Ten years ago, I had the privilege of launching The New Zealand Initiative.
I believed then and believe more firmly now that New Zealand needs institutions independent of government and the public purse to broaden and deepen our intellectual life.
In New Zealand, the state and its institutions dominate public life. It is difficult for the arts, culture, and civic life to operate without government resources.
Most of our intellectual capital is concentrated in government agencies, tertiary institutions, and state media. Nowadays, even private media accept government subsidies on the condition that they agree with the government on specific issues.
There are limits to what each of these publicly funded institutions can do and say. Formerly powerful institutions, like churches, are no longer able to challenge the state.
In our small and isolated nation, the unchallenged dominance of the state leads to passive compliance and intellectual sclerosis.
In recent years, one of the most important challenges has been the revival of Maori institutions almost destroyed by the early New Zealand State. Independent iwi with a long-term perspective and the resources to back up their words will increasingly provide a counterbalance to the state.
Another such counterbalance is the robust, privately funded New Zealand Initiative. With its independent viewpoint, it has consistently influenced public debate and created change through its intellectual capacity.
Among the Initiative’s contributions are credible alternatives to Covid policy. It developed them by illustrating the trade-offs between public health and maintaining social cohesion.
By campaigning on localism based on international experiences, the Initiative has helped to question and rethink the traditional paradigm of funding for local communities.
Education policy is the clearest example of the state’s intellectual stranglehold. The Initiative proved itself to be a serious research organisation by using integrated government data to slay some sacred cows about the dumb decile system and school performance. The Initiative’s work was sufficiently dangerous, no wonder it had to be officially ignored.
In these times, standing out, offering advice, proposing ideas and criticising others requires courage.
Public institutions and corporates dress themselves up in the language of wellbeing, transformation, equity and the just transition - language made meaningless by overuse and under-delivery.
The New Zealand Initiative is at its best when it cuts through the fog of good intentions and gets to the nub of what actually happens or could happen. It has done an admirable job of maintaining clear economic principles while it grapples with politicised current issues.
I hope businesses and individuals will continue to fund The New Zealand Initiative and digest its output.
The Rt Hon Sir Bill English was Prime Minister of New Zealand from 2016 to 2017 and Minister of Finance from 2008 to 2016.