19 Mar 2020

How has New Zealand coped with major disruptions in the past?

From Afternoons, 3:23 pm on 19 March 2020

NZ's social, political, cultural and economic life is currently being severely disrupted by the Covid-19 situation. 

But how have we coped with major national disruptions in the past? What have been the most disruptive events in our history? 

For people who lost their jobs and had few savings the early years of the 1930s were tough. Here a group of men queue with their enamel mugs for some hot soup.

For people who lost their jobs and had few savings the early years of the 1930s were tough. Here a group of men queue with their enamel mugs for some hot soup. Photo: Alexander Turnbull Library, Evening Post Collection (PAColl-0614) Reference: EP-8645-1/2-F

Dr Grant Morris from Victoria University talked to Jesse Mulligan about about events that have had dramatic and transformational effects on NZ in the short, medium and long terms.

“It’s impossible to tell whether something is going to be a massive disruption until sometime after. While you might feel like you’re in a big disruption it may turn out to be less than you thought, or perhaps it may turn out to be more than you thought and I know a lot of people are thinking about that in relation to the Covid-19 and I thought it might be helpful to look at some of the other disruptions and how they played out and what effect they had.” 

He says one of the first major ones for New Zealand was the encounter between Pākehā and Māori . 

“That’s a disruption that’s, of course, ongoing. But, it’s also one that played out over a century in terms of Māori Aotearoa into colonial settler state - 1769 through to the end of the New Zealand wars - and there’s no doubt that New Zealand was completely transformed. Māori society was completely and permanently disrupted while the settler state was set up and the effects continue to this day."

Dr Morris says it’s a good example of how disruptions aren’t always just something that happen in a few weeks, they can be ongoing and happen over a long period of time. 

Most people, Dr Morris says, tend to gravitate towards the short period between 1914-1945 where there were three major disruptions to New Zealand: World War I, the depression and World War II. 

“If we start with World War I, obviously it had a huge impact on New Zealand and we’ve been commemorating that - all the battles, the deaths, the injuries, the trauma that it caused to our nation.

“People talk about it as a ‘coming-of-age’ for New Zealand, but I think it was more of a traumatic experience for New Zealand and it left an indelible mark on our nation. I think it created a lot of disillusionment about overseas entanglement and about war and the realities of war.”

Those soldiers coming back from World War I also bought with them the Spanish Flu which had a short but pronounced affect on New Zealand in 1918. 

Dr Morris says the Great Depression hit New Zealand particularly hard.

“From 1929 through to 1935 New Zealand went through, again, a national trauma - this time an economic one. And although there were, at times, riots, the amazing thing to me - and I hope we can draw from this - was just how society held together. 

“Even in the midst of mass unemployment and destitution, and a government that wasn’t particularly proactive until Labour came in at the end, society still held together. Year after year it went on. Sometimes it must have seemed like it was never going to end and yet, we got through it.”

He says the depression was the trigger for the establishment of the welfare state set up by the Labour Government in 1935. 

When World War II came along, Dr Morris says New Zealand had a better idea of what to expect. 

“We knew what war could be like. Again we had the deaths, again we had the casualties. At the end of it, our perspective changed - and that’s what happens with disruptions - whether it’s long or short, your perspective will change.”

Dr Morris says the same will happen when the Covid-19 crisis is over. 

“We will probably see some things differently. It’s pretty hard to say what we’ll see differently. With World War II, New Zealand started to see the rest of the world differently. Britain was supposed to protect us, that was the deal from 1840 through to the early 1940s. When it came to it, Britain couldn’t protect New Zealand, but the American Navy could - it changed the way we viewed the world.”

New Zealand also has examples of more localised disruptions such as the Napier and Christchurch earthquakes, but Dr Morris said he’s more focused on things that affected the entire nation.

Dr Morris says it will be years before we know how disruptive and dislocating Covid-19 is to New Zealand life. 

“I’d encourage listeners to just think about what’s happened in the past and how we’ve dealt with it, especially external events that come into New Zealand like world wars or depressions - how they’ve bought the country together and how, if necessary, we can replicate that again.” 

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