Geoff Parker: Culture Is Not Democracy - Equal Citizenship Is

Professor Dominic O'Sullivan argues that abolishing Mana Whakahono ā Rohe Agreements "undermines democracy". In reality, the opposite is true.

No one is arguing that Māori culture should be excluded from public life. Every New Zealander is free to express their culture, advocate for their interests, and participate in democratic processes.

The issue is whether one ethnic group should enjoy statutory rights that no other citizens possess.

Andy Oakley: Kapiti Mayor Exposes Her Racist Agenda

Unelected Māori infiltrate Council

Well, today we have a real humdinger to discuss. In a July 6 article in Kapiti News by Ashleigh Collis, Kapiti Mayor Janet Holborow made what amounts to a public confession that she is a Marxist, or rather, she’s in charge, and she’s against democratic accountability.

Ryan Bridge: Democracy is a privilege billions still don't have

It was a weekend of big events. A wedding, a funeral, and a milestone birthday.

Congratulations, in that order, to America on its 250th anniversary, to Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce on their wedding, to those Iranians who suffered under the Ayatollah's rule, and to the All Blacks for beating France.

The Leighton Smith Podcast: Dr Muriel Newman on this year's hugely consequential general election

Leighton Smith and Dr Muriel Newman discuss the ongoing constitutional shift toward iwi influence, co-governance and race-based policies. In this election year, New Zealand is arguably facing its biggest challenge to date.

Click to listen - Audio

Caleb Anderson: Binding Citizens Referenda - could this work?

Increasingly Western voters are losing confidence in the governments they elect, not in New Zealand alone.

Commitments made before elections are frequently ignored or traded, influencers seem to exert disproportionate leverage in shaping policy, while bureaucrats delay and obstruct, and politicians obfuscate.

Barrie Davis - Weimar Germany: Death of a Democracy

“The Weimar Republic was Germany’s postwar experiment with democracy, and a time of unprecedented intellectual and artistic freedom. But beneath the glamour was a polarized society plagued by economic disasters, populist leaders fuelling culture wars and an uneasy political settlement that would soon spawn the horrors of Nazism.”

Guest Post: What is destroying New Zealand - yes, we were warned

A Guest Post by Alfred Johns on Brash & Mitchell.

Former U.S. President Barack Obama was speaking to Americans—not New Zealanders—when he issued this warning in 2006. Yet his words seem uncannily relevant to New Zealand today.

Guest Post: Notice To The New Zealand First Parliamentary Caucus

Guest Post by Ivan Barnett on New Minister

Ref: Immediate Legislative Action Required to Halt Ongoing Iwi Entrenchment in Local Government

To the Members of the New Zealand First Caucus,

This notice is issued to express the deep concern of New Zealanders who have watched the steady erosion of democratic authority through the appointment of unelected iwi representatives to council committees with full voting rights. The Government’s recent announcement claiming to “restore democratic accountability” is not action. It is not reform. It is not protection of the principle of one person, one vote. It is a political cover‑up for continued inaction.

Geoff Parker: Local Choice Cannot Override Democracy

Mariameno Kapa-Kingi argues that the Government's local government reforms represent an attack on local choice. But her argument contains a fundamental contradiction.

She claims that councils should be free to appoint iwi representatives as voting members because local communities may support those arrangements. Yet the very essence of democracy is that those who exercise voting power over public decisions should themselves be elected by the public.

Stuart Smith: Are We Captured by the Bureaucracy?

Voters elect members of parliament, mayors and councillors to make decisions, set priorities and keep a tight rein on spending. But over my political career, I’ve observed too many instances where real power seems to sit with the bureaucracy that writes the reports, sets the agenda and controls the information. It is fair to ask: have some elected representatives been captured by the machines they are supposed to lead?

Pee Kay: “…equal treatment is deemed discrimination”

2026 finds New Zealand standing at a critical political and social intersection.

The path a future New Zealand takes, will in some part, likely be decided at the ballot box on November 7th and will most probably be central to heated and continued constitutional discussion and argument into the late 2020s!

With a population of 5.3 million New Zealand is wrestling with a fragile economy and a constitutional and an identity crisis. If our country is to ever secure a prosperous future, surely it is now time to turn away from the politically imposed obstructions of co-governance, partnership and the movement towards Maori sovereignty.

John McLean: Parliament Passing Legislation Is.....Undemocratic!?

Whacky reactions to proposed legislation extinguishing crazy climate Court cases

On Tuesday 12 May, Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith announced a legislative reform to stop New Zealand Courts forcing “greenhouse gas”-producing businesses to compensate New Zealanders for damage from bad weather. The yet-to-be-drafted legislation will amend New Zealand’s Climate Change Response Act 2002.

The legislation will have the particular effect of extinguishing current Court action by a race hustler with a boring name. I’ve covered Mike Smith’s judicial machinations in a previous Substack.

Roger Partridge: An affront to democracy?

Mike Smith, the climate activist suing six of New Zealand’s largest companies over greenhouse gas emissions, is unhappy. On Tuesday, the Government announced it will amend the Climate Change Response Act 2002 to stop cases like his and others like it. Smith calls the move “an affront to democracy.”

He has the wrong end of the stick.

Pee Kay: Equal Rights is Being Quietly Euthanised

Last week, I pulled back the curtain exposing a small fraction of the financial reality of Māori privilege. Today I’m endeavouring to follow the trail to the very source of the decay. Today I’m looking at the systemic foundations that sustain Maori privilege.

New Zealand isn’t just drifting toward a two-tier society, I say we’ve already arrived!

While we go about our daily lives, a quiet revolution is being engineered by the very people sworn to represent us. This isn’t a conspiracy; Oh no, it’s a co-ordinated march toward tribal rule, led by politicians and protected by a shield of complicit media, elite academics, and bureaucratic “gatekeepers.”

Peter Williams: The FNDC debacle – Why democracy matters

The Local Government Act must be changed

Democracy, as Sir Winston Churchill once said in the House of Commons (quoting an unknown parliamentary predecessor) is the worst form of government, apart from all those other forms which have been tried from time to time.

Democracy, from the Greek words demos, meaning people, and kratos (rule, power or strength) in its purist form is government of the people, by the people and for the people.

Thousands of organisations, from the smallest membership based incorporated societies to local authorities and central government vote for the people they wish to govern them.

Elizabeth Rata: Neotribal Capitalism and Co-Governance

In a Nutshell

Capitalism creates prosperity. But its relentless drive to accumulate must be controlled by democratic politics. Neotribal economic corporations (the 'neo' means they are different from the pre-modern tribal re-distributive economy) are like socialist ones. They merge the economy with politics. Dangerously, they institutionalise the merger in legislation, policy and practice. Because those combined interests are invisible, they are unchallengeable.

Barrie Saunders: TVNZ – a reassessment

Apart from 7 years abroad, I have grown up with TVNZ’s channel one and was privileged to serve six years on its board – 2011 to 2017

Up until recently I retained a forlorn hope that it was possible to create a hybrid public service/commercial TV operation, that was positively New Zealand oriented, presenting objectively the reality of life here, and abroad.

Elliott Ikilei: It is worse than you think - Far North Council has been taken over

Things are going badly wrong in the Far North, and the Government is choosing to sit on its hands and let it happen. We have to take action now.

A sitting councillor, Davina Smolders has come forward in an interview with Duncan Garner on his podcast and described what is happening inside the Far North District Council. This is no petty disagreement over policy. It is a fundamental shift in who is exercising power and the complete overriding of democracy.

Dr Oliver Hartwich: The end of the golden bargain

Campaign slogans used to sell the future. In 1960, John F. Kennedy promised Americans a ‘New Frontier’. Bill Clinton chose Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Don’t Stop’ as his anthem. Tony Blair swept into Downing Street to D:Ream’s ‘Things Can Only Get Better’. Gerhard Schröder promised Germans he would not do everything differently but many things better.

These were statements of faith: the future would be an improvement on the present, and democratic politics was the vehicle that would take you there.

Pee Kay: Are these two......

the biggest threats to the continuance of democracy in New Zealand?