In this major work, the leading Māori political scientist Dominic O’Sullivan draws on theories of republicanism and the commonwealth to challenge understandings of Te Tiriti as a partnership between races, or between Māori people and the Crown. O’Sullivan also critiques the idea that Te Tiriti created one people, assimilating Māori into colonial ways of governing. Instead, he proposes a new politics where Māori self-determination and liberal democracy, rangatiratanga and kāwanatanga, complement one another to promote meaningful and culturally grounded political equality.

O’Sullivan enables us to see a future for Aotearoa in which political authority and responsibility belong to everyone and should therefore work equally well for all; a country where Māori people, as much as anyone else, bring their tikanga to public life; and a society where the Crown is no longer the word we use to describe government.

For scholars, policymakers and political leaders, for Māori and Pākehā, for all of us imagining a respectful and inclusive future for our island democracy, this is essential reading.

Author

Dominic O’Sullivan (Te Rarawa, Ngāti Kahu) is a political scientist and professor at Charles Sturt University in Australia. He is the author of eight books including Indigeneity: A Politics of Potential (Policy Press, 2017) and Sharing the Sovereign: Indigenous Peoples, Recognition, Treaties and the State (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020).

Endorsements

‘This will be a seminal book in Aotearoa New Zealand political and Māori scholarship. O’Sullivan moves beyond the weirdness of the Treaty principles and interminable originalist arguments. Instead, he provides a language grounded in republican ideals of non-domination and equality to debate the political morality of our current institutional arrangements. He thinks through the practical implications of rangatiratanga, mana motuhake and community control amongst iwi, hapū and other Māori political authorities – offering a new way of thinking about how we ought to live together, given the legacies of colonisation.’ — Lindsey Te Ata o Tū MacDonald, University of Canterbury, Te Whare Wānanga o Waitaha

‘I admire O’Sullivan’s work and think it is significant and timely. He explores the potential of deliberative democracy in a commonwealth that draws upon legacies from te ao Māori, the indigenous “world” as well as cosmopolitan modernity in a way that respects his own critique of “a simple Māori/Pākehā or kāwanatanga/rangatiratanga binary”. This holds great promise. As O’Sullivan argues throughout, the challenge is for deliberation and decision-making to be equally shared, rather than unilaterally imposed, as has too often been the case from the beginning.’ — Dame Anne Salmond, Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland

Reviews