Nau mai haere mai – and welcome to this week’s newsletter.

With yesterday’s record case numbers and the government’s imminent announcement on the path forward, it feels like we’re all in a kind of waiting room. Naturally, that’s left plenty of time for speculation and anxiety, especially about how well this complex stage of the pandemic is being managed.

But as Massey University’s Suze Wilson writes, what might appear messy and reactive can, in fact, be looked at another way. What have been called “wicked” or “adaptive” problems often call for so-called “clumsy” leadership – the kind Jacinda Ardern has been exhibiting lately as she responds to the ever-shifting demands of the Delta outbreak.

While we wait, it’s worth shifting the focus away from the pandemic to promising developments elsewhere, such as last week’s recognition by the UN Human Rights Council of the right to a healthy environment. It’s not a legally binding right, but neither is it useless.

As University of Waikato academic lawyer Nathan Cooper writes, it comes on the eve of the UN climate summit in Glasgow and could offer a new lever for achieving big changes in the small window of time we have left.

As always, you’ll find much more to read in this newsletter and on our home page. Thank you for your ongoing interest and support - until next time, mā te wā.

Veronika Meduna

New Zealand Editor: Science, Health + Environment
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How the new human right to a healthy environment could accelerate New Zealand’s action on climate change

Nathan Cooper, University of Waikato

In countries where the right to a healthy environment is part of domestic law, court decisions are already resulting in stronger climate action.
GettyImages

Why Jacinda Ardern’s ‘clumsy’ leadership response to Delta could still be the right approach

Suze Wilson, Massey University

Dealing with what have been called ‘wicked’ and ‘adaptive’ problems is a huge challenge for political leaders. A ‘clumsy’ response can be inevitable – and even desirable.
University of Auckland Department of Conservation

The critically endangered Māui dolphin is a conservation priority – we shouldn’t let uncertainty stop action to save it

Rochelle Constantine, University of Auckland; Wendi Roe, Massey University

Māui dolphins are at risk of extinction. With a marine mammal sanctuary in place since 2008, the risk from fisheries is now largely under control. It’s time to take other threats more seriously.
GettyImages

Anniversary of a landslide: new research reveals what really swung New Zealand’s 2020 ‘COVID election’

Josh Van Veen, University of Auckland; Jack Vowles, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington; Jennifer Curtin, University of Auckland; Lara Greaves, University of Auckland; Sam Crawley, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

One year on, the NZ Election Survey crunches the numbers on what drove Jacinda Ardern’s unprecedented 2020 victory.
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Widespread collapse of West Antarctica’s ice sheet is avoidable if we keep global warming below 2℃

Dan Lowry, GNS Science; Mario Krapp, GNS Science; Nick Golledge, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

A new modelling approach improves projections of Antarctica’s future ice loss. It shows a low-emissions scenario would avoid the collapse of West Antarctica’s ice sheet and limit sea-level rise.
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Many of New Zealand’s most popular websites use ‘dark patterns’ to manipulate users – is it time to regulate?

Cherie Lacey, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington; Alex Beattie, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

Kiwi consumers are increasingly experiencing personalised, targeted manipulation online, but the law has very little to say about it.
Hannah Peters/Getty Images

How a random sampling regime could help detect COVID and highlight infection hotspots

Stephen John Haslett, Massey University; Richard Arnold, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

A statistically designed random sampling scheme, based on as few as 100 people, would give a very high probability of detecting if there are any COVID-19 cases and highlight at-risk hotspots.
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Why it’s time to treat medicinal cannabis as an alternative therapy, not a pharmaceutical

Marta Rychert, Massey University; Chris Wilkins, Massey University; Vinuli Withanarachchie, Massey University

Non-intoxicating cannabis products are safe and well tolerated by those who use them, so why not lower the clinical threshold for their manufacture and sale?

From our foreign editions

NSW scraps home quarantine for returnees. What are the risks, and what does this mean for the rest of Australia?

Amalie Dyda, The University of Queensland

There are reasons for concern, but there are also some protections in place.

As a patriot and Black man, Colin Powell embodied the ‘two-ness’ of the African American experience

Chad Williams, Brandeis University

A scholar of African American studies explores how the former secretary of state, who died at 84, dealt with what WEB DuBois described as the ‘double-consciousness’ of being Black and American.

COVID-19 cases rise when schools open – but more so when teachers and students don’t wear masks

Zoë Hyde, The University of Western Australia

A new study in the United States found school reopening in late 2020 was associated with an increase in COVID-19 cases and deaths. But this was mostly the case where masks weren’t required.

David Amess killing: threats of violence and harassment have become commonplace for politicians

James Weinberg, University of Sheffield

Politics has become a low-trust, high-blame environment that has left public servants under near constant threat of attack.

Eugene Palmer: a Black British artist you need to know about

Richard Hylton, SOAS, University of London

The lie of the land: Britain’s hidden legacies of slavery in Eugene Palmer’s paintings.

A new fossil discovery may add hundreds of millions of years to the evolutionary history of animals

Elizabeth C. Turner, Laurentian University

A recent discovery of a sponge fossil may be the oldest known animal fossil, extending the evolutionary timeline by hundreds of millions of years.

COP26: Africa’s challenges must steer the climate change conference

Victor Ongoma, Université Mohammed VI Polytechnique; Portia Adade Williams, CSIR-Science and Technology Policy Research Institute

African countries cannot be ignored, or just listened to. Their needs should shape the agenda.

A forgotten mangrove forest around remote inland lagoons in Mexico’s Yucatan tells a story of rising seas

Sula E Vanderplank, San Diego State University

Mangroves grow in saltwater along tropical coastlines, but scientists have found them along a river in Mexico’s Yucatan, more than 100 miles from the sea. Climate change explains their shift.