Blood, beaches and cannibalism: history, identity and equality in the New Zealand / Aotearoa foreshore debate

Abstract

This thesis analyses the ways in which notions of identity and history are invoked to legitimate and discredit positions on indigenous rights, specifically looking at debate surrounding indigenous rights claims of Maori iwi (tribal groups) in Aotearoa / New Zealand regarding local areas of foreshore and seabed. The thesis proceeds by analysing the ways in which the texts - in the form of news articles, letters to the editor, and public submissions - function argumentatively to legitimise their own positions and discredit alternatives. Where previous research has approached discriminatory discourse as monological, the present thesis treats it as a form of dialogue in which identity and history are taken as flexible notions that can be used in varying ways to legitimise particular positions in the debate. That is, discriminatory discourse is seen as argumentatively geared towards and engaged with arguments that legitimise indigenous rights, and therefore both angles are analysed to better understand how discrimination is both supported and critiqued. Specifically, this thesis illustrates how indigenous rights may be discredited by hiding the ethnic interests and perspective of the majority; dehistoricising the contemporary taken-for-granted actions of the majority; portraying the rights claims as motivated by greed; construing indigenous rights as amounting to racial privilege; construing the claims as in contrary to the interests of a nation that treats everyone the same; and constructing indigenous rights as in opposition to tolerance and multiculturalism. Further, the analysis shows how arguments legitimate the claims by highlighting the position of the ethnic majority; placing the claims in a larger narrative of colonisation and discrimination; arguing how the claims stem from ethnic responsibilities and inherited ancestral rights; construing the claims as consistent with the interests of a nation that treats everyone fairly; and constructing indigenous rights as integral to a fair and understanding society. It illustrates how the foreshore claims could be legitimised through the construction of an essentialised Maori identity that emphasises the inherent link between Maori and the land, how this is undermined in turn by a construction that emphasises the link all New Zealanders have with the land, and finally how arguments that stress the ancestral and iwi-specific grounds of the claims overcome these objections. The thesis concludes by analysing the possibilities for Pakeha / Tauiwi identities in providing positive positions from which non-Maori people may support indigenous rights. The analysis highlights the importance of treating identity, history and equality as negotiable and interrelated concepts rather than stable, non-problematic entities.