Open Journal Systems at the Victoria University of Wellington Library
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Consistency and Decidability in Some Paraconsistent Arithmetics
Get PDFThe standard style of argument used to prove that a theory is unde- cidable relies on certain consistency assumptions, usually that some fragment or other is negation consistent. In a non-paraconsistent set- ting, this amounts to an assumption that the theory is non-trivial, but these diverge when theories are couched in paraconsistent logics. Furthermore, there are general methods for constructing inconsistent models of arithmetic from consistent models, and the theories of such inconsistent models seem likely to differ in terms of complexity. In this paper, I begin to explore this terrain, working, particularly, in incon- sistent theories of arithmetic couched in three-valued paraconsistent logics which have strong (i.e. detaching) conditionals
Is Voluntary Administration Failing Companies? An Investigation into the Operation of Voluntary Administration in New Zealand from Inception to 2019
Get PDFThis article investigates the operation of voluntary administration in New Zealand from inception in 2007 to 2019. Voluntary administration is a formal insolvency procedure that is intended to maximise an insolvent company's chances of rehabilitation. Research undertaken for this article suggests that voluntary administration is not operating as was intended. It appears to have been underused and largely ineffective as a business rehabilitation mechanism. This article suggests that contributing reasons for the findings of the research include cost barriers for small businesses, a lack of confidence on behalf of creditors, and a misuse of voluntary administration by company directors. It proposes that useful reforms would be to reduce cost barriers and place limitations on when and how the procedure can be used
How Many 'Clicks' Does it Take? Finding Price Information on New Zealand Lawyers' Websites
Get PDFThis article examines price transparency in New Zealand's civil legal services market and compares the civil legal services market characteristics to those of other jurisdictions. The current law does not incentivise providers within the legal services market to communicate price information to consumers searching for a provider. The researcher utilised a web-sweep method to assess how New Zealand law firms that provide dispute resolution services and employment advocates share information through their websites. The web-sweep covered the websites of 96 New Zealand law firms and 30 New Zealand employment advocates. The author assessed the ease with which prospective consumers could navigate and understand price-related information. The results demonstrated that in a majority of instances, price information is unclear and uncertain. It is therefore not comparable between providers. Consumers in New Zealand face a high search cost when looking for prices and deciding on a legal service provider. They are unable to make a meaningful price comparison between providers of dispute resolution services before engaging them. Stronger regulation of providers (lawyers and employment advocates) to require the display of pricing information would lower search costs for consumers and increase competition
On Reflexivity in Ethnographic Practice and Knowledge Production: Thoughts from the Arab Region
Get PDFDeployed as much during fieldwork as in writing, reflexivity is itself positioned, its saliency as an epistemological device having transformed over time and space. Re-tracing its initial absence, subsequent rise in popularity and eventual routinization in academia, we position ourselves against reflexivity’s near-total displacement today by a narrow and increasingly prevalent understanding of positionality. We argue for a return to a broader and more relational understanding of reflexivity, proposing a methodological program to achieve and maintain its critical, ethical and political edge. Our aim is to engage in conversation about the value of reflexivity as an iterative and collaborative ethnographic endeavour with potential to produce more relational and engaged knowledge about increasingly overbearing field-sites in the Arab region and beyond.
Lamia Moghnieh's writing of the article has been partly funded by the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (ERC Starting Grant DECOLMAD 851871)
The New Zealand Public Service Response to Covid-19
Get PDFThe New Zealand public service faced an unprecedented challenge in 2020. The focus of this article is on what the Covid-19 experience can tell us about the strengths of the public service, and whether the course that we have set for the future, enshrined through the Public Service Act 2020, is the right one. The established directions of public service change helped the Covid response: functional leadership made a definite contribution; dispersed leadership roles proved their worth; the deepening experience of inter-agency collaboration over the past decade cannot be proved to have contributed, but it seems reasonable to conclude that it did. Public servants proved willing to behave as participants in a single service rather than employees of a single agency, living up to the more complete view of human motivation reflected in the Public Service Act. The article concludes with some observations on the importance of interoperability for the future public service, and on the implications the strong Mäori response to Covid-19 may have for the public service of the future
Public Trust in Science and Research: responsibility and ethics
No full textInnovation in science and research technology often raises questions of acceptability, ethics and governance processes. This article explores research assessment and ethics frameworks based on values, responsibility, relationships, trust and distributed power, which could give guidance to decision making around research and development investments in scientific institutes. Governance using a responsibility lens alongside risk mitigation, based on explicit ethical and moral values, allows critical evaluation of research programmes which seek to address inequities in society. Funding for formal research assessment structures that bring diverse perspectives together within institutions would facilitate ongoing dialogue with Mäori and local communities and strengthen decision making. The example of the current and future development of waste water-based epidemiology technologies is used to show how a responsible research approach could be applied
What Is Happening to Tax Policy in New Zealand and Is It Sensible?
Get PDFThis article reviews two recent changes to tax policy settings in New Zealand: an increase in the top income tax rate and a ‘housing package’. It argues that both represent ad hoc responses without a coherent strategy. Further, government officials’ policy assessments confirm that these were progressed unduly rapidly, based on limited analysis and against official advice on the most suitable option to deliver on the government’s own objectives. This is likely to result in policy outcomes falling well short of objectives, and potentially serious unintended consequences. Coherence of the tax system in particular is at risk
Towards a Left Secretariat for the Pacific
Get PDFThe Pacific Islands region occupies a vast ocean continent, consisting of a diversity of cultures. What draws the islands together is a shared experience of economic dependency and vulnerability driven by global warming, geopolitical competition, and class divisions. Together, these factors account for poor performance on a range of development indicators, including policy and inequality. It is in this context that Epeli Hau‘ofa has argued that the hoped-for era of autonomy following political independence has not materialised in the Pacific. In response, this paper explores the possibilities and potential aims of a Left secretariat in the Pacific. It aims to rethink political and economic autonomy in the Pacific by bringing together Left theory and practice with the history of Indigenous and class struggles
Christianity Without Guarantees
Get PDFThis review essay critically examines Hannah Strømmen and Ulrich Schmiedel’s The Claim to Christianity, an activist intervention that seeks to explicate and contest the theologies running through far-right claims to Christianity. While importantly focused on the semantic struggle for Christianity, refusing to interpret the presence of Christianity in far-right ideology as mere instrumentalisation, and espousing a critical Christianity without guarantees, the book suffers from several analytical and evaluative shortcomings. Framing the object of Strømmen and Schmiedel’s work as a component part of the contemporary post-fascist atmosphere, I suggest that drawing on the work of Ernst Bloch and Antonio Gramsci and attending to the utopian, dystopian, stratified, temporally multiple, and synthetic qualities of far-right claims to Christianity better illuminates the ideological operations of post-fascism and suggests the need for powerful alternative theologies
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