Latest from the Policy Commons
Alan France: The poor stay poor and the rich get rich – everybody knows
Everybody knows that the dice are loaded Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed Everybody knows the war is over Everybody knows the good guys lost Everybody knows the fight was fixed The poor stay poor, the rich get rich That's how it goes, everybody knows...
A Better, But Not as Yet, Good Parliament: The UK House of Commons 2016-2018
Sarah Childs, Professor of Politics and Gender, Birkbeck College University of London and Distinguished Visiting Researcher, University of Auckland, discusses progress on implementing the recommendations of her report The Good Parliament two years on from its...
Equal pay starts with transparency
By Ryan Greenaway-McGrevy - If everyone knows what their peers are getting paid, it is much harder for women to remain underpaid relative to their male colleagues, argues the University of Auckland's Dr Ryan Greenaway-McGrevy Mary* first learned that her colleague...
Melinda Webber: Ethnic ‘mixedness’ on the rise
As ethnic 'mixedness' is on the rise, the message is that individuals must find their own way to become, be, and belong, writes Melinda Webber. The number of people who identify having multiple ethnicities is increasing, both in New Zealand and internationally....
PM’s Baby Is a Chance to Improve Parliament for Parents
By Jennifer Curtin - [At at a conference of Speakers and Clerks from Australia and the Pacific Islands last week, Labour MP Kiri Allan argued for a change in the travel cap for partners of MPs with young babies, and the National Party pushed back on a...
Evidence and the ‘Three Strikes’ law
By Len Cook - The ‘Three Strikes’ law exists because a majority of Members of Parliament want it, although there is no evidence which exists to justify or shape it. This is not an unusual situation, and there are many examples of legislation being weakly informed...
A new way to fix our housing bubble
By Susan St John - Susan St John says the Government's Tax Working Group will not find real answers for the housing market, and a new kind of tax on our net housing equity is needed. To say that New Zealand has been in the grips of an extraordinary speculative...
Thinking, Writing, Doing in the Humanities and Social Sciences: An Edited Collection.
By Thomas Basbøll, Rachel Cayley and Oliver March - *Reprinted with permission from the LSE Impact Blog. The act of writing and how it contributes to and shapes the practice of communicating research is a rich topic for consideration for scholars at every stage of...
Strange but true: Australia has a lot to teach us about renewable energy
By Karl Check - With the announcement that the Government will end offshore oil and gas exploration in New Zealand, and at the end of our four-yearly schooling by Australia in how to win medals, Vector’s Karl Check says parts of Australia are also making pretty...
Professor Susan Himmelweit: ‘Holding Government to Account on Gender Equality’ ▶️
‘Holding Government to Account on Gender Equality: The experience of the UK Women’s Budget Group’ Since 1989, the UK Women’s Budget Group (WBG), a group of academics, activists and trade unionists, has tried to hold successive UK governments to account for the...
NZ can learn from 40 years of climate change mitigation policies
By Anna Berka - Political and social science research on climate change shows some countries have been far more successful than others in orchestrating state-led transition to renewable energy over the past 40 years. Without exception, it is countries that have...
An emerging iron cage? Understanding the risks of increased use of big data applications in social policy
By Hamish Robertson and Joanne Travaglia - Big data technologies are increasingly being utilised in the field of social policy. Although big data methods and strategies are often preferred as a form of evidence-based policy development, big data techniques do not...
A Small Revolution in Our Suburbs: The sports hub phenomenon
By Kevin Jenkins - Christchurch’s new sports hub Ngā Puna Wai is set to open in stages over 2018–19, with track and field facilities due first in May this year, followed by hockey in July. Big-ticket metropolitan projects like Ngā Puna Wai of course stand out, but...
Eyes are on the US and Syria, but domestic US politics is changing with implications for public policy
By Michele L. Swers at LSE US Centre - This week, the Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan (R-WI), announced that he would be handing in his gavel at year’s end and would not run for reelection. Michele L. Swers writes that before becoming Speaker, Ryan was a...
Sharing Economy Hurtling Ahead of NZ Laws
By Kevin Jenkins - Over the warmer months, the Otago Farmers Market has the best fresh produce in New Zealand – like Central Otago apricots the size of peaches, old-school gooseberries, and greengage plums – along with artisan products like seaweed condiments,...
Shorter Timeframes, Co-designed, with “First-cut” Insights: How university policy research can become more responsive to the needs of policymakers
By Tamas Wells and Emma Blomkamp - How might universities develop a research agenda that is responsive to the needs of policymakers? After running a series of workshops on public policy innovation with policy practitioners from various levels of government in...
Progressing Gender Analysis: What Can Auckland Council Learn from San Francisco?
By Kathryn Cammell - Learning from policies adopted elsewhere is often what underpins innovative change in local government. In the case of Auckland Council, we saw this with the introduction of a living wage for Auckland Council employees. A Living Wage Unit was...
Why Did New Zealand’s Social Investment Model Fail?
By Jess Berentson-Shaw - Self-professed policy wonk Jess Berentson-Shaw agrees with a lot of what Bill English said about welfare spending, but argues his big social investment idea failed because it was too narrow, paternalistic and complex for already-stressed...
Getting Serious about Road and Tourism Congestion
By Tim Hazeldine - Queenstown is crowded right now, crowded with stranded travellers unable to get home. As of last Friday, every single seat on every single flight to Auckland was sold out, for all this week, on both airlines. For some Aucklanders forced to delay...
What Is Happening to Obesity Rates Among NZ Pre-Schoolers?
By Nichola Shackleton - Obesity, a key public health issue for the 21st century and possibly one of the most talked about and researched health topics. But it’s more than a health condition; there are social and economic consequences to obesity also. Obesity is...
