In the last 12 months, New Zealand marches against climate change and in support of the Black Lives Matter movement have garnered comparisons to the country’s ‘golden age’ of protests in the 1960s and 1970s – but are those resemblances justified?
anti-Vietnam War protest (1971): Photo: NZ History archives
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Last year tens of thousands of New Zealanders marched throughout the country demanding government action on climate change.
In 2020, thousands of Kiwis joined the global chorus of marchers for the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States.
The protests have drawn parallels to those in New Zealand during the 1960s and 1970s – what Victoria University of Wellington historian Dr Grant Morris called a Golden Age of protests.
The '60s and '70s protests were dominated by issues such as the Vietnam War, environmental protections, women’s rights, homosexual rights and the anti-nuclear movement.
Then in the 1980s, New Zealand had arguably its most renowned protests when the country was divided over racial inequality issues, heightened by the Springbok Tour of 1981 during Apartheid.
New Zealand’s protests were heavily influenced by what was going on in the United States, Morris tells RNZ Afternoons.
“You can look at the different protests that were occurring in New Zealand and you can see variations of them occurring in the US one or two or even three years earlier, so there’s a bit of a lag when it comes to New Zealand.
“Now, interestingly TV was introduced… in the early 1960s so I think that plays a key part, New Zealanders are seeing what’s happening in the US and other similar jurisdictions on TV and then that is energising the protest movement as well, but of course without social media perhaps the lag is greater.”
Dr Morris says, while today’s protests are similar to those 50 or 60 years ago, there are distinct differences.
“They (1960s protesters) were pushing back against the establishment views, they were pushing back against the status quo, which had existed for a long time and particularly had been prevalent in the west in the '50s and early '60s and that conformism that some found to be stifling. A classic example is the anti-Vietnam protest – you had a National government in power, Keith Holyoake as Prime Minister, New Zealand was involved supporting the US in Vietnam, so these many, mainly young New Zealanders, could push back against that in a counter-culture way.
“Now just compare that to those huge marches we saw last year with climate change which were impressive but were different in the sense that it was protesters asking for movement on climate change to a government which was very open and supportive of that and was kind of moving in that direction, albeit perhaps too slowly for the protesters’ liking. It’s quite different to have a protest movement which is in conflict with the powers that be rather than one which in many ways is in line with the powers that be.”
Demographics are another aspect that differentiates today’s protests from previous generations, Dr Morris says.
In the 1960s, university students were the lion’s share of protesters, whereas today’s marches are much more diverse.
As for whether New Zealand is in another golden age of protests, Dr Morris believes it’s too early to tell.
“It has kind of built-up momentum over the last three or four years, especially marches, that’s the go-to now, to do a street march, even though there’s obviously lots of other ways that protesters are doing things as well, and social media, of course, makes it far easier to organise a protest. But I’m not sure I’m at a point where I can say ‘yes this is the equivalent of the '60s and '70s’.
“I think there’s a way to go yet and we’ve still got to see how things play out before we can make that kind of comparison, but this is a politically-active age and we’re seeing that in the last few weeks and we saw it last year and I think it’s going to probably continue for a while yet.”