The New Zealand Initiative

In this episode, Michael speaks with Oliver Hartwich about his new research note "Who Runs the Country?", examining the friction between New Zealand's elected government and its permanent public service. They explore how the appointment of chief executives can undermine ministerial control, and why Germany's model of political appointments with institutional safeguards offers a promising alternative.

In this episode, Oliver speaks with retired Major General John Howard about the escalating Middle East conflict, unpacking the military realities behind the United States' shifting approach and the growing role of global powers like China and Russia. They explore what disruption in the Strait of Hormuz means for energy markets and why New Zealand may be more exposed to fuel and supply shocks than it realises.

In this episode, Eric talks with Andreas Heuser, partner at Heuser Whittington and lead economist on the government's fuel security study, about why the price system is New Zealand's best tool for managing fuel scarcity in the wake of the Strait of Hormuz closure. They discuss why calls for rationing are misguided, what the Marsden Point decision got right, and how the existing tax and transfer system can address the real pain households are facing.

In this episode, Nick and Benno discuss whether New Zealand's proposed planning reforms can actually deliver housing affordability or fail to escape the gravitational pull of the status quo. They unpack how our current planning system and the rules it makes are an extractive institution: one that concentrates decision-making power over land use in the hands of a few, beholden to a privileged group of incumbents. The result is artificial scarcity that inflates land prices across entire cities, driving up house prices and rents. They introduce competitive urban land markets as the countervailing force: a more inclusive institution that respects people's right to use land to meet society's needs and empowers the citizenry to participate in land and development markets. The Planning Bill does mark a genuine milestone: for the first time, competitive urban land markets appears as an explicit goal of the planning system. But we need to clarify what that means and provide the basic elements needed for that goal to bite: a definition, independent monitoring to assess whether land markets are actually competitive, and a requirement that the planning system respond when they are not. Without these, the new goal risks being captured by a planning and legal system that continues to do what it already knows how to do: predict and provide for scarcity.

In this episode, Michael talks with Dr James Kierstead about the pressures on academics to align with universities’ institutional priorities, including expectations to incorporate Māori and Pasifika perspectives in all teaching programmes. The discussion raises questions about academic freedom, institutional neutrality, and accountability, illustrated by the circumstances surrounding Dr Kierstead’s redundancy from Victoria University of Wellington.

Renowned urbanist Alain Bertaud has spent six decades studying cities: from working as a young draftsman in Chandigarh in 1963 to advising governments worldwide on urban land markets. His book Order Without Design has become a touchstone for New Zealand's housing reforms, cited by ministers on both sides of the aisle. In this episode, Eric and Benno are joined by Bertaud and Salim Furth of the Mercatus Centre to discuss why cities are labour markets first and infrastructure projects second, what happens when planners try to control things they cannot predict, why monitoring land prices may be the single most important thing a planning department can do, and how to make sure infrastructure investment and delivery serves the spontaneous order rather than the other way around. As both guests note, New Zealand has worked through so many of the foundational policy questions that the debate is now at the frontier: how to finance and deliver infrastructure under genuine uncertainty, in a system that lets cities grow flexibly. These are problems you only get to when the earlier questions have been answered well. The world is watching.

In this episode, Oliver Hartwich and Eric Crampton are joined by retired Major General John Howard to assess the Iran conflict three weeks on, covering how it has escalated, what the odds of de-escalation look like, and whether a US ground invasion or ceasefire is realistic. They also explore the wider global picture, from China's posture around Taiwan to Ukraine's worsening position, and what it all means for New Zealand's fuel security, energy resilience, and national preparedness.

In this episode, Nick talks with Bryce about the government’s proposed replacement of the Resource Management Act and what it means for property rights. Bryce argues the bills fall short of the government’s stated commitment to property rights, lacking the economic disciplines needed to ensure regulation delivers net benefits for New Zealanders.

In this episode, Oliver talks to retired Major General John Howard about the first week of US–Israel strikes on Iran — what the opening strikes reveal, how Iran is responding, and why the risk of escalation remains real. They then zoom out to the global ripple effects (Russia and Ukraine, China and Taiwan, NATO cohesion) and the practical consequences for New Zealand, from fuel and supply-chain disruption to the need for more proactive national security planning.

In this episode, Oliver talks to Roger Partridge about his new report, Renovating the Nation, which proposes selling around $25 billion worth of government-owned commercial assets and reinvesting the proceeds into critical public infrastructure. Drawing on the success of New South Wales's asset recycling programme, Roger argues the Crown has too much capital tied up in businesses it doesn't need to own, and that ring-fencing sale proceeds in an independently governed fund could deliver the roads, hospitals, and public transport New Zealand desperately needs.