“The old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born”
This quote from Antonio Gramsci was the theme of Supreme Court Judge Sir Joseph Williams’ keynote address to the Wananga Symposium on 16 November 2023 at Waitangi, titled Negotiating power distribution across the void.
Justice Williams referred to the meshing of Christian and traditional thought among Māori in the past. He referred to historic biblical references in translation to rangatiratanga and kawanatanga, with rangatiratanga being interpreted to mean “dominion” and self-determination.
According to Justice Williams, this was “a big thing”. The judge’s thesis was that the chiefs who signed the Treaty of Waitangi would have understood that kawanatanga (the Crown’s right to govern) was to be exercised under the umbrella of rangatiratanga. He also acknowledged that this point of view was up for debate.
Justice Williams analogised a passage across a cultural void in 1840 with such a void being crossed now, by Aotearoa “decolonising” itself. He asked how the Bible and Christianity speak to “that turning” in the contemporary movement of decolonisation.
What he meant by colonisation and its antithesis was not clear, since Britain gave up New Zealand as a colony a long time ago. One assumes the judge was referring to cultural matters, although he appeared to include a new political settlement based on radical equality founded on his interpretation of the Treaty of Waitangi.
Sir Joseph Williams Source: Courts of New Zealand
Te Ao Māori, he said, is waking up to the old beliefs, for example to Te Urewera and the Whanganui River as beings, which is “a powerful thing”, and something which is “intuitively wise” (see the reference to such beings in Smith v Fonterra Co-Operative Group Limited [2024] NZSC 5).
The Christian gospel could seek to weave itself back into Matauranga Māori, as it had done in the early era of the missionaries and with the coming of the Māori prophets. This waking up, the judge added, is an expression of mana Motuhake and rangatiratanga, with the wider community “vibing” to this movement. The power of the gospel as liberator was said to be great, with the judge adding that it would be a pity not to weave it back into a generation that is now reconstructing itself.
Building on his theme, the judge observed that now is a time of great opportunity and great risk in Aotearoa, with Te Ao Māori growing in confidence.
He said Māori culture has been embraced by wider society, even though this direction of travel may make some feel uncomfortable. He hoped Māori culture could in the future lie comfortably with the wider culture, so that “everybody will want to copy us”.
Living in the past?
What struck me when listening to the judge’s presentation, apart from his contagious passion for the cause of Māori, was his view of a supposed continuing cultural and social dichotomy of Māori and pakeha, as if we were still living in the 19th century.
While Māori culture remains a living and unique human expression, there is no such thing as pakeha culture. So, there can be no such dichotomy and postulating it merely paints a picture of sharp lines of societal division where there are none.
There is a New Zealand culture, which has at its core Māori culture. This point came home to me as long ago as 1989 when I attended a lecture at Victoria University given by Paul Temm QC (as he then was).
Temm spoke of his own awakening while working on the Ngai Tahu claim, and about the importance of Māori culture to New Zealand’s culture. Putting it simply, New Zealand is the place in the world where Māori culture lives and New Zealand would be unrecognisable without Māori culture. But the two are meshed as a new culture of rich diversity, in a new country, albeit with distinctive currents.
The Christianisation of Māori as a colonising force has come and gone. Māoritanga, enlivening as it is to many Māori, will not provide the necessary ingredients to advance Māori interests in the modern world, with or without the support of the churches (social reformers indeed revolutionaries are fond of recruiting priests and bishops to their causes, as one often sees in central and south America).
Open society
A new paradigm has emerged since the second world war which rejects the three ancient poisons of race, creed and superior culture as a basis for the organisation of society. This new paradigm is the democratic nation State, which is characterised by an open society and the rule of law, the enlargement of liberty and individual rights, and open markets.
Modern civilisation is no longer governed by western or indigenous myths, oracular histories and superstition: it is powered by accountable government, modern science and technology.
While tradition and culture, whether Māori, Christian or other, continue to have an enriching place in society, they need an open society and the rule of law to ensure their survival and to prevent them from being pushed to the margins by an oppressive majority or snuffed out entirely by a despotic or ideologically narrow political regime (such as communism).
Whatever popular appeal such movements may have, any attempt to graft onto an open society a cultural appendage that coerces conformity to its ideas runs against the grain of the essential features of a modern democratic state.
Such a program, sooner or later, will come into conflict with social and political realities that in a democratic country; not everyone will agree with their cause or their methods. And the more coercive they become, the more they will be opposed.
So, let’s not get too carried away with the achievements arising out of the cultural programs of the anointed. The current Māori cultural renaissance will take Māori only so far.
Lingering inter-generational disadvantage is fuelling the cultural renaissance, with many Māori clinging to the hope that a cultural revival will give rise to a better future for all Māori. This is wishful thinking.
While Māoritanga has a big part to play in the living culture of the country, Māori advancement in a modern world requires a modern market economy, competent government dedicated to rational policy making, access to capital, equality of access to opportunities in the professions and in business and winning ongoing battles for justice.
A revivalist movement of old beliefs and superstitions won’t cut it. Iwi leaders know this, which is why iwi are investing in wealth-producing modern enterprises and modern education for young Māori.
In our passage through the void referenced by Justice Williams, we face the risk of it becoming a time of monsters (being the second part of the Gramsci quote above, which was not referred to by the judge).
Gramsci spoke of organisations such as churches, charities, the media, schools and universities needing to be invaded by socialist thinkers in order to effect social change. This approach was later dubbed by 1960s German student activist Rudi Dutschke as “the long march through the institutions”. Gramsci wrote in the 1930s of a “war of position” for socialists and communists, which was designed to subvert Western culture from within, in an attempt to compel it to redefine itself.
Modern activists of other stripes often deploy this socially divisive and deeply illiberal strategy. There is evidence of such Gramscian methods being deployed in New Zealand in a variety of culture-war contexts.
In my opinion, the Gramsci quote was both revealing and ill-chosen, particularly by a Supreme Court Judge. Assuming the judge knows what Gramsci was about, he suggests a vision for the future of New Zealand that sits uneasily with the open pluralistic society we have become.
Warren Pyke is an Auckland barrister and a member of The Law Association’s Public & Administrative Law committee
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