Kiwi hostility to democracy

Matt McCarten, in his column in the Herald looks at how events surrounding the demolition of Melissa Lee's National party candidacy in Mt. Albert highlights serious problem with democracy in New Zealand. In particular, McCarten looks at the lack of active engagement by all but a very small proportion of the population in the party political process.

My own experience of political involvement in NZ over the past 25 years suggests many Kiwis are only happy with “democracy” provided everyone agrees with them and things are done the way they want them done. If things don't go the way they want them to, then they don't like democracy itself.
Allowing anyone but them to have an effective say is undesirable in their view. Most often they also see no reason why they would ever get involved and actually do something to get things moving in their preferred direction. Even if they do decide to get involved, to them the answers are obvious and they don't want to waste a minute persuading anyone of the merits of their views. Just do it and democracy just gets in the way.

Real life isn’t like that, so this sort of person will turn up at meetings, find that they are just one of the many there and everyone ISN’T hanging on their every word.

Discussion, debate and negotiation take time and require people to do their homework. Meeting(s) will sometimes, or often, arrive at a decision not everyone agrees with, in part or whole. The un/anti-democratic Kiwi tend to de-commit fairly quickly and may even spit the dummy completely and thereafter go around telling everyone "camels are horses designed by committees". That is the sure sign of someone who doesn't know how to work well with others (and may never have even tried).

All the 'wise' heads nod in agreement. This sort of person prefers to dictate rather than listen and engage in a positive and constructive way. Any outcome but the one they want is proof (to them) democracy sucks.

In my experience, Kiwi politics (like politics anywhere) is, at times, greatly hindered by these immature people who want it all their own way while at the same time not listening to anyone else. The irony is that too many of them in the same room can produce exactly the outcome they all object to: gridlock and confusion.

Sometimes, they rise to high office in the absence of any local competition within their party. With few democratic checks in place, they can go far on very little indeed. Once there, they avoid any real consultation as a waste of their time. They practice the art of fait accompli and very much prefer situations that allow them to dictate rather than negotiate.

Of the two major parties, National is the worse for lacking internal democracy, though Labour is very far from perfect and not much better.

National's members have very little say at all about what happens in the party. Their members (including many MPs) have no effective say in policy formulation. Local members elect only their local candidate and have no say about any other or about the party list or its ranking or the Parliamentary leadership of their party.

This is no accident. National is actively hostile to democracy. They want to reduce democracy in Auckland to make it more effective. National wants to get rid of MMP so they can dictate more effectively to everyone, not just Auckland. National is - in effect - the vehicle for the immature, negative, un/anti-democratic tendency that runs strongly in the veins of the Kiwi body politic. These are the people who have no idea how a city council works or what an MP does all day. They will have strongly negative views of politicians despite having no direct experience of any of them. They won't have ever read a Bill or made a submission on anything.

One perverse aspect of this anti-democratic attitude, in my view, was National warning voters in 1993 of the prospect of undemocratically selected party list candidates being elected under MMP. National then set about proving themselves right by demonstrating no commitment to internal party democracy. It was all empty talk about wanting democracy. Gioven the chance,  they didn't do it and actively seek to undermine democracy for others who do do it.

Are people outraged by National's anti-democratic policies? Not really. Perhaps they don't actually understand what it all means. Perhaps it's because they don't understand very much about politics at all in any case.

Most Kiwis today are actually quite happy with this anti-democratic position. Again, my own experience suggests aren’t well informed politically (or about anything, really). They certainly aren't engaged or active in the political process. Few have any real experience of working positively and constructively for a solution that everyone can live with, though to their credit, Maori culture is often more democratic than the mainstream culture with frequent hui and consultation in many iwi. But most Kiwis prefer to dictate. Discussion is a waste of time, debate is seen as squabbling and negotiation is seen as weakness. Never mind that these are the most effective ways for groups of people to get things done together without conflict and disruption.

What is noticeable about many who do persist in politics over many years is they are more measured and mature in their approach and do tend (not always!) to be positive and constructive in approaching most issues.

Sadly though, Melissa Lee is just one more indicator of the consequences of most Kiwis’ disinterest or active hostility to the daily grind of actual practice of grassroots democracy. The party bosses in National were able to pick someone who clearly wasn't up to the job and no one questioned them. No one could.

Of course people won’t see themselves as hostile to democracy, but what they actually DO gives the game away. Most Kiwis wanted MMP because they didn't like the way things were going. I was certainly one of them. But once we got more and better democracy, many of those same people were almost immediately disenchanted because real democracy allows people you disagree with to take part and have an equal say.

For most Kiwis, this just won't do. In their heart of hearts most Kiwis don't actually like democracy very much at all.  This is very frustrating and disheartening for the very large minority of Kiwis who do value democracy and that portion of those who actually take part in it.