A fine risk: Ethics in Kaupapa Maori politics

Kaupapa Maori theory is broadly underpinned by a politics that has strategically promoted forms of cultural essentialism and oppositional political stances/power analyses, which have been useful to the revitalisation of culture and the assertion of rights and recognition. Although they serve Maori struggles, these positions often become less self-consciously strategic, and more often lead to accepted political orthodoxy. At the same time, Kaupapa Maori has asserted the importance of theory developed from indigenous - Maori ways of thinking and acting. In this article I contribute to such a project by reflecting on Maori cultural ethics and what they might offer to theorising social and political relations beyond the oppositional colonised-coloniser binary. With particular reference to the work of Emmanuel Levinas, I argue that Maori orientations suggest an imperative to relationship - not opposition, and to responsibility for others - not simply the assertion of rights claims. A politics informed by Maori cultural ethics glimpses a different, certainly riskier, but ultimately more radical and productive politics.