In the seven years I have lived in New Zealand, I have often heard new immigrants from Europe, South Africa and North America refer to it as a second world country. As evidence of New Zealand's second world status, they cite the fact that Kiwis wear thermal underwear, down vests and mufflers to work in the winter (owing to ambient indoor temperatures of 60-63 degrees F - energy is already extremely expensive here); that most professional women feel guilty using a clothes dryer and still hang their washing on the line; and that Do It Yourself and jury-rigging with duct tape and Number 8 wire are a matter of national pride and summoning a repairman is seen as an unmanly extravagance.
The terminology first, second and third world was originally coined during the Cold War to designated capitalist countries aligned with the US (first world), communist countries aligned with the USSR (second world), and countries aligned with neither (third world). Recently, however, especially the terms first and third world are used to describe economic status, as opposed to political alignment.
The term "second world" has definitely taken on a new meaning in New Zealand - especially since the International Monetary Fund (IMF) came knocking at our door last week. I wonder if this might also be the case in Iceland, Greece, Spain, Italy and Portugal - other countries facing unsustainable debt levels as they struggle to keep vital public programs going.
Three days ago Radio New Zealand National reported that the IMF was asking the New Zealand government to make further cuts in public spending. I had shivers up my spine, flashing back to the time my grandmother had a collision with a known Mafia figure and our family received one of those offers you can't refuse. My colleagues in the National Health Service (where I work as a child and adolescent psychiatrist) and I are very wary of the IMF's so-called "recommendations." In fact we can see little difference between the IMF knocking at your door and a mafia or gang member trying to sell you a protection racket.
New Zealand is the only industrialized country I know of that didn't implement economic bail-outs for banks, jobless workers or families losing their homes. Moreover, as a result of the recession, our government has already made major cuts to public spending, resulting in the layoff of 1500 public service workers. However the IMF expects us to go still further, with specific recommendations that we end free GP visits (for children, seniors and the disadvantaged) and student loan rebates (to address an extremely critical shortage of doctors and teachers). In other words they want us to "privatize" aspects of our health care system and tertiary education.
The Pressure to Privatize Our National Health Service
Given that New Zealand has a national health service, and that both National (the conservatives) and Labour (the liberals) support the belief that health care is a basic human right, I see a clear subtext here. It is well known the people who run the IMF (who for the most part represent financial institutions such as banks, brokerage firms and insurance companies) do not accept the notion of a right to health care. They view health care delivery as a commodity with immense profit potential - and see absolutely no reason why private health insurance companies should be denied the right to make a profit from illness and human misery in all industrialized countries, as they do in the US. I know this because the structural adjustment programs they impose on debtor nations always includes a demand that these countries abolish their publicly funded health systems and open their markets to private insurance companies.
What Happens if We Refuse an Offer We Can't Refuse?
If New Zealand were frittering away IMF money, I could accept that the IMF might be in a position to dictate how we spend it. However New Zealand hasn't borrowed any money from the IMF. At present New Zealand borrows approximately 0 millions per week from commercial lenders at 4 - 6.5% interest. We pay a low interest rate because we have an AA+ (countries receive credit ratings just like individuals).
The threat, of course, is that if New Zealand fails to cut public spending enough to satisfy its global lenders, our credit rating will be downgraded from AA+ to BBB- (like Iceland and Greece) and our government will be force to borrow from the IMF (like Iceland and Greece). We will then be forced to pay 18% interest and agree to draconian cuts in health and education. Fitch and other rating agencies are supposed to be independent from the financial institutions that control the IMF. However recent criminal prosecutions suggest that they aren't - and that banks and other financial institutions can "buy" favorable or unfavorable credit ratings to suit their commercial interests.
If New Zealand was inhospitable to foreign companies wanting to do business here or irresponsible in collecting taxes or managing government fraud and corruption, it would be a far different story. However New Zealand is consistently designated as the country with the least red tape and regulation for foreign businesses, as well as the most fraud free. We also have a well-earned reputation for frugality. Our government ran a surplus between 1999 and October 2008 - the month the world economy collapsed and we stopped selling exports and overseas travel to tourists - owing to circumstances which were totally beyond our control.
A Second World Perspective on the Sustainability Movement
All this got me thinking whether New Zealand, like Iceland, Greece, Italy, Spain, and Portugal, which all face massive debt problems through no fault of their own, might have something to offer the global sustainability movement. Although it rarely makes the nightly news, the sustainability movement is a growing influence in the lives of the educated middle class in most industrialized countries. Millions of people world wide accept that they face a less energy intensive future (whether due to a shrinking global economy, fossil fuel depletion or international treaties to reduce carbon emissions). Which means millions of people are already making conscious lifestyle choices to reduce their energy and carbon footprint.
It's a historical fact that New Zealand was a latecomer to globalization and the pressure this produced to become an export-driven economy. Prior to the disastrous "structural adjustment" New Zealand under went in 1984 (aka Rogernomics), Kiwis got along just fine without the billions of dollars of cheap Asian imports that dominate our retail shelves at present. In fact women of my own generation talk of growing their own fruit, veggies and chooks (chickens) in their backyard when their children were young, as well as canning surplus fruit and veggies for winter, sewing their children's clothes, knitting their jumpers (sweaters) and saving and recycling string, rags, scrap metal and any other household waste that could be used for some other purpose. It is intriguing to watch many of them fall back on these deeply engrained habits, as they make conscious choices to reduce their energy and carbon footprint.
New Zealand also has the advantage of having a mainly agricultural economy and a slower rate of urbanization than other industrialized countries. At present 55.6% percent of Kiwis live in New Zealand's 12 cities, as opposed to an average 75% urbanization rate for other industrialized countries. Thus making it relatively easy for at least half of New Zealanders to undertake concrete local energy conservation, alternative transport and waste reduction initiatives, as well as creating community gardens, farmers markets and community supported agriculture schemes.
New Zealand Transition Towns Movement
Most of New Zealand's sustainability related organizations are locally based and formal or informal members of Transition Towns New Zealand, a member of the global Transition Towns movement that started in Ireland and the UK. In perusing the TT New Zealand website, it is interesting to see how many local groups have taken up concepts that originated with the Y2K movement of the late nineties - which was advising people on preparing for the possible "End of Civilization as We Know It." The following are key examples:
Initiatives to improve local food (and water) security:
¨ De-paving - digging up private and public driveways and parking lots and replacing them with backyard veggie gardens and community orchards and gardens.
¨ Lawn liberation - replacing lawns and ornamental trees and shrubs with fruit and nut trees and productive gardens.
¨ Development of "bioregional" transportation security (that doesn't rely on imported oil) for food delivery (99.9 percent of human existence has relied on a bioregional economic model - which entails sourcing the majority of food and other essentials within a 100 mile radius)
¨ Development of strong community networks to provide neighbourhood patrols in the absence of police services.
¨ Neighborhood systems of rainwater collection and purification
¨ Strong local credit unions and locally owned businesses and cooperatives
¨ A local currency or trading system
¨ Building a solid tradition of neighbors sharing with one another and helping each other one other out.
¨ Increasing local expertise in permaculture and biointensive agriculture techniques, should industrial fertilizers and insecticides (which are manufactured from fossil fuels) become unavailable or prohibitively expensive.
Initiatives to improve energy security:
¨ Neighborhood and community solar and wind power energy systems
¨ A shift in urban planning to put essential services closer to residential areas, facilitating increased use of public transportation and an increase in active transport (walking, cycling, skateboarding, etc.).
¨ Ensuring that everyone in your neighborhood has dry firewood, candles and oil lamps and ensuring that schools, churches and other neighborhood gathering sites are similarly prepared.
Like the Y2K movement that proceeded it, the Transition Town movement emphasizes the over-riding importance of building strong social networks to cushion the impact of a sudden economic shock or infrastructure breakdown. This approach is supported by extensive medical and psychological studies showing that people with strong social networks recover more quickly from any illness, personal crisis or catastrophe.
