This new, retitled and expanded New Zealand edition is a substantially revised edition of the Historical Dictionary of New Zealand published in the United States in 2005. It describes the many changes of the past decade while building on the solid foundations of the earlier editions that examined the country's long and lively history. It covers a wide range of topics from relations between the Pakeha and the Maori to the country's recent economic changes and environmental policies. The introduction provides a good starting point, and the chronology traces New Zealand's history from the earliest settlers to the present. The dictionary includes hundreds of entries on important people, places, events, and institutions, as well as significant political, economic, social, and cultural aspects, and a bibliography for further reading.

The dictionary provides a reference to people, events and policies in New Zealand. It presents a chronology beginning in c200 AD, and there is an introductory essay 'New Zealand: a social and economic laboratory'. The bibliography is arranged in topical sections. Tables provide information about the population of New Zealand, the ethnic composition of the population, exports and imports, the creation of state-owned enterprises, and New Zealand government asset sales from March 1988 to November 1994.

Diverse elements have created New Zealand’s distinctive political and social culture. First is New Zealand’s journey as a colony, and the various impacts this had on settler and Maori society. The second theme is the quest for what one prominent historian has labelled ‘national obsessions’ – equality and security, both individual and collective. The third, and more recent, theme is New Zealand’s emergence as a nation with a unique identity. New Zealand’s small geographic size and relative isolation from other societies, the dominant influence of British culture, the resurgence of Maori language and culture, the endemic instability of an economy based on a narrow range of pastoral products, and the dominance of the state in the lives of its people, all help to explain much of the present-day New Zealand psyche. This third edition of Historical Dictionary of New Zealand contains a chronology, an introduction, appendix, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 800 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, politics, economy, foreign relations, religion, and culture. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about New Zealand.

The Historical Dictionary of Japan to 1945 spans the entire period from the earliest evidence of human habitation in Japan through to the end of the Pacific War. It includes substantial topics such as cultural and literary history, with entries ranging from aesthetics to various genres of writing. Other branches of history also feature, such as economic history, industrial history, political history, and so forth. And of course there are the makers of Japanese history, ranging from emperors and shoguns to politicians and extremists – as well as foreign arrivals. The early history of Japan is told through a detailed chronology, an introductory essay, appendixes, an extensive bibliography, and over 800 cross-referenced dictionary entries on important people, organizations, activities, and events. The Historical Dictionary of Japan to 1945 will appeal to both academics and the general public who have an interest in Japan, particularly those who want reliable information quickly and easily.

"The principle guide to the political context, institutions and processesz of government in New Zealand. It provides readers with a clear and comprehensive introduction to the history, theory and knowledge required to understand the New Zealand political system."--Publisher's description.

The year 2003 is the 150th anniversary of Parliamentary elections in New Zealand and this book was commissioned by the Electoral Commission to celebrate. In a well-illustrated and readable text, the book takes the reader through the evolution of modern voting.

‘Dreadful murder at Opunake', said the Taranaki Herald, ‘Shocking outrage', cried the Evening Post in Wellington when they learned in November 1880 that a young woman called Mary Dobie had been found lying under a flax bush near Opunake on the Taranaki coast with her throat cut so deep her head was almost severed. In the midst of tensions between Maori and Pakeha in 1880, the murder ignited questions: Pakeha feared it was an act of political terrorism in response to the state's determination to take the land of the tribes in the region. Maori thought it would be the cue for the state to use force against them, especially the pacifist settlement at Parihaka. Was it rape or robbery, was the killer Maori or Pakeha? In this book, David Hastings takes us back to that lonely road on the Taranaki coast in nineteenth-century New Zealand to unravels the many deaths of Mary Dobie – the murder, the social tensions in Taranaki, the hunt for the killer and the lessons that Maori and Pakeha learnt about the murder and about themselves.