Chris
Trotter reminds us of how fascism has entered the New Zealand psyche
Working
Towards The Führer.
Chris
Trotter
All
Together Now! In terms of the inviolability of the new
neoliberal establishment, it mattered very little whether Labour or
National was in power. And, since cabinet ministers from both sides
of the aisle clearly regarded ideological boat-rocking as being every
bit as career-terminating as state sector CEOs, there was scant
incentive to entertain any alternative definitions to what
constituted “good governance”. In the years since 1984,
therefore, it has made much more sense, personally and politically,
to “work towards the [neoliberal] führer”.
21
December, 2018
AN
“AFFRONT TO DEMOCRACY”, was the State Services
Commissioner’s characterisation of the state bureaucracy’s
decision to spy on political activists. Few would disagree. That
multiple state agencies felt entitled to contract-out the gathering
of political intelligence to the privately owned and operated
Thompson & Clark Investigations Ltd reveals a widespread
antidemocratic disdain for citizens’ rights within the New Zealand
public service. The alarming revelations of the State Services’
inquiry raise two very important questions: How did this disdain for
democratic norms become so entrenched? And what, if anything, can
Jacinda Ardern’s government do to eradicate it?
The
dangerous truth, in relation to the first question, is also painfully
relevant to the second. The effective abrogation of democratic norms
in New Zealand dates back to 1984 and the events which the former CTU
economist and ministerial adviser, Peter Harris, characterised as a
“bureaucratic coup d’état”. In was in July 1984 that elements
within the NZ Treasury and the Reserve Bank, taking full advantage of
the relationships they had been cultivating for at least a year with
the parliamentary leadership of the NZ Labour Party, initiated the
detailed and extremely radical economic policy programme which came
to be known as “Rogernomics”.
This
programme, set forth in “Economic Management” – the book-length
briefing paper for the incoming Minister of Finance, Roger Douglas –
had received no mandate from the electorate. Indeed, the ordinary
voter had no inkling whatsoever that the Labour Party of Mickey
Savage and Norman Kirk was about to unleash a programme considerably
to the right of Margaret Thatcher’s and Ronald Reagan’s. The
authors of “Economic Management” were not, however, interested in
obtaining a democratic mandate for their proposed reforms. In fact,
they strongly suspected that submitting their ideas to the voters was
just about the surest way of securing their emphatic rejection.
Since
the mid-1970s the conviction had been growing among big-business
leaders and high-ranking civil servants living in the wealthiest
capitalist nations, that democracy had gotten out of hand; and that
unless the scope for democratic intervention in the economy was
radically reduced, then the future of capitalism could not be
guaranteed. Free Market Economics, as it was called then, or
Neoliberalism, as we know it today, was, from the outset,
incompatible with the social-democratic principles that had
underpinned western policy-making in the post-war world. It could
only be imposed, and kept in place, by a political class sealed-off
from all manner of pressures from below. If that meant gutting the
major parties of the centre-left and right; purging the civil
service, academia and the news media of dissenters; and crushing the
trade unions – then so be it.
Once
it became clear that the free-market “revolution” was not about
to be halted in its tracks, all those with an ambition to rise within
the new order made haste to learn its rules and spared no effort in
enforcing them. This phenomenon: of absorbing and implementing an
antidemocratic regime’s imperatives was described by British
historian of the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw, as “Working Towards The
Fuhrer”. Kershaw lifted the phrase from a speech delivered in 1934
by the Prussian civil servant, Werner Willikens:
“Everyone
who has the opportunity to observe it knows that the Fuhrer can
hardly dictate from above everything which he intends to realize
sooner or later. On the contrary, up till now, everyone with a post
in the new Germany has worked best when he has, so to speak, worked
towards the Fuhrer. Very often and in many spheres, it has been the
case—in previous years as well—that individuals have simply
waited for orders and instructions. Unfortunately, the same will be
true in the future; but in fact, it is the duty of everybody to try
to work towards the Fuhrer along the lines he would wish. Anyone who
makes mistakes will notice it soon enough. But anyone who really
works towards the Fuhrer along his lines and towards his goal will
certainly both now and in the future, one day have the finest reward
in the form of the sudden legal confirmation of his work.”
The
behaviour of New Zealand civil servants and their private sector
contractors conforms very neatly to Kershaw’s thesis. In terms of
the inviolability of the new neoliberal establishment, it mattered
very little whether Labour or National was in power. And, since
cabinet ministers from both sides of the aisle clearly regarded
ideological boat-rocking as being every bit as career-terminating as
state sector CEOs, there was scant incentive to entertain any
alternative definitions to what constituted “good governance”. In
the years since 1984, therefore, it has made much more sense,
personally and politically, to “work towards the [neoliberal]
führer”.
Certainly,
Kershaw’s “Working Towards the Führer” thesis would explain
the behaviour that has so disturbed readers of the State Services
Commission’s report like Victoria University’s School of
Government academic, Chris Eichbaum. Namely, why so few of the people
involved in this “affront to democracy” displayed any awareness
that they were behaving unethically. If Neoliberalism, like the Third
Reich, is not a force which can be legitimately contradicted or
criticised, then obviously any person or group engaging in activities
inimical to the implementation of state policy is bound to be
considered an enemy of the system.
Not
that the neoliberal order will ever acknowledge its political
imperatives so honestly. A large measure of bad faith continues to
operate within the system. It has to – otherwise the still useful
façade of human rights and democratic consent will rapidly fall
apart.
Ministries
and other state entities reach for the private investigator rather
than the police officer because the latter is still (at least in
theory) accountable. By contrast, the paper and/or electronic trails
left by the likes of Thompson & Clark are considerably more
difficult to track than those carefully logged in an official Police
investigation. What’s more, the unofficial and private aggregation
of “evidence” against the State’s “enemies” opens up the
possibility of their unofficial and private punishment.
That
job the activist lost, or failed to get. The bank loan that was
refused. Simple bad luck? Or something else?
The
most sinister aspect of the “Working Towards The Fuhrer”
phenomenon is that any obstacles or objections encountered along the
way will be taken as evidence of forces working against the
führer. Popular resistance to neoliberal objectives is never taken
as a sign that those objectives might be ill-advised,
counterproductive, or just plain wrong. Rather, it is taken as proof
that those responsible for organising such resistance are dangerous
and irrational opponents of beneficent policies to which there are no
viable alternatives.
It
appears never to have occurred to Gerry Brownlee, for example, that
the rising levels of desperation and anger among the Christchurch
clients of the state-owned Southern Response insurance company –
feelings that were manifesting themselves in threats to life and
property – might be evidence of massive failures on the company’s
part. John Key, similarly, refused to accept that oil and gas
exploration might constitute a genuine threat to New Zealand’s
(and, ultimately, the entire planet’s) natural environment.
Was
Simon Bridges, when he introduced legislation outlawing waterborne
protests within 2 kilometres of the oil and gas industry’s drilling
platforms, doing no more than working along the lines and towards the
goals of his leader?
As
above, so below: the law of hierarchy is immutable. Thomson &
Clark may have been the tool in the hands of ruthless public servants
“working towards the führer”, but the masters of those servants
were the neoliberal politicians from both major parties who, ever
since 1984, have been tireless in their defence of the neoliberal
order against its most fearsome foe – the New Zealand people.
The
question, therefore, arises: If the Coalition Government demonstrates
the slightest willingness to move against the servants of that
neoliberal order (as Greater Christchurch Regeneration Minister,
Megan Woods, by forcing the resignation of the Chair of Southern
Response, has arguably done already) will the same forces that
subverted Labour in 1984 set in motion the measures necessary to
bring down Jacinda Ardern’s “issue motivated group” in 2020?
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