Islands of Indigenous innovation: reclaiming and reconceptualising innovation within, against and beyond colonial-capitalism

Abstract

ABSTRACT From Vision Mātauranga and Callaghan, to Silicon Valley and billionaire space races, ‘innovation’ is becoming a placeholder for particular conceptions of progress. The concept is almost exclusively, however, associated with capitalist innovation for profit. This dominant and exclusionary framing has the effect of obscuring innovative knowledge and practices that occur outside of colonial-capitalism. This study places the concept of innovation under a critical Indigenous lens to rethink and reclaim innovation as a crucial aspect of Indigeneity, within-and-against, and beyond the colonial-capital relation. We provide two mini qualitative case studies of Indigenous innovation within-and-against and beyond colonial-capitalism from across the vast historical and contemporary scope of Te Moana-nui-a-kiwa. Together these cases extend Indigenous innovation to include collective struggle for collective wellbeing. In doing so, this study creates diverse theoretical and empirical space for a past, present and future of Indigenous innovation.