This study grew out of a longstanding interest in electricity planning that goes back to the struggles over Lake Manapouri and Upper Clutha River in New Zealand, which aroused my interest when a student at the University of Otago. While I had long been interested in politics, these cases did as much as anything to convince me that there was more to politics than elections and politicians – that what was at stake and what happened between elections was equally, perhaps more, important. The conflict over hydroelectric development in the South Island of New Zealand, therefore, had a lot to do with my focusing on the study of public policy and, to that extent, this book involves revisiting my intellectual roots.

These cases demonstrated that the options available to politicians and public alike were themselves the result of choices made more deeply within the structures of government, and called attention to the need to look at underlying planning processes rather than just at the politics surrounding the construction of a single power scheme. They also raised questions about the accountability of those making such decisions – questions fundamental to democratic governance in an age of increasing technological sophistication. The book also owes much to four years spent at the Centre for Environmental Studies at the University of Tasmania at the peak of the fight to save the Franklin River from hydroelectric development. There the earlier loss of Lake Pedder presented some remarkable parallels with the history of conflict over electric power development in New Zealand.