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Imagining New Zealand’s Economy in the Mid-Twentieth Century

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Imagining Britain’s Economic Future, c.1800–1975

Abstract

Mid-twentieth-century British commentaries on New Zealand were usually positive, focusing on the industrial peace and general high living standards that New Zealanders enjoyed—all conceived as to some extent the opposite of the British experience. Many explanations of New Zealand’s apparent success focused on its fortune in terms of natural resources and its distance from political instability. Other, more sceptical, voices did however argue that New Zealand was a dependent economy reliant on the UK, and that its economy would find it difficult to deal with the removal of British patronage. This chapter explores the oscillating balance between these two interpretations, and examines some of the deeper intellectual reasons behind their adoption by different writers and policy-makers, throughout the post-Second World War era.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    P.J. Coleman, ‘New Zealand liberalism and the origins of the American welfare state’, Journal of American History 69 (1982), pp. 372, 376.

  2. 2.

    P.J. Coleman, ‘“Strikes are war! War is hell!”: American responses to the compulsory arbitration of labor disputes, 1890–1920’, Wisconsin Magazine of History 70 (1987), pp. 190, 208–209.

  3. 3.

    Masako Gavin, ‘Abe Iso and New Zealand as a model for a “new” Japan’, Japan Forum 16 (2004), pp. 393–397.

  4. 4.

    Duncan Bell, The idea of greater Britain: empire and the future of world order, 1860–1900 (Princeton, NJ, 2007), pp. 34, 107–108; James Belich, Replenishing the earth: the settler revolution and the rise of the Anglo-world, 1783–1939 (Oxford, 2009), p. 154.

  5. 5.

    William Beinart and Lotte Hughes, The Oxford history of the British Empire: environment and empire (Oxford, 2007), pp. 338–342; for some of the post-Second World War roots of this process, see R. Scott Sheffield, ‘Rehabilitating the Indigene: post-war reconstruction and the image of the indigenous other in English Canada and New Zealand, 1943–1948’, in Philip Buckner and R. Douglas Francis, eds., Rediscovering the British world (Calgary, 2005), pp. 344–346.

  6. 6.

    See Andrew S. Thompson, Imperial Britain: the empire in British politics, c.1880–1932 (Harlow, 2000), pp. 3–8; K. Darian-Smith, P. Grimshaw and S. Macintyre, ‘Introduction: Britishness abroad’, in Kate Darian-Smith, Patricia Grimshaw and Stuart Macintyre, eds., Britishness abroad: transnational movements and imperial cultures (Melbourne, 2007), pp. 4–6; Simon Potter, ‘Webs, networks and systems: globalization and the mass media in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century British Empire’, Journal of British Studies 46 (2007), pp. 621–646; Gary Magee and Andrew Thompson, Empire and globalisation: networks of people, goods and capital in the British world, c.1850 – 1914 (Cambridge, 2010), pp. 26–30.

  7. 7.

    This conception of the Empire as an exchange of investment for food and raw materials is clearest in L.E. Davis and R.A. Huttenback, Mammon and the pursuit of empire: the political economy of British imperialism, 1860–1912 (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 268–272, while specific comments on New Zealand can be found in P.J. Cain and A.G. Hopkins, British imperialism: innovation and expansion 1688–1914 (London, 1993), pp. 242–243, 255–257. These arguments have been countered by Jim McAloon, ‘Gentlemanly capitalism and settler capitalists: imperialism, dependent development and colonial wealth in the South Island of New Zealand’, Australian Economic History Review, 42 (2002), pp. 204–223.

  8. 8.

    Eric Hobsbawm, ‘Introduction: inventing traditions’, in E. J. Hobsbawm and T.O. Ranger, eds., The invention of tradition (Cambridge, 1983), p. 12.

  9. 9.

    See Benedict Anderson, Imagined communities: reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism (rev. edn., London, 1991), pp. 83–86.

  10. 10.

    Patricia Clavin, ‘Defining transnationalism’, Contemporary European History 14 (2005), pp. 421–439.

  11. 11.

    Robert Jervis, Perception and misperception in international politics (Princeton, NJ, 1976), p. 28.

  12. 12.

    Antoinette Burton, ‘New narratives of imperial politics in the nineteenth century’, in Catherine Hall and Sonya Rose, eds., At home with the Empire: metropolitan culture and the imperial world (Cambridge, 2006), pp. 212–229; James Holt, Compulsory arbitration in New Zealand: the first forty years (Auckland, 1986), pp. 104–105.

  13. 13.

    Keith Sinclair, William Pember Reeves: New Zealand Fabian (Oxford, 1965), p. 207.

  14. 14.

    Henry Demarest Lloyd, A country without strikes: a visit to the Compulsory Arbitration Court of New Zealand (London, 1900), p. 120.

  15. 15.

    Diary entry for 3 August 1898: Beatrice Webb and Sidney Webb, Visit to New Zealand in 1898: Beatrice Webb’s diary with entries by Sidney Webb (Wellington, 1959), pp. 8–9.

  16. 16.

    William Pember Reeves, Reform and experiment in New Zealand: selected speeches (London, 1896), p. 33.

  17. 17.

    Diary entry for 24 August 1898: Webb and Webb, New Zealand, p. 53.

  18. 18.

    Melanie Nolan, ‘The reality and myth of New Zealand egalitarianism: explaining the pattern of a labour historiography at the edge of empires’, Labour History Review 72 (2007), pp. 121, 123.

  19. 19.

    A.H. Tocker, ‘New Zealand’s immigrant absorption capacity,’ in W.G.K. Duncan and C.V. Janes, eds., The future of immigration into Australia and New Zealand (Sydney, 1937), pp. 241, 245.

  20. 20.

    E.P. Neale, ‘Some statistical aspects of New Zealand migration’, in Duncan and Janes eds., Future of immigration into Australia and New Zealand, pp. 217–219; Kent Fedorowich, Unfit for heroes: reconstruction and soldier settlement in the Empire between the wars (Manchester, 1995), pp. 177–180.

  21. 21.

    Marjory Harper and Stephen Constantine, Migration and empire (Oxford, 2010), p. 76; Stephen Constantine, ‘British emigration to the Empire-Commonwealth since 1880: from overseas settlement to diaspora?’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History 31 (2003), p. 27.

  22. 22.

    Constantine, ‘British emigration to the Empire-Commonwealth’, p. 21.

  23. 23.

    Peter Holland, Jim Williams and Vaughan Wood, ‘Learning about the environment in early colonial New Zealand’, in Tim Brooking and Eric Pawson, eds., Seeds of empire: the environmental transformation of New Zealand (London, 2010), pp. 46–49; David Hackett Fischer, Fairness and freedom: a history of two open societies: New Zealand and the United States (Oxford, 2012), p. 34.

  24. 24.

    P.J. Coleman, Progressivism and the world of reform: New Zealand and the origins of the American welfare state (Lawrence, KS, 1987), pp. 76, 68, 82.

  25. 25.

    Daniel T. Rodgers, Atlantic crossings: social politics in a progressive age (Cambridge, MA, 1998), pp. 55–56, 250.

  26. 26.

    New Zealand Treasury, Measuring economic growth in New Zealand (Wellington, 2002), pp. 2–3.

  27. 27.

    Angus Maddison, The world economy: a millennial perspective (Paris, 2001), Table C1-a, p. 271, and Table C1-c, pp. 277, 279.

  28. 28.

    Bronwyn Labrum, Real modern: everyday life in New Zealand in the 1950s and 1960s (Wellington, 2015), pp. 12, 30–31.

  29. 29.

    National Westminster Bank Ltd., These are your markets: a guide to trading conditions and establishing a business in New Zealand (London, 1963), p. 8.

  30. 30.

    James Belich, Making peoples: a history of the New Zealanders, from Polynesian settlement to the end of the nineteenth century (Auckland, 2001), pp. 321–326.

  31. 31.

    Inter-departmental committee on emigration to Canada, Australia and New Zealand, Note by the Department of Economic Affairs, 7 September 1968, London, The National Archives (TNA), LAB 8/3204.

  32. 32.

    Report by the working party on the effects on the British economy of increased emigration to Canada, Australia and New Zealand, n.d. [1965], TNA, LAB8/3204.

  33. 33.

    Harper and Constantine, Migration, p. 89; Eric Richards, Britannia’s children: emigration from England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland since 1600 (London, 2004), map 5, p. 211.

  34. 34.

    W.D. Borrie, The European peopling of Australasia: a demographic history, 1788–1988 (Canberra, 1994), Table 12.2, p. 290; Statistics New Zealand, Permanent and long-term migration to and from the United Kingdom (Wellington, 2008), Table, p. 1.

  35. 35.

    Ruth Farmer, ‘International migration’, in R.J. Warwick Neville and C. James O’Neill, eds., The population of New Zealand: interdisciplinary perspectives (Auckland, 1979), Table 2.2, pp. 44–45.

  36. 36.

    M. Hutching, Long journey for sevenpence: an oral history of assisted immigration to New Zealand from the United Kingdom, 1947–1975 (Wellington, 1999), pp. 76, 79, 82.

  37. 37.

    David Pearson, ‘Comparing cultures of decline? Class perceptions among English migrants in New Zealand’, New Zealand Sociology 28 (2013), pp. 88–89.

  38. 38.

    David Goldblatt, Democracy at ease: a New Zealand profile (London, 1957), pp. 78–81; James Belich, Paradise reforged: a history of the New Zealanders from the 1880s to the year 2000 (Auckland, 2001), pp. 262–263.

  39. 39.

    Leslie Lipson, ‘Reconversion in Australia and New Zealand’, The Journal of Politics 9 (1947), pp. 226–228.

  40. 40.

    Gordon Walker memorandum to Cabinet Economic Policy Committee, ‘The economic and social policies of the governments of Australia and New Zealand’, 17 January 1951, TNA CAB 134/229.

  41. 41.

    Itinerary for Sir Norman and Lady Kipping, December 1959, and enclos. to New Zealand despatch No. 9, ‘New Zealand economic survey for 1959’, 14 August 1959, Modern Records Centre (MRC), Warwick, Federation of British Industries (FBI) papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/79.

  42. 42.

    Kipping memorandum, ‘UK trade relations with New Zealand’, 17 February 1960 (also second draft of 18 February 1960), MRC, FBI papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/79.

  43. 43.

    Reading to Kipping, 19 August 1964, and enclos., ‘Programme of Sir Norman Kipping’s visit to Wellington’, 11–15 September 1964, MRC, FBI papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/78.

  44. 44.

    Whitehorn aide memoire, ‘Visit to New Zealand’, April 1965, MRC, FBI papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/78.

  45. 45.

    Tarrant (Wellington) to Watt, ‘William Cooke & Co., Ltd.’, 22 January 1959, MRC, FBI papers, MSS 200/8/3/02/3/32.

  46. 46.

    D. Denoon, Settler capitalism: the dynamics of dependent development in the southern hemisphere (Oxford, 1983), pp. 35–38, 104–106, 221–224.

  47. 47.

    Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Collective bargaining and government policies: conference held at Washington DC, 10–13 July, 1978 (Paris, 1979), pp. 85–86.

  48. 48.

    W.B. Sutch, The quest for security in New Zealand, 1850–1966 (London, 1966), p. 423.

  49. 49.

    Economist Intelligence Unit, Quarterly economic review: New Zealand (London, October 1965), pp. 2–4.

  50. 50.

    ‘The Commonwealth, 1960–1970’, draft Cabinet memorandum by CRO for Future Policy Study Working Group: Ronald Hyam and Wm. Roger Louis, eds., The Conservative government and the end of empire, 1957–1964, part I: high policy, political and constitutional change (London, 2000), doc. 11, p. 62.

  51. 51.

    J.B. Condliffe, New Zealand in the making: a study of economic and social development (London, 2nd edn., 1959), p. 252.

  52. 52.

    Kipping (?) to Russell, 14 February 1952, MRC, FBI papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/78.

  53. 53.

    On the Ottawa Agreement and New Zealand see M.F. Lloyd Pritchard, An economic history of New Zealand to 1939 (London, 1970), pp. 359–362.

  54. 54.

    NatWest, Markets, pp. 16, 20.

  55. 55.

    Goldblatt, Democracy, pp. 62–63.

  56. 56.

    Birks report, ‘New Zealand’, January 1957, MRC, FBI papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/78.

  57. 57.

    On the 1957–1958 negotiations see: Note of a discussion between A.E. Percival and A.E. Please, ‘Trade relations with New Zealand’, 1 October 1958, MRC, FBI papers, MSS.200/F/3/D3/6/78.

  58. 58.

    See e.g. negotiations when the butter price fell in 1958: Heathcoat Amory to Macmillan, ‘Butter’, 7 May 1958, Lee to Barnes, ‘Butter’, 19 November 1958, TNA CAB 21/3165.

  59. 59.

    CRO press release, Duncan Sandys speech at New Zealand Society dinner, 26 September 1962, Pryde, Federated Farmers of New Zealand, to Feather, TUC, 16 November 1972, MRC, FBI papers, MSS.292D/993.1/1.

  60. 60.

    ‘Discussion at Commonwealth Prime Ministers’ Meeting about UK’s Joining the Common Market’, Cabinet conclusions, 13 September, 20 September 1962: Ronald Hyam and Wm. Roger Louis (eds.), The Conservative government and the end of empire, 1957–1964, part II: economics, international relations and the Commonwealth (London, 2000), docs. 372, 373, pp. 219–223.

  61. 61.

    OECD, Agricultural policy in New Zealand (Paris, 1974), Tables 4 and 5, pp. 20–21; Lloyd Pritchard, Economic history, Table 154, p. 354.

  62. 62.

    Mitchell to Harding, 12 June 1961, TNA T 299/77.

  63. 63.

    Jenkyns to Mitchell, 7 June 1961, TNA T 236/6549.

  64. 64.

    Sir Roy Price, High Commissioner in Wellington, Report to FO, 19 February 1953, TNA DO 35/6479.

  65. 65.

    NatWest, Markets, Table, p. 8.

  66. 66.

    Frank W. Holmes, Money, finance and the economy: an introduction to the New Zealand financial system (Auckland, 1972), Table V:8, p. 75, and pp. 78–79.

  67. 67.

    Ainsley to Anson, 29 April 1960, Foreign Office to Washington, 17 March 1961, Rickett meeting with Greensmith, minutes, 30 May 1961, and IMF memorandum, ‘Membership for New Zealand’, 19 June 1961, TNA T 236/6490.

  68. 68.

    Leslie Lipson, The politics of equality: New Zealand’s adventures in democracy (Chicago, IL., 1948), p. 491.

  69. 69.

    Russell (Wellington) to Brownie, 17 May 1955, MRC, FBI papers, MSS 200/8/3/02/3/32.

  70. 70.

    J.B. Condliffe, The economic outlook for New Zealand (Christchurch, 1969), pp. 144, 149.

  71. 71.

    J.W. Rowe, ‘New Zealand’, in J.O.N. Perkins ed., Macroeconomic policy: a comparative study: Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa (London, 1972), p. 95 and Table 4.1, p. 96.

  72. 72.

    Ibid., pp. 110–111.

  73. 73.

    Economist Intelligence Unit, Quarterly economic review: New Zealand (London, Dec 1965), frontispiece.

  74. 74.

    Peter Walker, ‘UK to begin talks with New Zealand on post-Brexit trade deal’, Guardian, 13 Jan 2017.

  75. 75.

    Peter Spence, ‘Brexit: lessons the UK could learn from nimble New Zealand’, Daily Telegraph, 9 Mar 2016.

  76. 76.

    Office for National Statistics, ‘BoP: current Account: goods and services: exports: new Zealand’, https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/timeseries/lgjq/pb; ONS, ‘Perspectives 2016: Trade with the EU and beyond’, http://visual.ons.gov.uk/uk-perspectives-2016-trade-with-the-eu-and-beyond/ [accessed 16 Feb 2017].

  77. 77.

    Goldblatt, Democracy, p. 86.

  78. 78.

    Keith Jackson and John Harré, New Zealand (London, 1969), pp. 85, 89.

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  1. Oxford Brookes University, Oxford, UK

    Glen O’Hara

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  1. Department of History, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom

    David Thackeray

  2. Department of History, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom

    Andrew Thompson

  3. Department of History, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom

    Richard Toye

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O’Hara, G. (2018). Imagining New Zealand’s Economy in the Mid-Twentieth Century. In: Thackeray, D., Thompson, A., Toye, R. (eds) Imagining Britain’s Economic Future, c.1800–1975. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71297-0_4

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