Nicholas Gruen

Latest Episodes:

Promoting Wellbeing or Anti-thinking? Jun 10, 2023

Show notes

This is the second part of a great discussion I had with friend and colleague Gene Tunny on wellbeing agendas, how they go wrong and how transformative they could be. We begin by exploring what I call ‘top-down thinking’ — a style of strategising that was largely (and mercifully) absent from life fifty years ago.

That’s the style of thinking which begins with fine sounding apex statements — Mission, vision and values statements — and then builds plans and priorities by ‘drilling down’ from such statements.

Wellbeing agendas too are tied up in pleasant-sounding objectives. However they pass over many of the important questions. They relate firstly to how trade-offs are made and secondly to how we'll acquire the knowhow to get what we're after. Planning from the top rarely addresses such questions.

This doesn't just mean we won't make much progress. It can actively undermine progress, as for instance when central planners insist that the measures by which projects will be assessed must be consistent across projects. Such stipulations sound like the soul of reasonableness. But quite obviously they dictate to those running programs in the field the way they’ll be measured. And this prevents such projects from developing their own monitoring and evaluation focused on their needs to understand what they’re doing and how they can improve. If you'd prefer to watch the video, it's here.

What a wellbeing budget would look like: Hint, not like Jacinta's budgets Jun 09, 2023

Show notes

In this interview with Leon Gettler I discuss why I think New Zealand's Wellbeing Budget was anything of the kind. It was a wellbeing themed budget, not one that will do much for wellbeing. I then discuss what it would look like if we really did want to embrace wellbeing. Will the Australian federal government manage to do better. We'll find out in the next year or so, but so far it seems to be heading down the New Zealand route.

The $100B lying on the pavement Jun 09, 2023

Show notes

Another great conversation with my friend, colleague and partner in podcasting crime Gene Tunny. Gene suggested we discuss various ways in which we've placed nationally independent analysis at the centre of government, only to find that it hasn't performed as well as it might. A classic example is regulatory impact statements, which were a good idea back when Australia was among the world's leaders in introducing them in 1986.

However, they've not had much impact because although notionally independent, government rewards 'can do' types both at the political and bureaucratic level. So the process degrades into a box-ticking process. Something similar happens with freedom of information as bureaucrats delay and resist release in various ways and the important stuff migrates into whispered conversations in corridors and secure and self-erasing platforms like Signal. And then there's independent assessment of infrastructure.

The new ALP Government has cleaned things up a little, but could go a lot further as independent Allegra Spender suggested in this intervention. But the two major parties wouldn't have it. Ultimately this takes us to the question of how firmly democratic principles are anchored in Western Democracies. They're under threat everywhere. Yet there's a simple, radical and democratic way to secure them. Build the institutions in which the people can defend them!

If you'd like to watch the discussion the video is here.

Four ways to fix the world Jun 02, 2023

Show notes

Every society evolves unique ways for people to live together happily and productively. But they change over time. Modernity has eclipsed these four ideas.

Recovering them can make us happier and more productive.

If I had four words to sum up where I've got to over the last couple of decades thinking how to improve the world, they'd be these. In discussing them with friend, philosopher and school teacher Martin Turkis, I gave myself the challenge of writing them out in a summary form for him to present to his high school students. This has got to be a better test of their value than whether they can be published in a learned journal.

If you'd like to check out the video, it's here:

2:13 Part 1 - Four Principles 2:54 Isegoria 6:03 Parrhesia 9:23 Fidelity 18:25 Merit 25:58 Part 2 - Question and Answer 29:14 De-Competitive Representation 1:12:53 Hate Speech

Engines of Oligarchy: with Hugh Pope May 26, 2023

Show notes

One of my favourite podcasts with journalist, scholar and gentleman Hugh Pope who has just brought to publication a book written by his father in 1990. But being well ahead of its time, the book was unpublishable. It pursued Aristotle's point that elections installed a governing class and were therefore oligarchic. The institution that democracy represented the people was selection by lot as embodied today in legal juries. If you'd rather watch the video, it's here. 1:52 Background 5:46 Aristotle's View on Elections 9:47 How Jury Service Could Work 13:06 How elections make us vulnerable to authoritarians 29:49 Bringing the shy people out 39:13 The pathway to a better system. 46:07 Sortition in Florence, Italy

Science: How it obscures reality May 19, 2023

Show notes

I enjoyed this discussion with philosophy PhD and high school teacher from San Francisco's Bay area. I tried to articulate my own view that our understanding of science as the paradigm of all knowledge gets in the way of understanding important aspects of reality that science can't help us with.

We talk about embodied cognition and various aspects of this essay.

The video of our conversation is here.

Talking with the ABC's Steve Austin about wellbeing. May 13, 2023

Show notes

I did this interview in the wake of the budget discussing what we could achieve if we took wellbeing seriously. Which no government I know of really has. And that includes Jacinta Ardern and her "Wellbeing" Budget.

Promoting Wellbeing or Anti-thinking? May 12, 2023

Show notes

Wellbeing: escaping the iron law of business-as-usual May 05, 2023

Show notes

I really enjoyed this week’s uncomfortable collision with reality with colleague Gene Tunny.

We covered a lot of ground talking about the use and abuse of the wellbeing agenda.

Where does it come from? Why is it taking off as an approach to policy making? How do we make the most of this as authorisation to improve our world?

By avoiding the pitfalls!

I argue that the main pitfall is imagining ourselves to be part of some grand new way of thinking. Bureaucrats and think tanks reach for frameworks and schematic diagrams.

But if they’re the wrong kinds — if they’re schematic rather than built to aid action — those frameworks simply give us new labels with which to dress up the same old same old and the iron law of business-as-usual takes hold again. Until the next new fad, the next new vocabulary.

However, done well, we could really address some big problems at the same time as improving the health and prosperity of our communities. You can find the audio file here. Here's the link to the video of our discussion.

Walking while chewing gum: Spurring innovation and fighting recession Apr 28, 2023

Show notes

Colleague Gene Tunny and I discuss a means by which we could improve the impact of innovation programs as well as fight recessions and booms.

And the cost? Nothing!

If you'd like to watch the conversation, it's here on YouTube.

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