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Research Commons is the University of Waikato's open access research repository, housing research publications and theses produced by the University's staff and students.
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Publication My private wolf and other stories(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 2024)My Private Wolf and other stories is a collection of 18 short stories, each touching on unexpected moments of kindness or compassion. Beginning with two young girls as they imagine the likely crimes of prisoners passing by their trampoline, the collection moves in unsentimental prose through towns and cities in Aotearoa, observing people as they step outside their own concerns and pay attention to one another. A small-minded tradesman accommodates a neighbour’s request. A school boy apologises for causing accidental humiliation. An artist protects his family history from becoming easy anecdote. What prompts these considered responses? A cat manslaughter, a misheard song lyric, a painting that starts off as Jesus but turns into a hamburger. In lives marked by striving, difficulty and failure, we see parents doing their best, strangers trying to help, children recognising vulnerability in others, spouses capable of forgiveness, and colleagues willing to intervene. The stories are not morality tales; an act of compassion doesn’t necessarily transform, a moment of assistance doesn’t ward off disaster. In Horses, one child’s care for another creates a resting place as larger events unfold. In Traffic, a housecleaner’s actions provide a brief breather within a spiral of despair. In other stories, it is an act of cruelty or the desire for revenge which precipitates connection and understanding. Along the way, questions arise. What happens when an attempt to be nice is rejected? When does kindness mask interference? To what extent do we deceive ourselves about our motivations? Is it only human beings who can give and receive empathy? Through the lives of a range of men, women and children, I hope to create a subtle exploration of our efforts to look out for one another.Publication Introductory notes to working paper series ‘a social history of mining in the Te Aroha mining district’(Working Paper, Historical Research Unit, University of Waikato, 2016)These working papers are provided as a resource for historians and genealogists. When covering the lives of individuals, they are deliberately as detailed as possible – possibly too detailed on such aspects as land ownership, but the intention is to provide as much information as is traceable. The nature of my research was inspired by the farewell address given by Sir Keith Hancock when he retired from being head of the History Department in the Research School of Social Sciences, Australian National University, when I was a student there. He included the comment that, in his retirement, he would tend his own garden; not meaning an intention to turn from historical research to gardening but to focus his research on his own locality, meaning the district of Monaro to the south of Canberra. The outcome was his publication, through Cambridge University Press, in 1972, of his excellent Discovering Monaro: A study of man’s inpact on his environment. The structure of this book combined a general analysis of geology, weather patterns, farming practices, and many other issues with case studies of farmers and others who lived in and developed the district. As this is a social history of the Te Aroha district, concentrating on mining, his example has been followed, with general papers being combined with personal accounts that illustrate the points made in the former papers. For instance, there is a paper on the skills required for successful prospecting, and the paper on Billy Nicholl relates the story of one of the most successful prospectors (successful at Waihi, that is, much less so elsewhere). As an unexpectedly large amounts of information was uncovered about some of those included in the case studies, the latter have ballooned far beyond the modest mini-biographies originally anticipated.Publication Why unavoidable moral wrongdoing is impossible(Thesis, The University of Waikato, 2025-10-17)We can be faced with situations in which we act in accordance with the all-things-considered morally right course of action, and yet nevertheless experience an emotion of self-directed distress at the fact that we have so acted. Moreover, we have the intuition that this emotion is rational or appropriate. Literature is scattered with such examples, and they crop up not infrequently in life. The fact that agents experience justified distress in such situations has been taken as evidence that unavoidable moral wrongdoing is possible. However, if this is the case, then the compelling intuition that an all-things-considered morally right action cannot be wrong must be false. In this thesis, I offer a way of reconciling these two compelling intuitions that denies the possibility of unavoidable moral wrongdoing. I argue that existing attempts to dissolve this contradiction by arguing in favour of the possibility of unavoidable moral wrongdoing are unsatisfactory; and I contend that, by utilising Susan Wolf’s ideas on the “nameless virtue” (2001), developed in order to solve the problem of resultant moral luck, we can arrive at a more compelling method of dissolving the apparent contradiction. This solution is one that allows us to retain the intuition that a right act cannot also be wrong, while simultaneously allowing for the rationality of emotion of self-directed distress agents experience in situations of apparent unavoidable moral wrongdoing.Item Theoretical models for an intersectional and inclusive citizens’ assembly(Report, EU-CIEMBLY, 2024)The aim of the EU-CIEMBLY project is to create a model for EU citizens’ assemblies that maximises intersectional equality, inclusion, and deliberation. To that goal, the researchers mapped the landscape of the relevant scholarship in Deliverable 2.1. Building on that foundation, Deliverable 2.2 initiated the development of theoretical and normative frameworks for fostering intersectional equality, inclusion, and deliberation within citizens’ assemblies. This Deliverable extends the theoretical work of Deliverable 2.2 by proposing innovative models for citizens’ assemblies. Adopting a 'blue sky' approach, it moves beyond practical constraints of resources and capacity to explore creative and conceptual design features, pushing the boundaries of what is possible in the pursuit of truly inclusive and deliberative democratic practices. Drawing from political theory, sociology, representational theory, and critical theory on democratic innovations, Deliverable 2.3 proposes different models and design features for citizens’ assemblies that enhance inclusiveness for marginalised groups and PMIMG (people belonging to multiple, intersecting, marginalised groups; see Deliverable 2.2, Appendix I). The models in this Deliverable integrate intersectionality in a way that allows for a focus on a variety of interacting social positions, forces, factors, and power structures that create the barriers experienced by marginalised groups and PMIMG when participating in citizens’ assemblies. By focusing on these dynamics, the models seek to propose design features to enhance intersectional equality, inclusion, and deliberation (as per the project’s analytical framework, presented in Deliverable 2.2). The Deliverable consists of six theoretical models. Model 1: Descriptive Representation, presents a range of options through the lens of including PMIMG in the participant body and bureaucracy involved in a citizens’ assembly. Model 2: Discursive Representation, emphasises inclusion of diverse knowledge, perspectives and discourses through various mechanisms by moving beyond the sole focus on identity-based representation of PMIMG. Model 3: Subaltern Counterpublics, acknowledges the systemic marginalisation of certain groups and advocates by providing safe, dedicated spaces for PMIMG to articulate their perspectives without the fear of being pressured by dominant narratives. Model 4: Power Sharing, focuses on the ways in which an intersectional citizens’ assembly could address power imbalances through popular control, governance, and community-driven design. Model 5: Agonistic Pluralism, provides a number of design choices around facilitating conflicting opinions in citizens’ assemblies, to draw out the views of PMIMG and minority perspectives. Finally, Model 6: Relationality and Interdependence, discusses a range of design choices that would complement many of the models through emphasising commonalities, relationships, and bonding between participants, their communities, and other parts of the broader society, such as nonhuman animals or landmarks. The exploration of the models is followed by a section that covers alternative design choices or ‘additional considerations’, including using an additive model for sampling, and reconsidering the traditional strive for consensus in citizens’ assemblies, and the subsequent implications for intersectionality. Lastly, the Deliverable sets out the scope for future work in the project. In particular, the section flags considerations of strengths based versus deficit framing, essentialism versus external inclusion, balancing perspectives, and considerations of legitimacy when altering the conventional sampling model. The section also includes broader points around the need for a deliberative system approach and discusses the potential to create an overarching politico-philosophical framework about the project's conceptualisations of democracy, as well as considerations for the creation of policy recommendations. These are important points to consider as the project heads into more practical considerations under Work Package 3. The Deliverable concludes with an overall options table (Table 7), which maps all the potential starting points for design choices by model and according to each stage of the citizens’ assembly (i.e., governance, organisation, and management; sampling and recruitment; and facilitation and deliberation). The options explored in this deliverable thus provide a beginning point, based on theory and drawing on the analytical framework from Deliverable 2.2, in order to begin designing the citizens’ assembly pilots. These models are theoretical in nature, so they were designed to help conceive ideas and therefore do not represent an off-the-shelf solution for later work. Instead, they represent a starting point for later work packages, and aim to provide novel ideas for both the EU-CIEMBLY project and others seeking to implement intersectionality in deliberative designs.Item Racial inequalities in engineering employment in Aotearoa New Zealand(Report, WERO, Te Ngira Institute for Population Research, The University of Waikato, 2025)This report presents findings from research on racism and inequality in engineering employment in New Zealand. Conducted as part of the Working to End Racial Oppression (WERO) research programme (see: https://wero.ac.nz/), this study examines how racial discrimination operates in recruitment and career progression within the engineering sector. The research was carried out with the support of Engineering New Zealand | Te Ao Rangahau and the Association of Consulting and Engineering New Zealand. This research involves two phases of in-depth interviews. The first phase entails interviews with industry key informants such as human resources staff, managers, or people from diversity and culture teams for different engineering firms that ranged from very small to large in size. In the second phase, currently employed engineers from different ethnic groups were undertaken, including Māori, Pacific, Pākehā, Asian and Middle Eastern, Latin American and African (MELAA). The findings from these two sets of interviews are presented respectively in Section 3 and 4. The research also included an analysis of the workforce composition and wage gaps in Engineering based on analysis of Census and New Zealand Income Survey data. This analysis, which is presented in Section 1, revealed the disproportionately low number of female engineers, and of Māori and Pacific people employed as engineers. Analysis of average median hourly wages revealed notable differences, with Māori and Pacific engineers having median wages that are around 80% of the overall median. There has been a significant emphasis on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in recruitment and human resource management in Engineering in recent years. This emphasis reflects industry efforts to address known ethnic and gender imbalances in the workforce. Industry informants, however, highlighted several challenges, tensions, and contradictions they faced in integrating and practicing DEI in recruitment. Employers often struggle to balance competing frameworks such as equity, meritocracy, and people-focused approaches, making recruitment decisions complex. Despite initiatives like blind CV screening, targeted graduate programmes and preferential shortlisting of Māori and Pacific applicants, the industry remains heavily merit-driven. Additionally, DEI efforts are largely gender-focused, lacking an intersectional approach that considers overlapping social inequities. The interviews with engineers revealed that individuals from different ethnic groups face distinct barriers and challenges in securing employment and advancing their careers. For Māori and Pacific engineers, the pathway into engineering is severely limited, with only a small number entering the profession each year. Those currently employed often experience what has been described V as a ‘cultural tax’—being expected to take on cultural responsibilities in addition to their technical roles, without monetary compensation or clear career advancement opportunities. Racialised immigrant engineers, on the contrary, reported devaluation and deskilling of their qualifications and experience based on their ethnic and national origins. Despite extensive work experience in their home countries, they were often required to restart their careers in graduate or entry-level positions. Several participants shared experiences of unfair promotions, where White, European, and Anglophone employees were favoured for leadership roles. When discussing their own career trajectories, most non-Pākehā and nonEuropean participants expressed scepticism about ever being promoted to senior positions with decision-making authority. The accounts of discriminations and racial inequalities shared by engineers have profound implications for their employment, career progression, well-being, and society at large. Navigating a predominantly monocultural work environment—marked by challenges like cultural taxation, glass ceilings, and the ‘white boys’ club’—places additional burdens on racialised groups. The pressure to constantly prove their worth further exacerbates these issues, leading to serious retention problems. If not addressed, the sector risks losing engineers from diverse ethnic backgrounds, exacerbating gender and ethnic pay gaps, worsening representation and diversity issues, and reinforcing systemic racial inequities. Addressing monoculturalism and the ‘white boys’ club’ culture and fostering a genuinely inclusive profession will require systemic changes within engineering firms and in accepted norms in the profession and industry. Without a shift in workplace culture, efforts to recruit more engineers from underrepresented backgrounds will remain ineffective, as many will continue to leave due to unwelcoming environments. To create lasting change, DEI initiatives must go beyond recruitment and actively reshape the structures, policies, and day-today practices that define the industry. This requires the mindful integration of diverse cultural values and practices into every layer of organisational functions, including recruitment, career advancement frameworks, and job descriptions.
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