Geoff Parker: Were Māori A Sovereign Nation Before The Treaty?

The claim that Māori had already established a sovereign nation before the Treaty of Waitangi sounds straightforward enough. But the answer depends on what is meant by “sovereign” and “nation” and, most importantly, whether Māori — the people with whom the Treaty was signed — were politically united under any common authority.

There is no doubt that Māori exercised authority before 1840. Chiefs, hapū and iwi controlled their own people and territories, and the British Government recognised that reality.

Lord Normanby's instructions to Captain Hobson in 1839 stated that Māori had:

“a title to the soil and to the sovereignty of New Zealand ... solemnly recognised by the British Government.”

That is strong evidence that Britain recognised Māori authority and sovereignty.

It is sometimes pointed out that Normanby had never visited New Zealand. That is true, but his instructions were not based simply on personal observation. The British Government had been receiving information about New Zealand from people on the ground, including British Resident James Busby, missionaries and settlers. More importantly, William Hobson himself had visited New Zealand in 1837 aboard HMS Rattlesnake, where he met Busby, missionaries, settlers and Māori leaders. He subsequently submitted a report to the British Government proposing a system of trading “factories” and a treaty with Māori. Normanby's instructions were prepared within the Colonial Office by James Stephen, drawing on this developing body of information.

But the same instructions (above) also contain an important qualification. Normanby described New Zealand's inhabitants as:

“numerous, dispersed, and petty tribes, who possess few political relations to each other, and are incompetent to act, or even to deliberate, in concert.”

That hardly describes a single, unified nation exercising sovereignty through one overarching political authority.

The question therefore is not whether Māori possessed authority or sovereignty before the Treaty. Clearly they did.

The question is: Was there one Māori government exercising authority over the whole of New Zealand?

There was no national parliament, executive, ruler or other overarching authority representing all Māori. Political authority rested principally with individual chiefs, hapū and iwi.

The 1835 Declaration of Independence and the Confederation of the United Tribes demonstrated an attempt by northern chiefs to establish collective authority. But the Confederation did not represent all Māori or develop into a government exercising authority throughout New Zealand.

The question also has an international-law dimension. If Māori had already established a single sovereign nation before 1840, it might be expected that there would have existed an organised political entity capable of entering into relations and agreements with other states.

In Twisting the Treaty, former Canterbury law lecturer David Round argues that Māori had not formed such an organised state. He contends that, under the international law of the time, they therefore lacked the capacity to enter into a treaty in the conventional international sense.

That view is not universally accepted, and the international legal status of the Treaty remains debated. But Round's argument nevertheless highlights the central historical question: if there was no unified Māori political entity capable of acting for all Māori, on what basis can it be claimed that Māori had already established a single sovereign nation covering the whole of New Zealand?

The Treaty itself recognised this fragmented political reality. The 'Official' English text distinguishes between the Confederation of the United Tribes and the “separate and independent Chiefs”, referring to the sovereignty they exercised over their respective territories.

Māori can certainly be described as a nation in a cultural sense: a people linked by ancestry, language and culture. But that is not necessarily the same as saying that all Māori had formed a single sovereign political nation governing the whole of New Zealand.

The most accurate conclusion seems to be this:

Before the Treaty, Māori possessed sovereignty and political authority, but it was exercised through numerous chiefs, hapū and iwi rather than through one unified Māori government or sovereign nation-state covering the whole of New Zealand.

That distinction matters.

Recognising Māori authority before 1840 does not require us to invent a unified Māori nation-state that the historical record itself does not clearly show existed.

And, as Normanby's own words demonstrate, the British Government recognised both sides of that reality: Māori possessed sovereignty, but they were also a collection of separate and dispersed tribes with limited political unity.

That is not Māori-bashing or history-twisting. It is recognising Māori authority and sovereignty where it existed, while refusing to turn a collection of independent iwi and hapū into a unified sovereign nation-state that the historical record does not clearly show ever existed.

Geoff Parker is a passionate advocate for equal rights and a colour blind society.