Nicky Hager

"Early in 2014 Nicky Hager was leaked a large number of email and online conversations from Cameron Slater's Whale Oil blog. Many of these were between Slater and his personal allies on the hard right, revealing an ugly and destructive style of politics. But there were also many communications with the prime minister's office and other cabinet ministers in the National Government. They show us a side of Prime Minister John Key and his government of which most New Zealanders are completely unaware. Key has constructed an easy-going and relaxed public image, declaring to the public that 'there's no room for negative campaigning in New Zealand'. The reality is very different. His government has worked hand in hand with Slater and his collaborators in a sustained campaign of personal attacks against their political enemies, a deliberate but hidden strategy to avoid being held responsible for negative campaigning. Dirty Politics continues the story that began in Hager's best-selling book The Hollow Men, investigating the way that underhand and deceptive politics poisons the political environment for everyone. If you care about integrity and ethics in politics, then this book will be disturbing but essential reading"--Cover.

How Attack Politics Is Poisoning New Zealand's Political Environment

Dirty Politics

Secret Power

In November, 2000 - in the middle of the Royal Commission on genetic engineering - the Government learned that a shipment of GE contaminated sweet corn seeds had been planted in three regions of New Zealand.

Seeds of Distrust

Bob Burton

What can Americans concerned about the environment learn about a campaign to promote clearcutting in New Zealand? This book offers a playbook for a PR effort that could take place anywhere -- and demonstrates the lengths logging firms and governments will go to get what they want. It's a blueprint for an end run around democracy in New Zealand, in Europe, in the United States.Most of us have no way of knowing what goes on behind the news: what isn't true, what we are not being told and who is pulling the strings. This book changes that. Using the example of environmental controversy -- in this case logging of West Coast native forests by the New Zealand state-owned Timberlands West Coast -- Nicky Hager and Bob Burton have produced a remarkable expose of how governments and business interests can use public relations to manipulate political debate. The story that emerges, of unscrupulous PR tactics by the international PR firm Shandwick and a casual policy of telling the public what is useful rather than what is true, serves as a warning and an example of the same forces at work in the United States.Using hundreds of pages of internal PR documents that were leaked by insiders offended at what they saw happening, Secrets and Lies provides a unique window on how PR muscle can steamroll public opinion. We see Timberlands systematically attacking critics, arranging the creation of an 'independent' pro-logging community, group, cultivating allies in academia, government and environmental groups, compromising the independence of politicians and journalists and much more -- all for the unworthy cause of keeping native forest logging going after most New Zealanders believed it should end.

Secrets and Lies

This book goes to the heart of why many New Zealanders feel disillusioned about politics. Nicky Hager believes that the way politicians and others in politics conduct themselves - the games they play to advance themselves - can harm the whole political system. Exposing their activities is the first step towards change.

A Study in the Politics of Deception

The Hollow Men

What can Americans concerned about the environment learn about a campaign to promote clearcutting in New Zealand? This book offers a playbook for a PR effort that could take place anywhere -- and demonstrates the lengths logging firms and governments will go to get what they want. It's a blueprint for an end run around democracy in New Zealand, in Europe, in the United States. Most of us have no way of knowing what goes on behind the news: what isn't true, what we are not being told and who is pulling the strings. This book changes that. Using the example of environmental controversy -- in this case logging of West Coast native forests by the New Zealand state-owned Timberlands West Coast -- Nicky Hager and Bob Burton have produced a remarkable expose of how governments and business interests can use public relations to manipulate political debate. The story that emerges, of unscrupulous PR tactics by the international PR firm Shandwick and a casual policy of telling the public what is useful rather than what is true, serves as a warning and an example of the same forces at work in the United States. Using hundreds of pages of internal PR documents that were leaked by insiders offended at what they saw happening, Secrets and Lies provides a unique window on how PR muscle can steamroll public opinion. We see Timberlands systematically attacking critics, arranging the creation of an 'independent' pro-logging community, group, cultivating allies in academia, government and environmental groups, compromising the independence of politicians and journalists and much more -- all for the unworthy cause of keeping native forest logging going after most New Zealanders believed it should end.

Nicky Hager

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