The National and New Zealand First coalition agreement contains numerous aspirational objectives, many of which have significant merit. It is, in a number of cases, the path to the aspiration that is problematic.
Much is made in this agreement of a dedication to "upholding the principles of liberal democracy, including equal citizenship, parliamentary sovereignty, the rule of law and property rights, especially when interpreting the Treaty of Waitangi".
The same wording is seen in the National and Act New Zealand agreement.
A cursory understanding of our history will very clearly reveal that the principles of democracy, liberal or not, were very effectively applied from the mid-19th century in the dispossession of Māori from their ancestral lands, together with an abrogation of their rights recognised by the Crown in the Declaration of Independence of New Zealand 1835 and Te Tiriti o Waitangi 1840. Parliaments of the 1860s,
’70s and ’80s, consisting almost entirely of white, property-owning males, passed numerous statutes which authorised acquisition of land, by confiscation or purchase at below market value under the guise of a partisan Native Lands Court, to the extent that the great majority of land was in European hands by the turn of the 20th century.
The rights of those who opposed this process were systematically abused by passage of legislation that enabled detention without trial, in some instances on an indefinite basis.
New Zealand has recognised the injustices that have occurred in the process, with efforts being made through the mechanism of the Waitangi Tribunal to effect some redress.
Of course, the enormity of the wrongs perpetrated and passage of time means that this, at best, has been an inadequate process. Little attention is given to date to the ongoing harm caused to indigenous people by structures and institutions put in place to benefit the socially dominant.
Liberal democracy by definition is unable to do this. Dr David Jenkins has recently written (ODT 22.1.24) warning that the fact that Israel is a democracy does not legitimise its excessive military campaign in Gaza. What is clear is that the current government of Israel is a coalition of right-wing extremists and religious zealots who serve the purpose of keeping the current president in power without which he would most likely be facing imprisonment for corruption. It is clear, or at least arguable, that the early parliaments of this country, deliberately and in pursuit of self-interest, legislated with huge negative impact on Māori, in breach of obligations entered into by the Crown, whence the authority of Parliament derived.
That this is acceptable is tantamount to arguing that the deadly path adopted by Israel is legitimised by its being a democracy. Israel, like New Zealand, is unicameral. This means, of course, that a simple majority in the Knesset, or parliament, can bring legislation into law. The party system brooks no deviation from the party position, thus a simple majority rules.
Those espousing the principles of liberal democracy appear to overlook the fact that the Houses of Westminster, heralded as the instigator of democracy as we know it today, is, in fact, bicameral as are most of the Western democracies with which we are familiar.
This provides some semblance of oversight of legislation. At the present time the Conservative Party has an absolute majority in the UK House of Commons and has legislated, for its own purposes, that Rwanda is a "safe" country in order to avoid a decision of the courts which was of a contrary view.
This "Alice in Wonderland" Bill requires approval of the House of Lords, the second of the Westminster Houses of Parliament which understandably is facing a rocky road.
In these turbulent times, it is necessary for us to take stock of the world around us as well as the institutions under which we operate.
Simply hitching our wagon to the principles of liberal democracy as is demonstrated in the coalition agreements in an effort to disempower Māori is unsafe, particularly if the time and effort to understand and articulate what those principles are is not fully explored.
■Noel O’Malley is a recent student at Otago’s School of Peace and Conflict Studies.
