Updated
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern says she still has hope for humanity in the wake of the Christchurch shootings that killed 51 people.
Key points:
- Ms Ardern said good government was important in an increasingly fragmented world
- She said a sense of fear had been seen in things such as the Brexit vote and conversations about migration
- Ms Ardern urged governments to encourage trade, not retreat behind protectionist barriers
Speaking at a trans-Tasman event in Melbourne, Ms Ardern said she was deeply moved by the love and compassion expressed by the Muslim community after the March 15 attacks.
"I have seen humanity in the darkest of spaces," Ms Ardern said.
Ms Ardern was originally due to deliver her speech for the Australian and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG) in March but cancelled as she continued to support her country.
Her warm and empathetic response in the aftermath of the shootings was met with surprise and admiration worldwide, something she said saddened her.
"It shouldn't have been noteworthy," she said.
"It's instinctive when you're mourning with someone to reach out in that way.
"It just felt to me like a human response … it was a Kiwi response."
Counter-narrative of hope
Ms Ardern used her speech on Thursday to highlight the importance of good government in an increasingly fractured and fragmented world.
She said there were signs of life in "old ideologies" as leaders globally faced a rising tide of public suspicion towards government.
"Increasingly voters see their governments as not hearing what their interests are, or at worst, working against their interests, even in long-established democracies.
"It's an environment made for shock politics where only the noisy or the surprising are heard."
Ms Ardern said she had observed the world was operating in an environment of fear even before the Christchurch attacks and that the outcome of that fear had been seen in votes such as Brexit and conversations around migration.
"What underpins all of this is the sense of fear, that people don't have the level of security that they perhaps feel — perhaps somewhat nostalgically — they once enjoyed."
Ms Ardern said her Government was working to reduce inequality, and investing in the public service and mental health, to lift the wellbeing of New Zealanders.
"In a political environment you can either choose to capitalise on that fear, stoke it and politically benefit from it.
"Or you can run a counter-narrative, you can talk about hope, you can talk about solutions to the problems that we have to admit many of us political beings have been a part of."
Jab at Trump's trade war
Ms Ardern said politicians and governments of all stripes had responded to the stresses of fragmentation and dissolution by turning inwards.
"Domestically some have chosen to reject the independent public service and the possibility of a mutually respectful and diverse nature," she said.
"And looking beyond their borders, some have rejected the international institutions that they paint as responsible for both economic and cultural problems when they aren't necessarily at fault.
"Fear and blame is an easy political out."
She also took a thinly veiled jab at Donald Trump's trade war with China — without mentioning the US President's name — by urging governments to encourage trade, not retreat behind protectionist barriers.
"Here I do think Australia and New Zealand can be examples; we share a strong commitment to the rules-based trading system that's currently under such strain," she said.
"I acknowledge and endorse Prime Minister Scott Morrison's call for countries to mend and not end this system, and to reject the idea that trade is a zero sum gain."
Topics: government-and-politics, unrest-conflict-and-war, melbourne-3000, vic, australia, new-zealand
First posted