However, the HRC has declined to take action against racist acts hostile to non-Māori. It did not defend effectively Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s free speech rights in New Zealand. Rather than focusing on its core legal obligations the HRC has now set as a strategic priority the elimination of racism from New Zealand. It believes this will require race-based constitutional change.
This change is along the lines set out in the 2019 He Puapua document. This argues for Māori governance of things Māori (rangatiratanga), Crown governance of its own affairs (kāwanatanga), and a joint sphere to deliberate upon matters of mutual concern (the relational sphere).
He Puapua denies that the Treaty of Waitangi/Tiriti o Waitangi transferred sovereignty/kāwanatanga to the Crown. In a footnote (p.28) it states incorrectly that “tino rangatiratanga” means “sovereignty”. In fact, tino rangatiratanga means chieftainship or ownership of properties, and this sits within a higher-level Crown sovereignty framework.
The HRC has restructured itself along He Puapua lines. This involves a CEO as ‘kāwanatanga leader, and the appointment of Dr Claire Charters, a He Puapua working group leader to a new role as an indigenous rights governance partner.
In recent publications the HRC has diagnosed racism as a white problem with Māori victims. It indicts white people for racism and argues that Māori can hold negative beliefs about others, however this is not racism because Māori lack power. The argument is that “prejudice without power is not racism.” There may be merit in this argument, however in absolute numbers there are likely to be more impoverished and powerless white people in New Zealand than there are Māori.
There is widespread acceptance that Māori socio-economic outcomes need to improve, however there are different views on how this can be done. I favour applying economic science to this challenge.
In late 2022 the HRC published a document, Maranga Mai! The dynamics and impacts of white supremacy, racism and colonisation on tangata whenua in Aoteoroa New Zealand.
Leading figures who put together Maranga Mai! included Tina Ngata, Rawiri Taonui and Linda Tuhiwai Smith. These are all fine people who have worked hard in their chosen fields. However, they are activists rather than dispassionate scholars.
Maranga Mai is written in accusatory language. It.attributes base, dishonest or malicious motives to key European figures in New Zealand history. In relation to the Waitangi Treaty it argues “that the Europeans who drafted the texts and led pre-signing discussions and assurances with rangatira concealed the full British intentions as outlined in the English version.”
This charge is untrue, as can be seen by reading the instructions from Lord Normanby to Captain Hobson . In discussions with Māori leading up to Te Tiriti’s signing, Hobson, Henry Williams and others put great emphasis on ensuring Māori knew what they were asked to agree to. Henry Williams translated Hobson’s presentation into Māori. Tāmati Wāka Nene spoke in favour, referring to Hobson as “a father, a judge, a peacemaker.”
McQueen (2020) comprehensively demonstrates that Māori fully understood what they were signing up to in Te Tiriti, including Crown sovereignty and its relationship with tino rangatiratanga.
As was their right, some chiefs did not sign Te Tiriti. However, all accepted that the Treaty created Crown sovereignty over all New Zealanders.
William Colenso took detailed notes of Tiriti discussions in 1840 and recorded them in The Authentic and Genuine History of the Signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. These notes were attested to by James Busby in the month following the Treaty’s signing. Others who left accounts of the discussions included Hobson, Pompallier and Henry Williams. The Māori perspective was very well reflected in Colenso’s record.
The 1860 Kohimarama Conference was the largest ever gathering of Māori chiefs in New Zealand – around 200 attended. Many of the chiefs who signed Te Tiriti o Waitangi in 1840 were at the 1860 Conference. Some expressed concerns around land, law and order, and engagement in the political process. However, they agreed unanimously to endorse Crown sovereignty.
The first Māori King Potatau Te Wherowhero had not signed the Treaty. However in 1953 the Queen visited King Koroki and other Tainui leaders at Ngaruawahia and Tainui pledged an “oath of true allegiance” which acknowledged the Queen’s sovereignty.
Some HRC publications are arguably racist in places and on some issues and this might be challengeable. The 2022 Supreme Court decision quashing the late Peter Ellis’ convictions saw tikanga incorporated into New Zealand’s common law system. Under tikanga, mana and reputation carry on beyond an individual’s life. This opens new legal avenues to challenge those who have libelled the reputations of people who gave themselves to advance Māori wellbeing, only to be besmirched after their deaths.
A test case could be legal action against the HRC to restore the reputations of 19th century Pakeha educators.
Maranga Mai argues that the Crown used colonisation and legislation to structure education to eliminate Māori identity, te reo and culture and to train young Māori to become menial manual and domestic workers.
In fact, missionaries largely created the foundation for widespread literacy in New Zealand. In 1816 Anglican missionaries founded the first school in New Zealand established on European lines. Te Aute College began in1854 as the Ahuriri Native Industrial School and then switched its focus to higher education. John Thornton, Te Aute College’s headmaster from 1878 to 1912 focused on preparing “Maori boys for the matriculation examination of the New Zealand University” so that Māori could have their own doctors, lawyers and other professionals.
Te Aute educated many influential Māori including Āpirana Ngata, Peter Buck (Te Rangi Hīroa), Māui Pōmare, Edward Ellison, Paraire Tomoana and Rēweti Kōhere. These graduates were educated to the best academic standards available in New Zealand at the time. Their teachers were highly educated Pakeha who also respected Māori culture and often spoke Māori fluently. Te Aute’s founder, Samuel Williams and Thornton lobbied to have Māori language included at university level in BA degrees.
In 1880 the brilliant polymath James Pope was appointed Inspector of the 57 native schools then operating. He drafted a native school’s code that set high standards for schools. He insisted that Māori must receive at least as good an education as European children. He visited Te Aute and described the standards reached in mathematics and science as “equal to those of any secondary school in the country”.
Pope’s Health for the Maori: A Manual for use in Native Schools published in 1884 was embraced by Te Aute college graduates. Translated into Māori, Pope’s manual was used by the young Āpirana Ngata, Rēweti Kōhere and others as a basis for their campaigns to improve hygiene and sanitation to enhance Māori health. Decades later, Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana gave Pope’s manual an important place in his missionary efforts. Not bad achievements for colonising white supremacists!
The Treaty/Tiriti established Crown governance and the rule of law, protected property rights, and conferred equal rights on all New Zealanders. As an international agreement Te Tiriti had no force until it was reflected in domestic legislation. This required the enactment of the NZ Constitution Act 1852 and the establishment of a Parliament.
The New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 gave the vote only to males who met a property qualification. This effectively excluded most Māori since their property was held communally. Four Māori seats were created in 1867 to address this problem. This gave the vote to all Māori men at a time when Pakeha men without property were voteless. Women achieved the vote in 1893.
As our constitution evolved, we achieved universal suffrage before any other country. We then adopted MMP in 1996 to further counterbalance majoritarian power with wider Parliamentary inclusiveness.
The Treaty/Tiriti was the starting point not the end point for New Zealand’s constitutional development. The1986 NZ Constitution Act confirmed the democratically elected Parliament’s authority and made clear that the Crown has only a symbolic and procedural role.
Sadly, the Crown violated Te Tiriti’s property right guarantees, leading to conflict and land loss. Rightly this required restitution through the Waitangi Tribunal and through direct settlements negotiated between government and Māori. Of course, Māori also violated Te Tiriti, however two wrongs do not make a right. Treaty settlements are about upholding the integrity of our government system and about showing respect to Māori and restoring mana.
Confusion in today’s Te Tiriti discourse largely arises from activists ignoring the 1840 document and substituting their own interpretations and wishes. For example, in 1840 taonga meant real property such as a tool or a waka, not intangible “property” such as broadcasting spectrum, language or water.
Te Tiriti is not a constitutional partnership between Pakeha and Māori or the Crown and Māori. Māori are subjects of the Crown, not partners with it. There are no principles stated in Te Tiriti. There is no “Aotearoa”; Māori are citizens of Nu Tirani (New Zealand). They are not referred to as indigenous nor as tangata whenua.
The Musket Wars, including associated take raupatu (rights of conquest), broke many of the linkages between specific hapu and iwi and their lands. Hapu and iwi borders were and still are contested. What does “tangata whenua” really mean when economic change has drawn most Māori away from their traditional tribal lands into cities or offshore?
To demonstrate balance, the HRC could prepare a report on the impact of the Musket Wars on Māori in New Zealand, as documented by Ron Crosby, a distinguished historian and Waitangi Tribunal member. The death toll from these “Māori on Māori” wars likely exceeded that from all other conflicts New Zealand has been involved in combined. White supremacists slavishly following the dictates of 15th century Papal Bulls can hardly be blamed for this violence and devastation.
The HRC shows little understanding of the psychology underlying phenomena such as conflict between and within groups. The human mind has evolved modules for coalition recognition and formation. These coalitions can include nationality, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, avocational and sporting affiliations, social class as well as race. Tribal affiliation not race was the major source of violence in pre-European New Zealand. Religious hatred more so than racism led to the mass murder of Muslims in Christchurch in 2019. Despite these complexities the HRC focuses on eliminating what it labels as white racism by promoting race-based constitutional change!
History shows that race-based societies fail. No tribally based society has ever succeeded in the modern world. And yet New Zealand is rapidly racializing and tribalizing its system of central and local government and other institutions.
It is time for the HRC to return to its core statutory obligations. In doing so, can we be spared from future “education” about the relevance of 15th century Papal Bulls and doctrines of discovery to the real problems New Zealand faces, such as low productivity, housing affordability, child poverty, mediocre education and decaying social cohesion?
References
HRC 2022: Maranga Mai! The Dynamics and Impacts of Colonisation, Racism, and
White Supremacy upon Tangata Whenua in Aotearoa.
McQueen, E. 2020: One Sun in the Sky. Galatas NZ Ltd.
Dr Peter Winsley has worked in policy and economics-related fields in New Zealand for many years. With qualifications and publications in economics, management and literature. This article was first published HERE
He Puapua denies that the Treaty of Waitangi/Tiriti o Waitangi transferred sovereignty/kāwanatanga to the Crown. In a footnote (p.28) it states incorrectly that “tino rangatiratanga” means “sovereignty”. In fact, tino rangatiratanga means chieftainship or ownership of properties, and this sits within a higher-level Crown sovereignty framework.
The HRC has restructured itself along He Puapua lines. This involves a CEO as ‘kāwanatanga leader, and the appointment of Dr Claire Charters, a He Puapua working group leader to a new role as an indigenous rights governance partner.
In recent publications the HRC has diagnosed racism as a white problem with Māori victims. It indicts white people for racism and argues that Māori can hold negative beliefs about others, however this is not racism because Māori lack power. The argument is that “prejudice without power is not racism.” There may be merit in this argument, however in absolute numbers there are likely to be more impoverished and powerless white people in New Zealand than there are Māori.
There is widespread acceptance that Māori socio-economic outcomes need to improve, however there are different views on how this can be done. I favour applying economic science to this challenge.
In late 2022 the HRC published a document, Maranga Mai! The dynamics and impacts of white supremacy, racism and colonisation on tangata whenua in Aoteoroa New Zealand.
Leading figures who put together Maranga Mai! included Tina Ngata, Rawiri Taonui and Linda Tuhiwai Smith. These are all fine people who have worked hard in their chosen fields. However, they are activists rather than dispassionate scholars.
Maranga Mai is written in accusatory language. It.attributes base, dishonest or malicious motives to key European figures in New Zealand history. In relation to the Waitangi Treaty it argues “that the Europeans who drafted the texts and led pre-signing discussions and assurances with rangatira concealed the full British intentions as outlined in the English version.”
This charge is untrue, as can be seen by reading the instructions from Lord Normanby to Captain Hobson . In discussions with Māori leading up to Te Tiriti’s signing, Hobson, Henry Williams and others put great emphasis on ensuring Māori knew what they were asked to agree to. Henry Williams translated Hobson’s presentation into Māori. Tāmati Wāka Nene spoke in favour, referring to Hobson as “a father, a judge, a peacemaker.”
McQueen (2020) comprehensively demonstrates that Māori fully understood what they were signing up to in Te Tiriti, including Crown sovereignty and its relationship with tino rangatiratanga.
As was their right, some chiefs did not sign Te Tiriti. However, all accepted that the Treaty created Crown sovereignty over all New Zealanders.
William Colenso took detailed notes of Tiriti discussions in 1840 and recorded them in The Authentic and Genuine History of the Signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. These notes were attested to by James Busby in the month following the Treaty’s signing. Others who left accounts of the discussions included Hobson, Pompallier and Henry Williams. The Māori perspective was very well reflected in Colenso’s record.
The 1860 Kohimarama Conference was the largest ever gathering of Māori chiefs in New Zealand – around 200 attended. Many of the chiefs who signed Te Tiriti o Waitangi in 1840 were at the 1860 Conference. Some expressed concerns around land, law and order, and engagement in the political process. However, they agreed unanimously to endorse Crown sovereignty.
The first Māori King Potatau Te Wherowhero had not signed the Treaty. However in 1953 the Queen visited King Koroki and other Tainui leaders at Ngaruawahia and Tainui pledged an “oath of true allegiance” which acknowledged the Queen’s sovereignty.
Some HRC publications are arguably racist in places and on some issues and this might be challengeable. The 2022 Supreme Court decision quashing the late Peter Ellis’ convictions saw tikanga incorporated into New Zealand’s common law system. Under tikanga, mana and reputation carry on beyond an individual’s life. This opens new legal avenues to challenge those who have libelled the reputations of people who gave themselves to advance Māori wellbeing, only to be besmirched after their deaths.
A test case could be legal action against the HRC to restore the reputations of 19th century Pakeha educators.
Maranga Mai argues that the Crown used colonisation and legislation to structure education to eliminate Māori identity, te reo and culture and to train young Māori to become menial manual and domestic workers.
In fact, missionaries largely created the foundation for widespread literacy in New Zealand. In 1816 Anglican missionaries founded the first school in New Zealand established on European lines. Te Aute College began in1854 as the Ahuriri Native Industrial School and then switched its focus to higher education. John Thornton, Te Aute College’s headmaster from 1878 to 1912 focused on preparing “Maori boys for the matriculation examination of the New Zealand University” so that Māori could have their own doctors, lawyers and other professionals.
Te Aute educated many influential Māori including Āpirana Ngata, Peter Buck (Te Rangi Hīroa), Māui Pōmare, Edward Ellison, Paraire Tomoana and Rēweti Kōhere. These graduates were educated to the best academic standards available in New Zealand at the time. Their teachers were highly educated Pakeha who also respected Māori culture and often spoke Māori fluently. Te Aute’s founder, Samuel Williams and Thornton lobbied to have Māori language included at university level in BA degrees.
In 1880 the brilliant polymath James Pope was appointed Inspector of the 57 native schools then operating. He drafted a native school’s code that set high standards for schools. He insisted that Māori must receive at least as good an education as European children. He visited Te Aute and described the standards reached in mathematics and science as “equal to those of any secondary school in the country”.
Pope’s Health for the Maori: A Manual for use in Native Schools published in 1884 was embraced by Te Aute college graduates. Translated into Māori, Pope’s manual was used by the young Āpirana Ngata, Rēweti Kōhere and others as a basis for their campaigns to improve hygiene and sanitation to enhance Māori health. Decades later, Tahupotiki Wiremu Ratana gave Pope’s manual an important place in his missionary efforts. Not bad achievements for colonising white supremacists!
The Treaty/Tiriti established Crown governance and the rule of law, protected property rights, and conferred equal rights on all New Zealanders. As an international agreement Te Tiriti had no force until it was reflected in domestic legislation. This required the enactment of the NZ Constitution Act 1852 and the establishment of a Parliament.
The New Zealand Constitution Act 1852 gave the vote only to males who met a property qualification. This effectively excluded most Māori since their property was held communally. Four Māori seats were created in 1867 to address this problem. This gave the vote to all Māori men at a time when Pakeha men without property were voteless. Women achieved the vote in 1893.
As our constitution evolved, we achieved universal suffrage before any other country. We then adopted MMP in 1996 to further counterbalance majoritarian power with wider Parliamentary inclusiveness.
The Treaty/Tiriti was the starting point not the end point for New Zealand’s constitutional development. The1986 NZ Constitution Act confirmed the democratically elected Parliament’s authority and made clear that the Crown has only a symbolic and procedural role.
Sadly, the Crown violated Te Tiriti’s property right guarantees, leading to conflict and land loss. Rightly this required restitution through the Waitangi Tribunal and through direct settlements negotiated between government and Māori. Of course, Māori also violated Te Tiriti, however two wrongs do not make a right. Treaty settlements are about upholding the integrity of our government system and about showing respect to Māori and restoring mana.
Confusion in today’s Te Tiriti discourse largely arises from activists ignoring the 1840 document and substituting their own interpretations and wishes. For example, in 1840 taonga meant real property such as a tool or a waka, not intangible “property” such as broadcasting spectrum, language or water.
Te Tiriti is not a constitutional partnership between Pakeha and Māori or the Crown and Māori. Māori are subjects of the Crown, not partners with it. There are no principles stated in Te Tiriti. There is no “Aotearoa”; Māori are citizens of Nu Tirani (New Zealand). They are not referred to as indigenous nor as tangata whenua.
The Musket Wars, including associated take raupatu (rights of conquest), broke many of the linkages between specific hapu and iwi and their lands. Hapu and iwi borders were and still are contested. What does “tangata whenua” really mean when economic change has drawn most Māori away from their traditional tribal lands into cities or offshore?
To demonstrate balance, the HRC could prepare a report on the impact of the Musket Wars on Māori in New Zealand, as documented by Ron Crosby, a distinguished historian and Waitangi Tribunal member. The death toll from these “Māori on Māori” wars likely exceeded that from all other conflicts New Zealand has been involved in combined. White supremacists slavishly following the dictates of 15th century Papal Bulls can hardly be blamed for this violence and devastation.
The HRC shows little understanding of the psychology underlying phenomena such as conflict between and within groups. The human mind has evolved modules for coalition recognition and formation. These coalitions can include nationality, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, avocational and sporting affiliations, social class as well as race. Tribal affiliation not race was the major source of violence in pre-European New Zealand. Religious hatred more so than racism led to the mass murder of Muslims in Christchurch in 2019. Despite these complexities the HRC focuses on eliminating what it labels as white racism by promoting race-based constitutional change!
History shows that race-based societies fail. No tribally based society has ever succeeded in the modern world. And yet New Zealand is rapidly racializing and tribalizing its system of central and local government and other institutions.
It is time for the HRC to return to its core statutory obligations. In doing so, can we be spared from future “education” about the relevance of 15th century Papal Bulls and doctrines of discovery to the real problems New Zealand faces, such as low productivity, housing affordability, child poverty, mediocre education and decaying social cohesion?
References
HRC 2022: Maranga Mai! The Dynamics and Impacts of Colonisation, Racism, and
White Supremacy upon Tangata Whenua in Aotearoa.
McQueen, E. 2020: One Sun in the Sky. Galatas NZ Ltd.
Dr Peter Winsley has worked in policy and economics-related fields in New Zealand for many years. With qualifications and publications in economics, management and literature. This article was first published HERE
6 comments:
Excellent analysis, Peter.
Much of the activism over the last few years may have been motivated by a genuine desire to achieve a fair and just society - but not all of it. We detect blind ambition and bullying there too, and it must be countered.
David Lillis
The woke have an answer for everything.
"Prejudice without power" is the woke mantra to explain why racism can only be practised by white people - because, in woke logic, they hold the power.
Therefore, overt racist comments by non-white people (who are powerless) is
" prejudice".
UK Labour MP stated this in a recent BBC interview.
Of course you are right Peter, having painstakingly gone over all this - AGAIN. It's boring isn't it because logical people can understand it and illogical malcontents never will. Paul Hunt has no such excuse. The Human Rights Commission is a whited sepulchre!
I'm pretty sure I don't have any power over anyone, last time I looked.
But then again, l'm just an old white guy.
Arguably the the most discriminated against group on the entire planet.
Almost 50 years ago, many books pertaining to New Zealand's history were suddenly removed from libraries, schools and museums. Why? I believe that there were more than 80 of them, and an acquaintance of mine has a copy of every one of them! What about New Zealand's Royal Charter/Letters Patent of November 16, 1840? A country which doesn't know its true history has no future!
Kevan
Thanks for this excellent piece especially in providing a true picture of education efforts for Maori. Important knowledge about which the current Maori activists and their foolish supporters are simply lying.
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