The McGuinness Institute

The McGuinness Institute

The McGuinness Institute is a Wellington based non-partisan think tank working towards a sustainable future, contributing strategic foresight through evidence-based research and policy analysis.
Latest entries
Submission season – five submissions in two months

Submission season – five submissions in two months

As well as all our projects bubbling away, the Institute has been busy preparing submissions on an array of issues relating to our work programme. Since mid-March 2020, we have prepared five submissions: a tertiary education inquiry by the Productivity Commission; an ETS review by Ministry for the Environment (MfE);  a Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill...
ForesightNZ Workshop - Day 3

ForesightNZ Workshop – Day 3

On the morning of day three of the ForesightNZ workshop, participants headed to the Treasury to present their findings from the workshop to Treasury officials. Participants had worked late into the night on Thursday, refining their ideas about the set of ForesightNZ playing cards and game instructions. The group presented their conclusions to Treasury officials Gabriel Makhlouf, Secretary and...
Strengthening strategy stewardship one-day workshop 14 July: Registrations now open

Strengthening strategy stewardship one-day workshop 14 July: Registrations now open

The Institute’s StrategyNZ project looks at how New Zealand can improve long-term strategic thinking and strategy stewardship in central government. On July 14 we are hosting a one-day workshop which will explore how New Zealand can better prepare and publish government department strategy documents (GDSs). More detail on the workshop can be found below, followed...
Sharing the baby box with the Wellington community

Sharing the baby box with the Wellington community

As part of the TacklingPovertyNZ initiative, we met with officials from the New Zealand Treasury and DCM Wellington this morning as the Treasury gifted DCM a baby box from the Baby Box Co. DCM (formerly known as Inner City Ministry and then Downtown Community Ministry) was founded by a group of Wellington churches in 2020...
ForesightNZ Workshop - Day 2

ForesightNZ Workshop – Day 2

Day two of the ForesightNZ workshop began with participants regrouping and reflecting on the previous evening’s session with the Hon. Bill English, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Finance and Minister Responsible for Housing New Zealand Corporation, and Colin James, political journalist. Participant Solomon Esera shared a powerful poem about his experiences of the workshop so far: Reality This is too...
Study abroad student reflects on life at sea and her time at the Institute

Study abroad student reflects on life at sea and her time at the Institute

We were lucky enough to have Hoai-Nam Bui, a 3rd year student at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota studying geology and biology join us at the Institute for a week. We first met at the Sea Semester event in March 2020. Below is Hoai-Nam’s reflections on her travels round New Zealand. This past week, I have...
TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter issue 1 out now!

TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter issue 1 out now!

We are pleased to announce that the first TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter is now available to view on our website. In response to the interest we have received around the TacklingPovertyNZ national tour, we have decided to create this TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter. The newsletter will be produced every two months for the remainder of 2020, and will share what we and others are doing to...
ForesightNZ Workshop - Day 1

ForesightNZ Workshop – Day 1

After weeks of preparation for the ForesightNZ workshop, the participants were eager to begin the first of three full days at the New Zealand Treasury thinking about New Zealand’s long-term future. The night before was spent meeting their groups and coming to terms with the fundamentals of futures thinking. Wendy McGuinness opened the workshop and...
Suzanne Snively on transparency and anti-corruption measures and their role in reducing poverty

Suzanne Snively on transparency and anti-corruption measures and their role in reducing poverty

Suzanne Snively was a speaker on day one of the TacklingPovertyNZ workshop in December 2020. You can watch the video on the McGuinness Institute’s YouTube channel, or you can view the video below. Suzanne spoke about how New Zealand’s attributes of transparency and integrity can prevent corruption and generate transparency. She spoke about how it was important for...
Timeline of significant events in the history of education in New Zealand, 1867 to 2014 is now published!

Timeline of significant events in the history of education in New Zealand, 2020 to 2020 is now published!

Given the December 2020 consultation on the Education Act 2020, and the Productivity Commission’s inquiry into new models of tertiary education, it seemed timely to take a closer look at the history of New Zealand’s education system.  As part of our TalentNZ project we have created a timeline titled Timeline of significant events in the history of education in...
The booklet sharing ideas from the Civics and Media Project workshop series is now published online

The booklet sharing ideas from the Civics and Media Project workshop series is now published online

Proceedings of The Civics and Media Project: A report on the three workshops held in 2020 is now published. The booklet is intended to contribute to the national conversation about civics and media by documenting our thinking about the nature of the issue, our vision for the future and some pragmatic ideas to get there. You...
Sign up to receive our new TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter!

Sign up to receive our new TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter!

In response to the interest we have received around the TacklingPovertyNZ national tour, and to build a community around this conversation, the Institute has decided to create a bimonthly TacklingPovertyNZ newsletter for the remainder of 2020. This newsletter will be produced every two months and will outline recent developments, research and resources. Please register your email address here. The first...