Wānanga|Workshops
Te Wai Ariki regularly hosts wānanga on important, topical issues bringing together academics, iwi leaders, activists, affected communities, lawyers, judges, students, non-governmental organisations and other interested people.
Our wānanga provide the opportunity for Māori actors in a particular area to critically examine, coordinate and strategise with respect to legal and political avenues to further Indigenous peoples’ rights. They also provide an opportunity for our academics to deepen their research on particular kaupapa|subject matter.
Our wānanga have been generously funded variously by Auckland Law School and Ngā Pae o te Maramatanga.
2023 Wānanga mapping the movement for constitutional transformation
Te Wai Ariki brought together advocates from around Aotearoa|New Zealand for constitutional transformation to realise He Whakaputanga, te Tiriti o Waitangi and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Our participants included iwi leaders, major human rights NGOs, youth rōpū, lawyers and academics. Together we agreed a path to galvanise and coordinate our initiatives to realise transformation.
2021 Wānanga on tikanga Māori|Māori law approaches to redress for Māori abused in care
In June 2021, the Centre convened a wānanga, with support from Ngā Pae o te Māramatanga, to discuss a tikanga Māori based approach to redress for Māori abused in state or faith-based care to inform the mahi of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. Based on their kōrero at the wānanga, participants, who included ngā mōrehu Māori (Māori survivors) abused in care and Māori with professional expertise in areas connected to understanding and responding to that abuse, produced the report Te Ara Tākatu | Pathway Free from Harm.
The report contains strong recommendations to the Royal Commission on how to work with Māori survivors going forward and on how ‘redress’ for Māori survivors of abuse should be conceptualised and implemented.
The report was submitted to the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care as it considers its future direction and upcoming recommendations on redress.
Out of the wānanga the rōpū|group Te Ara Takatū was formed. Te Ara Takatū is a Māori survivor-led collective supporting and advocating for Māori survivors of abuse in state and faith-based care. Te Ara Takatū has offered critical feedback on the work of the Royal Commission and actively promotes Māori survivor-led responses to abuse in care. In 2023, members of Te Ara Takatū presented in the Forum Tent at Waitangi during the Waitangi Day celebrations to draw attention to these issues.
2021 Wānanga on tikanga Māori|Māori law and state law
A high-powered group of academics, lawyers, tauira and judges, including Supreme Court Justice Joe Williams, critically examined and questioned the increasing incorporation of tikanga Māori in the state legal system, especially in case law and in legislation.
2020 Wānanga on Māori rights to, and interests, in freshwater
Lawyers, iwi leaders, representatives of national Māori organisations and other advocates brainstormed legal and political avenues to realise Māori rights and interests in freshwater.