Brian S Roper's Blog: July 2024

This is where I'll be putting links to audio-visual and other material for POLS 102 New Zealand Politics during Semester 2, 2024. It is currently under construction and will be modified throughout the semester.

New Zealand/Aotearoa Music Videos- Selected from a Wide Range of Alternative Music Genres but all by Musical Artists with Strong Links to Aoteroa

2024 Music Video Screenings

Titanic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KQm_7Lpt5E

Slow Dive - Star Roving

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogCih4OavoY

The Go! Team - May Day

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evwkrcL8P6g

Lecture 1

• Yumi Zouma - Catastrophe

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSX3_qTcQEM

• The Beatniks - Wake Up Jane

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTYu9UzGXFs

• The Go Team - Mayday!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evwkrcL8P6g

Lecture 2

• Shapeshifter - Monarch

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUYU5W0JVO8&list=PL4pbiHpxsbdyeUbZUbDVQA1EJCV33C4tJ

Lecture 3

• Vagina Dry - My Voice My Choice

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuTvNclWXa4

• Die Die Die - Sideways Here We Come

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yV9f4w9SXEc

• LAB - In the Air

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI5usbhzmbY

Lecture 4

• The 3ds - Outer Space

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePvmxGA2vqU

• Marlon Williams - Beautiful Dress

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lrNMdiWDUs

Lecture 5

• The Clean - Beatnik

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ol3JHWlSRzc

• Pearly - Post Key PCP

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQKuCDm6leA

• The Phoenix Foundation - Bob Lennon John Dylan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=digLC94vx2I

Lecture 6

• Emily Fairlight - The Escape

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzW-HUXjAj4

• Lorde - Green Light Live at Glastonbury

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3urw1bnEMM

Lecture 7

• The Chills - Pink Frost (Live 1988)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PghRoiz6TFA

• The Chills - Heavenly Pop Hit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvYihKlgzOg

• The Chills - Kaleidoscope World

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILvY3FoTQF8

Lecture 8

• Avantdale Bowling Club

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqPls3tfI5c

Lecture 9

•Six Sixty - Before You Leave

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Sz8kZTDy4c

Lecture 10

• Fly My Pretties - Garden

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLgPTeTRjeI

•Shihad - Home Again (Live at Aotea Square)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBMlNiXyR44

Lecture 11

The Bats - North by North

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC4SX4c50Ig

• Tiki Taane - Dub Soldier

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TP-xlCFhdjk

Lecture 12

• Che Fu - Faded

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHq2CELf_Ic

Lecture 13

• Che Fu - Misty Frequencies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0acHcgPiLLU

•Shihad - My Mind's Sedate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBMlNiXyR44

Lecture 14

•Marlon Williams - Can't Always Get What you Want

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsJIDptF-2c

• Bic Runga - Winning Arrow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P93apT2p4PI

Lecture 18

• Three Houses Down - Love & Affection

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io5lzCMHcWU

•Marlin's Dreaming - Lucky Stars

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEvUAR59Ilc

Lecture 20

• The Adults - Nothing to Lose

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fx6G0NGZJxU

Lecture 21

• The Verlaines - Joed Out

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8bZN_FBrUc

Lecture 22

• Sisters Underground - In the Neighbourhood

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rw_uFUttGKQ

• Straightjacket Fits - She Speeds

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMIddxUAAQw

Lecture 23

• Scribe - Dreaming

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLGncTl9r78

•The Veils - The Letter

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpkJ0WFM7XU

Lecture 24

• Don McGlassan - Miracle Sun

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-FW7JY3gik

• The Beths - Expert Dying in a Field

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-KACt6YhOyY&t=84s

• Princess Chelsea - The Cigarette Duet

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TV_128Fz2g

• The D4 - Party

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9VLyMpmmjY

--------------------------------------

Video Documentaries and Exerts, Links to Useful Websites

• Here are links to some of the more important official government websites:

• New Zealand Government: Information and Services
This is a gateway website providing links to all official government websites and the websites of the political parties with MPs.
https://www.govt.nz/

• Electoral Commission
This is where you will be able to find out more about the electoral system and election results.http://www.elections.org.nz/

• Statistics New Zealand
This is where you will find a comprehensive range of statistical information about New Zealand's society, economy and polity.
http://www.stats.govt.nz/

• Treasury
This is where you will find a comprehensive range of information about the economy and the government's approach to managing it, as well as the budget and all main areas of government policy-making.
http://www.treasury.govt.nz/

• Ministry of Social Development- Household Incomes
This is where you will find some of the most important facts and figures with respect to the distribution of income, wealth, and poverty in New Zealand since 1982. https://www.msd.govt.nz/about-msd-and-our-work/publications-resources/monitoring/household-incomes/

• Maori Land Loss, 1960-2000 Interactive Map of North Island
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/interactive/maori-land-1860-2000

Over-representation of Business and Under-representation of Women, Workers and Asians in the New Zealand Parliament, 1996-2017

The Parliamentary Service has produced a research paper (released December 2017) entitled 'FINAL RESULTS FOR THE 2017 NEW ZEALAND GENERAL ELECTION' that contains very useful data pertaining to representation in New Zealand parliaments from 1996 to 2017. A PDF can downloaded from: https://www.parliament.nz/resource/en-NZ/00PLLawRP17041/4107f6fef63135f9e2e297af9318a7edf69cd3c3

New Zealand's Political History, 1935 to the Present

• First Labour Government 1935-1949

• The 1935 Election. A reasonably OK video on the 1935 election. I haven't had the time to carefully fact check it, but worth watching if taken with a grain of salt. Good collection of images from the time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CiHnV0aTLz4

• 1935 Election Victory Speech by Michel Joseph Savage - two short exerts):
http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/speech/49/m-j-savage-reassuring-new-zealand-about-the-labour-government

http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/speech/34030/michael-joseph-savages-victory-speech-1935

• Second (Holyoake) National Government, 1960-1972
• 1963 Interview with National Prime Minister Keith Holyoake- gives a sense of a very different period in NZ's political history.
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/video/interview-with-prime-minister-keith-holyoake-1963

• Third (Kirk, Rowling) Labour Government, 1972-1975
• New Zealand Labour Party TV Campaign add for the 1969 election- illustrates the influence of the wider political context of the time.
http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/media/video/labour-party-tv-ad-1969

NZ 1972: Labour, Big Norm, Womens Lib

• Interesting report on Labour at the time of the 1972 election. As above, it highlights the influence of the political context over the Labour Party.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z0mmhQAFeM

• Short speech from Norman Kirk opposing French nuclear testing in the South Pacific.

https://teara.govt.nz/en/speech/27/norman-kirk-speaking-at-the-official-farewell-to-hms-otago

"Prime Minister Norman Kirk told the 242 crew of HMNZS Otago that their Mururoa mission was an ‘honourable’ one − they were to be a ‘silent accusing witness with the power to bring alive the conscience of the world’.

France had conducted atmospheric nuclear tests at Mururoa (or Moruroa), an atoll 1250 km south-east of Tahiti, since 1966. When the French refused to accept an International Court of Justice injunction against atmospheric testing, New Zealand’s Labour government decided to alternately station two frigates, HMNZS Otago and Canterbury, in international waters outside the test area. A Cabinet minister would accompany this daring protest. Kirk put all their names into a hat and drew out that of Fraser Colman, the minister of immigration and mines. The opposition National Party declined an invitation to send an MP on Otago.

The protests had some success. In 1974, by which time 41 atmospheric tests had been conducted at Mururoa, the new French president, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, decided that future testing would be held underground. Even so, the atoll remained a focus of anti-nuclear protest. The test site at Mururoa was dismantled following France’s last underground explosion in 1996."

https://nzhistory.govt.nz/hmnzs-otago-sails-for-mururoa-test-zone

• 1975 National Party Election Anti-Labour Advertisement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbevFguT6NE

• The Rise of Sir Robert Muldoon (late 1960s to 1975)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPNJzxyL9IM

• 1984 General Election
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFyJvtM3uy0

It's also worth looking at this documentary - Fortress New Zealand. It documents the transition from Keynesianism to Neoliberalism (From Muldoon, to Lange, to Richardson).
It includes great interviews.

Part 1 Muldoon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZXpeUQ0tD8

Part 2 Lange's first term: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7drcQVvpM0

Part 3 Lange's second term and downfall: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhTgrSiiXDk

Part 4 After Lange: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsvmVKqkX_o

• In a Land of Plenty: The Story of Unemployment in New Zealand
For a more systematically critical account, see the following excellent video documentary.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vzp2_K9d2s

AV Material on the Labour Party
• David Shearer on Budget 2013- illustrates the ideology and political rhetoric of the Labour Party at this time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LKZl9HyLGk&feature=c4-overview&list=UUiz_HNe4CVNzP-yeYoFydQw

AV Material on the National Party
• John Key on Budget 2013- gives a clear illustration of the pragmatic conservatism of the National Party and the government that he led.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROiDCagPC9U&list=PL2B847CA387E265AF

2017 Election Campaign

Jacinda Ardern - Labour Campaign Ad: "Let's Do This!'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_kycR6u0Tg

The Treasury
• Treasury Homepage
http://www.treasury.govt.nz/
• Treasury job advertisement
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQBfB_8oQ2o
• John Whitehead, head of Treasury in 2009, on policy responses to the global financial crisis and ensuing recession in New Zealand.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVu4Fh0sJmA

• Useful Links for the POLS 102 Essay:
• Treasury (see above)
• National Party – www.national.org.nz
• Labour Party – www.labour.org.nz
• Electoral Commision – http://www.elections.org.nz/
• MMP Review website – http://www.mmpreview.org.nz/
• Statistics NZ – http://www.stats.govt.nz/

• New Zealand Political Parties and Organizations

Parliamentary Parties:

• ACT New Zealand — http://www.act.org.nz

• Green Party of Aotearoa/New Zealand – http://www.greens.org.nz

• National Party – www.national.org.nz

• Labour Party – www.labour.org.nz

• New Zealand First - www.nzfirst.org.nz/

• Maori Party–www.maoriparty.com/

• United Future New Zealand - www.unitedfuture.org.nz/

Extra-Parliamentary Parties:

• Alliance — http://www.alliance.org.nz

• Conservative Party– http://www.conservativeparty.org.nz/

• International Socialist Organisation– http://www.iso.org.nz

• Mana Party – http://mana.net.nz/

• Campbell Live Poll on the GCSB Bill
http://www.3news.co.nz/Campbell-Live-GCSB-roadie-poll-end/tabid/817/articleID/309661/Default.aspx

New Zealand Interest Groups

• New Zealand Council of Trade Unions (NZCTU)
http://union.org.nz/
• For a full list of all affiliated unions go to:
http://union.org.nz/about/ctu-affiliates

• Business NZ
http://www.businessnz.org.nz/
This is New Zealand's largest and most influential business association.

• Federated Farmers
http://www.fedfarm.org.nz/

• The New Zealand Initiative
In 2012 the Business Roundtable and the New Zealand Institute merged to form The New Zealand Initiative - a group of executives from big business that advocates extreme neolioberal policies broadly consistent with those of the ACT Party.
http://nzinitiative.org.nz/

This is a propaganda video that glosses over the specifics of the kind of extreme right-wing policies that the NZ Initiative advocates. Note that while much of what they claim they advocating, such as 'affordable housing', is double-speak. That is if these policies were actually implemented they would actually have the opposite effect to what is being claimed by the NZ Initiative.
http://nzinitiative.org.nz/About+Us.html

• The New Zealand Retailers Association
http://www.retail.org.nz/

• The New Zealand Chambers of Commerce
http://www.newzealandchambers.co.nz/

• The National Government- Background and Context

• The Hollow Men - Video Documentary on Don Brash's Leadership of the National party and the 2006 election campaign.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvszui3U8vM

• Alan Bollard, Governor of the Reserve Bank speaks to the 2009 Jobs Summit on the scale and impact of the global financial crisis.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XDjo_QtIdmI

• Excellent video presentations on Marx and David Harvey's contemporary Marxist analysis of the global financial crisis.

• Funny and informative introduction to Marx's life, ideas and politics. It's a play scripted by the famous left-wing American historian - Howard Zinn - and performed brilliantly by the American teacher, actor, activist and socialist - Brian Jones.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2baw7stI6U

• Animated 11 minute summary of David Harvey's Marxist analysis of the global financial crisis.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOP2V_np2c0

The Fifth (Key) Governments Neoliberal Policy Agenda, 2008-2017

• For National's presentation of its 'plan that's working' and policies as of 2014-2016 go to:
https://www.national.org.nz/plan/plan

https://www.national.org.nz/policies

• Budget 2015, including Bill English's Budget Speech, can be downloaded from:
http://www.treasury.govt.nz/budget/2015

• Treasury's 2015 economic and fiscal update provides useful information on the state of the economy and government finances since 2000.
http://www.treasury.govt.nz/budget/forecasts/befu2015

• A two minute media interview of Finance Minister Bill English about Budget 2015. Gives a good sense of the Government's justification of its neoliberal approach to economic management and policy-making:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBZk5UnBIQ4

• A three minute media interview of Prime Minister John Key about Budget 2015. Gives a good sense of the Government's justification of its neoliberal approach to economic management and policy-making:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltMDuBK118A&list=PL3ZQ5CpNulQm6tksFqnSEccOJg-PQurtj

• A defence of the Government in terms of its 'compassionate conservatism' by Bill English:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49dr8FPtCgQ&list=PL3ZQ5CpNulQm6tksFqnSEccOJg-PQurtj&index=2

• In 2013, Minister of Finance Bill English stated that:
"We don't believe there is 'a' solution to poverty in general. So I would not expect any large scale intervention. We've been focusing on reaching the hard to reach and intervening to improve their lives." http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/budget-2013/8670053/State-housing-revamp-on-the-cards

• An independent critical assessment of the Government's approach in Budget 2015 by the Child Poverty Action Group can be downloaded from: http://www.cpag.org.nz/assets/Budget/2015%20CPAG%20BUDGET%20REVIEW.pdf

The website is: http://www.cpag.org.nz/

• To critically assess the Government's performance with respect to economic management and policy-making it is worth considering the relevant official statistics.

For example, for current stats on growth, employment and offshore debt go to http://www.stats.govt.nz/ and follow the links. Balance of payments and offshore debt stats can be found here: http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/snapshots-of-nz/top-statistics.aspx

The best source of official statistical data on socio-economic inequality is here: https://www.msd.govt.nz/about-msd-and-our-work/publications-resources/monitoring/household-incomes/

• The Politics of Climate Change and Global Warming

The Titanic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPoMFB0FjYg

• To access the 2014 major assessment report (AR5) by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), go to: http://www.ipcc.ch/

If you want to download the most important graphs and figures then go to: http://www.climatechange2013.org/report/reports-graphic/ch2-graphics/

• To access the 2007 major assessment report (AR4) by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC),
go to: http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_fourth_assessment_report_synthesis_report.htm

• Video summarizing the US NOAA, State of the Climate 2014 Report. The facts in this video are drawn from official US based sources.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mhhtvm1pcio

• Video showing thinning of Greenland polar ice based on international study using satellite data and photographs from the University of Leeds website.http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=GAhA8NBHZIo

• See also the British channel 4 news report on the study (2012) at:
http://www.leeds.ac.uk/news/article/3336/

• "2012 Record Low Artic Ice Sheet". The Arctic ice cap is melting at a rapid rate and may shrink to its lowest-ever level within weeks as temperatures continue to rise. Al Jazeera's Nick Clark joined an expedition travelling deep into the Arctic Circle to Qaanaaq, in Greenland. Three minute report on the melting of the Arctic ice caps. Well worth watching.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwwBcdmT8tc

• Very interesting report on the 'carbon bubble' on the Guardian website. Highlights which stock exchange listed companies have the greatest carbon assets and the financial risks that they face if these assets become unburnable due to the introduction of more effective environmental policies addressing the causes of climate change. This also indicates just how powerfully motivated these companies are to lobby governments to prevent them introducting more effective environmental policies to counter global warming.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/interactive/2013/apr/19/countries-exposed-carbon-bubble-map

• Really interesting article in The Guardian: "The climate crisis of the 21st century has been caused largely by just 90 companies, which between them produced nearly two-thirds of the greenhouse gas emissions generated since the dawning of the industrial age, new research suggests."
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/20/90-companies-man-made-global-warming-emissions-climate-change

• John Bellamy Foster gives lecture on capitalism and climate change.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmhFc9kdTRU&list=PL432220236CB86FAB

The Sixth (Ardern) Labour Government, 2017-

The Global Financial Crisis: Is A Repeat Looming?
It is interesting that economists right, left and centre all agree that another crash is coming. It is not if, it is when. The important questions are not to do with whether it will happen, but how severe the downturn will be, what capacity governments and central banks will have to manage it, and whether the world's poor and middling folks will be prepared to tolerate another bank bailout that they know that they, as opposed to the rich, will have to pay for.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business /news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12126427
http://www.cadtm.org/A-new-global-credit-crunch-to-come