The facts are all there for you to read/view in ‘The Corporation’ by Joel Bakan, both on paperback and on film.

The facts are too numerous for me to list here, but feel free to pretend those facts don’t exist by not picking up the book/watching the film. You are, after all, a free individual.

But for your benefit, just consider this:
* Some multinational corporations are worth more than the GDP of some countries - mandate, perhaps, to throw your weight around?
* The WTO and IMF dictate policies to - and sometime even change the policies of - democratically-elected governments.
* Multinational corporations and the business lobby have a huge influence on the WTO.
* Corporations are answerable to no-one but their shareholders; governments on the other hand are answerable to the entire citizenry - REGARDLESS of whether the people voted for them (or even voted at all).
* The public has no say in the policies of, and decisions made by, multinational corporations - even though these may well affect their lives.

However, once again, feel free to ignore these fact.

“In corporations we trust?” - Hell no.

Damnit I have to apologize because I completely left out the fact that election day is not a holiday, IS a Tuesday and people have to go to work. You are absolutely right.

respectfully
BJ

This was the Nader battle cry and it IS true. However, FPP systems as perverse as that in the USA, with polarization as great as in the US, leads to 2 party systems with neither party fielding decent candidates. The goal is to defeat the candidate you like the least, and you vote as you must to achieve even that… and ignoring that, as Nader and the US Greens did in 2000 leads to disaster.

respectfully
BJ

‘After all, in many countries, the power of governments/the State has been superseded by that of transnational corporation, who are unaccountable to the citizenry and whose decisions etc. the voting public have no say in determining.”

–> care to provide some evidence for this rathern citing leftish dogma that’s just not based on the facts?

Also I suspect it would be incredibly hard to find a casual relationship bewteen ‘neo-liberalism’ (whatever you say it is) and ‘disenfranchisement’ (again, whatever you say that is).

In Germany, elections were the day after ours.
Voting age: 18
Turnout: 77.7% (down from 79.1% in 2002)

Too much of our society is about enclosing children in marginal experiences, in making the parents responsible for everything the child does/experiences, so that children grow into teenagers without any sense of autonomy or responsibility. Then they go to work, and find that teachers are replaced by autocratic employers, there’s no union to support employees rights, and anyway, they’ve never heard of unions since the ECA kicked in….

It’s no wonder that people under 30 are so dispirited and apathetic. their upbringing has conditioned them to be miserably apolitical, and they expect to just struggle along trying to pay their way.

I contrast our political apathy with France, where teens study political science from 12 - 16 at lycees, and by the time they vote at 18 have a reasonable idea where the political views of their parents, their peers and their society have come from. They have a very rational social model, teenagers who drink alcohol without committing automotive homicide/suicide, and family friendly working conditions.

That the French are predominantly governed by socialists suggests something about the domination of NZ politics by centrist interests in both of the major parties; there is no real opportunity for alternatives to be tried here, because the government and the opposition are really only squabbling over the same few metres square of centre ground.

Until there is any real “point of difference” in the political branding, the participation rates will not change, because 20% of the population really doesn’t see much benefit or harm coming to them from either governing option….

Roll on the Revolution, anybody?

Our curriculum keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Be explicit about what you plan to take out if you plan to put something else in - because unless you’re making the school day longer, _something_ will get squeezed.

Also teaching civics (like the Americans do) just does not work. The US has the strongest civics-education setup in the world, and some of the worst figures for participation in democracy (as a % of population US citizens don’t vote, don’t join political parties, don’t get out and get involved).

It’s like the US model of trying to give kids bigger vocabularies by making them learn lists of words. It fails dismally. You’re much better off encouraging kids to read more and trusting that they’ll learn vocab themselves.

Likewise you’re better off encouraging engagement in society, and encouraging kids to take an interest in politics. Give them the interest, and they will pick up the knowledge themselves. Trying to do it the other way around just does not work.

Pick local issues that they care about (hey, some city council’s playgrounds are being upgraded, and the local one isn’t - why not? when will it be? who decides? how could you influence it?). Get them interested in the topic in ways they care about, and they’ll fill in the knowledge themselves, start local and they’ll build up from there. But if you try to force ‘citizenship education’ at them at an abstract/national level (”What is the political role of the governor general?”) and they will just turn off.

So, Stuey, check out the timing:

19th July 2005 Nandor’s Misuse of Drugs (Cannabis Infringement) Amendment Bill launched

24th July 2005 First day hoardings could go up (so everyone was in campaign mode).

Even if it wasn’t an official campaign topic, the timing was so close that large numbers of people assumed that it was (you wouldn’t believe how many people grilled me about it).

As for cows:

“Further growth of dairying should only be allowed to happen if there is a serious reversal in the trend that wherever there are additional cows, there is lower water quality,� said Jeanette (8th December 2004)

Yes, we talked about all those things you list. The real question is: did anyone listen?