What next for Jacinda Ardern?
The PM’s re-election has proven she has the mettle to lead in a crisis, and gain the nation’s trust. Will she use her star power to make lasting change? By Michelle Duff.
In 2017, the nation was caught in one of the worst storm metaphors in living memory. There were waves of Jacindamania, surging polls, and rising tides of popularity. Promises were being hurled overboard like so many life rafts. Transformation! Change! Let’s do this!
Ardern, then the newlyminted Labour leader, was everywhere; in a mall, mobbed by young women. On that magazine cover, smiling warmly. In TV studios, telling shock jocks where to put their sexist remarks. She won an election that seemed unwinnable, and that Labour might admit it didn’t really expect to.
Three years later, the flavour of this election campaign befit a year typified by a global pandemic so horrific and simultaneously boring it makes you want to curl up under a duvet and watch Netflix forever. But right before you fall asleep, you want someone to tuck you in and tell you everything is going to be alright. I bring you the Jacinda Ardern of 2020.
Today’s Ardern is not the same person who was elected in 2017. Then, she was borne to leadership on a seven-week long whirlwind that came from seemingly nowhere and that, even in the first days and weeks, made her grasp on power seem flimsy. The majority of New Zealanders had not voted for her, which is how MMP works, but it had critics questioning her moral mandate to lead. How long could her cobbled-together coalition last?
Where there was once an untested leader, where voters saw inexperience and youth, they saw resolve and steely determination in a leader who acted quickly to change gun laws after the Christchurch terrorist attack, and could ruthlessly cull or demote inept ministers.
And where they might have once seen kindness as weakness, they saw it as a viable alternative to brute strength.
If anything changed in the past term, it wasn’t the country nor most of the problems an Ardernled Labour pledged to address (go on, pick one – child poverty, the housing crisis, inequality, the tax system, the welfare system, meaningful steps to address climate change and sexual and domestic violence). It was her, and the nation’s collective trust that she could do the job.
That, despite her Government falling short on almost every demonstrable measure – from abysmal failures like KiwiBuild and the instigation of a capital gains tax to the inability to set up a framework to stop men beating
up women and children.
The fact Labour gets another crack isn’t down to performance – at least, not apart from the overall success of the Covid-19 response. It is mostly testimony to Ardern’s leadership, evidenced throughout years of unprecedented crisis. Ardern’s brand of kindness, warmth and empathy was most effective when it united us. She has drawn New Zealanders closer, where other countries with strongman leaders –Trump and Johnson, anyone? – are tearing themselves apart.
From her first day in the job, Ardern was a magnet for international media. The world’s youngest female leader and then, after her pregnancy was announced in 2018, the second to have a baby while in office. The image of Ardern sweeping down the hallway in Buckingham Palace, wearing a ka¯kahu cloak to meet The Queen, is seared in the minds of a generation of women.
But it wasn’t only her mirror on motherhood and power that entranced. She seemed like an antidote; someone who used love to motivate, rather than fear. At the United Nations general
assembly in late 2018, where she made history by taking then three-month-old Neve, she said: ‘‘If I could distil it down into one concept what we are pursuing in New Zealand, it is simple and it is this: kindness.’’
Minutes after March 15, Ardern proved how much words mattered. Her response was to alienate the gunman, casting him as a shared enemy. ‘‘They are us. The person who has perpetuated this violence against us is not. They have no place in New Zealand.’’
Islamic Women’s Council of New Zealand spokeswoman Anjum Rahman believed this saved lives.
‘‘The whole country was really in danger with what could have happened after those attacks, and it didn’t happen.’’
Rahman thought that laid the foundation for managing Covid19. A year later when Ardern asked New Zealanders to upend their lives, 87 per cent supported lockdown.
‘‘I think she outperformed as a leader on everyone’s expectations,’’ Auckland University’s professor Jennifer Curtin says. ‘‘There are things she’s owned, and she has delivered, in a way
people didn’t expect.’’
Ardern’s brand was built around her approachability. She was in Facebook Live in her sweats, cracking jokes on the campaign trail. She gained the nickname ‘‘Aunty Jacinda’’. Numerous people I spoke to for my book, Jacinda Ardern: The story behind an extraordinary leader, and since, say she’s a good listener; she asks questions. She rings experts directly. Wesley Community Action’s David Hanna recalls a hui where she was meant to speak but instead sat down with an impoverished family, an academic and an economist and brainstormed answers to child poverty.
But likeability isn’t a panacea. Remember John Key? The former National prime minister spent three terms of government trying to please everyone. Remind me again what he achieved? There is a price to be paid in carrying the nation along with you on every policy decision. That price is mediocrity.
By buoying the country through frightening times, Ardern gained trust. On the campaign trail, venues brimmed with supporters; a far cry from New Zealand First’s barren rooms, or National leader Judith Collins’ staged crowd interactions.
If there was a moment that illustrated how far Ardern had come, look to the final TVNZ leaders’ debate. When asked if she would stay on if she lost, Ardern did not hesitate. ‘‘ No.’’ And, afterwards: ‘‘My message would be that if people don’t want to see me resign, then to vote for Labour.’’
From a leader who has built her brand around ‘‘ relentless positivity’’ this was not insignificant. This was a ‘‘no,’’ said with the confidence of a leader who reckons she’s done enough for people to vote her in again – and perhaps the knowledge a loss would be cushioned with highpaying international job offers.
Ardern begins this term flush with political capital, her star power shining brighter than ever. So when is she going to use it?
For women voters across the spectrum, Ardern’s leadership under pressure while being the mother of a small child has undoubtedly resonated. Yet when it comes down to it, what had she really done for women? When Covid threw thousands of women out of work, the thenGovernment’s response was to pump billions into maledominated industries.
Family violence is this country’s deepest shame. What could help fix this? Increasing benefits, for one. Being poor doesn’t cause violence, but they are interlinked. ‘‘ It’s not just about throwing money at the problem, but that is the starting point,’’ Children’s Commissioner Andrew Becroft says.
As the then Minister for Child Poverty, Ardern knew this, which is why the Welfare Expert Advisory Group was instigated in her first term. Of its 42 recommendations, almost nothing has been instigated.
Tax changes would make a difference but any discussions about addressing inequality by shaking up New Zealand’s tax system inevitably ended in Ardern ruling out change.
With Ardern there was the rhetoric, and the reality. And while Ardern didn’t lie, she was selective with parts of the story that suited. In the coming years, there is real risk that her core supporters will become increasingly alienated by a Government that doesn’t make any real commitment to, well, anything. Some feel that, while there have been some inroads much was under-delivered.
‘‘She has a strong social justice background and I don’t think we’ve really seen it, we’ve seen it in her behaviour but not her politics,’’ says Auckland University of Technology associate professor Khylee Quince. ‘‘She needs to be more courageous.’’
For now, they are holding out hope. ‘‘There was no way in the world that some of those targets were ever going to be met,’’ Women’s Refuge head Dr Ang Jury says. ‘‘I get a sense that this last three years has been a trustbuilding exercise, and I’m prepared to give them that for the time being.’’
Sunny optimism might help get us through crisis, but it won’t work forever. Now the waters have calmed, it’s Ardern’s chance to show us she can really steer the ship.
Or, let’s get more Kiwi about it: it’s time to do the mahi Jacinda, even if you don’t get the treats.
Ardern’s brand of kindness, warmth and empathy was most effective when it united us.