Professor Michael Rainsborough: Towards Post-totalitarianism in the West: Some Warnings From the East

“Do we not stand as a kind of warning to the West, revealing to it its own latent tendencies?” So asked Czech playwright Václav Havel in 1978 in ‘The Power of the Powerless’, his epic essay on the nature of dissent in Communist Eastern Europe. Havel argued that the fate of East European countries under Communist tyranny stood as a monument to the debilitating effects of late-stage techno-bureaucratic rationalism – a system focused solely on material existence. This system, he argued, ceased to serve humanity, eroded individual dignity and coldly tore people away from their natural affiliations: their habitat, their family, their community, their nation.

Peter St. Onge: They Have the Money - We Have the Numbers

Authoritarianism is back across the West — from Europe to the Biden-Harris censorship regime that would fit perfectly in Communist China.

I think many of us were surprised during Covid to realize just what the supposedly liberal West has become: Essentially the Soviet Union but with better uniforms — well, better video games, anyway.

Of course, it was decades in the making — Covid just showed their cards.

The question, as always, is What’s Next.

NZCPR Newsletter: Unwinding Labour's Agenda

Former US President Ronald Reagan once said, “Freedom is a fragile thing and it’s never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by way of inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation.”

The fight for freedom in New Zealand has now reached a critical juncture. After six years of Labour’s increasingly authoritarian restrictions on our freedoms and democratic rights, unwinding their agenda will be a major challenge for the new Government. 

Suze Wilson: Romantic heroes or ‘one of us’

How we judge political leaders is rarely objective or rational

Given the presidential style of modern politics, the intense media focus on party leaders is unavoidable. But this involves a degree of artifice. New Zealanders don’t vote directly for a prime minister, they vote for their preferred party and electorate candidate.

Technicalities aside, though, party leaders play a key role in shaping their party’s policies and soliciting public support. The upside of the attention they receive, therefore, is that voters get to scrutinise before they “buy”.

Graham Adams: Is Ardern a liability for Labour?

Ministers are pretending the former PM has simply vanished.

Late last week, Tova O’Brien asked Grant Robertson on her Stuff podcast if Jacinda Ardern should be “rolled out” to “galvanise the base” to help save Labour’s faltering campaign.

Robertson laughed. ”I’m sure for Jacinda the last thing on her mind is the election.”

James Kierstead: Surveillance is freedom

Last year, Kiri Allan was forced to withdraw the government’s latest ‘hate speech’ proposals, only a year or so after Kris Faafoi was forced to shelve similar plans.

We have no doubt that you were as dismayed as we were by these developments (or lack of developments).

After all, how will we stop authoritarianism without regulating citizens’ speech?

Geoff Parker: The Authoritarian Noose Tightens

We live in disquieting times when even some books of the marvellous children’s author and perceptive political cartoonist, the late Dr Seuss are being deplatformed. This is in keeping with a trend throughout the Western World to restrict or manipulate the flow of information, commentary and opinion. This movement now includes historical facts, perceptions and historical context.  

The intent seems to be to create a new world order by promoting a radical, anti-Western, anti-democracy ideology. This is being facilitated by the internet’s global reach and behaviours of international bureaucrats, the mass media, large corporates, law firms and those lacking critical thinking skills. Here in New Zealand, organisations enjoying government or council largesse are particularly prone to looking the other way – and their numbers are growing by the year.