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| 1885 |
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| The Women's Christian Temperance Union began to campaign for women's suffrage. | 1 |
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| 1889 |
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| Full male suffrage. | 2 |
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| 1890 |
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| New Zealand's first major industrial dispute, a maritime strike, took place, involving 8,000 unionists. The strike was defeated, but unions grew rapidly thereafter. Radical political parties began to appear, as party politics replaced the old dominance of local interests. | 3 |
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| 1891 |
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| A Liberal-Labour Party government was elected with John Ballance as premier. (The Liberals remained in power until 1912.) Taxation on absentee landlords and on the owners of large estates was increased, with the intention of reducing large landholdings. | 4 |
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| 1892 |
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| Kotahitanga Maori parliament was established from an alliance of tribes aiming at autonomy. Meetings of the Kotahitanga continued until 1902, but its authority was never accepted by the Pakeha government. | 5 |
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| 1893–96 |
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| The aggressive populist politician Richard John Seddon (King Dick) became premier. His administration was associated with a series of social and economic reforms, in particular those sponsored by Minister of Labour William Pember Reeves. New Zealand acquired an international reputation for state socialist experimentation. The size of the civil service and state involvement in the economy also increased. | 6 |
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| 1893 |
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| New Zealand granted women's suffrage, the first country in the world to do so. Women also gained rights to join the medical and legal professions in the 1890s. | 7 |
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| 1894 |
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| The Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act established compulsory mediation of industrial disputes and the setting of national wage awards to apply in all parts of a single industry. State arbitration became the basis of the New Zealand industrial relations system, along with rapid trade union growth. | 8 |
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| 1895 |
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| The government secured cheap loans to fund a program of agricultural expansion. Small dairy farms expanded in the North Island, forming the mainstay of the agricultural economy there. | 9 |
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| 1897 |
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| The eight-hour working day was established by law. The Te Aute College Students' Association was established, forming the basis for the Young Maori Party, a group of leaders including Maui Pomare, Apirana Ngata, and Te Rangi Hiroa (Peter Buck), who sought to improve Maori conditions by entering mainstream Pakeha institutions, including Parliament. Both Ngata and Pomare became cabinet ministers. | 10 |
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| 1898 |
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| Old age pensions were introduced. | 11 |
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| 1899 |
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| The New Zealand Farmers' Union was formed to address the concerns of farmers; it soon came to have political importance and was a rival to radical trade unions. | 12 |
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