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Indigenous peoples across the world have a shared experience of colonisation; a process that has resulted in war, disease and the decimation of their lands, homes and peoples. In New Zealand, the effects of colonisation are still evident with Māori (the indigenous people of New Zealand) experiencing poorer outcomes compared with non-Māori citizens across a range of social, health and well-being indicators. This paper is a case study of work being done in New Zealand, which may have resonance with work in South Africa, and other countries with a history of colonisation. It begins with a brief history of the impacts of colonisation on Māori before considering the concept of decolonisation. The author outlines the work her organisation does as an independent, tribally owned, Māori health research centre to advance a decolonisation agenda. Reflecting on their emancipatory and democratising ambitions as researchers provides the opening for a discussion about indigenous ethics. The paper presents a number of Māori ethical principles that guide their work, arguing that were such principles applied in the development and implementation of social policy and legislation, the effect would be a fairer, more equitable policy that better meets the needs of Māori as citizens. Recent legislation enacted to improve New Zealand’s care and protection system for children is discussed to illustrate the need for greater consideration of Māori values when developing legislation that directly impacts Māori. The paper concludes with a challenge to policymakers, practitioners, academics, and researchers alike to actively contribute to an agenda of liberation, emancipation and decolonisation for indigenous peoples.
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During the 1980s and 1990s biculturalism was the ascendant political philosophy for managing the relationship between the New Zealand Crown and the indigenous Maori population. Biculturalism understood Maori politics as a partnership between Maori and the state, grounded in the Treaty of Waitangi, the agreement signed in 1840 from which British government was established. Biculturalism was presented as morally superior to multiculturalism which was understood as setting aside Maori Treaty rights and rights of prior occupancy in favour of less substantive rights available to Maori as one of many ethnic minorities. However, a deeper reading of multicultural political theory provides an instructive critique of biculturalism's inherent limits from the perspective of the Maori right to self-determination. It shows why biculturalism's influence waned. It also shows why Matike Mai o Aotearoa, a blueprint for constitutional transformation commissioned by tribal leaders is unlikely to succeed as a contemporary attempt to reassert biculturalism's influence. Multicultural theory is not a panacea for the right to self-determination, but it does not restrict the development of a broader Maori-centred differentiated liberal citizenship in the ways that biculturalism precludes.
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Colonial praxis has been imposed on the culture, epistemologies and praxis of indigenous Maori in Aotearoa, entrenching the settler cultural project that ensures the continuation of the colonial state, producing damaging disparities. This article theorises ways in which settler privilege works at multiple levels supporting settler interests, aspirations and sensibilities. In institutions, myriad mundane processes operate through commerce, law, media, education, health services, environment, religion and international relations constituting settler culture, values and norms. Among individuals, settler discursive/ideological frameworks are hegemonic, powerfully influencing interactions with Maori to produce outcomes that routinely suit settlers. In the internalised domain, there is a symbiotic sense of belonging, rightness, entitlement and confidence that the established social hierarchies will serve settler interests. This structure of privilege works together with overt and implicit acts of racism to reproduce a collective sense of superiority. It requires progressive de-mobilising together with anti-racism efforts to enable our society to move toward social justice.
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Indigenous peoples find themselves locked in power struggles with states and transnational actors who resist their claims, raising important questions in theory and practice. Edited by Marc Woons.
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The idea of dignity is often taken to be a foundation for principles of justice and democracy. In the West it has numerous formulations and conceptualisations. Within the capabilities approach to justice theorists have expanded the concept of dignity to encompass animals and ecological communities. In this article I rework the idea of dignity to include the Māori philosophical concepts of mauri, tapu and mana – something I argue is necessary if the capabilities approach is to decolonise in the Aotearoa context. Furthermore, the article links the nation's recognition of three extensive geographical regions – Te Awa Tupua, Te Urewera and Mt Taranaki – as legal persons to Mātauranga Māori and nonhuman dignity. In doing so, I identify the potential that this understanding of dignity and these legal moves have to decolonise democracy within the settler state.
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