Māori People
Māori people are the indigenous inhabitants of New Zealand, believed to have arrived from Polynesia around the thirteenth or fourteenth century. They are known for their rich cultural heritage, which includes distinctive art forms, performance arts, legends, tattoos, and customs that emphasize a strong sense of community. The arrival of European settlers in the early nineteenth century marked a significant turning point, culminating in the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, which aimed to establish relations between Māori chiefs and the British Crown. However, differing interpretations of the treaty led to prolonged conflicts, including the New Zealand Wars, and resulted in significant loss of land and sovereignty for Māori.
In recent decades, there has been a resurgence of Māori culture and activism, particularly following the civil rights movements in the 1960s and the establishment of the Treaty of Waitangi Act in 1975, which allowed for claims regarding historical grievances. The Māori population today stands at about 887,493, making up roughly 17.8% of New Zealand's total population, with a significant presence also in Australia. Despite political representation and initiatives aimed at restoring rights and land ownership, Māori communities still face socio-economic challenges, including higher rates of unemployment, lower educational attainment, and disparities in health and social outcomes compared to their non-Māori counterparts.
Māori People
Māori people are believed to have first arrived in New Zealand from Polynesia in the thirteenth or fourteenth century. Māori are celebrated for their art, performance arts, legends, tattoos, unique customs, and their strong sense of community. Europeans, called Pakeha by Māori, began to settle in New Zealand in the early nineteenth century, and in 1840, representatives of the British Crown and Māori chiefs signed the Treaty of Waitangi, in which Māori ostensibly traded tribal sovereignty to Britain while retaining control over their own lands, forests, and waterways. British settlement increased following the treaty, and colonization turned Māori people into a minority population living under British rule. After centuries of trying to assimilate Māori people into the greater society, in the latter half of the twentieth century, New Zealand authorities acknowledged that Māori have a right to their own culture, language, and customs. Beginning in 1840, Māori repeatedly sued for reparations under the Treaty of Waitangi. Not until the 1990s, however, did reparations actually begin, amid significant controversy. Into the twenty-first century, Māori continued to be more likely than New Zealanders of European descent to be found among socially and economically disadvantaged groups.
Brief History
Māori are thought to have come to New Zealand between 1250 and 1300, arriving in stages along a route through Polynesian countries from Taiwan and the Philippines to Tahiti and the Cook Islands. On December 19, 1642, a group of Dutch seamen under the leadership of explorer Abel Tasman (1603–59) came close to the shores of New Zealand and were approached by a group of Māori in canoes. Since neither the Dutch nor Māori understood the other’s intentions, the encounter led to violence, and several people were killed. British explorer James Cook (1728–79) became the first European to establish relations with Māori when voyaging to New Zealand in 1769 and 1777.
Guns and ammunition arrived in New Zealand along with European settlers, leading to the Musket Wars, in which Māori tribes fought one another, between the 1810s and the 1830s. Some tribes were completely wiped out and others were decimated by constant warfare and exposure to European diseases. New European settlers arrived to take over lands left vacant by fleeing Māori, paving the way for disputes over land that continued for centuries.
On February 6, 1840, which is still celebrated as a national holiday, Waitangi Day, in New Zealand, representatives of the British government and a group of Māori chiefs negotiated the Treaty of Waitangi. As a result of differences in wording between the English and Māori versions of the treaty, the British claimed that Māori willingly traded their sovereignty for the protections of British citizenship, but Māori insisted that they had retained the right to govern themselves. While both sides initially recognized the rights of Māori to maintain control of their lands, forests, and fisheries, acceptance eroded over time.
Māori responded to the British interpretation of the Treaty of Waitangi by waging war against the British between 1845 and 1872 in what became known as the New Zealand Wars. In the 1860s, the British confiscated three-fourths of all Māori land. By the time the wars ended, the Māori population had declined to around thirty-nine thousand. At the same time, several Māori tribes established a monarchy as a form of solidarity and self-control known as the King movement. Beginning in the late 1850s, a hereditary leader served as a Māori monarch to oversee affairs such as land ownership and reparations, including through mediation with the Crown. The year 2024, following the death of the prior sovereign, Tūheitia Pōtatau Te Wherowhero, saw the coronation of the monarchy's second queen and eighth leader, Ngā Wai hono i te pō Paki.
Māori People Today
The civil rights movement taking place in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s motivated Māori people, who began to demand a right to their own voice and culture. Passage of the Treaty of Waitangi Act in 1975 set up a special tribunal, paving the way for submission of Māori claims. In 1985, Prime Minister David Lange extended the jurisdiction of the tribunal, empowering them to investigate all claims since the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840. New Zealand experienced a Māori renaissance in the 1980s, and tribal culture began to be celebrated throughout New Zealand.
In the early 1990s, the New Zealand government launched a program of restoration designed to settle Māori claims. Māori contended that since the colonial period, they had been denied possession of their lands and alienated from the mainstream. Reparations have been complicated by the fact that less than 20 percent of Māori still lived on tribal lands, and urban Māori remained scattered and often removed from the sociopolitical organizations of their tribes. Despite the creation of urban organizations created to address the problem, the government opted to work only with tribal leaders. Even that method faced obstacles due to the division of Māori into tribes (iwi), subtribes (hapū), and supertribes (waka), making it difficult to determine true ownership of land.
In 2004, Māori of northern South Island filed suit, claiming that the Marlborough Sounds foreshore and seabed belonged to Māori. Parliament responded with the Foreshore and Seabed Act of 2004, maintaining that all parts of the foreshore and seabed not owned privately were the property of the Crown. The public retained access for purposes of recreation and boating, but Māori retained the right to conduct traditional activities in the area. In response to the controversy, the Marine and Coastal Area Act of 2011 repealed the previous act and granted public access to the land, stipulating that it could never be sold. Provisions were also established for Māori who had inhabited the land continuously since 1840 to file claims of ownership.
According to New Zealand's 2023 Census, there were approximately 887,493 Māori in New Zealand, making up about 17.8 percent of the population. In 2021, according to census statistics, there were about 170,057 people with Māori ancestry living in Australia. While English is the most widely spoken language, Māori is also an official language. In acknowledgement of Māori self-autonomy, the Department of Māori Affairs was restructured in 1989 by the Runanga A Iwi Act, and much of its power devolved to Māori community leaders. However, the act was repealed the following year when the National Party won control of the government.
Political representation of Māori people has been guaranteed since the mid-nineteenth century. In the twenty-first century, it remained protected by a mixed-member proportional representation (MMP) electoral system in which a set number of seats in parliament are guaranteed to Māori representatives according to the number of Māori in the total population. Other Māori sit in parliament because they are chosen from the voting list of the Māori Party, which was established in 2004 in response to outrage over the Foreshore and Seabed Act. Māori also served as members of other political parties. By 2023, about 27 percent of New Zealand's parliament consisted of Māori.
Although significant improvements were made since 1999, Māori people remained disproportionately represented among New Zealand’s lower socioeconomic classes. Māori are more likely than non-Māori to be found in low-paying jobs, receive welfare, or be unemployed. Māori also tend to have lower levels of education and higher rates of teenage pregnancy and are more likely to live in single-parent homes or to be incarcerated.
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