Tuesday March 1st

Veronica Tawhai- an excellent article

Veronica W.H. Tawhai has an article in Maori and the Environment; Kaitiaki edited by Selby, Moore and Mulholland and published in 2010 by Huia Press.
Veronica W.H. Tawhai’s paper is entitled, Rawaho, in and out of the environmental engagement loop (Selby, Moore and Mulholland 2010: 77-94) and is one of the gems of the Kaitiaki collection. Her key points of legislative reference are the Resource Management Act 1991 and the Local Government Act 2002. Her thesis is well expressed by her in a few lines at the outset of her argument;
In the tribal lands of another, the manner in which Maori individuals can express their interests as Maori is unclear. Similarly there are concerns about the extent to which Maori, living far from their tribal homelands can effectively be involved in the management of tribal and public environmental resources.
(ibid 2010: 77)
Tawhai considers people who are known variously as rawaho or taura here or maataawaka. Her argument precedes that of Rangi Mataamua and Pou Temara in a later article that refers to diaspora. Tawhai is talking about the situation of rawaho, people who live outside their homeland without clear lines of civic relation to the homeland or the place that they live in. Tawhai quotes one informant to the effect that three sites are involved; where the person lives, where they were born and their ancestral homeland (ibid 2010:78).
Tawhai is talking about the rights of rawaho under the Local Government Act of 2002. There is a sense in which the words rawaho and Maori are at odds. Maori means to be native to natural to an area. Rawaho means to be from without.
She notes that eight out of ten 25-29 year old Maori have moved at least once since 2001. With this kind of movement between localities the challenge of engaging rawaho is different.
Tawhai falls back again and again in the article to using the Treaty of Waitangi as the basis of the relationship between rawaho and councils. This is also seen in her model on (2010:92). No matter whether the entity is mana whenua or rawaho the relationship is always based on the Treaty of Waitangi.
A primary problem is the engagement of Maori from an assimilationist view of citizenship and not upon a basis that is culturally appropriate or recognizant of the disadvantaged socio-historical position that Maori bear when engaging with local authorities.
Cheyne and Tawhai 2007
Tawhai suggests a lack of clarity about roles locally and in tribal areas and that it is easier for rawaho to identify with national issues than local or tribal homeland issues. At one point she suggests for many Maori their collective identity overshadows their individual one, at least with regard to environmental management (2010: 91).
In her conclusion Tawhai says she is making assumptions about whakapapa and this is undoubtedly true as it is throughout the Kaitiaki collection including the work of Kawharu. Tawhai also asks questions about the role of urban Maori authorities.
Veronica Tawhai is raising- without directly addressing- questions to do with the distribution of environmental rights. Rawaho relate to environmental rights on a national basis and contribute at that level. But at the local level the locals, the mana whenua as she calls them have first rights, so to speak, regarding the environments. This evokes the literature set out by Van Mejl and Goldsmith in their work (Van Mejl and Goldsmith 2003). Van Mejl especially of the two seems to follow a straight whanau-hapu-iwi model of distribution and Veronica Tawhai shows some of the other dimensions involved.
Tawhai does not emphasise rawaho solutions. Sometimes there is a distinct relationship between the rawaho group and tangata whenua or mana whenua. In Auckland, for example, the Tuhoe have Te Tira Hou as their own marae outside of their area. In Rotorua Tuhoe have Mataatua Paa which was arranged for them by Te Arawa. The latter is of long standing and illustrates that the rawaho/diaspora situation is not new. In the 1950s and 1960s Maori people from outside Auckland used to gather in the Community Centre in Fanshawe Street.
While not emphasizing solutions Tawhai’s work is extremely important. A sense of order, a way to arrange matters between kin is sketched and hinted at within her article. The intricacy of it all is striking.
Bibliography
Bennett, April 2010 Uncharted Waters- recent settlements as new spaces for enhancing Maori participation in fresh-water management and decision making in Selby, Moore and Mulholland, 2010: 175-184
Cheyne, C.M. and Tawhai, V.M.H. 2007 He Wharenoa Te Rakau, Ka Mahue Maori Engagement with local government. Knowledge, Experience and Recommendations, Palmerston North, Massey University
Kawharu, Merata 2010 Environment as a marae locale in Selby, Moore and Mulholland
Mutu, Margaret 2010 Ngati Kahu kaitiakitanga in Selby, Moore and Mulholland (13-36)
Selby R, Moore P, Mullholland, M 2010 Maaori and the environment:Kaitiaki Huia Publishers
Tawhai, Veronica W.H. Rawaho, in and out of the environmental engagement loop (Selby, Moore and Mulholland 2010: 77-94)
Van Meijl, Toon, 2003:260-279 Conflicts of Redistribution in Contemporary Maori Society: Leadership and the Tainui Settlement In Van Meijl and Goldsmith

Van Meijl, Toon and Goldsmith Michael, Postcolonial dilemmas: reappraising justice and identity in New Zealand and Australia , Journal of the Polynesian Society, Volume 112, September 2003, No3

Van Meijl, Toon and Goldsmith, Michael, 2003: 205-218 Introduction: Recognition, Redistribution and Reconciliation in Postcolonial Settler Societies. In Van Meijl and Goldsmith

Whare, Tracey, 2010: 59-75 The Foreshore and Seabed Act: Five years on, where to from here? in Maori and the environment:Kaitiaki Edited Selby, Moore andf Mulholland
Huia Publishers
Hotaka
March 1 Tues
Te moana me te ngahere
Kaupapa korero mo te ra nei
Te Ruwhenua ki Otautahi
Rangahau
Nga rangona korero o te ra mo te ruwhenua.
Subject of the day
The earthquake in Christchurch
Analysis
The news of the day about the earthquake.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Christchurch-quake-Still-a-rescue-mission/tabid/423/articleID/200603/Default.aspx