Mana, magic and (post-)modernity: dissenting futures in Aotearoa

Abstract

In New Zealand, as in many parts of the world, forms of life, patterns of ownership and control of economic activity, and visions of the future are becoming increasingly aligned with the so-called laws of the market (supply and demand) and with the icons of efficiency and self-interest. The exhortations of ultra-liberal politicians combine with the dictums of the IMF and the World Trade Organisation to facilitate an `experiment' of the `open economy', rending up the former British colony to the pluckings of direct overseas investment and free trade. At the same time the nation is engaged in a legislative experiment that defines its future as avowedly bicultural and respectful of the intrinsic value of other parties, present and future, living on this planet. How should we resolve, how should we interpret this antinomy? The paper sets elements of the Baudrillard critique of modernity against fragments of New Zealand poetry (from both colonial and `post-colonial' periods), in an interrogation of Aotearoa/New Zealand's new resource management texts. Four types of texts are juxtaposed: post-colonial resource management law, post-modern critique, anthropology (and some nostalgia), and post-indigenous/colonial poetry. In line with current preoccupations with `sustainable development', we ask: what is the likely nature of the future, the future of nature, and of human nature, in the land formerly called, Godzone and Aotearoa. 1 God's Own Country, the happy name proposed by some of the settlers coming from Ireland and Britain, seeing the relative comfort and prospects of plenty of the rich waters and land. Aotearoa is a name used by Maori, referring to The Land of the Long White Cloud as seen more than a thousand years ago by Polynesian canoe voyagers on their horizon. 1