Rights Recognition within a Relational Framework: Approaches to Indigenous Rights Recognition in Canada and New Zealand

Abstract

Any cross-jurisdictional comparison between countries on matters of indigenous rights reconciliation is immediately frustrated by the innumerable and varying factors involved. While the reasons may be varied and hard to pin down, the differences between New Zealand and Canada’s approach to indigenous rights recognition lends itself to a certain hypothesis. That is, that although there is an overarching similarity in the issues and relationships involved, the characteristics of each countries' broader political and legal systems, in particular the relationship between the executive and judicial branches of government, have led the countries down divergent paths in terms of their approach to indigenous rights recognition and reconciliation.1 Looked at side by side, each country has embarked on its own model of management of indigenous relations and rights which has led to the proliferation of certain themes and outcomes at the expense of others. An examination of each approach exposes significant strengths and weaknesses inherent in following one route at the expense of the other.