A Different Kind of Power summary

When Ardern was 17, her aunt Marie – a lifelong Labour supporter – took her out to campaign for the party’s local MP. It was Ardern’s first encounter with the movement she’d one day lead. Until that moment, politics had seemed impossibly abstract. It was about big ideas and even bigger ideals – something you debated and argued over, not something you did. But up close, politics didn’t feel abstract at all. It was about choosing the right words, reading the room, handing out leaflets, and knocking on doors. It was practical; it was about people. 

Ardern had found her calling. 

Those seven weeks in the lead-up to the election flew by in a breathless whirl of handshakes, hugs, and camera flashes. There were speeches and interviews – and endless questions. They ranged from the trivial – one journalist wanted to know the temperature molten glass was heated to in a factory she’d visited – to the plain insulting. When a TV interviewer asked her if she planned on taking maternity leave as a sitting prime minister, Ardern cut him off at the knees: his question, she said, was as unacceptable in a general election as it was in any other job interview. 

Her answer spoke to the lived frustrations of millions of women and the clip went viral. Ardern’s appeal wasn’t limited to a single demographic, though. Calm, down-to-earth, and likeable in an everyday way politicians rarely are, she embodied what many New Zealanders like best about their country. Her emphasis on kindness, honesty, and civility reassured voters who worried that New Zealand would follow Trumpist America and Brexit Britain down the populist rabbit hole. The crowds grew larger and the polling improved. Pundits called it “Jacindamania.” 

The spread of COVID-19 in early 2020 was a once-in-a-century event: the kind of crisis that takes even the best prepared states by surprise. 

Governments were scrambling when it arrived. Some downplayed the threat; others toyed with a let-it-rip strategy designed to achieve “herd immunity.” Most committed to “flattening the curve” – slowing the spread of the disease to prevent hospital ICUs being overwhelmed. New Zealand adopted a more radical approach: eliminating COVID-19 entirely. The nation’s borders were sealed in March 2020 and one of the world’s strictest lockdowns began. By mid-June, the disease had been suppressed. An envious world looked on as maskless New Zealanders returned to schools and offices, and normal life resumed – summer music festivals included. 

Ardern remembers sitting down to play with her daughter at the height of the pandemic. It’d been a long day and she was drained. “I wasn’t there,” she recalls, “not all of me.” The only thing she could think about was pandemic-related graphs. 

Public office takes a toll on its holders at the best of times. Ardern’s two terms weren’t the best of times – they were studded with crises. From terrorism to COVID-19, the Ukraine war to inflation, her government was always on the back foot scrambling to respond to uncontrollable global events. Throw in an increasingly cranky opposition, trust-corroding disinformation, and threats to her own safety, and it’s easy to understand why Ardern was burned out by late 2022.