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The Broken Decade Prosperity, Depression and Recovery in New Zealand 1928-39. - Otago Univ Pr 2016. - 512 p. ill. some col 24 cm.

The Depression of the 1930s was a defining period in New Zealand history. It had its own vocabulary swaggers and sugarbags, relief work and sustenance, the Queen Street riots and special constables that was all too familiar to those who lived through that tumultuous decade. But one generations reality is anothers history. The desperate struggles experienced by many for work, food and shelter during the 1930s eventually gave way to the sunny postwar years, when the Depression was no more than an uncomfortable memory. And now, for the children of the twenty-first century, its just a word. While the lives of those most affected by the Depression have been admirably documented in oral histories in various forms, the political and economic context, and the manoeuvrings and responses to the unprecedented conditions have not, until now, been given the extensive analysis they deserve. The Broken Decade, Malcolm McKinnons detailed and absorbing history of this period, unpicks the Depression year by year. It begins by introducing the prosperous world of New Zealand in the late 1920s before focusing on the sudden onset of the Depression in 193031, the catastrophic months that followed and, finally, on the attempt to find a way back to that pre-Depression prosperity. Informed by exhaustive research, relevant statistics and fascinating personal accounts, and made accessible and meaningful by insightful analysis, this important book will become New Zealands definitive study of the 1930s Depression.

ISBN: 9781927322260 192732226X

Subjects--Topical Terms:
Economics.
Economic development--Environmental aspects--New Zealand.

Subjects--Geographic Terms:
New Zealand--History--20th century--Fiction.

Dewey Class. No.: 993.032