Our previous blog about the Treaty of Waitangi Sovereignty Debate spurred much comment on social media sites. Many readers insist that they know "the truth" - the truth about why sovereignty was ceded - or the truth as to why it was not ceded (which is why these "truths" have become more like "beliefs", in my view). I challenge those holding strong views - on both sides - to consider their answer to the following puzzle, which I can't figure out myself:
If I strike a deal whereby the other party promises me that I will retain possession & ownership of my existing assets & treasures, and in exchange I promise to grant that other party powers of Sovereignty, of Statehood, of Government, where does that leave us? Here's the puzzle: a sovereign authority / state / government, has the power to tax. That's the distinguishing feature which defines such entities (together with a monopoly over the use of violence). Once I act as your Sovereign/ State / Government, I am empowered to pass laws. Those laws can include asset taxes, which mean I can slowly - or quickly - take the property you were promised, back from you. I only need to introduce a tax on assets at, say, 2% of their value, annually. In a few decades, most of your assets can be appropriated back to me.
What this means to an economist is that guaranteeing to one party they can hold onto their assets & treasures, in exchange for granting sovereign, government, or state powers to another party, creates a contradictory, paradoxical quagmire. Whether your prefer the English or the Māori version of The Treaty, it makes no difference - there remains the same unresolvable murkiness concerning what both parties thought they were signing up to.
Though Opposition Leader Hipkins thinks he may have cleverly wriggled out of this debate by arguing Sovereignty / Statehood / Powers of Government were not ceded in the Treaty, but have been since, he cannot have it both ways. Why? As just one example, we know he wants to introduce capital & asset taxes in NZ and also know he won't levy such taxes on Māori Authority / Iwi assets. What that means is he unambiguously does not accept the NZ Parliament - right now - holds the key power defining what it is to be the sovereign / state / government. That power is the right to levy taxes on all assets, including those promised to be retained by others in Treaties. Therefore, Mr Hipkins does not accept the ruling authority of his own Parliament. To make matters even more contradictory, he has reserved the right, and is openly discussing it, of confiscating the wealth of hard-working Kiwis through the capital / asset taxes he's lining up for the next election, thereby asserting his full powers of Sovereignty / Statehood / Government over non-Māori assets, but not of Māori assets.
My interpretation of this situation is that the Treaty, from the viewpoint of an economist, is a self-contradictory document. It was drawn up by folks who, on both sides, did not much, for whatever reason, contemplate the paradoxes it created. It is simply impossible for me to be given the rights to hold onto what I consider to be "my assets" in perpetuity, while at the same time handing you powers to govern over those assets - which means you can take them back through taxation. Its looking to me like the Treaty was not the deal it pretended to be. The economics of it is opaque. What the parties agreed to baffles this economist. That's why we may need to start over again, and stop having endless arguments trying to interpret the uninterpretable.
Professor Robert MacCulloch holds the Matthew S. Abel Chair of Macroeconomics at Auckland University. He has previously worked at the Reserve Bank, Oxford University, and the London School of Economics. He runs the blog Down to Earth Kiwi from where this article was sourced.
2 comments:
Robert, if you take an economist’s view, then you should recognise the good that was provided in return for the land. For the Maoris, that means everything they now have, from the food they eat, the clothes they wear and the houses they live in, to the devices they thumb, the cars they drive and the internationally used language they speak and can now write. Compare that to what the Maoris had before 1840 and measure it by their life expectancy and population growth.
I call this the pakeha taonga. The chiefs took it into consideration when they signed the Treaty and the Maoris acquired it as part of the deal. It has been acquired by Europeans after thousands of years of hard work including the building of this country by the colonists. Our philosophy, science and technology are seldom recognized. Why? You have a paradox because you select your data.
You would be right to say that beliefs in the Treaty are not as important as the facts of colonization. Instead, you implicitly denigrate the colonists when you should venerate them. Break out of the Orwellian, progressive, authoritarian (woke) zeitgeist.
By the way, I watched a clip recently in which Chris Hipkins said he learned what he knows about the Treaty from what he was taught at school. The mind boggles at the irony.
The Treaty doesnt say Maori land is theirs in perpetuity... It says its yours now...establishing a baseline and thereby preventing wildcat claims by Europeans... And then said you can sell your land if you wish to the crown....
Parliament is soveriegn. Ngata made this clear and he would know a hell a lot more about that than anyone alive today
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