New Zealand's Current Foreign Policy: An Absence Of Realism.

What Are You trying To Say? The contrast between Helen Clark’s stewardship of New Zealand foreign policy and Jacinda Ardern’s is stark. Ardern’s generation, raised in the shadow of Rogernomics, has never evinced the same strong interest in international issues that characterised the Baby Boomers. The USA had won the Cold War, leaving neoliberal capitalism in command of the planet. Taking issue with this new status quo could be seriously career-limiting. With Ardern, it’s not quite a matter of “where Uncle Sam goes, we go” – but it’s close.

NOWHERE is the difference between Helen Clark and Jacinda Ardern more apparent than in the field of foreign policy.

Clark’s induction to left-wing politics came, as it did for so many of her generation, from New Zealand’s interactions with the rest of the world.

Be it this country’s relationship with the United States, France or South Africa, there was never any shortage of deficiencies to be challenged and (hopefully) overcome. The Vietnam War, Atmospheric Nuclear Testing, Apartheid: these were the issues that mobilised thousands of young New Zealanders – and Labour was on the right side of them all.

For those, like Clark, who were driven to do more than protest, serious engagement with foreign policy issues required a high degree of intellectual and political discipline. If one’s intention was to do more than shout slogans and wave placards, then the facts had to be mastered and the arguments, both for and against, understood. Without the ability to make a case, and defend it, the chances of being heard by those with the power to effect change were negligible.

What was sauce for the goose of foreign policy was, of course, also sauce for the gander of domestic policy. Mastering the art of the possible in relation to the former pretty much guaranteed equal mastery with respect to the latter. More importantly, Clark soon realised than in a small trading nation tucked away at the bottom of the planet, building and maintaining strong and mutually advantageous relationships with the rest of the world was absolutely crucial to the preservation of national prosperity.

It was an insight which propelled Clark towards the “realist” school of international relations pioneered by Hans Morgenthau. At the heart of Morgenthau’s realism was his belief that the relationships between countries should be guided by an assessment of the power each is able to bring to the task of advancing and defending their national interests. Ethical considerations are not irrelevant to this sort of calculation, but neither are they pivotal. In Morgenthau’s opinion: “A good foreign policy minimizes risks and maximizes benefits.”

Clark’s realism proved highly effective in advancing New Zealand’s national interest. She earned the respect of four-fifths of humanity by declining to join in the USA’s illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003. More impressively, she persuaded the Chinese to put their trust in New Zealand, and thus became the first western leader to negotiate a free trade agreement with the People’s Republic.

The contrast between Clark’s stewardship of New Zealand foreign policy and Ardern’s is stark. Ardern’s generation, raised in the shadow of Rogernomics, has never evinced the same strong interest in international issues that characterised the Baby Boomers. The USA had won the Cold War, leaving neoliberal capitalism in command of the planet. Taking issue with this new status quo could be seriously career-limiting. With Ardern, it’s not quite a matter of “where Uncle Sam goes, we go” – but it’s close.

This is a long way from Morgenthau’s realism. Absent from New Zealand’s current foreign policy is the constant and careful calculation of precisely how much diplomatic power is available to us at any given moment for the advancement of our national interest.

The Foreign Minister, Winston Peters, apparently on his own recognisance, has signed New Zealand up holus-bolus to the USA’s new “Indo-Pacific” strategy. In the process he has gratuitously breached the trust upon which New Zealand’s immensely valuable economic relationship with China rests. He did not see fit to consult his Prime Minister about this radical realignment – and, by all accounts, she saw no reason to object.

Quite what Clark makes of the unholy mess Peters has made of her carefully balanced foreign policy can only be imagined. When the pressure is applied: from Canberra, London, Washington or Beijing; the Foreign Minister is suddenly nowhere to be found. Leaving his hapless Prime Minister to follow the line of least diplomatic resistance. Towards Washington one day. Towards Beijing the next.

From the point of view of the two largest powers on New Zealand’s dance card, squeezing the Kiwis makes perfect sense. If a nation reveals itself to be vulnerable to pressure, then pressure will be applied.

Ardern has led New Zealand into the very predicament Clark worked so hard to keep us out of: caught between an American rock and a Chinese hard place.

This essay was originally published in The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 15 March 2019.

When Five Million Seems Like A Very Small Number.

Divided Loyalties: When it comes to settling on a Twenty-First Century protector, New Zealand faces a dilemma. The United States provides military protection, but refuses to offer economic security. China provides economic security, but cannot (for the moment) offer military protection. Neither power is likely to go on contributing the ‘missing half’ of a complete protection package indefinitely.

NEW ZEALAND is a tiny nation living in a big country. It’s one of those mind-boggling facts that in an island roughly the same size as New Zealand’s two largest islands combined, the United Kingdom somehow manages to squeeze-in 66 million human-beings. Greater London, alone, packs twice New Zealand’s entire population into an area smaller than Stewart Island. In the greater scheme of things, Planet Earth’s roughly five million New Zealanders don’t count for much: not in the eyes of the other 7.6 billion human-beings who share it with them.

Given its tiny population, how should New Zealand position itself vis-à-vis the rest of the world? How does it deal with the all-too-obvious discrepancy between its landmass and its population?

This is not a trick question. As Maori discovered in the Nineteenth Century: a large pair of islands, located comfortably in the southern hemisphere’s temperate zone, and peopled by (at most) 150,000 human-beings; is simply too-tempting a prize for the world’s predator nations to ignore. Had the tribes not signed-up with the British, chances are they’d have signed-on with the French.

From a strategic perspective, the Maori decision to place themselves under the protection of what was then the world’s most powerful state makes perfect sense. That their faith in the British Government’s promise to respect the manifold local sovereignties of hapu and iwi was misplaced is hardly their fault! Even after the military defeat and economic marginalisation of New Zealand’s indigenous population, however, the Waitangi signatories’ original strategic insight remains unimpeachable. Two relatively large, but thinly-populated islands, located at the bottom of the world, will always be in need of at least one unanswerably powerful friend.

Unfortunately, that sort of protection comes at a price. (As any victim of the New York Mafia will attest!) And, Dear God! New Zealand has paid dearly! For keeping the sea-lanes open to the endless circuit of refrigerated vessels transporting this country’s lamb, wool, butter and cheese to the port cities of the British Isles, the “Mother Country” siphoned-off a small lake of New Zealand blood.

Less visceral, but arguably even more debilitating, was the oppressive cultural straight-jacket into which the United Kingdom fastened its most loyal dominion. All the worst features of British imperialism: its deeply ingrained class prejudices; the complacent avarice of its monied elites; and, most damaging of all, the Empire’s indefatigable racism; left deep scars on New Zealand’s collective psyche. More than a century after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, and notwithstanding the tragic losses of two world wars, New Zealanders – Maori as well as Pakeha – could still be reduced to obsequious delirium by the mere physical presence of the reigning British monarch.

There was, however, no disputing the fact that Britain’s imperial sun was setting. If New Zealand was to remain safe, it would require a more credible protector than the over-extended empire whose power-projection pretentions were sent to the bottom of the South China Sea in December 1941.

The United States’ rise to super-power status during World War II, when combined with the UK’s demise as a global player, unleashed a cultural revolution in far-off New Zealand. The official egalitarianism of the American republic, especially when combined with the raw energy of its artistic output – its music and cinema particularly – armed the USA with a historically unprecedented amount of “soft-power”. Though Kiwis have been slow to admit it, the emancipation of their cultural imagination owes an enormous debt of gratitude to their American protector.

New Zealand’s strategic dilemma in the Twenty-First Century arises out of two historically related developments. The first was Deng Xiaoping’s decision to pursue “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” – basically, his Communist Party’s re-invention of traditional Chinese mercantilism. The second, the “Reagan Revolution’s” triumph over Rooseveltian progressivism in the 1980s. This brought about a qualitative change in the character of American soft power. It was a change which many New Zealanders found unpalatable – even frightening.

As the consequences of these two historical shifts worked their way through New Zealand’s economy and society, the maintenance of a coherent foreign policy became increasingly difficult. Economically, New Zealand is oriented firmly towards its crucial Chinese markets. Culturally, diplomatically and militarily, however, the ties that bind remain American. The challenge confronting successive New Zealand governments has been how to reconcile Washington’s insistence that New Zealand remain a US protectorate, while simultaneously refusing to guarantee its economic security.

When it comes to settling on a Twenty-First Century protector, therefore, New Zealand faces a dilemma. The United States provides military protection, but refuses to offer economic security. China provides economic security, but cannot (for the moment) offer military protection. Neither power is likely to go on contributing the ‘missing half’ of a complete protection package indefinitely.

There are times when five million seems like a very small number indeed.

This essay was originally published in The Press of Tuesday, 28 November 2017.

2017: In The Shadow Of Trump

A Shadow Across The Sun: A key factor driving the New Zealand electorate’s probable flight to the right in 2017 will be the profound and ideologically toxic influence of Donald Trump’s presidency.

 

THE POLITICAL CONSENSUS, at the beginning of 2017 – election year – is that the National-led Government will hold on to power. Not in its own right, as might have happened had John Key led them into battle, but with sufficient parliamentary support to govern comfortably. The identity and character of National’s support will likely prove the most intriguing electoral story of the year. The most significant political event of 2017, however, could well be the collapse of the Labour Party and the emergence of the Greens as New Zealand’s leading party of the centre-left.

 

A key factor driving the New Zealand electorate’s flight to the right will be the profound and ideologically toxic influence of Donald Trump’s presidency. Nobel economics laureate, Paul Krugman, predicts a global trade war, and the prestigious Foreign Policy magazine is filled with disquieting articles foreshadowing an ominous deterioration in the relationship between the USA and China.

 

If either of these predictions come to pass, then the consequences for the New Zealand economy will be extremely serious. Both the Chinese and the American governments will expect their “friends” to stand by them in any test of geopolitical strength. Initially, Foreign Minister Murray McCully will strive to retain the good will of both this country’s leading export market and its principal defence guarantor. But, if push comes to shove, he will come under enormous pressure from both Washington and Canberra to declare for the “auld alliance”. The Foreign Minister may conclude that he has no choice but to recommend to Prime Minister Bill English that we let go of China’s hand – with all that portends for New Zealand’s primary industries.

 

It’s a scenario which can only make the already strong electoral challenge of NZ First even stronger. The provinces will suffer most if the NZ-China economic connection falters and the voters most affected: farmers and the agricultural servicing sector; will be looking for someone to blame. Inevitably, the government will be criticised, but by far the largest share of the blame will be directed towards the government of the Chinese people. This rapidly-developing, racially-charged, crisis will be Winston Peters’ opportunity.

 

In a neat division of political labour, NZ First will lead the attack on China while, publicly, National condemns (but not too loudly) Peters’ racially-charged rhetoric. Meanwhile, privately, the conservative supporters of both parties will be encouraged to recognise the inherent electoral synergies of the unfolding crisis. As the countdown to the election shortens, the prospect of a National-NZ First coalition government will begin to acquire the aura of inevitability.

 

Amplifying the conservative message among the Maori electorate, the Maori Party will cast the Chinese as a second-wave of colonisers threatening not only tino rangatiratanga but also Pakeha sovereignty. Iwi corporations will be portrayed as the foundation stones of Aotearoa/New Zealand’s economic independence. The incipient government of the centre-right will thus be presented as a National-NZ First-Maori Party alliance.

 

The turmoil created by the Trump Administration will similarly throw into sharp relief the serious disjunction between the beliefs of the Labour Party and its electoral base. Even if Andrew Little and his advisors were of a mind to join with Peters in attacking China, the reflexive anti-Americanism of his caucus and Labour’s wider membership would drive the party inexorably towards their enemy’s enemy. Immediately, what was left of Labour’s support among “Waitakere Men” would decamp for the Sinophobic right.

 

The reverse manoeuvre: in which Little prevails upon caucus and party to follow National, NZ First and the Maori Party into Trumpism and Sinophobia; would only drive Labour’s younger, more progressive, voters towards the Greens. The classic Labour solution – trying to have a bob each way – risks losing both the conservative and the progressive components of its electoral base.

 

The extreme-nationalist complexion of the Trump Administration and its geopolitical focus on the burgeoning power of China can only hasten the disintegration of Labour’s electoral position. The party’s embrace of globalisation and free-market ideas in the 1980s, by hollowing-out the traditional working-class communities from which it drew its most consistent support, made Labour ever more dependent on the support of well-educated middle-class baby-boomers. But, as these voters have aged, their progressive instincts have shrivelled. Increasingly, the banners of the left are being carried by younger voters – the Chloe Swarbrick generation.

 

It is, however, highly doubtful that sufficient young people will participate in the 2017 general election to significantly offset the emotionally powerful appeal of an unabashedly nationalistic, Sinophobic and pro-American coalition of National, NZ First and the Maori Party. Neither conservative fish, nor progressive fowl, Labour is likely to see its party vote plummet into the teens – and with it any hope of reclaiming major party status. The baton of progressive politics will pass to the Greens. Real political power, however, will remain with the National Party and its allies.

 

This essay was originally published in The Press of Tuesday, 3 January 2017.

The Great Tightening 2.0

Trading Sovereignty For Investment Capital - Again: The suppression of local democracy is absolutely crucial to the success of the second “Great Tightening” exercise in New Zealand history. Unless the responsibility for making critical resource allocation and/or conservation decisions is taken out of the hands of elected local representatives and placed in the hands of unelected officials appointed by central government, then foreign investors will not feel sufficiently confident to risk their capital in major development projects.

 

ECONOMICALLY SPEAKING, it is difficult to define New Zealand as anything other than a colony. Its biggest export earner, agriculture, remains a price-taking not a price-making industry, and the other big foreign exchange earners: tourism and education; are essentially extractive. The former “mines” our spectacular scenery; the latter our status as a first-world, English-speaking nation.

 

That New Zealand is able to classify itself as a first-world nation is actually rather remarkable. A reliance on agricultural commodity exports and tourism is an economic condition generally associated with third-world states – most of which, only a century ago, were colonies of the major European powers. Officially, these former colonies are now free and independent states. But, if post-war history teaches us anything, it is that winning political independence, and becoming economically independent, are two very different things.

 

In order to grow and prosper, price-taking economies require a patron. For most of New Zealand’s history that role was fulfilled by Great Britain. It was British capital which financed the extensive infrastructure of its far-off farm, and it was in British markets that the produce of that far-off farm was sold. Without her capital and her markets, Great Britain’s far-off-farm would have failed. Certainly, New Zealand’s home-grown capitalists were too few and too poor to build a “Better Britain” in the South Pacific on their own.

 

More recently, the role of New Zealand’s principal economic patron has been taken over by China – which currently absorbs the lion’s share of New Zealand’s agricultural exports. If its history as a British colony is any guide, then the capital required to finance New Zealand’s future development will, increasingly, come from the Peoples Republic.

 

Like their British predecessors, Chinese investors are already attempting to secure control of the key supply chains to their domestic market. Just as New Zealand lambs were once raised on farms financed by British-owned banks; slaughtered in British-owned freezing works; transported to Smithfield in British-owned ships; and their frozen carcasses sold to British-owned retail outlets: New Zealand milk will soon be extracted from Chinese-owned cows; raised on Chinese-owned farms; processed into infant formula in Chinese-owned factories; shipped in Chinese-owned containers; and sold in Chinese-owned supermarkets.

 

One of the most interesting themes developed by the New Zealand historian, James Belich, in his 2001 book, Paradise Reforged, is what he calls “The Great Tightening”. In a nutshell, this describes the ways in which New Zealand politicians bound their countrymen ever more tightly to the British economy. New Zealand’s primary production went out to Britain; British manufactured goods came back; and woe betide anybody who got in the way (like visionary economic nationalists, socialist trade unionists, and other assorted pests).

 

It is rapidly becoming clear that a very similar tightening exercise is underway in twenty-first century New Zealand. In order to attract the foreign direct investment it believes New Zealand must have to keep its economy growing, the National Government of John Key is methodically emptying the statute books of every legislative impediment to economic development.

 

The suppression of local democracy is absolutely crucial to the success of this second “Great Tightening”. Unless the responsibility for making critical resource allocation and/or conservation decisions is taken out of the hands of elected local representatives and placed in the hands of unelected officials appointed by central government, then foreign investors will not feel sufficiently confident to risk their capital in major development projects.

 

Stripping local politicians of their power to manage and develop key infrastructure is an equally vital element of the same tightening programme. It’s what lies behind the draconian provisions of the Local Government Reform Bill currently before Parliament. Under this new law the unelected Local Government Commission will have the power to force local councils to hive-off key services, such as water reticulation, energy, ports and transportation to so-called “Council Controlled Organisations”. These Orwellian entities are, of course, anything but council controlled – as anyone living in Auckland, where they have been operating since the creation of the “Supercity” in 2010, will attest.

 

Auckland has not been the only laboratory in which the anti-democratic elements of National’s tightening have been tested. The people of Canterbury have been without democratic representation at the regional level since the Government sacked Ecan’s elected councillors and replaced them with appointed commissioners – also in 2010. With commissioners safely installed, the irrigation schemes deemed essential to dairy intensification in Canterbury could proceed without fear of democratic interference.

 

When most of the population of colonial New Zealand could trace their origins directly to Great Britain; and when the patriotic mists of Imperial Albion largely obscured the predatory commercial interests of the City of London, the first Great Tightening proved broadly acceptable.

 

The second will be very different. Those wondering how it feels to see one’s country subordinated to foreign interests should probably consult a Maori.

 

This essay was originally published in The Press of Tuesday, 6 September 2016.

Between A Rock And A Hard Place.

Difficult Decisions Ahead: New Zealand cannot endorse Obama’s gunboat diplomacy in the South China Sea without antagonising its largest trading partner. Hence, Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee’s description of China as a “true strategic partner”, and his announcement that Kiwi troops will train alongside the Peoples Liberation Army. This both-sides-against-the-middle approach to building strategic security may end up dwarfing the consequences of the anti-nuclear policy.

 

MANY NEW ZEALANDERS would be surprised to learn that their government considers the Peoples Republic of China a “true strategic partner”.  Most of us have come to terms with the fact that China is our largest trading partner – but a “true strategic partner”? Strategic partnerships are the stuff of geopolitics: they’re about the nation’s fundamental interests; its oldest loyalties. When something’s wrong in your neighbourhood, who ya gonna call?

 

Up until the Japanese sinking of the British warships Repulse and Prince of Wales in 1941, New Zealand’s “true strategic partner” had been Britain. New Zealand had been a British colony since 1840, and a Dominion since 1907. At the outbreak of war in 1939, New Zealand’s foreign policy was memorably summed-up by Prime Minister, Michael Joseph Savage, when he stated simply: “Where Britain stands, we stand. Where she goes, we go.”

 

And go we did. Not even the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour and her armies lightning advance into the Pacific and South-East Asia was sufficient to persuade the New Zealand Government to bring her only effective military forces home from North Africa. The Australians were not so selfless. With Darwin in flames, and Emperor Hirohito’s forces advancing across New Guinea, Prime Minister Curtin recalled his troops to defend the Australian continent. He, at least, understood that, in geopolitical terms, Australasia’s “true strategic partner” was no longer Britain, but the United States of America.

 

By 1951 that partnership had taken the form of the Australian, New Zealand, United States (ANZUS) Agreement. Diplomatically and militarily, the ANZUS alliance spoke eloquently of the new strategic realities inside the Pacific rim. While sentiment, and London’s fading dreams of empire, may have persuaded many Kiwis to persist in calling Britain “home”, it was to Washington that her senior soldiers and diplomats turned – not only for protection, but also for guidance.

 

And that was the way the story went for the best part of thirty years, until, as we all know, it fell apart amidst New Zealanders’ determination to make, and keep, their country nuclear-free. Needless to say it wasn’t an outcome with which the country’s senior defence force personnel, diplomats and public servants were at all comfortable. As far as they were concerned, New Zealand’s need for a “true strategic partner” had grown more, not less, acute. The Chinese giant was waking up. South America was outgrowing its dictators. Absent her true strategic partners, New Zealand was extremely vulnerable.

 

Their problem was that, in the eyes of those partners, New Zealand’s anti-nuclear policy constituted a massive rock in the road to a full restoration of the strategic relationship. And that wouldn’t happen, said Washington and Canberra, until the obstacle was removed. In vain did the NZ defence Force and MFAT protest that removing the obstacle was politically impossible. With both the Labour and National parties committed to a nuclear-free New Zealand, that wretched rock wasn’t going anywhere.

 

New Zealand diplomats had no other option except to come up with their own solution to the problem of how to restore the Washington, Canberra, Wellington relationship. In the end, MFAT and the NZDF decided that if they couldn’t remove the rock, or go through the rock, then they would simply have to go around the rock.

 

As a way out of the impasse it was nothing short of brilliant. By quietly cutting a narrow track on both sides of the rock, and then widening it, laying down shingle, and, finally, sealing it over, the rock was gradually reduced to one of those landmarks that everybody passes by without really noticing. Washington and Canberra hadn’t changed their position on the undesirability of the rock, but now, with the encouragement of successive New Zealand governments, they were simply invited to ignore it. The signing of the Wellington Declaration in November 2010, while not formally restoring New Zealand to the status of an American “ally”, did describe her as the United States’ “partner” in the Pacific. It was a remarkable diplomatic breakthrough.

 

Rapprochement with the USA did not, however, leave New Zealand suddenly bereft of rocks in the road. Determined to check the Peoples Republic’s rising global influence, President Barack Obama “pivoted” away from the Middle East and back towards the Pacific, where he’s currently flexing American muscle in the South China Sea. America’s Pacific “partners” will be expected to join in.

 

New Zealand cannot, however, endorse Obama’s gunboat diplomacy without antagonising its largest trading partner. Hence, Defence Minister Gerry Brownlee’s description of China as a “true strategic partner”, and his announcement that Kiwi troops will train alongside the Peoples Liberation Army. This both-sides-against-the-middle approach to building strategic security threatens to dwarf the consequences of the anti-nuclear policy.

 

Somehow, New Zealand has to avoid catching itself between this latest rock in the road and a very hard place indeed.

 

This essay was originally published in The Press of Tuesday, 3 November 2015.