1. SETTING THE CONTEXT

In 1978 John Eekelaar published the first edition of his book Family Law and Social Policy. A second edition was published in 1984. While the second edition is no clone of the first, I have gone back primarily to the first because, in many ways, it represents a turning point in the literature about family law. While the book is a development, for example, from the establishment of the Oxford Centre for Socio-Legal Studies approximately 50 years ago, it captures a change in thinking from family law as a black-letter law subject, to one that can only be properly explored in its wider social, cultural, ethical and political context. Indeed, the Eekelaar book was in the ‘Law in Context’ series.

Since 1978 much has changed, both in the law and in society. The laws of marriage and divorce are much less significant in contrast to the laws of unmarried cohabitation, home violence and abuse, elder law, and even more broadly, child poverty. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child is a significant backdrop to much of the debate about child law. Other international conventions, such as the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, highlight a growing globalisation of family law. Forms of dispute resolution have changed, with an emphasis on specialist family courts and alternative methods, such as mediation. Yet alongside globalisation, there is more indigeneity.

New Zealand is a nation that owes much to its British heritage, and a great deal of what Eekelaar was saying in 1978 resonated on the other side of the world. Over four decades later, that is far less true. Prompted in part by Britain’s entry into Europe and now, ironically, its ‘Brexit’, New Zealand’s focus has shifted to the Asia-Pacific region. This is reflected, for example, in the changing ethnic demographic. Within the country itself, the colonial strings (at one stage purse strings as well) are gradually falling away. While New Zealand still has ‘the Crown’, the Treaty of Waitangi/te Tiriti o Waitangi of 1840 between the Crown and Māori chiefs has taken on much more importance. In relation to family law and social policy, indigenous culture is increasingly becoming a major driving force.