The Politics of Privilege Scoping Project

This study on the nature of privilege sheds light on how those with the least advantage are positioned to seem as though they are receiving ‘special benefits’, while unearned advantages that accrue to the privileged remain invisible and unscrutinised, particularly by those that benefit the most from them. Participants’ constructions of privilege emphasise the multi-faceted complexity and discursive ambiguities of the ways in which the concept is utilised within our political economy to account for disparity and covertly reproduce the status quo of Pakeha advantage. The research team's data and analyses illuminate how debates that have political and resource repercussions can be vulnerable to framing that eludes scrutiny of real privilege and thereby replicates the status quo and may further disadvantage the marginalised.

Outputs

Publications
•    Paper presented to the Public Health Association Conference, 4-6 July 2006
•    Paper presented to the Joint Conference Australian Psychological Society and New Zealand Psychological Society, 26-30 September 2006
•    HRC Funding Application submitted, 20 October 2006
•    Presentation to Parihaka International Peace Festival, 5-7 January 2007