The new book Secret History: State Surveillance in New Zealand, 1900-1956 by Richard S Hill and Steven Loveridge (Auckland University Press, 2023) opens up the ‘secret world’ of security intelligence during a period in which counter-espionage and counter-subversion duties were primarily handled by the New Zealand Police Force.
This is the first of two volumes chronicling the history of state surveillance in New Zealand. It is the story of the surveillers who – in times of war and peace, turmoil and tranquillity – monitored and analysed perceived threats to national interests. It is also the story of the surveilled: those whose association with organisations and movements led to their public and private lives being documented in secret files. Secret History explores a hidden and intriguing dimension of New Zealand history, one which sits uneasily with cherished national notions of an exceptionally fair and open society.
At this session, recorded at the Stout Research Centre for New Zealand Studies at Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University of Wellington in October 2023, the authors discussed the book’s revelations, methodology and implications with Malcolm McKinnon. This was followed by a Q and A session with the audience.
Speakers:
Richard S. Hill is an Emeritus Professor at the Stout Research Centre. Among his outputs are four books in the History of Policing in New Zealand series, and two on Crown-Māori relations in the twentieth century. His co-authored book, Secret History, is the first of two volumes in a history of security intelligence in twentieth-century New Zealand.
Steven Loveridge is an adjunct Research Associate at the Stout Research Centre. His published work includes some major studies of New Zealand society during the First World War, and work on diplomatic history and security intelligence. He is currently co-authoring the second volume in the history of security intelligence in twentieth-century New Zealand which will cover the 1956-2000 period.
Malcolm McKinnon is an adjunct research associate in the School of History, Philosophy, Political Science and International Relations at Victoria University of Wellington Te Herenga Waka. He is the author of a number of works on the history of both New Zealand's foreign relations and its political economy.
Download a transcript of this talk: https://nzhistory.govt.nz/files/pdfs/secret-history-public-history-talk.pdf
The tragedy of the SS Talune and the 1918 influenza pandemic
Polly Plum and the first wave of feminism
‘Researching kindergarten: the endeavours of women for the play of children’
‘The Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, redux’
Jazzy Nerves, Aching Feet, and Foxtrots: New Zealand’s Jazz Age
How does a city make a writer?
Māori Women, Politics and Petitions in the 19th Century
The Great War for New Zealand
Counting redcoats: Who were the imperial soldiers serving in New Zealand in the 1860s?
The Broken Decade: 1928 - 39 by Malcom McKinnon
Past Caring? Gender, Work and Emotion - A talk by Professor Barbara Brookes
Hearth and Home: Reconstructing the Rural Kitchen, c1840–1940’
The Māori War Effort at Home and Abroad 1917
New Zealand’s Rivers: can we learn from history?
Reflections on the Big Smoke
KŪPAPA - the bitter legacy of Māori alliances with the Crown
Richard Seddon: King of God’s Own
Dr Steven Loveridge: New Zealand Society at War
Dr Grant Morris: ’Legal Villain’
Andrew Francis: Enemy aliens and the New Zealand experience
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Irish Songs with Ken Murray
History Obscura
Historycal: Words that Shaped the World
The Rest Is History
Lore