KSK: Politicians Often Commit to Promises That Are Really Wishes

The Green Party Manifesto with its unrealistic ‘policies’ includes the word “aspiration” and also covers recent policy announcements around reducing income inequality, along with the introduction of rent controls – which Labour has already ruled out – and clearing the social housing waitlist with a commitment to build 35,000 public homes.

But now Chris Hipkins has rained on their parade by ruling out a wealth tax or a capital gains tax after the election and it is not only the Greens who find this a less-than-desirable outcome.

“National leader Christopher Luxon is calling it ‘cynical politics’, while Greens co-leader James Shaw said only the Green Party is standing for progressive change.”

Cynical it is indeed when the Labour Party and Chris Hipkins are both flagging in the polls and desperate to shore up votes – as is Christopher Luxon.

The Greens’ “policies and aspirations” are already biting the dust. Aspiration is an interesting word in politics. Aspiration is a hope or ambition of achieving something. You don’t actually have to deliver on an aspiration. It’s just a cuddly word, isn’t it? No, it’s not, as it turns out. It has both positive and negative effects and possible outcomes.

The Politics of Aspiration

We identify three core features of aspiration that undergird its theoretical utility:

lofty goals, change over time, and transformation through imagination.

In the hands of skilled political actors, aspiration does essential work in both facilitating agreement and mobilizing social action that create change in the world.

However, aspiration also has a dark side and can be manipulated to: dodge accountability, postpone action, and serve private, rather than public, goals.

Developing the concept of aspiration is more than a theoretical exercise. Better understanding of aspiration as a distinct concept helps us make sense of what would otherwise be political puzzles. Why, for example, do states and other political actors routinely commit to fulfil goals they know they cannot reach? The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to eliminate poverty and hunger everywhere in the world by 2030 (SDGs 1 and 2) are one such example. Poverty and hunger are unlikely to disappear by 2030. If political leaders believe traditional concepts like reputation, promises, and credibility create consequences for noncompliance, then ambitious proclamations like the SDGs make little sense.

Politics of Aspiration | International Studies Quarterly | Oxford Academic (oup.com)

The Labour government throughout its reign has not met policy outcomes, has dodged accountability and postponed action and is able to hide behind broken promises.

At the Greens’ AGM, many of the announced policies and aspirations are dependent on the introduction of their “wealth tax proposal” as Marama Davidson “alluded to in her speech to the party faithful, drawing huge cheers.”

“Everyone in Aotearoa will have what they need to have kai on the table, a safe place to call home and live a good life – and we will tax the mega-rich to pay for it,” she said. 

Green Party lays out key policies in manifesto focused on ‘people, nature and climate’ – NZ Herald

Let’s unpack what she said. Everyone will have what they need to have food on the table. What does that mean exactly? A job to pay for the food? Or taxpayer funded beans on toast – or a three-course meal? What is their definition of living a good life? A safe place to call home – how can that be provided in the face of increasing domestic violence and child abuse and rising social upheaval and gang member build-ups? Is a safe home a domestic or a government issue?

And how will the Greens implement their policies? Actually they won’t be able to implement their tax policy aimed at the mega rich or any other of their so-called policies, not only because Chris Hipkins has effectively called time on them. They may be able to help shape some policy but they will never be in a position to implement it.

Note that they conveniently never define mega-rich leaving it wide open to “adjustment on the hop” according to the ‘need’ to fund whatever policy.

They overlook that the mega-rich are not that way because they spend their days sitting on the sofa watching Netflix. They will not blindly just sit there and be randomly taxed to suit the political aspirations of the Green party. They have worked hard to become wealthy, have developed strategies to do so and remain so and will regularly evaluate their results and make changes to their strategies and how they do business.

When the Greens go to collect their “mega rich taxes” they will find the mega rich have simply moved on and the pot will be empty.

[…] political rhetoric is mostly about aspirations, and rarely about policies. Political candidates talk about problems with the status quo, and their aspirations for improving things. They talk about what they want to accomplish, but not what policies they favour for accomplishing their aspirations.

The reason is that everyone can agree the status quo is not ideal, so calls to improve the status quo receive widespread support. Hope and change. Just don’t be specific about what policies will drive that change. Lots of people will agree that things can be improved, but fewer people will agree that any specific policy will actually lead to improvement. So, politicians talk in terms of aspirations rather than policies.

Aspirations and Policies | Randall G. Holcombe (independent.org)

The (UK) Labour Party draft policy platform for 2024 covers the following in “the report’s six sections: a green and digital future, better jobs and better work, safe and secure communities, public services that work from the start, a future where families come first, and Britain in the world.”

How is policy development achieved? It is generally accepted that there are five stages in the development of public policy, known as the policy cycle: 

1. Agenda setting – identification of a problem requiring government intervention. No decision will have been made about how the problem might be addressed and whether that solution will ever be implemented.
2. Policy formulation – how to address the problems it would like to address and how it will address them.
3. Decision-making – a ‘bargaining process’ by those with interests in the problem with the decision-making levels of government to advance those interests.
4. Implementation – including solution details, allocation of resources, clear delegation of decision-making authority.
5. Evaluation – measurement of success of the policy. How do we know if it has been a success or not? At this stage evaluation feedback feeds back into the agenda stage.

What of NZ Labour’s “policies”? The 100,000 homes they promised they would build over ten years. The mega-merger of the technical colleges that has led to their collapse. So too health, education, crime…and on it goes. And we have sudden announcements of another multi-million-dollar pay out to yet another organisation to deal with another issue – based on what policy? Measured against what? Measured when? Reported when? That is not policy-based expenditure but vote-catching spend-ups.

The 2024 Labour Party Draft Policy reads like an agenda, not policy.

The Greens’ “policy” list is an inventory of aspirations.

Does any of this matter or is it simply a pedantic exercise?

It matters because policy is based on a series of logical steps and actions and an evaluation of the outcomes and success or not of those actions.

Aspirations are wishes and puffed-up political rhetoric.

The question remains: Why do politicians routinely commit to fulfilling goals they know they cannot reach?

KSK has a Master of Management degree from the University of Auckland. She has a business management background following many years in the medical field. She is a former business mentor with Business Mentors NZ. This article was first published HERE