Indigenous self-determination, temporalities and fast-tracking transition

Indigenous self-determination is a key site for organising alternative futures. But though Indigenous peoples create their own histories, they do not always do so in conditions of their own choosing. Kāi Tahu, an Indigenous Māori grouping in the South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand, had their tino rangatiratanga (self-determination) affirmed in 1840 and reaffirmed in 1998. But neither of these affirmations have been honoured by the Crown. Kāi Tahu’s vision of mō tātou, ā, mō kā uri ā muri ake nei (for us and our children after us) is based on a temporality that coalesces obligations to ancestors and descendants, including non-human relations, into an eternal present. The ability to practise this temporality is structurally constrained by the Crown’s failure to honour its obligations, including through timing practices exercised in policy or regulation. Taking this problematic as our starting point, we explore a resource-consenting process and a Treaty Impact Assessment as our primary empirical materials. This case surfaces three findings related to temporality. First, Kāi Tahu temporalities are maintained by upholding a ‘Manawhenua baseline’, which reflects the historical conditions at 1840 and the goal to restore the well-being of a culturally important river system. Second, historical failures by the state and corporate actors to engage with Kāi Tahu are a manifestation of recursive dispossession that continues to constrain self-determination and environmental protection in the present and future. Third, timing practices exemplified in fast-tracking regimes reflect expanded opportunities for deferral in transition and denial of Indigenous self-determination.