The Authoritarian Monster raises its Head

I missed this last night - apparently the New Zealand parliament unanimously passed the Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery Bill allowing the Governor-General to make Orders-in-Council at the advice of the Minister for Canterbury Earthquake Recovery, effectively allowing him to repeal or modify any existing law without consulting Parliament, his Government, or even the Cabinet.

While the intention is undoubtedly good, there has nonetheless been a bit of an uproar by online commentators over whether or not New Zealand is now a dictatorship, as the nation's legislation can now be changed at the whim of a single man.

I'd have to agree that removing a lot of obstacles during the rebuilding process is a wonderful idea, but I can't shake the ominous feeling that the disaster has softened the Kiwi opposition to authoritarianism. It's a scary thought that the seeds have now been sown, and all it takes is for someone to step in and harvest them at an opportune time.

Here's the take on the situation from various blogs:

From those more than a little concerned...
Kiwipolitico
Andrew Geddis
No Right Turn
Not PC

To those who voted for it or think it's good...
Greens
Labour
National
Kiwiblog

Sue Bradford's resignation

Big news indeed. There's been a press release on this, and various blogposts with different opinions, and I'm not sure what there is to add except a personal perspective on the whole issue.

I'm personally very sad to see her go. A very effective politician, a very effective activist working within parliament to generate change from within. Certainly one of the best MPs in the last ten years.

I'm sad, but not disappointed. She's given ten years of service to New Zealand, which, even as a backbencher, is a fair chunk of time. Losing the leadership was, in her own words, "personally disappointing", and that is understandable. I don't think you can begrudge someone their right to resign given that she felt that she had lost the support of her own party's members. (The Greens democratically elect their co-leaders.)

On the other hand, this may not be a loss for the Green Party. Bradford polarised the nation over S59 - and public opinion was mostly against her, as demonstrated by the referendum. A comment on the Greens blog said that she "lives in the wrong century". I agree, she's a century ahead of our time, and in a few decades we will probably wonder why we as a nation fought so hard to defend our right to assault our children. But right here, right now, she's a political hindrance to a party that is trying to extend their influence beyond their traditional grassroot activist voter base.

The woman who beat her to the co-leadership is no slouch either. She's green left through and through, but Norman and Turei are so politically adept that they just might reach through to the centrist but environmentally-concerned vote. They are also more than capable of touching base with the younger professional vote, and indeed I envision that the Greens will become a mainstay of Left politics in the future, especially whilst Labour with Goff sinks into irrelevance.

In summary; it's a big loss to New Zealand, but a politically smart move for the Greens.

link: cultural protectionism

A bit tired to write up a long post today, so I'll be lazy and link to an interesting post on another blog.

This post from Kiwipolitico caught my eye:

Resentful reactionary ethnocentric cultural protectionism

Whilst not the point of the post, it does make me think about the role that assimilation plays in our society as a counter to multiculturalism, and whether cultural tradition equates to cultural protectionism.

Smacking Referendum

"Should a smack as part of good parental correction be a criminal offence in New Zealand?"

Wow, is this a terribly ambiguous question or what? No, you think it's straightforward? Well I guess I'd better give a bit of background info for non-Kiwi readers.

New Zealand's Crimes Act 1961 Section 59 previously allowed a legal defence of "reasonable force" for parents prosecuted for assaulting their children. Intended to protect parents' rights to use reasonable force to discipline their children, this law was ultimately interpreted by a NZ jury to allow violent parents to beat their children with metal pipes and other large objects.

In 2005 a member's bill was introduced (by Sue Bradford, a NZ Greens MP) which was to amend Section 59 to disallow this legal defence. This bill was passed on 16 May 2007 at its third reading, but not without great controversy as "family-friendly" groups such as Family First NZ were concerned that they would no longer be able to harshly beat their children in order to discipline them without threat of prosecution.

And so we have this referendum. And as I stated at the start, how ridiculously ambiguous is this. I respect that sometimes - not all the time - it is useful to give a child a light smack, like when there's a little arm reaching for the frying pan and it'll save a lot of tears. Sure, a light smack in order to prevent greater pain for the child should not be a legal offence.

But wait we're not talking about a "light smack" here. The word in question is simply - "smack". Not to mention "good parental correction" is open to interpretation also.

No, this isn't a fair question. My initial reaction (and I'm sure most people's) would be to vote "No", because that's the way it's intended to come across. In reality, we're looking at a current law which has removed the ability for parents to get away with physical abuse of their children.

I mailed my "Yes" vote in today - hopefully it gets to NZ in time.

Edit: Here are links to both sides to the argument - both make some excellent points (and some not-so-good points).

"Yes" vote - "No" vote