But why doesn’t such a party arise and succeed? Can it arise Ex Nihilo: ‘out of nothing’? That is not as a breakaway from existing parties? Is the real issue the limitations of centrism itself, as – I’d suggest – a recent attempt to create such a party demonstrates.
Over about 18 months I was one of a number of people who strategy and advertising consultant Paul Kennedy Gunson bounced ideas off as a new centrist political party was planned and developed, one which sadly went into suspension over the summer due to insufficient benefactor support.
It was interesting to be part of this, even in a small, non-member way, as it helped me refine some thinking about the issues of party politics in a small democracy and what I might term the societal inhibitors of any such new venture. It’s also very useful to have access to a Q&A which Gunson undertook with a couple of independent commentators as such self-reflexive honesty is all too rare in our political system. [Gunson has very kindly allowed me to make use of it for this discussion]
The aim of the proposed new party, to be called “Forward”, was “to improve the public trust in politicians” [some might say that was in itself the central challenge to success] by not only “diluting the influence of special interests” but also by improving “the right kind of political discourse”.
Yet all our existing and successful political parties have arisen from and still include and represent ‘special interests’; it’s what gives them their history and their identity and their influence. We could say special interests provide their ontology, their nature of being.
This ontology, this collection of ‘special interests’, waxes and wanes and changes over time, sometimes a core facet can be lost or discarded or beguiled away by another party (i.e. the conservative working class to National under Muldoon) while new special interests arise and rise (or fall) through internal politics and infighting and dominance. Parties can also form out of alliances that become an ongoing set of internal, often competing special interests such as the birth of the National party in 1936 out of the conservative Reform and liberal United parties.
But what and who, we need to ask, are the ‘special interests’ of any centrist party that is not a coming together of existing members and importantly, MPs of oppositional parties and blocs? How many remember the brief centrist spurt of Clive Matthewson’s United New Zealand party that in 1995 brought together six MPs but failed to survive the 1996 election? Peter Dunne was the only one of the six to survive by being able to draw on his existing, well-established right-wing Labour roots and find an accommodation not only with his electorate voters but with both Labour and National-led governments. We could say his ‘special interests’ were the voters of what was variously Ohariu, Ohariu-Belmont, Onslow and then again Ohariu (the later name also going through a variety of spellings).
But these centrist MPs came from somewhere, they didn’t arise ‘out of nothing’; so I wonder if it is all but impossible for any new Centrist party to arise unless it forms out of existing ones and MPs? And even then it seem it is very difficult, if not impossible to survive. That is, how do you make a centrist idea a new reality?
As Gunson notes, ‘special interests’ both represent and attract donors and political parties can’t arise and exist and succeed without such donors… which in retrospect puts an anti-special interest stance as a fatal flaw.
A second challenge the proposed Forward party faced was a decision to be “anti-special interests without being anti-establishment”. Yet I’d suggest both Labour and National are not only centrally based in special interests, these special interests, especially in parliament, represent different factions of an overall New Zealand political establishment. That’s why they can work together on various cross-party committees and in socializing. The centre is in fact both Labour and National and both look to limit the extremes of parties on their own sides of the political bloc and of those afflicting the other party as well. Dunne was useful as he was a single voice and a single electorate and he was a parliamentary and government insider; he was not a body of new voters or electorates or MPs to accommodate.
But a new party with a new leader and new voters is much harder to accommodate, predict and control. At least with Winston and NZ First it is clear who his ‘special interests’ are, (many would suggest the main one being Winston himself) and the same goes for ACT formed out of right-wing Labour and National ‘more market’ MPs and believers. The challenge of the Greens is working out which of its ‘special interests’ and which of its leaders in in control and why… and the same is true in a different way for Te Pati Māori. But none of NZ First, ACT, the Greens or TPM claim to be or wish to be ‘centrist’; they are happy in being ‘special interests’ parties.
It can also be suggested that the most ‘successful’ Prime Ministers are those that are able to present a centrist persona and charisma from within their own political party over a number of elections. Holyoake did it, Muldoon represented a significant populist realignment of the centrist Overton window that impacted and changed Labour, Bolger then realigned it as did then Clark for and from Labour, and Key continued this for and from National. It’s important, I’d suggest, to note, that National has been able to do so more often than Labour; which also indicates that the centrism New Zealand voters tend to be more comfortable with and return to power is a centre-right centrism more than a centre-left one.
All of this is a challenge to establishing a successful new centrist party. Without existing MPs as leader and members as it lacks a base and history and a definite position. For centrism is in fact not neutral; nor is successful politics – in either FFP or MMP systems – the pursuit of centrist strategy at the expense of special interests or exiting party voters. We also forget the importance and value of Peter Dunne was that he maintained very small variations of the status quo, he did not seek to change it. He was in fact incrementalism, not new centrism in action.
Another issue is that Forward positioned and viewed itself as a “hybrid or semi-populist party” but its suggested “Five-point Democratic Reform” to be put forward as its “red-line policy” would have needed a mass of MPs and voters to make such a red-line viable, yet it focused only on winning the North Shore electorate. Neither did it have a populist leader capable of creating the nation-wide loyalty [and loathing] that populism requires.
A final issue is that Forward actually positioned itself as – in effect – a centre-left party focused on democratic reform that ruled out working with “ ‘big money’ National”; there was an intellectual honesty to doing so, but I’d suggest also a political naivety. Because as Gunson notes, many people “think that centrism means ‘being open to working with both sides’”; which means Forward was always going to have to explain why its version of ‘centrism’ was not and is not the version that many voters would expect and wish it to be.
So where does this leave any version of New Zealand centrism? I’d suggest right-and-left where it has always been since the 1930s; as a two-power, two party bloc of the establishment parties. If we are to revitalize the centre then it needs to come from within both Labour and National where they can meet and agree and disagree, spurred on and provoked [within reason?] by the smaller special-special interests non-establishment parties that make up their bloc. The centre is not the same as the idea of centrism…
Mike Grimshaw (PhD Otago) is associate professor in sociology at the University of Canterbury. This article was sourced HERE
It was interesting to be part of this, even in a small, non-member way, as it helped me refine some thinking about the issues of party politics in a small democracy and what I might term the societal inhibitors of any such new venture. It’s also very useful to have access to a Q&A which Gunson undertook with a couple of independent commentators as such self-reflexive honesty is all too rare in our political system. [Gunson has very kindly allowed me to make use of it for this discussion]
The aim of the proposed new party, to be called “Forward”, was “to improve the public trust in politicians” [some might say that was in itself the central challenge to success] by not only “diluting the influence of special interests” but also by improving “the right kind of political discourse”.
Yet all our existing and successful political parties have arisen from and still include and represent ‘special interests’; it’s what gives them their history and their identity and their influence. We could say special interests provide their ontology, their nature of being.
This ontology, this collection of ‘special interests’, waxes and wanes and changes over time, sometimes a core facet can be lost or discarded or beguiled away by another party (i.e. the conservative working class to National under Muldoon) while new special interests arise and rise (or fall) through internal politics and infighting and dominance. Parties can also form out of alliances that become an ongoing set of internal, often competing special interests such as the birth of the National party in 1936 out of the conservative Reform and liberal United parties.
But what and who, we need to ask, are the ‘special interests’ of any centrist party that is not a coming together of existing members and importantly, MPs of oppositional parties and blocs? How many remember the brief centrist spurt of Clive Matthewson’s United New Zealand party that in 1995 brought together six MPs but failed to survive the 1996 election? Peter Dunne was the only one of the six to survive by being able to draw on his existing, well-established right-wing Labour roots and find an accommodation not only with his electorate voters but with both Labour and National-led governments. We could say his ‘special interests’ were the voters of what was variously Ohariu, Ohariu-Belmont, Onslow and then again Ohariu (the later name also going through a variety of spellings).
But these centrist MPs came from somewhere, they didn’t arise ‘out of nothing’; so I wonder if it is all but impossible for any new Centrist party to arise unless it forms out of existing ones and MPs? And even then it seem it is very difficult, if not impossible to survive. That is, how do you make a centrist idea a new reality?
As Gunson notes, ‘special interests’ both represent and attract donors and political parties can’t arise and exist and succeed without such donors… which in retrospect puts an anti-special interest stance as a fatal flaw.
A second challenge the proposed Forward party faced was a decision to be “anti-special interests without being anti-establishment”. Yet I’d suggest both Labour and National are not only centrally based in special interests, these special interests, especially in parliament, represent different factions of an overall New Zealand political establishment. That’s why they can work together on various cross-party committees and in socializing. The centre is in fact both Labour and National and both look to limit the extremes of parties on their own sides of the political bloc and of those afflicting the other party as well. Dunne was useful as he was a single voice and a single electorate and he was a parliamentary and government insider; he was not a body of new voters or electorates or MPs to accommodate.
But a new party with a new leader and new voters is much harder to accommodate, predict and control. At least with Winston and NZ First it is clear who his ‘special interests’ are, (many would suggest the main one being Winston himself) and the same goes for ACT formed out of right-wing Labour and National ‘more market’ MPs and believers. The challenge of the Greens is working out which of its ‘special interests’ and which of its leaders in in control and why… and the same is true in a different way for Te Pati Māori. But none of NZ First, ACT, the Greens or TPM claim to be or wish to be ‘centrist’; they are happy in being ‘special interests’ parties.
It can also be suggested that the most ‘successful’ Prime Ministers are those that are able to present a centrist persona and charisma from within their own political party over a number of elections. Holyoake did it, Muldoon represented a significant populist realignment of the centrist Overton window that impacted and changed Labour, Bolger then realigned it as did then Clark for and from Labour, and Key continued this for and from National. It’s important, I’d suggest, to note, that National has been able to do so more often than Labour; which also indicates that the centrism New Zealand voters tend to be more comfortable with and return to power is a centre-right centrism more than a centre-left one.
All of this is a challenge to establishing a successful new centrist party. Without existing MPs as leader and members as it lacks a base and history and a definite position. For centrism is in fact not neutral; nor is successful politics – in either FFP or MMP systems – the pursuit of centrist strategy at the expense of special interests or exiting party voters. We also forget the importance and value of Peter Dunne was that he maintained very small variations of the status quo, he did not seek to change it. He was in fact incrementalism, not new centrism in action.
Another issue is that Forward positioned and viewed itself as a “hybrid or semi-populist party” but its suggested “Five-point Democratic Reform” to be put forward as its “red-line policy” would have needed a mass of MPs and voters to make such a red-line viable, yet it focused only on winning the North Shore electorate. Neither did it have a populist leader capable of creating the nation-wide loyalty [and loathing] that populism requires.
A final issue is that Forward actually positioned itself as – in effect – a centre-left party focused on democratic reform that ruled out working with “ ‘big money’ National”; there was an intellectual honesty to doing so, but I’d suggest also a political naivety. Because as Gunson notes, many people “think that centrism means ‘being open to working with both sides’”; which means Forward was always going to have to explain why its version of ‘centrism’ was not and is not the version that many voters would expect and wish it to be.
So where does this leave any version of New Zealand centrism? I’d suggest right-and-left where it has always been since the 1930s; as a two-power, two party bloc of the establishment parties. If we are to revitalize the centre then it needs to come from within both Labour and National where they can meet and agree and disagree, spurred on and provoked [within reason?] by the smaller special-special interests non-establishment parties that make up their bloc. The centre is not the same as the idea of centrism…
Mike Grimshaw (PhD Otago) is associate professor in sociology at the University of Canterbury. This article was sourced HERE
7 comments:
In New Zealand we have a problem that the media would call the radical policies of Jacinda Ardern centrist. It isn't possible for a centrist party to be anything but left wing, culturally Marxist and aligned with the Te Tiriti ideology. Hence David Seymour's saying 'all New Zealanders are equal' is absurdly denounced as far right fascism.
A new party change is not needed for this election , but a public understanding that the election needs to address a decade of overspending and waste of taxpayer contributions. The 2026 election is not about "are we better off" but "have we eliminated the
foolhardy decisions of the political bureaucracy".
The ACT party has demonstrated fiscal smarts this term and will bottom line a direction towards surplus for all NZers.
Oh dear, oh dear, good try Mike, but any attempt to improve the existing grossly dysfunctional system with something guaranteed to become equally grossly dysfunctional is, maybe, not all that clever. Why don’t we ask another question? How about; how do we ensure that our MPs are suited for, and capable of, the task we expect of them? I suggest that such a question automatically disqualifies party political membership, (with all its potential horrors) absolutely. And after all, suitability for the task is a fundamental requirement for virtually any job I can think of. Who would you sooner have as a legislator: a capable, objective thinker primarily concerned with making NZ the best country in the world to live in, or, say, another Chloe or Jacinda, or Chris, ideologically stapled to his/her teenage fantasies of power and control. A no-brainer eh?
Great article Mike and nice to see someone proposing a solution. The problems have been well articulated and repeating them ad nauseum hasn't solved a thing, although it has raised awareness.
Academia needs to step up to save Kiwis.
Professor McCullough spoke up, he revealed the political corruption allowing the price colluding Aussie: energy, food, banking, and insurance cartels; to push kiwi wallets to their limits. For example, when setting prices, electricity companies don't use ROI as their measure, they scour the globe to find out what percentage of customer's earnings, international electricity companies have successfully pushed their prices to, and follow suit.
Academics know cartels can't exist without corrupt politicians. Prof McCullough is the only academic brave enough to expose the obvious corruption...
'New Zealand’s “soft corruption” has been called out this week by leading economics professor Robert MacCulloch of the University of Auckland. He’s launched some heavy broadsides at the way that political and business elites in this country are ruining the economy and the political process by their dysfunctional hold on power in which dissent and debate are suppressed using patronage and threats.'
NZ continues its fall down the corruption rankings..."New Zealand has slipped further down the corruption rankings highlights the conflicts of interest at the heart of the Luxon government.
It follows a report by Transparency International in which New Zealand's Corruptions Perceptions Index score has fallen by two points for the fourth consecutive year".
So, Kiwis need a new, honest party / leader and to get it we require NZ academics to brush up on ethics and speak up. it is a shame on all academia you left Prof McCullough as sole voice.
So who will step up and challenge the dishonest, Kiwi family robbing, Aussie cartel supporting; Luxon / willis show?
Kiwi families need NZ academics to regain their morals.
Anonymous 1220. If David Seymour is saying 'all New Zealanders are equal" why has Chourr been caight out allowing Maori workers special privileges at OT?
And why was Brooke Van Velden caught out maorifying the fire service?
David Seymour is a dishonest hypocrite who actively supports the aussie cartel's making Kiwi's lives a cost of living nightmare.
We’ve already got one, the Opportunities party. The only problem is they aren’t getting enough votes because they don’t know how to dog whistle. If they jumped on the anti-migrant / anti-Maori / anti-science bandwagon , they’d have a chance. They don’t need to follow through on the right-wing nonsense, they just need to get the numbers.
Anon 351 Ain’t nobody arguing with the Seymour sentiment there. You seem to have lost the plot on Van Der Velden though (or BrookeGPT, as they say around the beehive).
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