Mr Modlik points to problems with our health system, education system, housing, food prices, pollution, failing infrastructure, and “deepening poverty, trauma, addiction, mental health issues and a host of crises — without adequate support. The list goes on and on.”
He claims:
“Despite decades of government attention, our social, economic and environmental wellbeing continues to decline. The reason is not individual political failure. It is systemic: the way we govern ourselves is no longer fit for purpose — and no matter who is in charge, it cannot succeed …
“We live in a hyper-complex, fast-changing, deeply interconnected world. The scale, pace and cost of our challenges are staggering. Yet we expect elected representatives — of varying quality, hired and fired every three to four years — to assume power, figure it all out, and implement the necessary changes through a risk-averse bureaucracy. That’s nuts.
“This is why things will only get worse unless we improve our democratic and bureaucratic systems.
“If we want better, fairer, more sustainable outcomes, we must democratise further. That means real participation, deliberation and support from the people who fund the system — us.
“Our representative democracy was a great idea — for its time. But version one is obsolete. It’s failing us badly. The time has come for version two.
I was agreeing with this, more or less, until I got to the end:
We can lead again – by designing new systems that embed deeper citizen participation in both government and economic processes, and show a struggling democratic world what is possible.
If not us, who?
If not now, when?
Mr Modlik speaks generally of ‘systems’ and ‘processes’ without saying specifically what they are or specifically what is wrong with them. He does not identify how We the people will have deeper participation in government and economic processes or in ‘designing new systems’. (That could happen now with referenda for constitutional issues.) This is ambiguous rhetoric which sets expectations, but with little substance and no specifics. Mr Modlik seems to be saying, hand control of the country to ‘us’ and ‘We’ will take care of it. Who, specifically, are ‘We’ and ‘us’?
There seems to be a belief with a significant number of New Zealanders, that simply handing the government to the Maoris will solve New Zealand’s problems. The rationale is that Maoris have a spiritual knowledge that is not available to other New Zealanders.
An example of that was given in a post by Gary Judd KC (here) of a Maori incantation (karakia) included in a Parliamentary Services strategy statement which includes that advice to Parliament would likely be influenced by the ideology given in the document.
That ideology is presumably indicated by the incantation which runs:
We acknowledge the celestial entities
We acknowledge our guiding stars
The coursing of the stars is invoked
Inspiring the path we follow through our world
In this endeavour, heaven and earth come together
Let it be
Does anyone even know what that means? I’m a PhD in the psychology of spiritual beliefs – Jung and all that – and it seems like blather to me. If it’s OK with Parliamentary Services, I would prefer something a little more concrete.
The point is, of course, that we are being fed a load of hogwash by the ruling class – iwi leaders and Government (Parliamentary Services) – about how New Zealand is to be governed. While it seems absurd and laughable, we have no choice but to take it seriously.
It is true that we are faced with some very difficult problems which, if they are not addressed, threaten to wreck our country. But we need hard-nosed solutions developed by evidence-based reasoning, not the nonsense we are getting now. We urgently need to turn this around.
Barrie Davis is a retired telecommunications engineer, holds a PhD in the psychology of Christian beliefs, and can often be found gnashing his teeth reading The Post outside Floyd’s cafe at Island Bay.
5 comments:
“The point is, of course, that we are being fed a load of hogwash by the ruling class – iwi leaders and Government (Parliamentary Services) – about how New Zealand is to be governed”.
The question then becomes, who has captured and is controlling the above puppets? What “foreign entity” has the power to deconstruct the collective west, because this “agenda of division, disharmony and destruction” (chaos) is not just a New Zealand issue.
Governments have been captured and are being controlled by “foreign agents”, working for the “Empire of the City” is my best guess.
Thank you Barrie for being able to put Modlik on the griddle. The Post gave him a whole page to push his idiotic politics and my 200 word letter was not published, vey likely because it didn't mesh with the Post's sycophancy towards all things maori. I offer it below.
"For Helmut Modlik, the governmental systems of the present do not suit his beliefs and aspirations (Representative democracy is failing us-we can lead the search for a new way, 25 May). In expressing an alternative, however, Modlik presents a confused, and sometimes inaccurate picture. Surprisingly, he seems to think that democracy “was conceived… more than 200 years ago”. If he means English settlers, he is way off the mark; democracy was conceived actually more than 2000 years ago in ancient Greece. The philosopher, Socrates, proclaimed: “Our constitution is named a democracy because it is in the hands not of the few but of the many. But our laws secure equal justice for all in their private disputes, and our public opinion welcomes and honours talent in every branch of achievement, on grounds of excellence alone”.
Modlik wants to “democratise further”; our current version is “obsolete”, he wants to “embed deeper citizen participation in both government and economic processes”. Is he calling for unelected persons to rule? Has he forgotten the Cambodian and Chinese populist regimes, for example, which collapsed completely because citizen ‘democracy’ could never get its act together and millions starved and died? Think again Mr Modlik."
In 1916, The Army of Russia decided they had had enough thus started a rebellion that went on to involve the people that up ended the Nation of Russia. Thus they welcomed the Bolshevik crusade that was to be the end all of problems of the time. Sadly the days the followed, those " end all factors " did not emerge and Russia collapsed into chaos - with the assistance of Lenin, Marx, Trotsky & Stalin. Amazingly they thought that they had the shining light to better prosperity for everyone (so thought Lenin) and thus went about " spreading the Gospel of Socialism " that would benefit the People not only in Russia but across the World. It is interesting to note that just how many Academics in Western Nations, " hugged the teapot " then and still do today.
Oh dear how written history has shown otherwise. It is from that time we saw -
- the ANC of South Africa espouse the same words employed the same brutal tactics (that the Bolshevik's did to the populace across Russia which included the Ukraine) - but was aimed at the White People, farmers more so - look at were South Africa is today.
And now we see Maoridom starting to embrace the same tactics, first the verbal assaults & insults, the massed protests, ignoring of Western Democratic process, just the start.
Having listened patiently to the confused and illogical drivel spouted by Helmut Modlik a few times, I came to the conclusion that the gentleman is simply put, an oxygen thief! It is all double speak with no real substance. I gather that he has some German ancestry. Well, I lived and worked in Berlin for a number of years and found that the majority of Germans, mainly by dint of the language were very clear speakers (except when a bit drunk). German has no concept of double entendre, something which in English allows for a certain type of humour. So, where did Helmut pick up his penchant for spouting such crap?
Barrie, you are absolutely right. Surely criticism without positive alternatives is futile. And collectively this nation is certainly on a downhill trend that is in urgent need of correction. We cannot yet determine the true source of the cultural disease we now suffer from, but we can see where immediate failings exist. The party political system is rotten, and no longer performs a positive or useful function for the country. We have certainly seen that over the last 5 years. Replace that with competent people, selected from the population by appropriate measures, and we might then be in a position to defend ourselves from the malevolent external forces, using the Quislings amongst us, now acting to tear this nation apart.
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