The Treaty on the Ground by Rachael Bell

Author:Rachael Bell [Bell, Rachael]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780994130051
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Massey University Press
Published: 2017-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

UNCONDITIONAL RATHER THAN RECIPROCAL

THE TREATY AND THE STATE SECTOR

Kim Workman (Ngāti Kahungunu ki Wairarapa me Rangitāne o Wairarapa), Adjunct Research Associate, Institute of Criminology, Victoria University of Wellington

In the 1980s, building on the establishment of the Waitangi Tribunal in 1975, government began responding to Māori demands: it expanded the powers of the Waitangi Tribunal, increasingly and controversially included references to the Treaty of Waitangi in legislation, and looked to devolve responsibilities for a wide range of services to iwi organisations. During this period of dramatic state-sector reform, biculturalism provided a model, and the Treaty of Waitangi became the primary platform for reform.

The development activity of the 1980s was preceded by a period of considerable political upheaval in the 1970s. In the latter part of that decade, the anti-war movement merged with other major causes: women’s rights, the anti-apartheid movement and the emerging Māori renaissance. Māori sought increased control over their own affairs; between 1975 and 1980 there were high-profile protests against the alienation of Māori land, and powerful resistance against earlier policies of assimilation and integration.

The continued alienation of Māori land was met with confrontational expressions of rangatiratanga at Waitangi Day and a succession of protests: the 1975 hīkoi led by Te Rarawa leader Whina Cooper,1 the occupation of Bastion Point in 1977, and the Raglan Golf Course protest in 1978. Māori made clear its autonomist view of Māori partnership with the Crown, and called for the government to reflect the bicultural direction of New Zealand society.

Ngā Tamatoa was in ascendance in the 1970s and, according to historian Richard Hill, by the early 1980s the Waitangi Action Committee was referred to as being at the ‘radical cutting edge of Māori politics’ both in its methods and demands.2 While they earned the ire of conservative Māori leadership and the Muldoon Government, protestors were able to draw upon support, not only from conservative Māori leaders, but also from increasing numbers of Pākehā who identified with, or participated in, Māori activist causes.

When a new political party, Mana Motuhake, was formed in 1980, it made clear its autonomist view of Māori sovereignty, but at the same time called on the government to reflect the bicultural direction of New Zealand society. This approach earned support outside the party, including from within the ranks of the public service. It was able to pull together a range of ideas and thoughts that reflected the need to identify and repair past harm, and then face the future with confidence. It rejected the assimilationist policies of the previous governments and demanded reparation for past breaches of the Treaty. Its message for the future was one of hope, self-reliance and advancement. Mana Motuhake’s influence was considerable, and complemented the Treaty-based discourse which increasingly came to permeate the public and political discussion, moving the debate beyond that of traditional concern with land issues to include the discussion about the place of Māori culture in a bicultural society and how rangatiratanga could be integrated into existing constitutional and political arrangements.3 The Hunn-styled policies of assimilation and/or integration were over.

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