The political history of New Zealand covers political events and trends related to the history of New Zealand, from the precolonial to the contemporary period, including significant milestones such as the attainment of self-government, transition to Dominion status, and ultimately, independence.
Prior to British colonisation, New Zealand politics were dominated by Māori chiefs () as leaders of and , utilising Māori customs as a political system. New Zealand became a British colony after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. Subsequently, a series of conflicts between the colonial government and Māori forces resulted in the alienation and confiscation of large amounts of Māori land.
The Colony of New Zealand was initially directly ruled by the governor. Early settlers desired representative democracy, leading to the first nationwide parliamentary election in 1853. In the 1st Parliament, there was a debate over whether ministers should be chosen by the governor or be responsible to Parliament; parliamentarians prevailed, leading to the formation of the first responsible government in 1856. Similar to Britain, suffrage in New Zealand was initially limited to males over 21 who were British subjects and owned a certain amount of land, effectively excluding Māori from voting rights. In 1867, Māori seats were established, allowing Māori to vote without property qualification. New Zealand granted voting rights to women in 1893, becoming the first self-governing country to do so. The party system in New Zealand began to take shape in the 1890s, prior to which all members of parliament were independents. The Liberal Party, formed in 1891, passed many significant progressive social and economic measures during its 21-year period in government. It was the sole political party until the establishment of the conservative Reform Party in 1909. The Liberal Party declined in the 1920s and became the United Party.
The early 20th-century working class and trade unions, discontent with existing political representation, founded the Labour Party in 1916. After Labour won office in 1935, the United and Reform parties amalgamated to form the National Party, marking the start of a two-party system dominated by Labour and National. Labour expanded New Zealand's welfare state, which was largely maintained by alternating Labour and National governments, until the 1980s when Labour initiated free-market reforms, further advanced by the National government in the 1990s. Third parties did not gain significant power until the electoral system was reformed in 1993, transitioning to a proportional representation system known as mixed-member proportional (MMP). The new MMP system has resulted in a multi-party system, with New Zealand governments since consisting of various parties.
Māori society The original Māori society of New Zealand was based on a collective identity found on the iwi and hapū. Iwi are the largest social units in Māori society. In the Māori language roughly means "people" or "nation",See also: Durie, A. (1999). Emancipatory Māori education: Speaking from the heart. In S. May (Ed.), Indigenous community education (pp. 67–78). Philadelphia, PA: Multilingual Matters. - See also: Healey, S. M. (2006). The nature of the relationship of the Crown in New Zealand with iwi Māori. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Auckland, New Zealand. - See also: Sharp, A. (1999). What if value and rights lie foundationally in groups? The Māori case. Critical Review of International, Social and Political Philosophy, 2(2), 1–28. and is often translated as "tribe",Taylor, R. (1848). A leaf from the natural history of New Zealand, or, A vocabulary of its different productions, &c., &c., with their native names. - White, J. (1887). The ancient history of the Maori, his mythology and traditions. - Smith, S. P. (1910). Maori wars of the nineteenth century; the struggle of the northern against the southern Maori tribes prior to the colonisation of New Zealand in 1840. - Best, E. (1934). The Maori as he was: A brief account of Maori life as it was in pre-European days. - Buck, P. (1949). The coming of the Maori. or "a confederation of tribes". Iwi groups trace their ancestry to the original Polynesian migrants who, according to tradition, arrived from Hawaiki. Some iwi cluster into larger groupings that are based on (genealogical tradition) and known as (literally "canoes", with reference to the original migration voyages). Māori use rohe to describe the territory or boundaries of iwi. In pre-European times, most Māori were allied to relatively small groups in the form of ("sub-tribes") and ("family"). Each contains a number of ; among the of the Ngāti Whātua iwi, for example, are Te Uri-o-Hau, Te Roroa, Te Taoū, and Ngāti Whātua-o-Ōrākei.
From the early 16th century, settlements were based around the pā. The pā were village or defensive hillforts–fortified settlements with palisades and defensive terraces–or fortified villages. A great pā represented the mana (prestige or power) and strategic ability of an iwi, as personified by a rangatira (chieftain). Māori built pā in various defensible locations around the rohe of an iwi to protect fertile plantation-sites and food supplies. A person's mana on the other hand could based on one of two sources: mana tangata, authority derived from whakapapa and mana huānga, defined as "authority derived from having a wealth of resources to gift to others to bind them into reciprocal obligations". Political leadership or governance traditionally came from the ariki and the rangatira. The ariki are "persons of the highest rank and seniority".Ballara, A. (1998). Iwi: The dynamics of Māori tribal organisation from c.1769 to c.1945. Wellington, New Zealand: Victoria University Press. The rangatira are the hereditary Māori leaders of hapū, often described by Europeans as chieftains.
The first impacts of Europeans in Oceania involved the effect of new weapons on traditional conflict. The Musket Wars were a series of as many as 3,000 battles and raids fought throughout New Zealand (including the Chatham Islands) among Māori between 1807 and 1837, after Māori first obtained muskets and then engaged in an intertribal arms race in order to gain territory or seek revenge for past defeats. The battles resulted in the deaths of between 20,000 and 40,000 people and the enslavement of tens of thousands of Māori and significantly altered the rohe. The wars also included the Moriori genocide. In the aftermath of the conflicts, three notable military leaders emerged as dominant figures in New Zealand's landscape: Hongi Hika from the Ngāpuhi iwi, Te Wherowhero of Waikato, and Te Rauparaha representing Ngāti Toa. Not just firearms but also innovative tactics and strategies shook up traditional tribal structures.
Colonial New Zealand New Zealand's connection to the British Empire began in 1830, initiated by Te Rauparaha, who sought the help of English Captain Stewart. In 1831, leaders from the Bay of Islands reached out to King William IV, requesting British protection against both British subjects and potential French incursions. Official British involvement took a modest step forward in May 1833 with the arrival of James Busby as the British Resident, funded by the Colony of New South Wales. In 1835, Busby crafted a Declaration of Independence, which was initially endorsed by 35 rangatira under The United Tribes of New Zealand. An additional 17 rangatira later signed the document, effectively proclaiming New Zealand as an independent state under British protection.
Establishment of the New Zealand Government The Treaty of Waitangi between rangatira and British representatives of Queen Victoria was subsequently signed on 6 February 1840. In the English version of the treaty, Māori ceded sovereignty in return for the rights, privileges and protections of being a British subject. The Māori translation of the treaty refers to which is generally translated as governance rather than sovereignty and this point remains a subject of much controversy and political debate. With the establishment of the Crown colony, Hobson became governor of New Zealand. The first organs of the New Zealand Government were also established to assist the governor: an Executive Council and a (General) Legislative Council. The Legislative Council had the power to issue laws called Ordinances. The colony was initially divided into three provinces: New Ulster Province (the North Island), New Munster Province (the South Island), and New Leinster Province (Stewart Island).
In 1840 the New Zealand Company, a company chartered in the United Kingdom for the systematic colonisation of New Zealand, raised the flag of the United Tribes at their settlement in Port Nicholson (Wellington), proclaiming government by "colonial council" that claimed to derive its powers from authority granted by local chiefs. Interpreting the moves as "high treason", Governor William Hobson declared British sovereignty over the entirety of the North Island on 21 May 1840, and on 23 May declared the council illegal. He then despatched his Colonial Secretary, Willoughby Shortland, with 30 soldiers and six mounted police on 30 June 1840, to Port Nicholson to tear down the flag. Shortland commanded the residents to withdraw from their "illegal association" and to submit to the representatives of the Crown.
The New Zealand Constitution Act was passed in 1852 and became the central constitutional document of the colony. It created the General Assembly, which consisted of the governor-appointed Legislative Council and an elected House of Representatives. The first general election for the House of Representatives was held from 14 July 1853 until early October. The 1st New Zealand Parliament was opened on 24 May 1854. The Administrator of Government, Robert Wynyard, was quickly confronted by the demands of the new parliament that responsible government be granted to the colony immediately; on 2 June the House of Representatives passed a resolution, sponsored by Edward Gibbon Wakefield, to that effect. Wynyard refused, and prorogued parliament for two weeks.
Parliament met on 8 August 1855, by which time Wynyard had received instructions from the Colonial Office to introduce responsible government. The new governor, Sir Thomas Gore Browne, arrived on 6 September 1855 and relieved Wynyard of his duties. Governor Thomas Gore Browne subsequently announced that self-government would begin with the 2nd New Zealand Parliament, elected in 1855. The Sewell Ministry constituted the first responsible government, with control over all domestic matters other than native policy. Formed in 1856, it lasted from 18 April to 20 May. From 7 May onward, Henry Sewell was titled "colonial secretary", and is generally regarded as having been the country's first prime minister.McIntyre, W. David. "Sewell, Henry ", from the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Retrieved 30 April 2017.
Māori resistance The New Zealand Wars took place from 1845 to 1872 between the New Zealand colonial government and allied Māori on one side, and Māori and Māori-allied settlers on the other. Although Māori were initially fought by British Army forces, the New Zealand government developed its own military force, including local militia, rifle volunteer groups, the specialist Forest Rangers and kūpapa (pro-government Māori). Traders, Sydney businessmen and the New Zealand Company had bought large tracts of land before 1840. The Treaty of Waitangi included the right of pre-emption on land sales, and the New Zealand colonial government, pressured by immigrant European settlers, tried to speed up land sales to provide farmland. This met resistance from the Māori King Movement that emerged in the 1850s and opposed further European encroachment.