Display of Badges

This display of badges is how the New Zealand Peace Foundation presented its activist and protest badges at points-of-sale throughout New Zealand in the 1980s and 1990s.

Thousands of such badges were made for the anti-nuclear and peace movements around the world. They were effective fundraising tools and message carriers, like wearing tiny portable billboards.

Badges play an important role in protest paraphernalia – they are small, easily reproducible, cheap and wearable. They enable a broad range of people to participate in protest at a daily ground level.

Badges transmit ideas and causes, and help people create their own protest identities. Their symbols and slogans can be powerful reminders of issues and concerns in society.

Two of the badges in this display include Māori koru designs which localise the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) symbol in Aotearoa.