Decolonising Dignity for Inclusive Democracy

Bens rational:

• This article responds to an aspect of Watene's question, 'What insights can Maori values bring to... the capability approach...?' (Watene, 2016: 288). It is a challenge to colonial arrogance, a challenge to the omnipresent presumption that Western philosophies are the 'most advanced' or conversely, that indigenous philosophies are something less.

• The philosophical foundation of entanglement comes from the epistemology of whakapapa (Roberts et al., 2004) and the ontological concepts of mauri, tapu and mana (Henare, 2001; Shirres, 1982; Watene, 2016). These latter three concepts together translate to something like the Western concept of dignity.

• In the introduction I identified that in Aotearoa iwi and the state have worked together to craft a hybrid structure, legal personhood, to blend Matauranga Maori and Western legal structures. 

• This paper discusses the concept of Māori dignity and how it can be used in decision making