The "populist" cat-call is being used a lot these days. Its often heard in the context of the US President. Now former NZ National Party Minister for Treaty Negotiations Chris Finlayson has written an article in the UK's Guardian newspaper called, "New Zealand’s divisive Treaty Principles Bill has been Defeated - but the Fight against Populism isn’t over". He states ACT is "adopting increasingly populist policies" and "One can only hope [the National Party] starts asserting itself over its populist smaller partners". What Garbage. Shame on Finlayson for wrongly characterizing NZ politics. What's he playing at? Seems he wants to associate ACT's Leader with being Trump-like, arguing Seymour is playing dirty politics to gain votes, but which could lead to NZ's ruin. The word "populism" conjures up awful images, because the most notorious politician ever branded "populist" was of course Germany's Nazi Party boss during World War 2. What made him populist? The Fuhrer ran a dishonest line that working class Germans bought into - namely that Germany had actually won World War I, but been mortally betrayed by an elite group of disloyal traitors, many of them communists and Jews, who'd engineered a humiliating surrender of the nation for their own benefit.
What does "populism" actually mean? An old Argentinian friend of mine, called Rafael Di Tella, at the IVY league US university Trump wants to defund, has spent years writing on it. We've had many chats about the topic. One of his articles quotes former UK Justice Minister Michael Gove, who said "The people in this country have had enough of experts" when asked to name a single independent economic authority that thought Brexit was a good idea. Di Tella writes, "The precise meaning of populism varies, but standard elements include nationalism, redistributive politics & emotional speeches". Populist leaders often campaign on how a powerful elite group has taken over, running the country for themselves & their mates, selling out the national interest. In Europe, it gained traction again since the European Commission, populated by folks who speak many languages & often come from posh backgrounds, long welcomed more internationalism. For them it meant skiing in Italy, swimming on the French Riviera, waltzing in Vienna, tasting gourmet foods and Wimbledon for tennis in London. They welcomed mass immigration, even when illegal. They weren't affected by it. In Britain, the Commission's arrogance fueled Brexit. Working-class folk, especially in the North, never embraced these wonders of the EU. Meanwhile, in blue collar Allentown in America, similar feelings of anger against the likes of President Barack Obama, who went to Yale Law School, President Bill Clinton, who went to Yale, Hillary Clinton, who went to Yale, and George W. Bush who went to Yale, rose. That anger, fed by the trillion $ bailout of Wall Street during the Global Financial Crisis, led to Trump's victory.
So should the ACT Party be called "populist"? Does it meet the criteria? I know ACT well, including its founder Sir Roger Douglas, and all its leaders over the years. Folks like Richard Prebble, Don Brash, and Banksy. Without a doubt, ACT has not one shred of "populism" in its DNA. Indeed, its' problem over the years, as Roger will tell you, has been to pursue causes its leaders held deep convictions about, yet which initially proved unpopular at the ballot box. Even now, Roger is subject to unpleasant (yes "populist") attacks by three former Labour Prime Ministers - Ardern, Clark and Hipkins. They've all tried to promote the untruth that ACT, far from being populist, was itself part of an elite wanting to sell out NZ and have it carved up by overseas investors and rich people. Nothing could be further from the truth. The entire point of ACT's foundation was to ensure that capture of NZ by a group of disloyal elitists would never happen. That was the basis for the reforms starting in 1984. Farmers, who once did have the inside track in Wellington, had subsidies cut to zero. Import licenses, that had been a license to print money, were rendered worthless by opening up to foreign competition. ACT was formed to stop entrenched interests being created. It was formed to eliminate "privilege". It still stands for that ideal. Seymour's Treaty Principles Bill had nothing to do with populist politics. It was simply a continuation of ACT's founding principle that no person or group in society should receive special privileges.
As for ACT disdaining competent technical experts (lots are talking about tariffs now) which is a key feature of populism, it is the NZ party most respective of experts, by a million miles. Sir Roger and I have even written articles together. Yes, ACT's founder teamed up with an academic. Our articles are about removing privileges that still exist, one of which is enjoyed by children from wealthy families who go to University here without barely paying anything. We show how stopping this tax-payer rort would enable NZ to establish a far higher quality health-care & retirement system for all. ACT Leader Seymour admirably got Dr Parmjeet Palmer back into Parliament after she was shafted by National, a Party frightened of anyone with a degree higher than a BCom. Parmjeet has a PhD in neuro-science. Former ACT President Jamie Whyte is a philosopher with a PhD from Cambridge University. Seymour and his Deputy, Brooke Van Velden, are both highly qualified. They love experts. They're overly nerdy, as politicians go. Seymour's Department of Regulation is about implementing technical, much-admired-by-experts, Cost Benefit Analyses on rules in NZ, not dismissing them out-of-hand like seems to be happening in the US these days. Sources tell me Brooke always sat in the front row of her Auckland University classes. Do Seymour, Van Velden and ACT's MPs reflect Di Tella's key attributes of populists ("nationalism, redistributive politics and emotional speeches")? Not one of them. They hate redistribution of wealth. As for nationalism, my worry is the likes of Brash are keener on China's interests than NZ's. On emotional speeches, we probably all wish Seymour and Van Velden did at least one. What garbage for National's former Treaty Minister Finlayson to cat-call ACT as being "populist".