Less is more
December 18th, 2007 at 9:44 am by David FarrarBryce Edwards makes the case for less, not more, state intervention in the democratic process.
It is not commonly realised that the US political system is one of the most highly regulated in the western world. Considerable regulations have been developed in order, ostensibly, to ensure a level playing field in elections. Of course, no such level playing field can be created from the huge restrictions on political activity that these state interventions impose.
By contrast, the New Zealand electoral system has historically been relatively laissez faire, with few state impediments to political activity. New Zealand political parties have been generally regarded as private organisations, and hence have had little obligation to report upon their internal affairs. Unfortunately, New Zealand has recently been shifting towards the American system of intense political regulation.
… The 1986 New Zealand Royal Commission on the Electoral System (RCES) anticipated the problems of the state-party relationship: ‘we recognise that there are dangers inherent in excessive State intervention in the democratic process. If taken too far, controls may represent an unjustifiable intrusion on the freedom of individuals, groups, political parties and candidates’ (RCES, 1986: p.185). Arguably, the regulation of politics has now been taken too far in New Zealand. And the consequences are not just a reduction in political liberty, but also many other apparently unintended consequences, including the creation of barriers to new political parties entering Parliament, and a reduction in the ability of the public to participate in politics.
In a perverse way, modern reforms actually exacerbate many of the problems they were intended to solve, as well as creating new problems along the way. Primarily, state intervention simply distorts political behaviour. As elsewhere, the reforms may be well intended but essentially, the cure of political regulation ends up being worse than the disease of financial scandal.
Read the full article. It’s very good.
Related posts:
- Well said Winston
- Law Society submission on electoral finance
- It’s about democracy
- De Facto State Funding
December 18th, 2007 at 9:57 am
A myth that Nz is ‘laissez faire’
Vote:Our regulation for radio and TV is the most prescriptive in the world, with the state buying the time and giving out set amounts to each group.
No party can buy any other time other than what they get given, other than cheat by not paying taxes on your total allocation of money so as to get more airtime
December 18th, 2007 at 10:02 am
ghostwhorants – get over it! You sound like a scratched record…and nobody can be bothered listening anymore.
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 10:20 am
No party can buy any other time other than what they get given, other than cheat by not paying taxes on your total allocation of money so as to get more airtime
Damn you are dumber than two bricks. GST was still paid, do you even understand how GST works? If I provide you with a service, no matter how much I charge you, or how much you pay I still have to send a fixed percentage to the IRD.
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 10:50 am
Ghost:
“Our regulation for radio and TV is the most prescriptive in the world, with the state buying the time and giving out set amounts to each group”
Yes and this has killed the broadcast medium as a vehicle for political advocacy. Our political ads are generally terrible.
As I have said before Bryce Edwards is one of the few academics to get this stuff right
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 11:11 am
bevan, be patient for a moment.
The amount allocated for television/radio includes GST. So the time you can buy has to come under this figure.
national spent all its allocated money but not including GST so that including the GST meant it came over their allocated amount.
Whether or not IRD got its money is not at issue.
Some say they tried to steal the election
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
GWW, others would point at Labour ignoring the Chief Electoral Office and overspending anyway and say they not only tried to steal the election, they succeeded.
The difference, as I told James Sleep, was that one party made a mistake. The other deliberately and knowingly broke the Electoral Laws and then covered it up with retrospective legislation.
So please, if you are going to point fingers, count the four pointing back at you.
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 3:00 pm
I’d like to see Bryce Edwards’ analysis of just WHAT makes the US system “highly regulated”.
The anti-anonymity provisions, certainly. But certainly NOT spending limits or time limits.
It seems to me that of all “regulated” sytems, theirs is regulated in the most valid areas.
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 3:51 pm
The EFB certainly took things too far. But given the internal corruption evident in political parties in most Western democracies (e.g. factions demanding the advancement of their candidates over locals of greater merit (ALP); head office effectively having the decision making power with local people’s voices muted (NZLP); throwing away the list rankings and making up your own (NZF) etc etc) I believe political parties’ activities do need to be covered by law.
Not externally regulated, mind. The law should simply provide a minimum framework for internal party democracy and provide a mechanism for disaffected party members to seek redress if they feel those standards have not been reached.
It’s sad that we need this, but the tendency of cabals to form within parties and to seek to corrupt its internal processes to their own ends makes it, I believe, a necessary evil.
Vote:December 18th, 2007 at 6:13 pm
Now if we had a real, non-partisan media, the process by which NZLabour candidates are “selected” would be sickening NZ-ers and costing the Clarkists yet more votes.
Rex Widerstrom, I think the law should merely require public disclosure of party processes such as these.
And it’s time that the stacking of the process in NZLabour by the Clarkists came back to bite them, hard, in the bum. I suggest that all the pissed-off candidates who have been passed over should get together under a banner like “Real Labour”, perhaps with Mike Moore and John Tamihere as leaders.
This suggestion CERTAINLY isn’t popular with the rabid Clark supporters that infest the blogs (the “traditional” Labourites seem conspicuous by their absence) and I suspect that it isn’t popular with the DPF types who would see it as taking votes off National (and probably holding the balance of power).
Vote:December 19th, 2007 at 2:39 pm
PhilBest suggests:
If I hadn’t personally witnessed the processes to which NZF had agreed to adhere thrown aside, then its MP use the precincts of Parliament to avoid service of summonses which would have forced them to testify as to the truth, then its Executive instruct its lawyers to argue on points of law that myself and my co-plaintiff had no standing rather than admit and defend their actions… I’d agree with you.
But saying one thing and doing something else behind closed doors is a hallmark of the corrupt and dishonest politician everywhere. If we had a people in politics with any integrity, disclosure would suffice. But we don’t, so it doesn’t.
Vote: