, from Africa to Asia and Latin America. Candidates and formal applicants include Argentina, Egypt, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

The timing of the surge in interest might seem surprising.

After all, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has seen Vladimir Putin become a pariah in the West – and problematic even elsewhere, thanks to the arrest warrant for the Russian president issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in March.

South Africa and the ICC’s 122 other member states are obliged to enforce the warrant – which explains why it was decided ‘by mutual agreement’ that Putin would attend this week’s summit only virtually.

This does not mean the Global South wants to completely isolate Russia. Heads of state from 17 African countries – including South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa and Egypt’s Abdel Fattah el-Sisi – attended a Russia-Africa summit in Moscow in July.

Ramaphosa is among those working the diplomatic track to try and find a pathway to peace in Ukraine. He is not the only one: in early August, Saudi Arabia also hosted talks in Jeddah that included representatives from more than 40 countries – including China, India, the US and Ukraine itself. On this occasion at least, Russia was not invited.

It remains to be seen whether the BRICS can – or want to – transform themselves into a larger grouping of Global South countries.

For New Zealand, the potential for an enlarged BRICS poses something of a dilemma.

Until now, the BRICS has been mainly an informal grouping. There is no BRICS secretariat.

However, if the BRICS decide to expand their club and adopt more formal structures, New Zealand would almost certainly rule out engagement because of Russia’s involvement.

Wellington has firmly backed the Western position on Ukraine since the war began, placing sanctions on Moscow and sending military support to Kyiv.

At the leader level, a visit to China in June by New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has been the exception that proves the rule.

The travel patterns of Hipkins and his predecessor, Jacinda Ardern, have heavily favoured Western destinations such as Australia, EU countries, the UK and the US. Only a handful of trips have been to countries that would be considered part of the Global South.

The picture looks a little different when it comes to the travel schedule for Nanaia Mahuta, New Zealand’s foreign minister.

This year, Mahuta has visited three of the BRICS countries – India, China and South Africa. She has also visited Indonesia – for ASEAN meetings – and, in the Pacific, Fiji and Vanuatu.

To be fair, these destinations have been part of a wider travel schedule in 2023 that has also included Brussels for a NATO foreign ministers’ meeting, as well as stops in Japan and Singapore. Mahuta also recently met US Secretary of State Antony Blinken when he visited Wellington.

Still, there might be something to the notion that Mahuta might be more ‘BRICS-friendly’ than other ministers in the Labour Cabinet. This includes the more pro-Western Hipkins and Ardern, and the Government’s notably hawkish defence minister, Andrew Little.

For example, Mahuta has attempted to put the brakes on New Zealand joining Pillar II of AUKUS. During Blinken’s visit, she told media ‘I’ll be really clear, we’re not contemplating joining AUKUS’, at odds with her own Prime Minister’s line that New Zealand was ‘open to conversations’ on the matter.

And in June, Mahuta gave a speech to the New Zealand Institute of International Affairs (NZIIA) conference in which she rejected ‘binary choices’ and said New Zealand’s ‘global partnerships are not exclusively with those mirroring our views’.

Of course, rhetoric is one thing – and actions quite another.

Mahuta has yet to visit Latin America, for instance. In fact, aside from John Key’s attendance at an APEC summit in Peru in 2016, no New Zealand Prime Minister has made an official visit to Latin America since 2013.

Moreover, the Government recently announced that funding for the Latin America Centre of Asia-Pacific Excellence (CAPE) – New Zealand’s only real centre of government capability for engagement with the continent – would be cut entirely from mid-2024. Given the opportunities, the decision appears perplexing at best.

New Zealand’s engagement with the Middle East is also worth considering. Mahuta visited the United Arab Emirates and Qatar as part of her inaugural foreign trip in November 2021, while Damien O’Connor, the trade minister, quietly visited Riyadh last year to chair the first meetings of New Zealand’s Joint Ministerial Commission with Saudi Arabia since 2018.

On the other hand, New Zealand Prime Ministers generally prefer to change planes in the Gulf on their way to Europe without making a stopover – a lost opportunity. The last leader to visit the region was John Key in 2015.

Further west, Helen Clark was the last Prime Minister to visit Egypt – which has officially applied to join the BRICS – in 2007, when she opened New Zealand’s embassy in Cairo.

Morocco has also been suggested as a potential BRICS member, although a report at the weekend rejected earlier suggestions that Rabat had made an official application. The country is home to Africa’s largest port, while Marrakech is hosting the annual meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) in October.

The BRICS contenders are clearly still hedging their bets.

After all, the biggest achievement of the BRICS so far has been financial in nature: the BRICS-backed New Development Bank (NDB) was launched in 2015 and has provided loans of more than $US30 billion to date.

This is still small when compared with the World Bank, but the NDB is growing and could become an important player in climate finance. There are parallels with China’s Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) that counts New Zealand as one of its members.

The BRICS want to issue more loans in local currencies, circumventing the US dollar that currently underpins much of the international system. A common BRICS currency could be an ultimate end goal.

It is unlikely that New Zealand would be a fan of every BRICS aspiration – and Russia’s inclusion perhaps makes the bloc too hot to handle, at least for the time being.

But the BRICS could yet turn into something akin to APEC, an economic-focused bloc of countries big and small, from different continents.

This could entail all manner of meetings and summits – an outcome that could provide valuable and more effective face-time opportunities for Wellington.

As things stand, New Zealand is too small for the G7 or G20. It is in the wrong region to join a geographically-focused bloc such as ASEAN or the EU. And APEC – while having laudable aims –has lost momentum as geopolitical tensions between its members continue to build.

One thing is clear.

Fifteen years on, the BRICS are not going away.

New Zealand needs to think more about them.

*******

Geoffrey Miller is the Democracy Project’s geopolitical analyst and writes on current New Zealand foreign policy and related geopolitical issues. He has lived in Germany and the Middle East and is a learner of Arabic and Russian. He is currently working on a PhD on New Zealand’s relations with the Gulf states.

In this the eighth episode of A View from Afar for 2023, political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning examine the risks of a 21st century nuclear war.

The movie Oppenheimer has renewed interest in the dawn of the nuclear era. Almost 80 years later, are we safer from nuclear war than we were in the years immediately after 1945?

The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists moved its Doomsday Clock hand to 90 seconds before midnight, the highest threat level since the Cuban Missile Crisis.What does that say about contemporary international security affairs?

No new nuclear arms limitation agreements have been signed in over a decade, several have lapsed and most nuclear armed countries are not signatories to them anyway.

Countries like China are rapidly expanding their arsenals and others like North Korea and Iran are seeking to join the nuclear armed club.

Has nuclear arms control failed?

What is the future of the Non-Proliferation Treaty?

Although conventions against the use of chemical and biological weapons are widely recognised, violations of the prohibitions have occurred regularly, most recently in Syria. Weapons like white phosphorus and cluster munitions continue to be used by many states.

The Questions include:

• Has non-nuclear arms control failed as well?

• Russia’s Putin Regime has threatened to use nuclear weapons against Ukraine and NATO. Is the nuclear genie about to come out of the bottle, even in a tactical use?

• Are we seeing the return of weapons of mass destruction (WMD)?

• Are we on the brink of Oppenheimer’s nightmare: nuclear Armageddon?

• And importantly, what are the solutions to this most serious and dangerous threat?

INTERACTION:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

In this the sixth episode of A View from Afar for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul G. Buchanan and Selwyn Manning present a two-part episode to analyse what to make of New Zealand Prime Minister, Chris Hipkins’ bilateral meetings with People’s Republic of China’s President Xi JinPing and other leaders of the PRC.

In part one, Paul and Selwyn also consider how the PRC-NZ trade relationship is seen in the eyes of New Zealand’s security partners.

Then, in the second half of today’s podcast, Paul and Selwyn analyse the most recent events in Russia – events that have taken shape since Wagner Commander Yevgeny Prigozhin’s pronounced intent to mobilise his mercenaries against the Russian Federation’s top two military heads, and, while doing so, pronounced that the Kremlin’s decision to invade Ukraine was based on falsehoods.

What should we expect next? What is the real state of Putinism? What do the political and power elites in Russia make of President Vladimir Putin’s handling of the matter?

Weeks prior to this event happening inside Russia, Paul and Selwyn analysed the question: How stable is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hold on power? It’s a question that all those who watch Russian affairs have now been confronted with.

In this episode Paul and Selwyn unpack the complexity, look at what has changed as opposed to what has been said.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recordings of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

In this the sixth episode of A View from Afar for 2023 political scientist Dr Paul G. Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will present a two-part episode to analyse what to make of New Zealand Prime Minister, Chris Hipkins’ bilateral meetings with People’s Republic of China’s President Xi JinPing and other leaders of the PRC.

In part one, we will also consider how the PRC-NZ trade relationship will be seen in the eyes of New Zealand’s security partners.

Then, in the second half of today’s podcast, Paul and Selwyn will analyse the most recent events in Russia – events that have taken shape since Wagner Commander Yevgeny Prigozhin’s pronounced intent to mobilise his mercenaries against the Russian Federation’s top two military heads, and, while doing so, pronounced that the Kremlin’s decision to invade Ukraine was based on falsehoods.

What should we expect next? What is the real state of Putinism? What do the political and power elites in Russia make of President Vladimir Putin’s handling of the matter?

Weeks prior to this event happening inside Russia, Paul and Selwyn analysed the question: How stable is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s hold on power? It’s a question that all those who watch Russian affairs have now been confronted with.

In this episode Paul and Selwyn will unpack the complexity, look at what has changed as opposed to what has been said, and consider the effect Russian instability has on NATO and BRICS aligned states.

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

Paul and Selwyn deep dive into the battle to control a narrative, waged by all sides in a polarised combative world, and how modern mainstream media institutions, like Radio New Zealand, fall vulnerable in the absence of robust all-sides-considered analysis and debate.

In this episode, Paul and Selwyn analyse how fourth Estate bias, propaganda, and conflict-force fact-vacuums are the challenge of our times in this disinformation age.

Upon this context, Paul and Selwyn consider:

* Why Is the Radio New Zealand sub-editor pro-RU-content debacle symptomatic of a fact-vacuum environment?

* Why is all media vulnerable to disinformation in the absence of robust NATO-Ukraine-Russia analysis?

* What are the unspoken of ‘big picture’ shifts in Russian Federation / Global South relations?

LINKS and REFERENCES:

• https://KiwiPolitico.com
• https://www.dekoder.org/de/person/ekaterina-schulmann-0
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/media/180
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/news-extras/story/2018893905/rnz-editorial-audit
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/top/491788/nz-entering-ukraine-conflict-at-whim-of-govt-former-labour-general-secretary
• https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/02/25/russia-ends-nowhere-they-say
• https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/why-russian-elites-think-putins-war-is-doomed-to-fail

INTERACTION:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

You can continue to interact with this podcast, simply by going to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

Paul and Selwyn will deep dive into the battle to control a narrative, waged by all sides in a polarised combative world, and how modern mainstream media institutions, like Radio New Zealand, fall vulnerable in the absence of robust all-sides-considered analysis and debate.

In this episode, Paul and Selwyn will analyse how fourth Estate bias, propaganda, and conflict-force fact-vacuums are the challenge of our times in this disinformation age.

Upon this context, Paul and Selwyn will consider:

* Why Is the Radio New Zealand sub-editor pro-RU-content debacle symptomatic of a fact-vacuum environment?

* Why is all media vulnerable to disinformation in the absence of robust NATO-Ukraine-Russia analysis?

* What are the unspoken of ‘big picture’ shifts in Russian Federation / Global South relations?

LINKS and REFERENCES:

• https://KiwiPolitico.com
• https://www.dekoder.org/de/person/ekaterina-schulmann-0
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/media/180
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/programmes/news-extras/story/2018893905/rnz-editorial-audit
• https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/top/491788/nz-entering-ukraine-conflict-at-whim-of-govt-former-labour-general-secretary
• https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/02/25/russia-ends-nowhere-they-say
• https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/why-russian-elites-think-putins-war-is-doomed-to-fail

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE:

Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

To interact during the live recording of this podcast, go to Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/

Remember to subscribe to the channel.

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Youtube.com/c/EveningReport/
• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

RECOGNITION: The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication. Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category.

You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

PODCAST: In this the second episode of A View from Afar podcast for 2023, political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning analyse the question:

• How stable is Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin’s regime?

PAUL AND SELWYN look at this question from a number of angles, and, reveal shifts within the regime’s control and structure that may surprise many in the West.

In this episode Paul deep dives into the dynamics between the mercenary Wagner Group’s commander Yevgeny Prigozhin, his relationship with Putin, the Kremlin, and the estrangement from Russia’s military generals and Putin appointees.

Paul and Selwyn consider: What is going on here? What is Prigozhin’s end-game? Does he have the support of Putin? Or is that support conditional on successes on the Ukraine conflict frontline?

And Selwyn digs into the pillars of power in the Russian Federation, in particular:

• Putin as the head of Russia’s personalised autocracy
• The Putin-era Oligarchs
• Russia’s State military
• And the rise of Private armies and militia.

Then Paul take us, contextually and comparatively, through all of this complexity so we can more accurately assess the big question: How stable is Putin’s regime?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE: Paul and Selwyn encourage their live audience to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

They recommended the audience does so via EveningReport’s YouTube channel, as Facebook has undergone significant changes. Here’s the link: Youtube (remember to subscribe to the channel).

For the on-demand audience, you can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

If you miss the LIVE Episode, you can see it as video-on-demand, and earlier episodes too, by checking out EveningReport.nz or, subscribe to the Evening Report podcast here, also YouTube podcasts and the Podcast hosts below.

RECOGNITION:

The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

INTERACTIVE WEBCAST: Join the LIVE recording of Paul G. Buchanan and Selwyn Manning’s podcast A View from Afar at midday Thursday (New Zealand time) and Wednesday 8pm (US EDT).

In this the second episode of A View from Afar podcast for 2023, political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will analyse the question:

• How stable is Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin’s regime?

We will look at this question from a number of angles, and, we will reveal shifts within the regime’s control and structure that may surprise many in the West.

In this episode Paul will deep dive into the dynamics between the mercenary Wagner Group’s commander Yevgeny Prigozhin, his relationship with Putin, the Kremlin, and the estrangement from Russia’s military generals and Putin appointees.

We will consider: What is going on here? What is Prigozhin’s end-game? Does he have the support of Putin? Or is that support conditional on successes on the Ukraine conflict frontline?

And Selwyn will dig into the pillars of power in the Russian Federation, in particular:

• Putin as the head of Russia’s personalised autocracy
• The Putin-era Oligarchs
• Russia’s State military
• And the rise of Private armies and militia.

Then Paul will take us, contextually and comparatively, through all of this complexity so we can more accurately assess the big question: How stable is Putin’s regime?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE: Paul and Selwyn invite and encourage you to interact while they are live with questions and comments.

They recommend you do so via EveningReport’s YouTube channel, as Facebook is undergoing significant changes. Here’s the link: Youtube (remember to subscribe to the channel).

You can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

If you miss the LIVE Episode, you can see it as video-on-demand, and earlier episodes too, by checking out EveningReport.nz or, subscribe to the Evening Report podcast here.

RECOGNITION:

The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.

Political Roundup: NZ’s foreign policy hardens under new leadership

Times are changing in New Zealand foreign policy.

That seems to be the message from New Zealand’s new triumvirate of ministers with responsibility for foreign affairs and defence – Prime Minister Chris Hipkins, foreign minister Nanaia Mahuta and defence minister Andrew Little.

Jacinda Ardern’s departure as Prime Minister was always going to provide an opportunity to adjust New Zealand’s positioning. In particular, Hipkins’ decision to appoint Andrew Little as defence minister – replacing Peeni Henare – seems to have been a strategic move.

From the top, Hipkins has struck a more ideological tone in his most substantive comments on foreign policy to date, promising in a recent interview that New Zealand would maintain ‘steadfast support for Ukraine and its people as they continue to defend their homeland, and in doing so, the principles that we hold dear’.

The comments appeared notably more forceful than what amounted to the final word on Ukraine made by Jacinda Ardern while she was Prime Minister, made in mid-December when the New Zealand Parliament hosted a virtual address by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

In her response to Zelensky at the time, Ardern seemed largely content to reiterate her government’s current level of assistance to Ukraine. The then Prime Minister told the Ukrainian President ‘I want to acknowledge your further calls for support’, but pledged only a relatively small amount of additional humanitarian aid to the Red Cross.

Hipkins’ shift in tone raises the possibility that more support from New Zealand could be in the works – perhaps including more money for ‘lethal aid’ weaponry to help Ukraine in any spring counter-offensive, or at least equipment that could be usefully deployed on the battlefield.

It has now been eleven months since New Zealand made its first and so far only lethal aid contribution to the war so far, which came in the form of a $NZ7.5m transfer to the United Kingdom to purchase weapons on New Zealand’s behalf.

Since the cash-for-weapons announcement last April, New Zealand’s assistance has focused on sanctions, money for non-lethal and humanitarian aid and on sending a small number of New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) personnel to Europe to train Ukrainian soldiers.

To that end, Little’s recent comments that the Government is at least giving ‘further consideration’ to Ukrainian requests for New Zealand to send it light armoured vehicles (LAVs) are intriguing.

New Zealand reportedly has 74 working LAVs, but Peeni Henare, Little’s predecessor as defence minister, rejected a request by Ukraine to send them last August.

Henare’s rejection was made ostensibly on technical grounds, motivated by factors such as a lack of spare parts and troops to provide training. This rationale has always seemed unconvincing and more like an excuse to maintain a firewall on sending more material support to Kyiv.

In the US, the Biden administration argued for some time that its own Abrams tanks needed too much fuel and heavy maintenance to be useful to Kyiv – only to eventually give in and send the hardware that Kyiv had been asking for in a deal announced in January.

Ukraine’s non-resident ambassador to New Zealand, Vasyl Myroshnychenko, says Canada could help to fix the LAVs – a suggestion that Little appears to at least be contemplating, based on his comment that ‘we would want to work with partners in terms of any support that we can provide.’

Exactly where the truth lies remains to be seen: Hipkins was non-committal and admitted ‘I haven’t got the latest information’ when asked about the LAVs at his post-cabinet press conference on Monday.

Still, there is far more to the foreign policy shifts than just a sharper tone (and potentially an upgrade in substance) when it comes to Ukraine. The defence portfolio provides further clues.

New Zealand’s military has essentially been in a holding pattern since Labour’s outright victory in the 2020 election. A formal ‘Defence Policy Review’ process was announced last July, with a rather generous final reporting date set for mid-2024.

But Little has suggested in media interviews that work on the review needs to ‘accelerate’ amidst a ‘materially different’ geopolitical environment.

The new defence minister noted increased military spending and activity by Japan, France, the UK and Australia in the Indo-Pacific, adding ‘there’s an expectation that we will demonstrate some leadership’.

It seems likely that this will involve New Zealand significantly boosting its defence spending and cooperating more closely with the countries Little mentioned.

While he was reluctant to comment on specifics, pointing to the review, Little suggested a ‘different range of maritime capability’ could be needed so that New Zealand could satisfy defence needs both closer to home and ‘further abroad’.

Major spending decisions may be just months away.

Under the original terms of reference for the Defence Policy Review, an initial draft of a new defence policy and strategy was to be submitted by October 2022, while a ‘future force design principles statement’ was expected by this April.

Those deadlines were subsequently pushed back even further: the strategy document is now reportedly due this month and the future force statement in June.

In between the two, on May 17, will be the Government’s first budget since Chris Hipkins took over as Prime Minister.

Given Little’s comments on the need to expedite the review process – and the fact that the election is scheduled to be held just five months after the budget, on October 17 – it seems plausible that funding decisions will now be based on just the initial strategy document.

In fact, in all likelihood, the decisions have already been made, with the review process simply serving as cover.

New Zealand’s military spending drifted slightly downwards to 1.4 per cent of GDP in 2021, according to figures from the World Bank.

But amidst a new wave of militarisation around the world, there seems little doubt that New Zealand’s spending will soon see a sharp rise.

China’s announcement at the weekend that it will increase its defence spending by an ‘appropriate’ amount will only provide further justification for a boost.

Countries around the Indo-Pacific are lifting military spending: Australia’s defence minister recently promised the country would soon take its ‘biggest step forward’, while India has announced a spending increase of 13 per cent.

A major uptick in the defence budget might seem at odds with Hipkins’ pledge to focus on ‘bread and butter’ domestic issues focused on the cost of living.

But the military spend is likely to be sold at least in part as a social and climate change policy response: in interviews, Little repeatedly spoke of ‘attrition’ in the ranks since the outbreak of Covid-19. He also referred to the difficulties New Zealand’s military would face in responding to a ‘significant disaster recovery exercise’ in the Pacific, pointing to the defence force’s role in New Zealand in the aftermath of Cyclone Gabrielle.

This brings us to the foreign minister, Nanaia Mahuta, who visited Japan and Singapore last week.

While ‘strengthening economic partnerships’ was the stated aim of Mahuta’s trip, in reality the mission rather predictably ended up being far more about hard security. As if to underline this, Mahuta met in Singapore not with her foreign minister counterpart, Vivian Balakrishnan, but with Singaporean defence minister Ng Eng Hen.

And earlier, during Nanaia Mahuta’s visit to Tokyo, New Zealand signed on to a rather hawkish joint statement with Japan on cooperation in the Pacific that agreed the region should remain ‘inclusive, stable and prosperous, and free from foreign interference and coercion’ – phrasing clearly aimed at China.

But the threats posed by climate change were also repeatedly mentioned in the document as rationale for a ‘family first approach to peace and security’ in the Pacific.

The most specific outcome from Mahuta’s trip to Tokyo was an undertaking by New Zealand and Japan to speed up discussions on an intelligence-sharing agreement that was signalled during Jacinda Ardern’s own visit to Japan last year.

Japan recently announced plans to double its defence budget to reach the NATO target of 2 per cent of GDP by 2027 – a decision that will see $NZ500 billion in spending in the next five years and will make Japan the third-biggest military spender in the world.

Interestingly, the Japanese foreign ministry’s account of Mahuta’s meeting with her Japanese counterpart, Yoshimasa Hayashi, described Australia, Japan, New Zealand and South Korea as a group of ‘like-minded countries’.

Japan-New Zealand Foreign Ministers’ Meeting#JapanNewZealand
https://t.co/uMCRq5JDp2 pic.twitter.com/1teC6YSmnH

— MOFA of Japan (@MofaJapan_en) February 28, 2023

This suggests that the ‘AP4’ format from last year’s NATO summit in Spain may endure and could yet turn into something of a mini-alliance. Leaders from all four Asia-Pacific (or ‘AP’) countries were invited guests at the NATO gathering in Madrid and held a separate meeting on the event’s sidelines.

While there are many geopolitical uncertainties, one thing is clear.

Across the Indo-Pacific, countries are rearming.

And New Zealand looks set to join the pack.

Geoffrey Miller is the Democracy Project’s geopolitical analyst and writes on current New Zealand foreign policy and related geopolitical issues. He has lived in Germany and the Middle East and is a learner of Arabic and Russian. He is currently working on a PhD on New Zealand’s relations with the Gulf states.

Other items of interest and importance today

PUBLIC SERVICE CONSULTANTS AND CONTRACTORS
Audrey Young (Herald): Consultants and contractors – where the money was spent in the public service (paywalled)
Anna Whyte (Stuff): $1.2 billion spent by core public service on consultants and contractors a year – where does the money go?
Russel Palmer (RNZ): Hipkins defends public sector spending on consultants, contractors
Jem Traylen (BusinessDesk): Can $400m be trimmed from the government’s contractors and consultants bill? (paywalled)
Esther Taunton (Stuff): What is a consultant, anyway?

NATIONAL PARTY POLICY ANNOUNCEMENTS, CHILDCARE
Chris Trotter (Interest): Settling for the ‘least worst’
Gordon Campbell: On childcare as an election bribe
Glenn McConnell (Stuff): The pressure’s on, but neither Labour or National will commit to free childcare
Felix Desmarais (1News): Nats to regulate ECE on ‘quality not box-ticking’
Mike Hosking (Newstalk ZB): National have the key to an election win
ODT Editorial: National’s well-placed lob
Herald Editorial: National’s recipe for struggling families (paywalled)
David Farrar (Patreon): Why National’s ECE tax credits is such smart politics (paywalled)
Tova O’Brien (Today FM): Is there such a thing as becoming too centrist?
Dileepa Fonseka (BusinessDesk): Plane sailing: Luxon pitches to fix things (paywalled)
Martyn Bradbury (Daily Blog): The real problem with consultants and why child care should be free
1News: National’s proposed childcare rebate won’t work – ACT
Zarina Hewlett (Today FM): National’s childcare policy will see cutbacks from ‘go nowhere’ projects, says Nicola Willis

ROB CAMPBELL PUBLIC SERVICE
Jonathan Milne (Newsroom): Sacked health chair used up at least $125k in fees in three months
Rob Campbell (Stuff): Public service bosses of ‘Pyongponeke’ forget who they are supposed to serve
Adam Pearse (Herald): Pharmac/ACC chairman, former Labour minister Steve Maharey in hot water for public political comments
RNZ: PM says Pharmac chair impartiality issue ‘quite a contrast’ to Rob Campbell
Jenna Lynch (Newshub): Steve Maharey: Another public boss gets political – what’s the difference this time?
Simon Wilson (Herald): Why they sacked Rob Campbell and why that has to stop (paywalled)
The Blue Review: Rob Campbell, my part in his downfall | A chat with Gwynn Compton
Ian McCrae (BusinessDesk): How many unionists does it take to screw up health? Two

ELECTION
Martyn Bradbury (Daily Blog): The possible surprises of the 2023 election
Phil Pennington (RNZ): Voter targeting tools could impact electoral integrity, disinformation expert says
Toby Manhire (Spinoff): ‘Fixing is not austerity’: Chlöe Swarbrick on Wayne Brown, cuts and seeking re-election

TRANSPORT
Jamie Ensor (Newshub): Government confirms change to previous transport priorities, now working on ’emergency style’ plan after Cyclone Gabrielle
Thomas Coughlan (Herald): Government u-turns on transport plan for cycleways and bus lanes, blaming Cyclone Gabrielle
Matthew Hooton (Patreon): Dead cat? (paywalled)
Felix Desmarais (1News): U-turn on emissions-focused transport plan, focus on cyclone recovery
Richard Harman (Politik): Hipkins: “Clearly, there’s been a change in leadership” (paywalled)
RNZ: Emissions still in mix but weather-proofing transport network crucial – Hipkins
RNZ: Hipkins changes transport focus away from agreed emissions reduction
Anna Whyte (Stuff): ‘Emergency style’ transport plan worked on by govt in wake of Cyclone Gabrielle
Heather du Plessis-Allan (Newstalk ZB): U-turn for Transport Minister
No Right Turn: Why we can’t have nice things
Jessica Lynch and Jamie Ensor (Newshub): Government to walk back draft plan prioritising cycle lanes ahead of road maintenance, Newshub understands
Kate Green (RNZ): Waka Kotahi concludes half-price fares not enough to lure more public transport users
John MacDonald (Newstalk ZB): Transport Minister’s huffing and puffing won’t fix roads
Georgina Campbell (Herald): Kaitaki ferry out for two weeks, Interislander disables Facebook comments
Herald: Maritime Transport Union calls for ‘love’ for Cook Strait ferry staff amid disruptions
RNZ: Growing numbers turn to car share services in Wellington
Lloyd Burr (Today FM): Auckland Transport has been broken for too long

EDUCATION, RICHARD DAWKINS, MĀTAURANGA MĀORI
Chris Trotter (Daily Blog): The Revolution Has Begun
Dave Armstrong (Stuff): Dr Dawkins and his misreading of Mātauranga Māori
Don Brash: Richard Dawkins is surely right
Melisa chase (Spinoff): Are we there yet? The slow inclusion of mātauranga Māori in schools
John Gerritsen (RNZ): Some teachers agree Qualifications Authority made trial NCEA tests too hard
John Gerritsen (RNZ): Agencies dispute over how to solve low literacy and numeracy scores

EXTREME WEATHER, INFRASTRUCTURE
Peter Davis (Herald): Our long-term problems keep catching up on us (paywalled)
Willie Jackson (Herald): Targeting cyclone funding to Māori as racist is ugly politics
1News: Findings of review into Auckland flood response delayed
Stephen Forbes (Local Democracy Reporting): Auckland water agency estimates price tag of flood damage at over $250m
1News: More money for cyclone-hit farmers and growers – Govt
RNZ: Cyclone fund for farmers and growers gets $26m expansion
RNZ: Auckland floods, Cyclone Gabrielle to cost insurance industry more than $1b
RNZ: Muriwai residents could wait 6 months before red-stickered property reassessment call
RNZ: Probe finds warehouse designs have multiple design flaws and are safety risk

LOCAL GOVERNMENT, THREE WATERS
Bernard Orsman (Herald): Auckland Mayor Wayne Brown’s cost-cutting budget triggers early job losses with more to come (paywalled)
Todd Niall (Stuff): Job cuts process begins as Auckland Council looks for $295m budget savings
Todd Niall (Stuff): Auckland and the risks of change overload
David Williams (Newsroom): Christchurch sleepwalks towards partial asset sales
Brent Edwards (NBR): Water Users’ Group wants Three Waters legislation withdrawn (paywalled)
Erin Gourley (Stuff): $8 million of pipes funding not provided in Wellington City Council plan
Hamish McNeilly (Stuff): Back to the drawing board as Dunedin council cannot decide on mayoral portraits
Alisha Evans (Local Democracy Reporting): Price increases planned for Tauranga’s council pools and hall hire

HOUSING, BUILDING INDUSTRY
Rob Stock (Stuff): Kiwis pay home loan interest rates others ‘wouldn’t touch with a barge pole’
Damien Venuto (Herald): The Front Page: How much mortgage pain are we in for – and when will interest rates come down? (paywalled)
RNZ: Women still trail men in home ownership stakes
Brent Melville (BusinessDesk): Kiwis track ahead of Aussies in housing co-ownership (paywalled)
Guy Marriage (Newsroom): Let’s end obsession with building poor housing as cheaply as possible
MIke Yardley (Press): Christchurch’s revised housing density plan is palatable, but far from perfect
Matthew Scott (Newsroom): Housing crisis: Queenstown rips at the seams
Miriam Bell (Stuff): Building activity falls for first time since Covid lockdowns
RNZ: Construction sector shows signs of cooling with fall in volume of building work
Zoe Hunter (Herald): Building the next generation: More apprentices needed to meet construction demands (paywalled)

CENSUS
RNZ: 1m and counting: Time ticking on filling in 2023 census
Ashleigh McCaull (RNZ): Iwi-led Census process in rohe makes big difference – Ngāti Wai Trust
David Williams (Newsroom): Trust in census a big issue, survey suggests
Debbie Jamieson (Stuff): Census to miss key data as visitors in short term rentals slip through
Herald: Census 2023 explainer: Everything you need to know
RNZ: Warning over Census scams harvesting information

HEALTH
Lloyd Burr (Today FM): Anatomy of a comms disaster: Pharmac’s Trikafta case
Tom Hunt (Stuff): Not a single fine handed out so far for smoking with kids in cars
Jonine Jancey (Stuff): Sex and lies are used to sell vapes online, even we were surprised at the marketing tactics we found
Tess McClure (Guardian): Make vapes a pharmacy-only drug, say New Zealand health groups
Emile Donovan (Stuff): GPs, anti-smoking charity at odds over vaping proposal
Whena Owen (1News): Q+A: New bill to scrutinise medicine, natural health product claims
Bridie Witton (Stuff): Te Whatu Ora boosts nurses’ pay by thousands but ‘irritation’ remains
RNZ: Covid-19 update: 11,453 new cases, six deaths and 177 in hospital

ENVIRONMENT
James Shaw (Guardian): We can’t afford to choose adaptation over cutting emissions – suggesting otherwise is dangerous
Pattrick Smellie (BusinessDesk): Is bi-partisan support for RMA reform breaking down? (paywalled)
Olivia Wannan (Stuff): Slash and burn: why we should use all that unwanted wood

MEDIA
Martyn Bradbury (Daily Blog): Mediawatch: The problem with Purity of Identity as a media lens in NZ newsrooms
Chris Lynch: RNZ apologises to broadcaster after missing crucial context
Gavin Ellis: Free speech at its best stirring people to anger
Duncan Greive (Spinoff): There’s now Voices for Freedom online radio for people who find The Platform too woke

EMPLOYMENT
Susan Edmunds (Stuff): Minimum wage should be even higher, union says, as inflation erodes increase
Brianna Mcilraith (Stuff): How to ‘quietly quit’ this year without damaging your work reputation
Maria Slade (NBR): Unemployment becoming a foreign concept (paywalled)
RNZ: Working from home: 78 percent of people work remotely some or all of the time

GEORGINA BEYER HAS DIED
1News: Trailblazing MP Georgina Beyer dies aged 65
Glenn McConnell, Piers Fuller and Bess Manson (Stuff): Georgina Beyer, the world’s first openly transgender MP and mayor, has died
RNZ: World’s first openly transgender mayor and MP, Georgina Beyer, has died
Jenna Lynch (Newshub): Georgina Beyer remembered as trailblazer by Prime Minister, Labour’s Rainbow caucus chair
Herald: World’s first openly transgender MP and mayor Georgina Beyer dies aged 65
Guardian: World’s first openly transgender MP, Georgina Beyer, dies in New Zealand aged 65

FOREIGN AFFAIRS, DEFENCE, AND TRADE
Samuel Hume (Jacobin): New Zealand is escalating tensions between China and the West
David Farrar: Mahuta says no to Ukraine
Jayden Holmes (Today FM): International Analyst wary of Tik Tok ban in United States, European Union
Pete McKenzie (North & South): In Our Defence

PODCAST – In this, the 25th episode of A View from Afar for 2022 political scientist Dr Paul Buchanan and host Selwyn Manning examine how hostage taking, prisoner exchanges, and establishing diplomatic back-channels work and how they are used by states during times of conflict.

Specifically, Paul and Selwyn examine:

• How hostage diplomacy appears to increase where authoritarians rise and are emboldened to challenge international norms
• How states use prisoner exchanges to establish two-way common-ground
• How back-channels can also be established through prisoner exchanges.
• Is this what we are seeing in the Russian-Ukraine conflict?
• What dangers arise when warring opponents reach a deadly stalemate in the battlefield?

INTERACTION WHILE LIVE: Paul and Selwyn invite and encourage you to interact while they are live with questions and comments. They recommend you do so via EveningReport’s YouTube channel, as Facebook is undergoing significant changes. Here’s the link: Youtube (remember to subscribe to the channel).

You can also keep the conversation going on this debate by clicking on one of the social media channels below:

• Facebook.com/selwyn.manning
• Youtube
• Twitter.com/Selwyn_Manning

If you miss the LIVE Episode, you can see it as video-on-demand, and earlier episodes too, by checking out EveningReport.nz or, subscribe to the Evening Report podcast here.

RECOGNITION:

The MIL Network’s podcast A View from Afar was Nominated as a Top  Defence Security Podcast by Threat.Technology – a London-based cyber security news publication.

Threat.Technology placed A View from Afar at 9th in its 20 Best Defence Security Podcasts of 2021 category. You can follow A View from Afar via our affiliate syndicators.