Barrie Davis: Matauranga Maori is a Myth

The New Zealand Parliament is now receiving advice which is informed by maturanga Maori, New Zealand universities are offering courses on maturanga Maori, and New Zealand corporations are incorporating maturanga Maori in their business practices. What is maturanga Maori and why have our institutions accepted it so readily?

Professor Sir Sidney (Hirini) Moko Mead, a foundation professor of Maori studies at Victoria University and a prolific author, has this year published Matauranga Maori, a book about Maori knowledge. It is a companion volume to his 2003 book Tikanga Maori on Maori practices and values. I will consult his Matauranga Maori to consider the above question.

Nick Hanne: Critic, Conscience and Kaupapa: the ongoing Free Speech clash at UoA

Spare a thought for election officials in India who have just run the largest national election in human history. Equally impressive though is the fact that India’s is just one of more than 60 different national elections which will take place in 2024, affecting 50% of the global population. If you were an alien visiting from outer space you could be forgiven for thinking this impressive democratic spectacle represented an upward trend toward greater global liberty and enlightenment.

Everything, however, is not what it seems.

David Lillis: Preserving Excellence in New Zealand Research

Introduction

Since the 1990s, New Zealand’s research effort has been directed towards the achievement of outcomes and investment decisions carried out primarily on the basis of excellence and potential to achieve those outcomes. Until recently, each of our funding instruments embodied excellence or "science quality" as a condition of funding but, unfortunately, excellence has diminished in importance in funding decision-making, especially within the Performance Based Research Fund (PBRF).

Elizabeth Rata: The Road to He Puapua – Is there really a Treaty partnership?

The He Puapua Report proposes revolutionary change for New Zealand. The question of how we have arrived at a crossroads where New Zealanders will have to choose between an ethno-nationalist state — which He Puapua leads to — or a democratic-nationalist one has its origins in three events in 1985, 1986 and 1987.

It was in these years that the concept of a Treaty of Waitangi “partnership” was created. It is the foundational pillar for the Report’s goal of “transformative restructuring of governance to recognise rangatiratanga Māori”. Iwi self-determination includes the co-governance arrangements laid out in He Puapua. There is also the likelihood of claims for the ownership of up to 50 per cent of public assets such as water, sea territories, flora and fauna, and airwaves. Is this path to ethnic nationalism inevitable?

The first key partnership event is the 1985 Treaty of Waitangi Amendment Act. While the 1975 Treaty of Waitangi Act was about the settlement of historical grievances, the 1985 Amendment Act was a very different matter. The recognition of iwi-Māori rather than pan-Māori as the inheritors of Treaty settlements established the reviving tribe as both political player and economic corporation.

Point of Order: Professors warn of constitutional change by stealth and of the dangers of protecting Maori knowledge against refutation

A radical makeover of the research and science sector is outlined in Te Ara Paerangi Future Pathways Green Paper, which was launched on October 28 by Dr Megan Woods as Minister of Research, Science and Innovation. Submissions on the discussion paper closed on March 16.

At the launch of the discussion paper, the government did not disguise its intention to embed the Treaty of Waitangi in the design and delivery of science and research in this country and to provide more opportunities for “mātauranga Māori”.

What does this portend? Graham Adams warns that the inevitable conclusion of the changes proposed in the discussion paper – especially if it is read alongside Te Pūtahitanga: A Tiriti–led Science-Policy Approach for Aotearoa New Zealand (HERE) – is co-governance with iwi of universities and Crown Research Institutes.

In other words, constitutional change by stealth.