Why can't we get what we want? Inequality and the early discursive practice of the sixth Labour government

ABSTRACT

Focus groups convened in New Zealand in 2014 confirmed a major finding of previous research: that while most people are concerned about existing levels of economic inequality, there is considerable uncertainty over whether and how a more equal distribution might be achieved. In asking why participants acquiesced to views that they did not like, the article suggests that they lacked a language in which to imagine or articulate their preferred alternative, partly because structural critiques of the status quo have become increasingly marginal within the wider public sphere. This observation sets the scene for an analysis of the discursive practice of Jacinda Ardern and the Labour Party during the 2017 election campaign and in the November 2017 Speech from the Throne. The article asks whether this practice represents a departure from – and a challenge to – the discursive dominance of ‘capitalist realism’. It finds signs of significant change relative to previous governments, particularly in the explicit articulation of values. At the same time, significant moments of ambivalence remain, especially on the question of how the new Government’s social and environmental objectives might be achieved.

KEYWORDS:

• Inequality
• deliberative democracy
• critical discourse analysis (CDA)
• New Zealand politics

Acknowledgements

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2017 New Zealand Political Studies Association Conference at the University of Otago. Some of the ideas had previously been expressed in a blog post at impolitikal.com. Many thanks to participants at the NZPSA Conference, and to Sarah Illingworth at Impolitikal for their constructive feedback. Thanks also to the editor and the anonymous reviewers of this journal. The focus groups reported on in this article were part of a project supported by a Marsden Fund Fast Start Grant.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Within the discussion of the tax system, participants were presented with two conflicting analyses of the existing tax code in New Zealand: a right-wing perspective that drew attention to the high proportion of income tax paid by a small proportion of high-income earners (Farrar, 2013), and a left-wing perspective that showed – in international comparison – how heavily New Zealand taxes low-income earners (Salmond, 2011).

 

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Royal Society of New Zealand [Marsden Fund Fast Start Grant 12-AUT-013].