History
The first people to reach New Zealand were Polynesians in oceangoing waka, who are believed to have arrived in several waves between about 1280 and 1350. According to most Māori oral traditions, the islands were first discovered by the semi-legendary explorer Kupe while in pursuit of a giant octopus. These traditions hold that Kupe was followed by a great fleet of settlers, who set out from Hawaiki in eastern Polynesia around 1350. The existence of a single great fleet that settled New Zealand has since been superseded by the belief that the majority of settlement was a planned and deliberate event that occurred over several decades.
The exact date of this settlement is unclear, with recent sources favouring settlement in the 14th century. While mitochondrial DNA variability within Māori populations suggests that New Zealand was first settled between 1250 and 1300, no human remains, artefacts or structures can be reliably dated to earlier than the Kaharoa eruption of Mount Tarawera around 1314. This scenario is also consistent with a debated third line of oral evidence, traditional genealogies (whakapapa) that point to around 1350 as a probable arrival date for several of the migratory waka (canoes) from which many Māori trace their descent. Some Māori later migrated to the Chatham Islands, where they developed their distinct Moriori culture; a later 1835 invasion by Māori iwi resulted in the massacre and virtual extinction of the Moriori.
In a hostile 1642 encounter between Ngāti Tūmatakōkiri and Abel Tasman's crew, four of Tasman's crew members were killed and at least one Māori was hit by canister shot. Europeans did not revisit New Zealand until 1769, when British explorer James Cook mapped almost the entire coastline. Following Cook, New Zealand was visited by numerous European and North American whaling, sealing, and trading ships. They traded European food, metal tools, weapons, and other goods for timber, Māori food, artefacts, and water.
The introduction of the potato and the musket transformed Māori agriculture and warfare. Potatoes provided a reliable food surplus, which enabled longer and more sustained military campaigns. The resulting intertribal Musket Wars encompassed over 600 battles between 1801 and 1840, killing 30,000–40,000 Māori. From the early 19th century, Christian missionaries began to settle New Zealand, eventually converting most of the Māori population. The Māori population declined to around 40% of its pre-contact level during the 19th century; introduced diseases were the major factor.
The British Government appointed James Busby as British Resident to New Zealand in 1832. His duties, given to him by Governor Bourke in Sydney, were to protect settlers and traders "of good standing", prevent "outrages" against Māori, and apprehend escaped convicts. In 1835, following an announcement of impending French settlement by Charles de Thierry, the nebulous United Tribes of New Zealand sent a Declaration of Independence to King William IV of the United Kingdom asking for protection. The Colonial Office sent Captain William Hobson to claim British sovereignty and negotiate a treaty with the Māori, prompted by growing unrest, the New Zealand Company's land-buying survey, and the legal ambiguity of the 1835 Declaration of Independence. The Treaty of Waitangi was first signed in the Bay of Islands on 6 February 1840. In response to the New Zealand Company's attempts to establish an independent settlement in Wellington, Hobson declared British sovereignty over all of New Zealand on 21 May 1840, even though copies of the treaty were still circulating throughout the country for Māori to sign. With the signing of the treaty and declaration of sovereignty, the number of immigrants, particularly from the United Kingdom, began to increase.
New Zealand was administered as a dependency of the Colony of New South Wales until becoming a separate Crown colony, the Colony of New Zealand, on 3 May 1841. Armed conflict began between the colonial government and Māori in 1843 with the Wairau Affray over land and disagreements over sovereignty. These conflicts, mainly in the North Island, saw thousands of imperial troops and the Royal Navy come to New Zealand, and became known as the New Zealand Wars. Following these armed conflicts, large areas of Māori land were confiscated by the government.
The colony gained a representative government in 1852, and the first Parliament met in 1854. In 1856 the colony effectively became self-governing, gaining responsibility over all domestic matters, except native policy, which was granted in the mid-1860s. Following concerns that the South Island might form a separate colony, premier Alfred Domett moved a resolution to transfer the capital from Auckland to a locality near Cook Strait. Wellington was chosen for its central location, with Parliament officially sitting there for the first time in 1865.
In 1886, following requests from the government in Wellington concerned about foreign influence in the region, the Secretary of State for Colonies in London reluctantly agreed to annex the volcanic Kermadec Islands to New Zealand, islands that were seemingly not of "any possible use...to that colony". As a result, instructions were issued directing the Admiral on the Australian Station to hoist the British flag on the Kermadecs, which lie about 1,000 km (620 mi) northeast of Auckland. Since 1937, the islands have been uninhabited except for about six people at Raoul Island station. These islands put the northern border of New Zealand at 29 degrees South latitude. After the 1982 UNCLOS, the islands contributed significantly to New Zealand's exclusive economic zone.
In 1891, the Liberal Party came to power as the first organised political party. The Liberal Government, led by Richard Seddon for most of its period in office, passed many important social and economic measures. In 1893, New Zealand was the first nation in the world to grant all women the right to vote and pioneered the adoption of compulsory arbitration between employers and unions in 1894. The Liberals also guaranteed a minimum wage in 1894, a world first.
In 1907, at the request of the New Zealand Parliament, King Edward VII proclaimed New Zealand a Dominion within the British Empire, reflecting its self-governing status. At the 1926 Imperial Conference, the Prime Ministers of the Dominions declared that Britain should provide them equal sovereignty to it. In 1947, New Zealand adopted the Statute of Westminster implementing the declaration, confirming that the British Parliament could no longer legislate for the country without its consent. The British government's residual legislative powers were later removed by the Constitution Act 1986, and final rights of appeal to British courts were abolished in 2003.
Early in the 20th century, New Zealand was involved in world affairs, fighting in the First and Second World Wars and suffering through the Great Depression. The depression led to the election of the first Labour Government and the establishment of a comprehensive welfare state and a protectionist economy. New Zealand experienced increasing prosperity following the Second World War, and Māori began to leave their traditional rural life and move to the cities in search of work. A Māori protest movement developed, which criticised Eurocentrism and worked for greater recognition of Māori culture and of the Treaty of Waitangi. In 1975, the Waitangi Tribunal was set up to investigate alleged breaches of the Treaty, and it was enabled to investigate historic grievances in 1985. The government has negotiated settlements of these grievances with many iwi, although Māori claims to the foreshore and seabed proved controversial in the 2000s.
