This thesis studies Friendly Societies of New Zealand from 1842, when the first lodge was established, to l94l when the Social Security Amendment Bill, allowing for the implementation of the general medical benefit, was enacted. It is the study of how, through the formation of mutual aid societies, a significant group of working people protected themselves against hardship. At the same time, it is the study of how Friendly Societies, by means of social activity and ritual, bonded their members together and synthesised their welfare role with the values of respectability, thrift and independence. The establishment of lodges throughout the nineteenth century is explored and it is shown how lodges, as well as providing for their members' welfare needs, were also effective community institutions of social integration, facilitating the adaptation of immigrants to their new environment. By the twentieth century very few New Zealand settlements were without a lodge. As an integral part of their communities, they were cross-class institutions, drawing together and mixing people from different classes, occupations and social groups. Traced also is the transformation of Friendly Societies from small, financially insecure, local lodges, combining conviviality with limited welfare benefits, to the large financially sound consolidated Societies of the 1930s providing their members with access to modem health care. Effective insurance became the primary focus of Friendly Societies. Although social life remained active, as the twentieth Century progressed, people increasingly joined lodges only for the health and medical benefits offered. Because of their wide range of benefits and because there was little else in the way of welfare relief at the time, Friendly Societies were relevant and significant suppliers of welfare. The state recognised this role and supported them with legislation and help, at least until 1910. However, as the state increasingly ventured into the welfare arena its support for the Societies waned, until finally friendly Society sickness benefits were replaced by the 1938 Social Security Act and their medical benefits by the Social Security Amendment Act of 1941. Friendly Societies were sidelined. Because welfare historiography has tended to focus on the state, it has neglected Friendly Societies. This study intends to redress the balance, and show that welfare did not start with tie state - that many people were making effective provision against sickness, disability and death for themselves long before the introduction of the welfare state.

This thesis is an examination of the importance of army supply in deciding the success and failure of the frontiers of the Roman Empire with particular emphasis on those frontiers in the Rhine-Danube provinces. It will look at logistics as the reason for the end of expansion of the Roman Empire and the frontiers forming where they did. It will also argue that the failure of logistics was a major factor in the collapse of those same frontier defences and the ultimate fall of the western part of the empire. The need to feed and supply large numbers of troops and their dependents dictated where they could be based. Because of the impossibility of supplying the whole army with imported goods, the suitability of local land for food production was also paramount. The need to have reliable sources of supply locally was met by placing veterans on retirement in villae rusticae in frontier zones. This had the effect of controlling those local sources of supply and also satisfying the increasingly expensive needs of the army praemia militiae. The increased warfare and periodic invasions from the reign of Marcus Aurelius especially on the upper Rhine and upper Danube made supply more difficult. The army placed an increasing number of beneficiarii consularis on important points on the transport network to control and direct the flow of army supplies. The more frequent invasions across the frontiers from the third century caused greater dislocation to the agricultural infrastructure not only on the frontiers but deeper into the more settled and richer provinces. This destroyed the sources of local supply and also often the source of imported supply, forcing Roman armies to stay well inside the imperial boundaries more often than before. The loss of their logistic superiority spelt the loss of their military advantage, and the loss of empire.

The role of London in forming New Zealand’s culture and identity is a significant feature of New Zealand’s cultural history that has, until now, been overlooked. Ties with London and with ‘Home’ generally, have received little study, and ‘Britishness’ in New Zealand is largely considered a legacy of demography to be eventually outgrown. This thesis suggests something different. During the period 1890-1940, technology changed cultural perceptions of time and space, and it changed the relationship between metropole and former colony too. These technologies drew New Zealand and London closer together. London was constructed as an active part of the New Zealand cultural landscape, rather than as a nostalgic remnant of a predominantly British-born settler population. London was New Zealand’s metropolis too, with consequences for the way New Zealand culture was shaped. This thesis considers the cultural impact of London using four tropes linked to those changing perceptions of time and space. ‘Greater New Zealand’ is concerned with space, whilst ‘“New” New Zealand’ is concerned with time. ‘London’s Farm’ and the ‘Imaginative Hinterland’ consider propinquity and simultaneity respectively. Each theme draws from different bases of evidence in order to suggest London’s broad impact. Collectively, they argue for a shift away from a core and periphery relationship, towards one better described as a city and hinterland relationship. This approach draws upon existing national, imperial, and cultural historiography, whilst at the same time questioning some of their conventions and conceptions. New Zealand as hinterland challenges the conceptual borders of ‘national history’, exploring the transnational nature of cultural formations that otherwise have been considered as autochthonous New Zealand (or for that matter, British) developments. At the same time, whilst hinterlands may exist as part of empire, they are not necessarily products of it. Nor are they necessarily formed in opposition to the metropole, even though alterity is often used to explain colonial relationships. ‘New Zealand’s London’ is, instead a reciprocal creation. Its shared cultural landscape is specific, but at the same time, it offers an alternative means for understanding other white settler colonies. Like New Zealand, their cultural histories may be more complex cultural constructions than national or imperial stories allow. / Whole document restricted, but available by request, use the feedback form to request access.

Whole document restricted, see Access Instructions file below for details of how to access the print copy. / Nineteenth-century representations of prostitutes were governed, modern historians argue, by a powerful and resilient mythology. The myth of the prostitute’s downward progress – a narrative involving disease, destitution, and early death – was allegedly crystallised in the Victorian consciousness from the 1840s, and consequently reproduced (visually and in print) into the mid and late Victorian period. Despite innovative studies into the social, economic, and cultural context of Victorian prostitution, scholars continue to read the sources for the omnipotence of the myth of downward trajectory. Such readings continue to constrain interpretations of Victorian ideologies regarding prostitution. Studying contemporary representations provides a way of reading prostitution. The analysis of texts reveals the construction of social meanings, attitudes, agendas, anxieties, and fears. This thesis reads a selection of post-1850 sources to subject Victorian ideology on prostitution to much needed scrutiny. The five chosen case studies represent the variety of discourses and cultural interest in prostitution in the Victorian period: Dr. William Acton’s Prostitution Considered (1870); The Report of the Royal Commission into the Contagious Diseases Acts (1871); Josephine Butler’s early repeal campaign literature; Wilkie Collins’ novel, The New Magdalen (1873); and the pornographic ‘memoir’, My Secret Life (c.1890). The choice of texts provides an argument on two fronts: canonical texts must be revisited and reread for their multiple layers, internal contradictions, and interpretative potential; and alternative sources should be utilised to illustrate the variety within the repertoire of Victorian cultural representations. In focusing on representations this thesis challenges scholarly orthodoxies. Where scholars have continued to read homogeneity in Victorian attitudes to prostitution, this thesis finds complexity, flexibility, and dissonance. The myth of the prostitute’s downward progress remained a popular narrative in much Victorian discourse on prostitution. But it was not the only narrative and did not go unchallenged. The prostitute was a powerful cultural symbol in the Victorian period and remains a figure of sustained interest for modern academics. It is therefore essential to recognise the complex ways in which she was represented in Victorian culture. This thesis argues for the heterogeneity of Victorian attitudes to prostitution.

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Author has removed photographs from digital version of thesis due to copyright restrictions. / Widely differing perceptions of the early twentieth century New Zealand writer James Cowan have led to confusion over how he should be best remembered – as a journalist, an historian, or a combination of both. Most of the previous scholarly assessments of Cowan have focused on his greatest achievement, The New Zealand Wars (1922-23), and not sought further connections with his other works to reveal the existence of a coherent historiography. This thesis fleshes out Cowan’s historiography by including and reviewing three other books in his oeuvre, two written immediately before the release of The New Zealand Wars (The Maoris of New Zealand and The Adventures of Kimble Bent), and one shortly afterwards (The Maoris in the Great War). All four books contributed in their own unique way to an early goal of Cowan’s to write a history of Maori-Pakeha interaction and reconciliation following the turmoil of the New Zealand Wars of the nineteenth century. They also reveal a progressive attempt by Cowan to write history of a suitable standard to ultimately earn him the dual status of firstly, ‘oral historian’ and secondly, ‘public historian’, that is, ‘an historian writing outside academia’. The terms did not exist in Cowan’s era, so his research methods must be considered advanced for the time. My subsequent review of Cowan’s major work The New Zealand Wars shows that his writing transcended journalism in its creation, and has led to this reassessment of Cowan as a much more significant writer for his era than has been accorded to him so far.

This thesis studies Friendly Societies of New Zealand from 1842, when the first lodge was established, to l94l when the Social Security Amendment Bill, allowing for the implementation of the general medical benefit, was enacted. It is the study of how, through the formation of mutual aid societies, a significant group of working people protected themselves against hardship. At the same time, it is the study of how Friendly Societies, by means of social activity and ritual, bonded their members together and synthesised their welfare role with the values of respectability, thrift and independence. The establishment of lodges throughout the nineteenth century is explored and it is shown how lodges, as well as providing for their members' welfare needs, were also effective community institutions of social integration, facilitating the adaptation of immigrants to their new environment. By the twentieth century very few New Zealand settlements were without a lodge. As an integral part of their communities, they were cross-class institutions, drawing together and mixing people from different classes, occupations and social groups. Traced also is the transformation of Friendly Societies from small, financially insecure, local lodges, combining conviviality with limited welfare benefits, to the large financially sound consolidated Societies of the 1930s providing their members with access to modem health care. Effective insurance became the primary focus of Friendly Societies. Although social life remained active, as the twentieth Century progressed, people increasingly joined lodges only for the health and medical benefits offered. Because of their wide range of benefits and because there was little else in the way of welfare relief at the time, Friendly Societies were relevant and significant suppliers of welfare. The state recognised this role and supported them with legislation and help, at least until 1910. However, as the state increasingly ventured into the welfare arena its support for the Societies waned, until finally friendly Society sickness benefits were replaced by the 1938 Social Security Act and their medical benefits by the Social Security Amendment Act of 1941. Friendly Societies were sidelined. Because welfare historiography has tended to focus on the state, it has neglected Friendly Societies. This study intends to redress the balance, and show that welfare did not start with tie state - that many people were making effective provision against sickness, disability and death for themselves long before the introduction of the welfare state.