The Drive for Security

Now let's move forward in time to New Zealand of the late 19th and early 20th century: an egalitarian society a fairly prosperous one, one in which there was an increasing standard of living and increasing expectations about the future. But then came that incredible phenomenon which was to shape the lives and outlook of a generation: the depression. The depression involved not just a decrease in the rate of increasing wealth; it involved an actual deterioration in the standard of living. People were deprived of things which they had previously had. This could only serve to increase the drive for economic security a hundred-fold. And this was further reinforced by the rationing of the Second World War. So man sub-merged himself in the push for affluence, and it coincided with another startling development of the 20th century the Technological Revolution. This supplied him with the means to achieve that affluence in a very short time. Within a period of about thirty years after the depression man had achieved something which he had been struggling for for centuries and centuries. It was a momentous period in human history.

Tony Brunt