Is New Zealand Really Doomed? I Don’t Think So

About 30 years ago, I decided to jump on a plane and perform the traditional Kiwi rite of passage. I embarked on my OE with an intent on seeing the world, meeting lots of people and getting up to mischief as far from the enquiring eyes of my mother as possible. And, in those days, the fact that one’s only real means of communication with home was via aerogramme and the highly irregular and conscientiously brief telephone call, it certainly was away from enquiring minds.

I was thinking about OEs recently as I read an article bemoaning the perceived current brain drain. If you were to believe the writer, pretty much every young person is running as fast as they can to the nearest airport in order to get the hell out of New Zealand. With nary a glance over their shoulder, they’re moving on, never to come back. It is, of course, a highly simplistic viewpoint. I’m writing this sitting in an office with half a dozen young people around me. All of these individuals, smart, young twentysomethings, are building careers here in New Zealand. Absolutely, they aspire to travel and offshore experiences, but they don’t in any way dismiss New Zealand as a viable long-term option.

That’s not to say that we don’t have problems. I’ve suggested, time and again, that there is neither societal nor political will to have the big conversations, the ones where we talk about priorities, trade-offs and what we really want as a society. I’ve decried the fact that we’d much rather watch reality TV than concentrate on informing ourselves of the bigger issues. Absolutely, we have problems, but absolutely not is there some kind of death knell being sounded for the country.

There’s something theatrical about doom-saying. It sells. Call it pessimism-as-entertainment. Say that the country is broken, that nothing works, that to stay is dumb and you’ll get attention. The more dramatic, the better. You get clicks, shares, late-night angrily nodded-at opinions. I imagine op-eds framed like that offer comfort: “At least I’m not staying blind to the apocalypse.” But what do they do for us, really? Do they help fix anything?

People point to high housing costs as proof. Yes, housing is a catastrophe in many places. Yes, in many suburbs there are children in damp homes. Yes, young families struggle. But presenting it as some sort of fatal condition, that there’s no possibility of turning this around, misses what change has happened over time, what has been done well, and what might be done. It omits nuance. It ignores stories of success amid difficulty. It implies that the whole country is irretrievably lost.

Perhaps immigration strain, lending rates, and the rich-poor divide are other pillars in this narrative of despair. And yes, these are serious challenges. But they are challenges, not proof we should pack up and move on. They demand attention, debate, creativity, policy work, compromise. They don’t demand giving up. When did we become so good at believing that the worst case is already upon us? It’s almost as if pessimism has become patriotic. As if saying “we’re doomed” elevates one’s sense of moral purity. And the flip side is that people who say “we can still build, we can still improve” are accused of naive optimism.

But as someone who’s seen both ends of this spectrum, I know the value of staying. I know that there’s dignity in staying and trying. I know there’s possibility in small changes. I know that while our challenges are big, our inheritance is also big: beautiful landscapes, a relatively equal starting point for many, institutions that still function better than in many places, people who still show kindness and solidarity in surprising ways.

I think what scares people is the gap between what we want from New Zealand and what it sometimes feels like we get. We see ideal versus reality, expectation versus delivery. And when the gap feels unbearably wide, when people feel ignored, betrayed, shut out, then the narrative of “broken country” gains power. It fills the void left when real direction seems absent, when politics seems transactional, not visionary. Injustice, yes, should be called out. Inequality, absolutely, needs redress. Poor housing, underfunded health, climate risks, mental health crises, these are real. But I want to suggest that believing in a kind of national irredeemability is dangerous. Because belief shapes behaviour. If we believe nothing can be fixed, we act accordingly. We stop trying. We withdraw. We may even leave.

I’ve met plenty of young Kiwis who hopped overseas, got more money, saw more people, then came back with new ideas, new networks, new hope. I’ve met older ones who’ve stayed through thick and thin, standing by community after community, trying policy idea after policy idea, sometimes failing badly, sometimes modestly succeeding. The story of New Zealand isn’t just one of decay. It’s also one of repair, of persistent effort, of the quotidian labour of love. So yes, it’s okay to complain. It’s healthy and necessary. But complaining as though the country is dead? That’s not okay. Because when we invest only in the collapse narrative, we may miss the paths out of the mess. We may cease to build the bridges, fund the schools, renew the housing, nurture the arts, support the marginalised. We may stop seeing opportunities where they are.

Back on that OE, I did all the things – met people, got up to mischief, made questionable life choices. But then, after a couple of years, I came back. Not because I thought home had become perfect, far from it, but because I believed that the good still outweighed the bad. Because I believed that I could participate in making things better. Because I had a stake here. I still believe that. It doesn’t mean ignorance. It doesn’t mean staying if you truly feel you must go for your own reasons. But believing that New Zealand is beyond redemption, that nothing can be done, that “to stay is dumb” – that’s a story we tell when we’re afraid, not when we’re hopeful. So I’m staying. And I think for many others, that’s just fine.