Tag: social justice

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Toitū te Tiriti

David Seymour talks about seeking equality and universal human rights. This is deceptive and fraudulent. On the surface equality is a persuasive catch phrase, much like the notion of freedom (see previous post). But if you dig beneath the surface it is clear that the ACT Party’s concept of equality in Aotearoa is that we can all be (behave) like Pākēha. It is taking us back to the 1950s – we can all be equal provided you live as we say you must live. This isn’t equality, it is coloniality: assimilation. And more than this we can and must all be (behave) like rich capitalist Pākēhā. This isn’t true either – Aotearoa is a radically unequal society. This is a simple function of capitalist economics. Look around you, tell me what you see.

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A politics of hope

A guest post by Bex Silver.

We are entering a dark period in the short history of our nation. There have been dark times before, and we have got through them. We will get through this too.

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The wrecking ball swings

We have just lost 9% of Oranga Tamariki staff in order to help reduce spending so that good Kiwis can get the tax cuts promised by the coalition Government. I am reminded of those pandemic casualty images where 5,000 people are standing in a field and then one in every ten is slowly faded out of view. This image is profoundly disturbing but it is the justification provided by the Minister – that this decimation of the physical and intellectual resouces of our state child protection and youth justice agency will make our ‘at risk’ kids safer – that is truly bizarre: “Hello … ? … is anybody home? … this doesn’t make any sense”, except perhaps in the alternate universe of hard-right ideology. The origin of the word ‘decimation’ lies in ancient times when every tenth soldier was put to death to punish and deter insurrection in rebellious Roman legions. There is an element of truth signalled in this analogy. Public servants are potentially powerful and rebellious.

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Truth matters

I try to tell social work students that they need be aware of the relationship between the big picture of politics and power (the policy settings that influence the way that opportunites and resources are distributed) and the small picture of individual circumstances. We are slow to learn from our history; patterns repeat in slightly altered form and in Aotearoa New Zealand we are on a regressive course politically, with tax cuts and benefit sanctions designed to redistribute wealth upwards to the already wealthy and privileged. In this post I would like to explore some wider questions about the socio-political construction of ‘truth’.

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What the genocide in Gaza teaches us

As a social work educator, I’m committed to helping students learn the knowledge, skills and values they need to – amongst other things – assert and protect the human rights of the people with whom they work. The IFSW (2014) definition of social work states, “Principles of social justice, human rights, collective responsibility and respect for diversities are central to social work”. But our understanding of human rights is informed not only by academic learning but also by our observations of the operation of international institutions in the real world.

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