What if Jacinda Ardern were just an ordinary Prime Minister?
Former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has just published her memoir, A Different Kind of Power. Photo / Jane Ussher
THE FACTS
What is it about Jacinda Ardern that turns some people completely mad?
The publication of her memoir, A Different Kind of Power, this week was met with a predictable mixture of acclaim and derision.
This week, in a piece by Rachel Morris explaining why New Zealand 'turn[ed] on
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
NZ Herald
a day ago
- NZ Herald
What if Jacinda Ardern were just an ordinary Prime Minister?
Former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has just published her memoir, A Different Kind of Power. Photo / Jane Ussher THE FACTS What is it about Jacinda Ardern that turns some people completely mad? The publication of her memoir, A Different Kind of Power, this week was met with a predictable mixture of acclaim and derision. This week, in a piece by Rachel Morris explaining why New Zealand 'turn[ed] on
Otago Daily Times
a day ago
- Otago Daily Times
Letters to the Editor: DCC, Ardern and tourism
Today's Letters to the Editor from readers cover topics including open conversations about DCC funding, the carping about Jacinda Ardern's memoir, and visitor levies. Finance policy queried, the DCC offers answer At a recent council meeting a significant change to the Dunedin City Council revenue and financing policy was pushed through the meeting, without public consultation and with little debate. While it may have sounded like a technical adjustment, the implications are anything but minor and should be of public concern. The change specifically allows more spending to be funded through debt, as in borrowing even more money. Debt can now be used to cover costs that many ratepayers would (rightly) expect to be paid from the annual (operational) budget, day-to-day costs dressed up as long-term investment, funded by loans and added to the debt. Here is one problem I see with this, under the Local Government Act, changes to this policy that are considered significant (especially those with wide financial impact), and must go through public consultation. It's not just best practice, it is the law. I have re-read the draft nine-year plan consultation document and there was no mention of this change. There was no staff report on the agenda, that I can find, that refers to this change. This change seems to have just materialised on the day. The change affects the financial future of Dunedin. Whether you agree with the change or not we (the ratepayers) should have had a voice. Who is calling the shots here? Now more than ever, we need open conversations about how DCC is funded, what is actually being built and spent and who is the beneficiary. We cannot afford to have major financial moves pushed through without reports, rigorous debate or consultation. Future Dunedin councillor candidate [Sandy Graham, DCC chief executive replies: "I would not normally comment on a potential candidate's public claims, but it appears Ms Twemlow has misunderstood the situation and I think public clarification is necessary. The Dunedin City Council has an existing revenue and financing policy, which has been in place for some years. This policy already allows for debt to be used to fund operational expenditure, including grants (you can find reference to it on page 221 of our last 10-year plan 2021-24). The changes introduced by council during deliberations on the nine-year plan simply clarify the parameters under which debt can be used in this way. This responds directly to requests from the community for additional financial support for the performing arts sector, and council's request for staff to consider the best ways of delivering this support. It is not a significant change and does not require further consultation. Ms Twemlow is welcome to contact our finance team for further clarification should it be required.] Well done Hats off to Duncan Connors for his fine and thoughtful article (Opinion ODT 10.6.25) on an assessment of the South Island in relation to the North Island. I often think that we in the South are the poor cousins compared with the north when their needs appear to be listened to and dealt with much more quickly than we "down under". Is the temptation by politicians to think that because voting power is predominantly in the north, they are given preference while we southerners have to go on bended knees? Dunedin hospital is a prime example. Politicians need to realise that they are voted in to serve the common good and care for all the people. Santana Minerals plan The piece by Jonathan West (Opinion ODT 9.6.25) brilliantly and clearly explained the effects of the proposed Bendigo to Ophir mine and what this will mean in the very heart of Central Otago. Short-term gain for long-term pain. Ignore the carping, memoir is a terrific read Take no notice of the sniping directed at Jacinda Ardern's autobiography by a little posse of New Zealand journalists. Political prejudice taints their judgement. This is a wonderful book, a completely different kind of political memoir. Deeply personal, rich in anecdote, revealing, often very funny, it enchanted me as it has enchanted readers across the world. It is a love story, to husband, daughter, mother, father. A thoroughly female account of power and the political life. (What other memoir of a public figure begins in a bathroom where the protagonist sits waiting for the red lines on a pregnancy test to appear?) It is a devastating record of terrible historical events and the tumultuous business of being in charge, making decisions day by day, hour by hour. It is compelling and beautifully, fluently written. Ignore the carping chorus. Read it. It is fantastic. Tourism levy should not be for other things So, the government chooses to use the funds from the international visitor levy to fund yet more visitors, in order to fund yet more levies. Funds which were originally devised to offset the environmental damage and infrastructure shortfalls from the tourism overload which has weighed on a number of high-profile visitor areas, especially central Otago. What a rort. Our Minister for the South Island says that "the levy fund allows ministers to invest the funding in a way which best suits the current economic conditions, which is growth". What an absolute perversion of what the fund was really intended to be used for. In Central Otago we are already nearly 50% ahead of pre-Covid visitor numbers: prior to Covid tourism overload was reaching a point where significant local resentment was emerging as a result of environmental and infrastructure incapacity beginning to seriously impact on local quality of life, not to mention visitor experience. Despite general consensus that we needed to use the Covid pause to engage in a reset and choose quality over quantity, virtually nothing has changed. The QLDC mayor calls out for yet more growth, whilst Queenstown becomes disabled by transport gridlock, ever worsening affordable housing shortage, dysfunctional and inadequate sewerage provision, and environmental degradation in our rivers and the big lakes. The other main thing that this never-ending growth has produced in the region is a serious reduction in quality of life for the residents. No wonder the QLDC has ended up with a resident approval rating somewhere between 4% and 17% depending on which survey you choose to accept. Yes, we need central government funds to cope with overtourism, but even if we do manage to get funding for such things it can only be effective if it is accompanied by a complete pause on growth so that we can get the shortfalls behind us. [Abridged — length. Editor.] Address Letters to the Editor to: Otago Daily Times, PO Box 517, 52-56 Lower Stuart St, Dunedin. Email: editor@
The Spinoff
6 days ago
- The Spinoff
A different kind of memoir? Five fake Jacinda Ardern books, read and reviewed
Generative AI can do anything these days, including, it would seem, write the former prime minister's hotly anticipated memoir. Mirjam Guesgen dives into this curious new literary genre. Jacinda Ardern's memoir, A Different Kind of Power, has been described by The Guardian as 'a strikingly different kind of political memoir' and 'often funny, compulsively readable and intimate' by The Listener. The Age reviewer, Jenna Price, said she'd cried twice by the time she reached page 60. Excited to spend my evenings being let into the inner sanctum of Ardern's thoughts and hopes, I hurriedly opened my Amazon page to get my hands on a copy (yes, I have Amazon because I live in Canada and have succumbed to the wiles of capitalism). But as well as being met by the expected black, white and fluorescent yellow cover, I came across half a dozen other versions of the book, all published around the same time as Power's release. Jacinda – or someone who looks vaguely like her –beamed at me from the covers, inviting me to glean the many facets of her life through these pages. I've never downloaded a veritable shelf of Kindle books faster. What follows is my review of a selection of these works. Jacinda Ardern Memoir: Navigating Different Kind of Power between Politics and Family By Luiz Goncalves 'Who is Jacinda Ardern?' That's the question at the heart of this 'unauthorised memoir'. I'm not sure the author knows what memoir means but that's beside the point because, according to Goncalves, 'Ardern's story is one that needs to be told.' By the end of the introduction, I can feel Goncalves' deep admiration for Ardern – in a kind of fake, robotic sense. He's writing this because he's moved by her story and wants to give us a fuller picture of her life. Unfortunately, Goncalves doesn't deliver on his goal. The book reads like one of those terrible essays you wrote in high school, parsed with such choice phrases as 'another significant moment' and 'one memorable moment'. It feels like you're reading a resume, padded out by clichés. Perhaps that's because this Luiz Goncalves, author, is either a roof inspector in Montreal, a Spanish and Portuguese lecturer at Princeton (unlikely), or a visually impaired runner. I'll give it to Goncalves though, he does have a way of turning the most mundane occurrences into literary page-fillers. Take the time that Ardern noticed that someone had stolen from her school tuck shop (did this even happen? I don't know). He waxes lyrical about the incident for no fewer than two paragraphs and describes it as an example of Ardern's moral compass. '… ultimately … prioritizing justice over social popularity'. My favourite chapter was the riveting one on her net worth. Don't be fooled, would-be reader! This isn't a recital of basic facts and figures. It's a way for the author to show you how her modest earnings are a testament to her career in public service. Goncalves concludes by posing the question, 'What if there were 10 Jacinda Arderns, or even thousands?' (There certainly are around 10 fake books about her.) Rating: 7 out of 10 large language models. Short and sweet. Not as short and sweet as Arderns Wikipedia page, which eerily has many of the same details… Power With Kind Purpose: The Jacinda Ardern Story By Amanda Humper (or Eleanor Riggs?) I was nervous about Googling this author's name, which appears in the Amazon listing but not on the cover, for some reason, for fear of what might pop up. Thankfully there is no Amanda Humper, so I needn't have worried. But maybe it was Eleanor Riggs who wrote this book, as the cover would suggest… Regardless of the author, I'm immediately drawn into this rendition of Ardern's story. The table of contents has been left completely blank, imbuing a sense of mystery into the whole thing. Humper's (or is it Riggs'?) goal in writing this account is to 'provide a comprehensive, nuanced account' that 'avoids hagiography'. It certainly does that. The chapter on Ardern's first term is so detailed, in fact, it'll have you asking, 'is this a white paper or a novel?'. If you want a blow-by-blow breakdown of all political policies that Ardern was involved in, then this is the book for you! The author does find space, however, for some colour in their storytelling. For example, the Whakaari/White Island eruption is described in gripping detail as 'a very significant event'. They also do a good job of making sure you know just how important this long list of facts and biographical details is, by adding phrases like 'had a profound impact', 'shaped' and 'marked a significant milestone' in almost every paragraph. A final interesting detail is that this memoir directly references Ardern's real 2025 memoir, stating that it 'cemented her power' – even though this book was published four days before the release of A Different Kind of Power. Prime Minister Movie Guide: Jacinda Ardern's Journey Through Tragedy and Triumph By Gregory J Edwards The cover of this book is what prompted me to purchase and review it. It features a solemn-looking Ardern (eeerr…) covered with what appear to be strange news article headlines and photographs. The longer I look at the tortured faces and garbled words, the more scared I become. This book starts off strong and it almost makes me feel like I'm reading a real book. I'm not sure where the movie part comes in though. I'm confused, but push on. By page nine, the text reads, 'this makes the 2025 documentary Prime Minister more than just a chronicle of what happened'. Ah. This is based on the Sundance film released in January 2025. My fault. Rating: 0 out of 10. Not ADKOP book. Jacinda Ardern Biography (Biographies of the Famous) By Famed History I was excited to review this book because it's the latest instalment in a series of biographies that also includes other great leaders like Nancy Pelosi and Buffalo Bill. Surely this publisher knows what they're doing. They really built my expectations, too. In the introduction I'm told that 'this is more than just a story' and to 'get ready to be touched, challenged, and uplifted'. Alright Famed History, let's go! I'm psyched. And in a way, they deliver on this promise. This is certainly the most grandiloquent of the books I reviewed. Ardern is described as someone who 'saw people as individuals, not numbers' and 'a child who believed the softest voice could bring about real change'. Maybe these are the tear jerkers that Price mentioned? But the emotive language isn't reserved for the fine print. Famed History has a way with words when it comes to chapter titles, with such greats as 'Dreams Beyond the Horizon' and 'A Leader in Lockdown'. Every description in this book is cranked up to 110. Murupara, for example, one of the towns of Ardern's youth, is described in a way that makes it sound like 1970s Harlem (yes, I concede that there's been a history of gang violence there). In another section, Famed History describes Ardern's transition out of high school: 'While others looked for careers focussed on wealth and prestige, Jacinda looked inwards. Her calling was about purpose… she enrolled… to study communication.' The same goes for her journey through politics: [We're about half way through her political story at this point, having read about her numerous involvements in local and international politics] 'what followed was a story few could have predicted'. With so much tension and drama throughout, you might wonder how such a book could end. Well, with a request by the author to give the book a good review if you liked it. Rating: 9 out of 10 tear-sodden tissues. Leading Quietly: How Jacinda Ardern Changed the World By Gordon D Flyn Since Prime Minister Movie Guide was a bust, I decided I needed to review one more Ardern memoir. Did I pick a lovely short read to ease my tired, Kindle-dried eyes? No, dear reader, I did not. I picked the longest book I could find. How did this book fill double the amount of pages as many of the previous works? The answer lay in repetition and a seeming lack of any kind of chronology. It haphazardly jumps from a summary of how Ardern handled the Covid-19 pandemic on page 20 back to details of her birth on page 22. In case you get reading whiplash, Flyn (with one n) makes sure to repeat everything at least twice, so you can piece the story together. He also conveniently bolds certain words and phrases throughout the book, and summarises key points of particular chapters with handy bullet-point lists. Confusion problem solved. One thing that Flyn does well is providing detailed portrayals of Ardern's communication strategy (including how she used social media and other 'modern technology'); what it was like working in a coalition government; and reactions to her resignation from around the world – all areas the other books I read didn't touch. Flyn also makes it very clear that this is not A Different Kind of Power. It's better. On page five he writes that this book seeks to answer a different set of questions. Questions like: how does a small town girl come to redefine global expectations? In chapter nine, Flyn provides the reader with a review of ADKOP (a book within a book!) He once again reiterates that this biography will delve deeper than that other paperweight. Sadly, we're 91% through this book already, leaving little time for Flyn to deliver on his promise. The book finishes with six pages of appendices, selected quotes, awards and further reading. In case these 126 pages weren't enough. Afterword I ran random sections of these books through ZeroGPT, an AI detection tool, and all were found to have been made by generative AI. Some were up to 98.7% AI-written. These books are part of a growing slew of AI-generated books scamming would-be readers. They are released around the same time as a highly anticipated book and try to profit off the hype by getting people to download them accidentally. My review of this phenomenon: another example of generative AI diluting and disrupting the media landscape. 0 out of 10.
