author
New Zealand. Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents
A controversial New Zealand government committee, this group is best known for producing the 1954 "Mazengarb Report," a document that captured national anxieties about youth behaviour, sexuality, and social change. Its work became one of the most talked-about official inquiries in mid-20th-century New Zealand.
1 Audiobook
Report of the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents
by New Zealand. Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents
About the author
Appointed by the New Zealand government on 23 July 1954, the Special Committee on Moral Delinquency in Children and Adolescents was asked to investigate influences believed to be undermining the sexual morality of children and teenagers. The committee was chaired by lawyer Oswald Chettle Mazengarb, and its report was delivered on 20 September 1954.
The committee is remembered mainly through the publication usually called the Mazengarb Report. Prompted by public concern after high-profile youth scandals and crimes, the report argued that changing social habits, weak supervision, and popular culture were contributing to juvenile moral decline. It was distributed very widely and quickly became a defining document in debates about postwar youth culture in New Zealand.
Today, the report is often discussed less as a neutral study than as a vivid snapshot of 1950s fears about teenagers, sexuality, and modern life. For readers interested in social history, it offers a striking look at how official institutions tried to explain and manage rapid cultural change.