Australia looks like it is preparing for a republic after the Queen dies, but New Zealand is still falling back on the platitudinous 'a republic is inevitable but right now is not a priority' response
Opinion: For most of the past 40 years, New Zealand has proclaimed proudly that it follows an independent foreign policy. But we have not been doing that since the Clark years, nearly two decades ago.
Over recent years, our foreign policy has become more ambivalent than independent. Recent events in the Pacific region demonstrate that all too well. We have watched passively from the sidelines the mounting Chinese interest in the region, but, when pushed ever so gently by President Joe Biden at the White House last week, we appeared to be lining up alongside the United States’ viewpoint. However, when China subsequently criticised that, we quickly reverted to asserting the independence of our foreign policy.
Meanwhile, Australia’s new government has stepped forward in a way not often seen recently to try to unite Pacific leaders to be wary of China’s approaches. Already there have been two visits to Pacific states by Australia’s new foreign minister in her first two weeks in office, while our foreign minister has stayed at home and kept largely quiet. The net effect has been that Australia has seized the Pacific initiative, while New Zealand is left in its wake.
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Political critics will sheet home these changing and confusing states of affairs to what they regard as the ineptitude of the present government and the lack of interest of the foreign minister. While that may be true up to a point, what has been happening is the product of far more long-standing factors.
When Britain announced its wish to join the European Economic Community in 1961, it further confirmed its desire to play a greater role in Europe by ending its historic “East of Suez” defence commitments in 1968. This abrupt upending of traditional economic and defence relationships left countries such as New Zealand reassessing their ongoing ties to the former “Mother Country”.
It is no coincidence the way New Zealanders began to view the Queen, as Head of the Commonwealth, and the British royal family changed accordingly. Even though the Queen was formally styled Queen of New Zealand in 1974, the level of New Zealand identification with her being “our Queen” was beginning to decline steadily from its peak during the 1953-54 royal tour.
At the same time, the Māori renaissance, and the increasingly multi-ethnic dimension of New Zealand had been growing rapidly, broadening dramatically our cultural horizons, and changing for ever the shape and voice of New Zealand in a way that was inconceivable two generations ago. The relevance of a head of state being a hereditary monarch living on the other side of the world with no day-to-day attachment to our country became more and more questionable.
While the Queen has retained unprecedented, huge personal respect and admiration across the spectrum in New Zealand by dint of her long and dedicated service, she has increasingly been seen as Britain’s monarch, rather than New Zealand’s head of state. The appointment since the 1970s of prominent New Zealanders to the role of governor-general, as opposed to the British aristocrats who preceded them, has reinforced that distancing, as has the fact that her advancing years mean it is now 20 years since the Queen last visited here.
Since at least the 1990s New Zealand’s leaders have been tacitly acknowledging there will inevitably be change after the Queen’s reign is over. There has been a general acceptance that at some point New Zealand will become an independent republic within the Commonwealth, like most other Commonwealth member states today. However, that acknowledgement has been matched by a persistent unwillingness to do anything to prepare for that eventuality.
The Queen’s platinum jubilee celebrations and the pathos surrounding her inability to attend many of them are a reminder that time is gently but surely running out. There is nowhere near the respect or admiration for her heir, Prince Charles, that the Queen enjoys, which raises its own questions about the monarchy’s future after she has gone.
The new Australian government has already recognised the potential developing situation by including a minister for the Australian republic in its new ministerial line-up. New Zealand, probably unsurprisingly, has shown no such interest, falling back on the platitudinous “a republic is inevitable but right now is not a priority” response.
The problem with that line is that we do not control events. Passivity in a time of change risks – as we have seen with China’s new interest in the Pacific – the turn of events occurring suddenly, leaving us looking ill-prepared and uncertain in response. It is a matter of huge regret that over the past few years we have not been doing anything to engender public discussion about the shape, form and timing of a possible republic after the Queen and how that may be brought about. Any such decision must be based on public consensus for it to be durable, not the will of a transient political majority of the day.
If Australia moves quickly after the Queen’s death to start the republic process, it will be very difficult for New Zealand not to do likewise. Historic and recent foreign policy events have shown us the folly of sitting back and waiting for things to unfold before we take a stand. We need our own clear strategy for the future to avoid looking like we are just copying Australia and scrambling to make up lost ground.
The hallmark of the independence we assert is that we make our own well-considered decisions. But, increasingly, our foreign policy looks hurriedly cobbled together because things have not happened the way or within the timeframe some expected. We cannot afford any move to become a republic to be botched. It is the right move, but it needs to be a positive assertion of New Zealand’s identity and future, not just following along because others have done it first.
