Entering a Post-literacy World
Unlike in some other places, the New Zealand Government decided that books were not essential goods and closed all bookshops during Alert Level 4. Even during Alert Level 3 you can only buy books online.
Category Archives: History of Ideas, Methodology, Philosophy
What Happened to Egalitarian New Zealand?
Bob Scott Lecture Series on Inequality, 25 June 2019. (See also Have We Abandoned the Egalitarian Society?) What I want to do this evening is examine egalitarianism. In particular, New Zealand is a less egalitarian society today than it was when I was growing up in the 1950s. Why? How? The structure of the paper…
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What is Meant by Wellbeing?
A discussion on ‘Nights’ with Bryan Crump. 28 May, 2019 The audio is here. See also here.
Obituary: Ian Francis Shirley
Ian Shirley (28 February 1940 – 20 January 2019) This obituary was first published in “The Policy Observatory” which Ian founded New Zealand’s progressive causes have been driven by a strong sense of social justice. Ian Shirley was one of the nation’s strongest drivers. He was born in Kaiapoi and spent his early years in…
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NEW ZEALAND’S 9/11: UNITY IN DIVERSITY
This was submitted to an American publication but not published.) On 15 March, 2019, a gunman entered Masjid Al Noor, a mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, during prayer time, and fired a semiautomatic rifle adapted to shoot continuously. He then went to a second mosque a few miles away, shooting people there too. Altogether 50…
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UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Paper to the Fabian Society, 12 October, 2016 While we continue to chew over the carcass of the Fourth Labour Government – the Lange-Douglas one – we pay little attention to the subsequent Fifth Labour Government. Yet the Clark-Cullen one is greatly shaping the current Labour Opposition and the current National Government. It will,…
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(William) KEITH EASTON: 18 August 1944 – 26 April 2016
(William) KEITH EASTON: 18 August 1944 – 26 April 2016 When I was about 12, the family was hit by a virus which made us lackadaisical and sleepy. I recall that on the afternoon it impacted on me, I struggled to meet my raspberry picking quota. Keith, 17 months younger, went down for a week….
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ARE NEW ZEALAND ECONOMISTS GOING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION?
The Secretary of the Treasury appears to have doubts. Pundit: 24 November, 2014. Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; In a speech to economics teachers earlier this month, the Secretary of the Treasury, Gabriel Makhlouf, argued for a different approach to economics from the one which dominates the profession in New…
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DOES PIKETTY MATTER?
Thomas Piketty says economic inequality has been getting greater in the world, and will get greater. What about New Zealand? Pundit: 28 October, 2014 Keywords: Distributional Economics; History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Paul Krugman has said “Thomas Piketty has transformed our economic discourse; we’ll never talk about wealth and inequality the…
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THE RIGHT TO DISSENT by Jack Shallcrass
Jack Shallcrass died on the 13 August, 2014 at the age of 91. Many years earlier in 1965 – he was 42 and I 21 – he spoke at the University of Curious Cove. His lecture, ‘The Right to Dissent’ greatly influenced my thinking. Its themes of the central role of dissent in a civilised…
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THE PURPOSE OF ECONOMIC POLICY
Published as a briefing paper: 13 May, 2014 (A service being provided by AUT) http://briefingpapers.co.nz/ Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; The annual May budget is a public spectacle. The Minister of Finance is photographed holding aloft a copy of his speech while those from political parties and sectors dominate media discussions…
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Growing Pains
As our main indicator of economic growth, GDP has major limitations. Listener: 30 January, 2014. Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Political Economy & History; The expectation is for normal economic growth in the coming year. The economy peaked in September 2007 and stagnated (in per-capita terms) through to March…
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Poor Show
Why it has taken so long for child poverty to become part of the conventional wisdom. Listener: 16th January, 2014 Keywords: Distributional Economics; History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Social Policy; Corso, the Council of Organisations for Relief Services Overseas, decided in 1979 that it was wrong to ignore poverty in New…
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MYTH, POLITICIANS AND MARKETS:
The Truth Behind the Free Market by Bryan Gould (Macmillan, $54.95) This review was commissioned by ‘The Listener’ but not used Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Political Economy & History; The dominant public narrative has a vision of business and the market as progressive forces, held back by unnecessary interventions from politicians and…
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The Archbishop and the Economist
St Andrew’s Trust for the Study of Religion and Society 24 October, 2013 Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Those who founded this venerable church, more than 160 years ago, might be a little disturbed that the Archbishop of Canterbury should be introduced into it. However my intention is not so much…
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The Austerian Economists’ Error
The Austerian Economists’ Error In the battle of opinions for managing sluggish economies, rhetoric often misrepresents the research. Listener: 13 June, 2013 Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Macroeconomics & Money; The right response to high unemployment and lethargic economic activity is to cut back government spending, according to “Austerians”, whose…
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Our Muslim Neighbours
Indonesian Muslims don’t necessarily support the opinions and actions of Middle Eastern Muslims. Listener: 8 June, 2013 Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Literature and Culture; Political Economy & History; I once flew from Dublin to Vienna – both Catholic but with very different atmospheres. The distance from Mecca to Jakarta…
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Thinking Fast, Thinking Slow, Thinking Moral
Presentation to the Ephesus Group, Wellington; 19 May, 2013. Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; I want to start a conversation which I hope will not end tonight. Instead I hope that many of you will go home and read the books on which the conversation is founded and continue it from…
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Albert Hirschman (1915-2012)
It is said social scientists don’t live dangerously, but here’s one who did. Listener: 16 February, 2013. Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; Political Economy & History; Miraculously, all four Jewish schoolboys in the picture (which accompanied the column) taken in Berlin in about 1930 escaped the Holocaust, which killed…
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Money Can’t Buy Me Love
The available text of Shakespeare?s Timon of Athens is a bit of a mess. It was all the compilers of the 1623 Folio edition of Shakespeare?s plays had when it was published, but it is almost certainly an early draft by its two playwrights (Thomas Middleton wrote about half of it), replete with inconsistencies that would have been dealt with when the play was staged. This may justify more freedom than modern directors regularly take with Shakespeare; the British National Theatre seized the opportunity last year with a stage production (right), also on film, located in London after the global financial crisis.