Talk:Politics of New Zealand

Role of Monarchy Overstated

My overall impression on reading this page is that the importance and relevance of the monarchy to New Zealand politics seems completely overblown. In reality the monarchy is almost irrelevant to New Zealand politics and persists only because there is even less support for an elected presidency which might rival the power of Parliament. It is not so much that the article is factually incorrect, it is more that it places unbalanced emphasis on the facts it does present to such a degree that it paints a false picture of the New Zealand political landscape. I suspect part of this may be due to an American obsession with monarchy which tends to lead them to overstate its importance in the scheme of things. It may also be due to the 'top down' structural organisation of the article which means that an inordinate amount of space is devoted at the beginning to the largely symbolic and theoretical powers of the monarch and Governor-General before the very real and important powers of Parliament and the Prime Minister are introduced. Hawthorn (talk) 00:00, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Thinking about this some more, it seems to me that the basic flaw is that the article attempts to describe New Zealand politics through the lens of American political theory. The American viewpoint begins with the constitution and the head of state which are regarded as vitally important. It then describes government in terms of three separate branches, the executive, the legislative and the judiciary which are viewed as being quite separate and indeed exercise a `balance of powers', a concept from American political theory quite alien to the way our political system is constructed. New Zealand politics just doesn't fit into this framework. Yet the article seems to be set out according to this framework and gives a distorted view of our political systsem as a result.

New Zealand doesn't have a formal written constitution and doesn't miss not having one. Our head of state is on the other side of the world and does practically nothing while her local representative has an almost entirely symbolic and theoretical set of powers. We don't see `head of state' as a particularly important role and indeed the idea that a state even needs a head would be regarded as debatable in New Zealand. The executive in New Zealand arises from Parliament and is subordinate to it, not rival to it. The government departments in New Zealand are politically independent, something which is important in New Zealand political theory. And the judiciary is non-political. Hawthorn (talk) 02:06, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

While I agree the role of the monarchy is overstated, that's more to do with my own POV rather than constitutional reality. The monarchy, however irrelevant to New Zealanders, still exists. The article conforms with the WP Manual of Style, so I don't think it would be right to re-arrange it. --Lholden (talk) 03:04, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

Go and look at Politics of Australia. That page has a much better order. First comes Parliament reflecting its primary role in Australian politics. Then comes the PM, Cabinet, and the government ministries. The Queen and GG are simply mentioned in passing and don't rate their own sections. That page presents an Australian view of Australian politics. Our page presents a very distorted view of NZ politics. Clearly the Australian example shows that there is nothing in the WP manual of style that prevent us changing the page to have a more rational order Hawthorn (talk) 13:32, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. I suggest starting as the Austrlaians do with the legislature and using the monarchy info in the "executive" section. --Lholden (talk) 21:56, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Again with the anti-constitution nonsense. New Zealand has a constitution that is comprised of a host of documents promulgated over time just as other constitutions are wedded together to establish a codified template. Malangthon (talk) 03:26, 28 November 2010 (UTC)

Opening statement

I don't think the opening statement, that NZ has a "parliamentary system of government closely patterned on that of the United Kingdom" is really true anymore, since the introduction of MMP, which — as everyone knows — is more similar to the German system. Comments? Grant65 (Talk) 08:50, Apr 3, 2005 (UTC)

I agree with the the basic point, but I think that there are still quite a few British traditions lurking in the system that we don't really think about. Things such as the role of the Speaker, the format of debates, the terminology used, some of the ceremonies, and so forth. Perhaps there's some way to phrase it which reflects both Parliament's origins (it was basically intended as a carbon copy of Westminster) and the newer changes? I've made the following attempt:

New Zealand functions as a constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary system of government. The basic system is closely patterned on that of the United Kingdom, although a number of significant modifications have been made. The head of state is...

Does that seem better? -- Vardion 17:23, 3 Apr 2005 (UTC)

As neither the constitution nor the monarchy are regarded as particularly important in New Zealand, I don't think "constitutional monarchy" describes us very well at all. How about simply calling us a "parliamentary democracy". Hawthorn (talk) 02:48, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

In fact, we do have a constitution, it's the statutes and common law, and it's in active use every day in every part of the country. We do have a monarchy system for our head of state whether people agree with it or not. Until we change to a presidency or whatever, then 'constitutional monarchy' is the correct term in both a legal and practical sense. The term 'parliamentary democracy' only describes the legislative branch of government, not the executive (ie, whether the parliament appoints a chief executive (PM) from its ranks or not, and whether the head of state is also the head of government, as in the US). 'Constitutional' is a necessary term before 'monarchy' to distinguish NZ from countries like Brunei, that still have a 'pure' monarchy (ie the hereditary head of state is also the head of government). Januarian (talk 22:13, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

There are many ways to describe a political system. A complete description obviously takes more than 2 words. However if you are going to use only 2 words, surely you should pick the two that describe the most important aspects. New Zealand is a constitutional monarchy sure. However it is also a parliamentary democracy. The issue is which one describes the most important aspects of the New Zealand political system. You say that the term parliamentary democracy only describes the legislative branch. ONLY!!! In New Zealand parliament has primacy over all else so what justification is there for using that word only. Parliament trumps the monarch - we could become a republic tomorrow if parliament voted (with only a simple majority) to make it so. And our `constitution' is mostly a bunch of laws that parliament wrote. I could better justify saying that constitutional monarchy only describes the head of state and sundry assorted laws and conventions. Head of state is an appendix in the New Zealand body politic - not a vital organ. The viewpoint that places primary importance on the head of state and constitution comes out of the school of political theory originating in the US, where a lot of political textbooks get written. The very words "legislative brnach" give the game away. In New Zealand we don't talk about parliament in that way. This describes us poorly at best. Hawthorn (talk) 02:18, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

I think it's better to be descriptive as possible - New Zealand is both a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary democracy. The current introduction is fine. --Lholden (talk) 07:04, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Always find reading this article amusing. Having lived here for years and quite some time in other states, clearly New Zealand is a republic since the elected make laws and the Monarch is not a ruler in New Zealand and the crown has no authority and has not for sometime. This glaring lack of accuracy is reinforced by the same old mantras about New Zealand being a dominion. The arguments to support this fallacy are based on the reading of documents which no longer have meaning and not on actual practice. Malangthon (talk) 03:22, 28 November 2010 (UTC)

Constitution article

I propose the constitutional information from the Politics of New Zealand article be transferred and expanded upon in a page which describes the New Zealand constitution in all its complexities. This will allow the Politics article to focus on politics, as the Australian one does. --Lholden 10:03, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

I think that's a great idea. I assume you're volunteering - go for it. You might also like to expand Constitution Act 1986 (NZ)-gadfium 18:41, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Sure am, I've started drafting an article now...--Lholden 21:10, 13 December 2005 (UTC)--

Local Govt

I feel that there should be an article entitle Local Government in New Zealand, is there anyone out there who knows enough on it to write it or at least start it? Simply put, the two articles (Regions of New Zealand and Territorial authorities of New Zealand are both short and won't make sense for many people seeking information on local government in new zealand. They are not logical searches for most people, and Wikipedia would be better off having a combining article which did things like explain the local government act. Thoughts, suggestions, offers to write? --LeftyG 07:29, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Template

The Template (the thing on the right of the page at the top) can be added to any New Zealand Politics page by adding {{Template:Politics of New Zealand}} to the page (at the top of it). So, the question is: what pages do we, the New Zealand politics wiki community, want that on? All? or just those mentioned? I would advocate for all, which will take time and effort, but is very do able (that also means that a full list of NZ politics articles would be found here. Cheers,

--LeftyG 03:03, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

5 and 8

5 is currently Political Parties and Elections 8 is Party Politics

Maybe these could be merged? --GeLuxe 07:03, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

I'd agree with that. I think section 5 was added as a sort of standard-issue thing applied broadly across multiple "Politics of..." articles, without the person realising that there was already a section on party politics. I'd suggest moving section 5 into section 8, which I believe was the original. (Could be wrong). -- Vardion 07:14, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

Helen Clark

It would be good if people looked at Helen Clark to bring it into being NPOV. --Midnighttonight 07:48, 2 April 2006 (UTC)

We have a new Governor-General now, we have had one for some time. Could someone update it?

And Trade?

I think the editor is correct about "Minister of Foreign Affairs" rather than "Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade". The DPMC website, the Beehive website, the Ministry website, the Parliamentary website, and the NZ First website all list merely "Minister of Foreign Affairs". (The first one, the DPMC website, explicitly lists the role as "Minister of Foreign Affairs" despite writing "Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade" in full, so it isn't just abbreviation. Moreover, Goff's current role as Minister of Trade didn't exist before Peters was appointed, so I think it's safe to say that the role of Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade has been split into two different roles. -- Vardion 01:31, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes the Ministers job is split because of the agreement with NZ First/Peters, but not the Ministry. With coalition government hard to say, but NZ could be back to having one Minister next time! Hugo999 20:39, 21 July 2007 (UTC) ^{Superscript text}

Post-election resignations

Would it be worthy of mention in the article that the Ministers and Executive Councillors resign after an election, even if their party wins? While this is the practice in some countries, it is not the case in some other significant Westminster-style countries. -Rrius (talk) 09:00, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Important notice

The government section of the "Outline of New Zealand" needs to be checked, corrected, and completed -- especially the subsections for the government branches.

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List of Ambassadors from New Zealand to South Korea

Should this not be merged here, or is there another article where it should be merged? Becritical (talk) 07:43, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Actually, why are there separate articles for all these? I don't understand [1]. Becritical (talk) 07:45, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

Template talk:WikiProject New Zealand

I've tried to start a discussion on the WPNZ template with respect to the governments project, but this hasn't attracted any contributions. If you are interested, please contribute. Schwede66 22:46, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Suggested image

I saw an aggregation of poll results since 2005 yesterday, taken from our opinion poll articles and using the R code published at commons. The result is at The Dim-Post tracking poll, and there's a discussion about it at Dim-Post Big Picture. Should we use a similar graph in Politics of New Zealand#Modern political history? The article is rather short of interesting illustrations.-gadfium 21:48, 20 May 2012 (UTC)

Does this article explain the ranking system?

Does this article explain the ranking system?

If so there should be a heading on it so I can easily find and read about it.

122.106.83.10 (talk) 17:14, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Try the Electoral system of New Zealand article. Schwede66 18:01, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Where exactly as I can't seem to find what I have asked for. 122.106.83.10 (talk) 18:20, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

In that case, why don't you look what the Electoral Commission has to say about it? Schwede66 19:00, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

I think there is a bit of misapprehension here. I was asking about the ranking system in the caucuses not with the voting system. 122.106.83.10 (talk) 08:20, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

The question about ranking in the caucuses has not been answered. I like it to be answered. 49.3.72.79 (talk) 08:33, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

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