pn878. Victoria University's Democracy Project: Some unanwered questions

 

I used to look forward to reading Bryce Edwards' NZ Politics Daily. It provided links to dozens of  media articles neatly arranged under headings such as Russia's invasion of Ukraine, National Party, Supermarket competition, Omicron outbreak, Housing, Local government, and Environmental change.   

 

But there have been no Dailies since the 8th March.  Instead, we've had a succession of Bryce's personal views, supported by a dozen articles on the same topic, in Political Roundup.

 In today's posting, for example, Bryce says Labour is pandering to negative opinion polls and needs to re-find its political soul. He's backed up by Jack Tame from Q&A (Government cares more about polls than principles), Molly Swift (Government more interested in doing what's popular than what's right), Duncan Garner (Is Ardern out of touch or losing her touch?), Henry Cooke (Government's $350m fuel tax cut skipped usual scrutiny), Tracy Watkins (Why Labour's legacy might not be what it wants), Janet Wilson (The stage is set for an election bunfight in 2023), Richard Prebble (It is going to be a landslide defeat for Labour), Peter Dunne (This Labour government has been neither aspirational nor transformative) and others.  

You could say much of this is positive criticism but the combined effect is negative and anti-Labour. All on the one topic, and many repetitive. Bang another nail into the coffin.

Both NZ Politics Daily and Political Roundup are part of Victoria University's Democracy Project, which aims/claims "to enhance New Zealand democracy and public life by promoting critical thinking, analysis, debate, and engagement on politics and society ... It is keen to involve a wide range of other public intellectuals in the project—journalists, academics, activists, and others— and create a platform offering up diverse views and thought. We are resolutely non-partisan and ‘for the public good’. An "experiment in new ways of doing politics, involving academic, civil society, and media collaboration." Great intentions and expectations!

Most of their sources are from mainstream media but they do include some blogs such as Bassett, Brash and Hide, Daily Blog and Bernard Hickey's Te Kākā.  They do not, however, include my blog and the emails I send them are not even answered. 

Funding for the Democracy Project comes entirely from philanthropy. I wonder if there's a "whoever pays the piper calls the tune" element in this sort of sponsorship. 

I look forward to the return of NZ Politics Daily, and more balance in Political Roundup.

-- ACW 

Note.

This is what the project states about its services:

NZ Politics Daily is a comprehensive, compendium of links to news and analysis on politics emailed to subscribers at 8 am, Monday to Friday.

Political Roundup is an in-depth column providing analysis on one topic of the day, especially through the aggregation of different perspectives. This is published regularly and emailed out freely to subscribers.

Political commentary in the media—we supply  regular interviews with journalists and broadcasters about issues of the day in New Zealand politics. This includes producing regular analysis pieces for other media, such as The Guardian.

Outreach, education and advocacy—we provide briefings, talks and advocacy about how politics works and how to improve democracy.