New Zealand and the United Nations 70 years on: Murray McCully launches a new volume that highlights New Zealand's role in the world body.

• Author: McCully, Murray
• Position: BOOK LAUNCH - Essay

In 1945, New Zealand joined with 49 other nations in the post-Second World War era to establish the United Nations. We played an active role in the negotiation of the UN Charter, setting the rules and principles to govern global relations. Our positions in 1945 included opposing the veto for the five permanent members of the proposed Security Council, advocating for the principles of collective security and self-determination and pushing for economic and social issues to be at the heart of the agenda. We did not win all those battles, and we are still fighting some of them.

In this article I want to reflect on just two points about our engagement in the United Nations: the changing nature of New Zealand's constituency in it since 1945, and the role of the Security Council. New Zealand's international relationships are fundamentally different today from 1945. Around the time the United Nations was formed, our place in the world was defined by our relationship with, if not dependence on, Britain and our membership of ANZUS.

In the period following the Second World War, it probably made sense to include New Zealand in the UN grouping of nations described as 'Western Europe and Others'. Today, although we share many of the same values, it is very hard to see how we now slot in logically alongside these states in the UN context.

We will always strongly value our ties to our traditional friends, but the way we engage on the diplomatic stage has to adapt to evolving realities. Since 1945, our position as the 'Britain of the South Pacific' has been replaced by deep and genuine ties to the Asia-Pacific region and a strongly independent voice that we raise more often on behalf of smaller states than established interests of our traditional allies. The Asia-Pacific region now accounts for more than 70 per cent of our two-way trade and China and Australia are our largest trading partners.

Changing composition

This shift is also reflected in the makeup of New Zealand society. Around 12 per cent of our population is now of Asian origin-- and in our largest city, Auckland, that proportion is 24 per cent. Seventy-five per cent of all international visitors to New Zealand last year were from the Asia-Pacific region. This trend will only accelerate as Asia's emerging middle class (expected to reach 1.75 billion by 2020) creates new trade opportunities for New Zealand. Likewise, it is now the accepted orthodoxy that New Zealand will not be an active participant in ANZUS in the future as we have looked closer to home for regional defence arrangements, and developed a new security partnership with the United...