The last issue of Policy Quarterly (June 2008) covered a single topic, and comprised five papers presented at a conference in Wellington in February this year on ‘After the reforms: Where are we now? Where are we heading?’ While the present issue contains two articles’ which are consistent with the focus of the last issue, it is eclectic in its composition. A wide range of topics are addressed, with a strong international flavour.

In the first contribution the new Head of VUW’s School of Government, Professor Terry Stokes, who took up the post in January this year, takes the opportunity to express his thoughts on the strategic direction that the School needs to take, and on some of the major issues confronting it in the immediate future. He makes it clear how the School’s mission requires strong engagement with practitioners in the public sector, particularly the Public Service. There is much in what he says that should engage the attention of both academics (and other staff) working in the School and many practitioners, not only senior ones, in governmental agencies.

The two articles that follow discuss matters which are strongly relevant to the theme of the June issue. In the first, Judy Whitcombe provides a review of state sector change in New Zealand over the past 25 years, with particular reference to the social services sector. Her article derives from her doctoral research on the subject, undertaken during the past three years, which will provide an important source of information and ideas about the New Zealand version of ‘New Public Management’.

In the next piece, Bill Ryan, Derek Gill, Elizabeth Eppel, and Miriam Lips report on their collaborative research on ‘Managing for Outcomes’ in the New Zealand public sector, a project undertaken by the School of Government on behalf of the Public Service. They discuss what actually works when officials cooperate on the ground, so to speak, as distinct from what formal, top-down, models prescribe as ‘best/good practice’. They argue that trends in 21st century governance will demand this sort of approach, and that New Zealand public sector managers are increasingly asking how it is to be done.

The fourth article in this issue shifts attention not only to a different topic but off-shore as well. Paul Hamer examines the electoral voting behaviour of Mäori living in Australia, where most of the Mäori diaspora lives, in both New Zealand and Australian general elections. He finds that they are largely disengaged politically, with few choosing to vote in either country (and most not taking up Australian citizenship). The author argues that the rise of the Mäori Party in New Zealand is likely to constitute the key to mobilising overseas Mäori voters, and he also relates his findings to arguments about political enfranchisement and equality in Australia.Rob Laking and Le’apai Lau Asofou So’o turn our attention to public sector reform in Samoa, in the next article, which draws from a series of interviews they conducted last year among citizens in a sample of eight villages, and among governmental officials. In addressing three main policy areas – primary education, health, and agricultural extension – they show how the balance of custom and written law in the Samoan constitution founded upon fa’asamoa underpins the stable governance of the country, and how the delivery of public services is a function of the relationship among the political authority of executive government, the administrative role of the public service, and the autonomy of village governance under fa’amatai.

In the sixth article, Brett Parker provides a data-based analysis of linkages between the international education sector and New Zealand’s economic development. He raises questions about the apparent reluctance of New Zealand employers to take on international graduates, particularly those with qualifications that are not recognised in New Zealand, and he raises questions and issues for further research on the linkages.

The penultimate article, by Negar Partow, continues the international flavour, discussing a topic of considerable concern to most people: the oil market and the price of oil. The author provides an historical narrative in order to better understand the current state of play, and she concludes with some challenging suggestions about the New Zealand government’s future role in regard to this critical and controversial natural resource.

In the final contribution to this issue, Stuart Birks responds to an article by Maureen Baker in Policy Quarterly’s March issue this year, on ‘lingering concerns about child custody and support’ in New Zealand. He argues that Baker’s discussion gave too narrow a perspective on the issues, because it reflected a dominant frame of reference which focuses too much on mothers in ‘lone parent households’, and which adopts unfavourable generalisations concerning fathers. (Maureen Baker declined an invitation from Policy Quarterly to reply in turn to Stuart Birks’ arguments.)

Robert Gregory (Co-Editor)