Conference Programme November 11th: Day One 9.00am Welcome Wharenui LT 1 9.30am Keynote: Constitutional Transformation Wharenui Featuring: Professor Margaret Mutu and Dr Veronica Tawhai LT 1 Constitutional transformation is one of the biggest political ideas Aotearoa must grapple with. But what does it mean? How does it happen? Sparking off our conference, Tayla Cook and Safari Hynes will sit down for a kaputī with Professor Margaret Mutu and Dr Veronica Tawhai, members of Matike Mai Aotearoa, the Independent Working Group on Constitutional Transformation. This intergenerational kōrero will set the scene for the rest of the week, and go straight to the heart of Aotearoa’s biggest questions around Te Tiriti o Waitangi, tino rangatiratanga, mana motuhake and political change. 10.30am Morning Tea 11.00am Papers: “Questioning Place and Privilege” Wharenui Missing from our Refugee Debate: the Right to Cross Borders LT 1 Presented by: Umesh Perinpanayagam Over the last few years activists have focused on (increasing) the New Zealand government’s refugee quota intake — a program which sees the government chose a fixed number of refugees from overseas to be resettled here. However, challenging the government’s policies to stop potential refugees reaching New Zealand borders, where they can claim asylum, has been missing from this debate. These policies have coincided with a marked decline in people claiming asylum here despite an unprecedented number of people displaced by wars and persecution globally — to which Western states have been major contributors. This paper outlines New Zealand government policies based on public sources and official information requests and touches upon their legal and moral implications. It will also discuss the case of the Andika — a boat which attempted to reach these shores in 2015 but was blocked — and its significance for refugee activists. Using My White Privilege - an Irish Woman in Aotearoa Presented by: Aoife Healy The esteemed Moana Jackson once spoke about the Irish being a “darker shade of pale” referring to the past oppression of the Irish people. In recent history, Ireland has wielded significant soft power globally and this has resulted in a total shift in attitudes towards the Irish culture. Unfortunately, many Irish people have transitioned out of our own colonial past and are not committed to ensuring other oppressed peoples have access to the same freedoms we now have. This forgetting of our ancestor’s fights is not unique to Irish people. The Oppression Olympics is particularly prevalent in groups who have garnered some level of social mobility - of culture, of gender, of financial circumstance. This paper will examine the nuances and complexities of these relationships and how understanding our own histories can remind us of where who we are responsible to and how we use our privilege in Aotearoa today. An Aotearoa/NZ histories Curriculum for Educators at All Levels Presented by: Tamsin Hanly Research shows that many NZers have been raised on the “grand colonial standard story” of NZ history. Generations across all ethnicities and social economic status from Prime Ministers, Ministers of Education, educators, to the public resulting in ignorance of more accurate histories, lack of knowledge about things Māori and Pākehā Culture, Te Tiriti, colonization and it’s impacts and Māori survival. I have designed a critique of and an alternative to the “grand colonial standard story” in the form of an Aotearoa/NZ curriculum for educators of all levels in 6 books. The content goes from the Māori origin narrative to the 2000s unpacking a beginners’ guide to Māori worldviews, British worldviews, what happened when they met, the Declaration, two Tiriti/Treaty texts, colonization, Pākehā Culture and Māori survival. Educators read and design their own plans in ninety schools currently. NZ history is compulsory by 2022, I have been trying to get a appointment with Ministry for 6 years, they do not know about my curriculum. Awa Making Space for Feelings MZ05 Presented by: Lenka Rochford Injustice makes us feel stuff and engaging in the struggle against injustice makes us feel stuff. We aren’t always entirely aware of what emotions are driving us at different times. Being more concious of our emotional motivations and reactions to the struggles we engage in can help us be more kind to ourselves and each other and can help us process them as we go along and avoid burn out. This workshop will encourage participants to think about their emotional responses to the world around us. What do we care about? why do we care? and what does it feel like to care? We won’t be doing group therapy or asking you to feel all the feelings. Lenka is a pakeha, cis woman, mum, activist and therapist. My ideas come from my life experience and psychotherapy theories of the mind. Kōhanga Reo Indigenous Solidarity, Community & Connection MZ06 Presented by: Anevili TS A panel and forum for Indigenous persons to discuss how we, as Indigenous and First Peoples of this region, maintain our cultures and communities in the face of colonisation, capitalism, imperialism and climate change. How does the remembrance of our ancestral relationships ground our movements and our solidarity with each other, near and far? How do we learn from each other without co-option/appropriation, how do we reforge our ancestral ties? Ātea Peace to Action: How Can Research Support Practical Action for Social MZ03 Change? Presented by: Dr Monica Carrer and Dr Sylvia Frain How can academic researchers support activists, individuals, and families to carry out everyday action for resistance, peace, and social change? In this session, we will stimulate a conversation focused around this question and welcome diverse perspectives on how to connect to make an impact. We will share the journeys that brought us to co-found The Everyday Peace Initiative (EPI) to bridge academic research and everyday peace action. Our goal is to explore practical ways for people to regain their agency while “unlearning” colonial, political, structural forms of violence. We are guided by answering these questions through practice: Who is our research for? How do we incorporate and value people’s knowledges? How do we, as researchers, engage with people and produce outcomes that benefit them? Whare Kai Weaving Intentions for the Kāwanatanga Sphere MZ02 Presented by: Dr Arama Rata (Ngāti Maniapoto, Taranaki, Ngāruahine) and Jess Mio (tauiwi pākehā) Matike Mai Aotearoa envisages a constitution that honours Te Tiriti o Waitangi and supports the free flourishing of all peoples in Aotearoa. Achieving this vision requires complete transformation of the kāwanatanga sphere: from its current form as the Crown in Parliament wielding stolen power, to a new system of tauiwi (non-Māori) making collective decisions in accordance with tikanga. This session asks us to each imagine our ideal kāwanatanga sphere. What values would be at its heart? How would tauiwi make appropriate decisions for ourselves here on whenua Māori? What would life be like in that transformed reality? All are welcome to contribute. 12.00pm Wharenui Pākehātanga LT 1 Presented by: Emily Beausoleil and members of Tauiwi mō Matike Mai Pākehātanga is the ongoing work within pākehā communities of developing a collective sense of identity and purpose. This session responds to the call from various corners for ‘pākehātanga’, in the name of and as necessary precursor and support for decolonisation and constitutional transformation. Over this hour, members of Tauiwi mō Matike Mai who have been developing a theory of change for tauiwi pākehā – as well as other pākehā who have been working in this space of pākehātanga in various ways - will share something of their learning and hold a space where the awkward, fraught, fumbling work of pākehātanga can be furthered in some way, by explicitly asking together what it would require, what actions we might or must take, and how pākehā, once gathered or, in part, in the very act of gathering ourselves, might contribute to constitutional transformation and decolonisation. Awa What Place Does Compassion Have in Achieving Social Change? MZ05 Presented by: Gaayathri Nair This session is a facilitated discussion, in it I put forward to the group the question “what place does compassion have in achieving social change?” and bring some examples of what compassion can look like. Some thoughts you might like to consider before attending are: Can compassion help us bridge the divide between ourselves and those who hold different values? How does defensiveness impede social change? How do you hold space and have grace for people while they change? Our panellists will reflect on their experiences in growing of renters’ movements in the last 5 years before facilitating a discussion with the audience on where next. Kōhanga Reo From One Tired Indigenous Māmā MZ06 Presented by: Tessa Williams In Person I constantly see the same people fighting for a better future for the collective, from whānau kitchens through to the frontlines of land occupations. The same people, over and over, giving all they can give without being asked. They do it not for themselves but for everyone else. Often these people are indigenous, often women, often māmā. They don’t expect recognition, but they deserve it. An exhibition of recent works by Tessa Williams created to give voice to the intertwined experiences of indigenous mothers and indigenous knowledge from Atua to present day. It demonstrates the value of our ways of knowing, doing, and moving, as indigenous people. The double session will include a short talk to kaupapa and each piece in Tessa’s series. Then, an intermission before creating space and time for the audience who attend to stop and appreciate themselves for all that they are able to do for others. Aroha mai aroha atu. Ātea Papers: “In Defence of Whenua” MZ03 The Common Denominator Presented by: Chris Huriwai Dairy milk consumption and production, its contribution to: climate change, water/natural resource scarcity, embedded colonial racism, inequality of outcomes for Māori and unjustified animal cruelty.