Financialisation of New Zealand media ownership

Sites: a journal of social anthropology and cultural studies

This article examines the enduring influence of the principle of methodological individualism in New Zealand society, following thirty years of neoliberal economic policies. It contextualises this examination within the global financial crisis of 2008-2011 and the debate as to whether this crisis signalled the start of a post-neoliberal epoch. Drawing upon welfare reforms over the past sixteen years, it argues that, within New Zealand, neoliberalism has become more entrenched than ever, manifest in the persistent remoralisation of those defined as poor and through the ways in which the principle of methodological individualism is frequently invoked as a solution to the challenges presented by neoliberal welfare entrenchment. Though it acknowledges neoliberalism as a contested political project, this article supports the view that continuities in successive National and Labour government welfare reforms in housing, child welfare, and social security have embedded a neoliberal culture of disparagement for those deemed unsuitable or unable to participate in the market.

Area, 2008

2015

This article examines the enduring influence of the principle of methodological individualism in New Zealand society, following thirty years of neoliberal economic policies. It contextualises this examination within the global financial crisis of 2008-2011 and the debate as to whether this crisis signalled the start of a post-neoliberal epoch. Drawing upon welfare reforms over the past sixteen years, it argues that, within New Zealand, neoliberalism has become more entrenched than ever, manifest in the persistent remoralisation of those defined as poor and through the ways in which the principle of methodological individualism is frequently invoked as a solution to the challenges presented by neoliberal welfare entrenchment. Though it acknowledges neoliberalism as a contested political project, this article supports the view that continuities in successive National and Labour government welfare reforms in housing, child welfare, and social security have embedded a neoliberal culture...

2006

There is a widespread sense of unease in New Zealand sociology. This disquiet emerges in the day to day as hushed concerns over student numbers, furrowed brows at budget balances and squeamish stomachs over research outputs. General and pervasive, this sense of unease is linked to profound changes in the organisation, provision and practice of an academic sociology radically re-shaped by neoliberal policies in New Zealand higher education (Olssen, 2002). There is an apprehension that under current conditions, sociology is unable to maintain itself as an academic discipline in New Zealand (Crothers, 1999). Yet still, people continue to be employed as sociologists in academic institutions and new sociology programmes continue to emerge (Spoonely, 2005). Discomfit between a pervading sense of unease about sociology and life on the ground for academic sociologists merits further investigation. This article seeks to embark on such an investigation. Using a variety of information gatherin...

How we get an income has a profound influence over our whole lives. Those who manage large numbers of people or own valuable assets, have very different experiences from the rest of us. We basically do what we are told at work, run small businesses or have limited supervisory or professional responsibilities at the middle levels of a big corporate or government hierarchy. That has obvious implications for our wealth and income. Workers on construction sites, clerks in banks or public service offices, even medical practitioners, lawyers and engineers whose incomes depend on their special skills, are not billionaires. The richest 10 per cent of Australians owned 45 per cent of wealth in the country in 1998, according to one study. Eighty six per cent of shares and other investments, 62 per cent of rental properties and 60 per cent of interest bearing deposits (like money in bank accounts) belonged to this small group. The top 1 per cent, less than 100 000 households, owned 52 per cent...

Considering Class: Theory, Culture and the Media in the 21st Century, 2018

2004

A number of authors have documented an increase in earnings or income inequality in New Zealand during the late 1980s and early 1990s, a period of major economic reform, however no study has evaluated changes in inequality during the post-reform era. This paper applies a recently-developed method for decomposing changes in inequality to New Zealand income and earnings data and extends it to analyse changes in inequality between men and women. Across the total working-age population, income inequality rose among both males and females between 1998 and 2003. In both cases, the majority of this was unexplained by changes in the observed determinants of income, however shifts in the distribution of education and the associated returns were responsible for part of the increase. Among the subset of workers, earnings inequality increased significantly for both genders. Although changes in the returns to measured characteristics contributed to the rise in inequality, this was partially offs...

Kōtuitui: New Zealand Journal of Social Sciences Online, 2019

This research explores how middle-class Aucklanders, participants in 'the middle', see themselves in terms of being squeezed. It is intended to augment existing statistical based work on class stratification and life chances and facilitate aspects of qualitative research around giving voice. The research confirms the notion of a squeezed middle for the participants based in Auckland, and a striking feature of that confirmation is the centrality of age in demarcating both resourcing (in particular, homeownership versus renting) and narratives. Insofar as the research captures the zeitgeist of the middle, this confirms a neoliberal governmentality wherein a class analysis is interpolated with personal responsibility and the latter remains paramount. Further, the research demonstrates that empathy is associated with social proximity. The semi-structured interviews also illuminated a widespread sense of resentment. This had two dimensions: directed against neoliberalism as an historic transformation that is seen as the cause of an increasingly squeezed middle, and; against baby boomers. Participants in their 40s demonstrated the highest levels of resentment, and this confirms other research which identifies them as a problematic age cohort because of changing socioeconomic conditions.

2015

This article examines the enduring influence of the principle of methodological individualism in New Zealand society, following thirty years of neoliberal economic policies. It contextualises this examination within the global financial crisis of 2008-2011 and the debate as to whether this crisis signalled the start of a post-neoliberal epoch. Drawing upon welfare reforms over the past sixteen years, it argues that, within New Zealand, neoliberalism has become more entrenched than ever, manifest in the persistent remoralisation of those defined as poor and through the ways in which the principle of methodological individualism is frequently invoked as a solution to the challenges presented by neoliberal welfare entrenchment. Though it acknowledges neoliberalism as a contested political project, this article supports the view that continuities in successive National and Labour government welfare reforms in housing, child welfare, and social security have embedded a neoliberal culture of disparagement for those deemed unsuitable or unable to participate in the market.

2017

Thanks are due to Clifton van der Linden for his agreement to use this data. Left-right issues were the rich-poor gap, the value of government spending, trickle-down economics, increasing the gap of New Zealand superannuation, the amount of the minimum wage, the private role in health care, free doctor visits for children, more or less for welfare recipients, business tax, tax on the wealthy, a capital gains tax, education (three questions) and housing policy (two questions). Progressive-Conservative issues were funding the department of Conservation, fracking, the Christchurch rebuild, corporal punishment, sentences for crime, immigration, foreign ownership of farmland, the Treaty of waitangi, Māori self-determination, support for the Māori language, the age threshold for alcohol purchase, legalisation of marijuana, and abortion.

Contemporary social science, 2016

In many countries around the world, the gap between rich and poor has increased during the twenty-first century. Not surprisingly, discussion of both the relationship of the top 1% to the rest of society (Stiglitz, 2011) and the growing misery of the bottom 1% (e.g. Weissman & Dickson, 2012) has also intensified in both public and academic forums. It is hard to open a newspaper without reading of another circumstance that reveals that the rich are unbearably rich, the middle class are under pressure and the poor are losing another element of their support system. Recent election campaigns in Canada, Finland, Guyana, Greece, Singapore, the US and the UK have remarkable similarity in the themes expressed by the electorates regarding related issues: wealth is not being shared, the next generation is struggling to find decent jobs, wages paid to many do not meet the threshold of 'living wages', difficulties finding good work are turning into dangerous resentments between native-born and foreign-born, education has become more extended and more expensive, austerity measures are hurting ordinary people and the social fabric, the ratios between the working populations and the non-working populations are shrinking in such a manner that produces onerous consequences for both. These themes reverberate at academic conferences that encourage academics to tie their research to important issues-'Hard Times, The Impact of Economic Inequality on Families and Individuals', 'Recovering the Social: Personal Troubles as Public Issues' and the 'The Futures We Want: Global Sociology and the Struggles for a Better World' are just a few examples. 1 Indeed, Holmwood's observation that the study of social inequality has become too narrow and specialised and that sociologists have been insufficiently active in interpreting current events (Holmwood, 2014) seems to be in the process of changing. The case for information about social inequality based on highquality analysis and data is consistently made (Fukuyama in Fukuyama and Diamond, 2012; Wilkinson & Pickett, 2009). With respect to the issue of understanding social inequality better, public concerns and the focus of academic research align. This special issue on 'Social Inequality and its Consequences' showcases the work of scholars who share a commitment to well-conceptualised and theoretically informed empirical investigation into the nature, processes and consequences of social inequality. The 10 articles presented here explore some of the ways that social processes influence social inequality in contemporary

2016

The public is constantly told income inequality is rising and the government should do something. This report seeks to explain why inequality matters, even though it has barely changed. It shows how income inequality did rise in the late 1980s and early 1990s, but has since flattened out. Meanwhile consumer spending inequality has returned to mid-1980s levels. Even so, higher housing costs have probably exacerbated wealth inequality. There is considerable income mobility in New Zealand, but it’s hard to tell whether it’s rising or falling, based on the available data. But isn’t the real issue that the gap between ‘the haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ is unfair? The report addresses this issue. A striking 72% of Kiwis believe that wealth is deserved and perceived to be legitimate in the sense of coming from individual talent and efforts. The New Zealand Initiative and every decent person should care deeply about eliminating all forms of injustice in our society. This report tries to sort ...

This course explores the study of social inequality and sociological approaches to this topic. Evidence of social, political and economic inequality is pervasive in society, and its causes and proposed solutions are often the subject of fierce debate in academia and broader society. Growing domestic and global poverty, the persistence of racial, ethnic, gender, class discrimination and the increasing visibility of inter-and intra-country differences in wealth and income are just some aspects of contemporary social inequality. This course introduces students to ongoing debates about the sources and consequences of inequality, while also exploring how social inequality is enacted and perpetuated daily. This course will cover basic concepts and facts as well as both classical and contemporary theoretical debates. NOTE: This course will also act, in part, as preparation for the Social Inequality comprehensive exam.

Social Science & Medicine, 2006

of the NZDep91, NZDep96 and NZDep2001 small-area indexes of relative socioeconomic deprivation for New Zealand. Clare then led a project, in collaboration with Peter, that developed and tested a methodology to provide a non-occupational classification for individuals based on deprivation indicators available from the 1996 Census. The NZiDep research is a natural extension of that work, exploring a much wider variety of deprivation markers than is available from the Census. Peter King (BA (Hons); PhD) is a Senior Researcher and sociologist in the Family Centre Social Policy Research Unit, working in the areas of social and economic development with particular reference to resource distribution, housing, poverty, and living standards in New Zealand, as part of the New Zealand Poverty Measurement Project. He is presently developing applications of social network analysis and social capital theory for research into the overlapping fields of poverty, living standards and deprivation research. The NZiDep research is a natural extension of his work in the fields of poverty and living standards research. Currently, Peter is an Objective leader within a five and a half year FRST funded research programme that has the aim of enhancing wellbeing in an ageing society.

This general introduction locates the GBCS papers on the elite, and their respondents, within a context. It emphasizes some of the key points made by the respondents in order to intervene in a discussion about what is at stake in doing sociological research on class. It draws attention to the differences between on the one hand status and stratification, and on the other class struggle perspectives, and hence the difference between a hierarchical gradational analysis and a relational one based on the struggle between groups over value. I begin to answer a question raised by many of the respondents in this special issue: ‘what is the question that the analysis of class is designed to answer?’ I also draw attention to some of the problems with Bourdieu’s ‘structuring architecture’, showing how the partial reproduction of Bourdieu presents fundamental problems, leading to a Great British Stratification Survey (‘GBSS’) rather than aGBCS. The different trajectories in class analysis that confusingly merge over the concept of culture in the present are briefly mapped, showing very different intentions in analysis. I argue that to understand class we need to understand the processes of classification: exploitation, domination, dispos- session and devaluation, and their legitimation. Overall this special issue extends the sociological debate on class into a larger political frame about injustice, classification and value. It develops arguments from anthropology that maintain that it is the ability to define what value is (through culture) that is the ultimate difference in politics and power.