Description

This book is an ethnohistorical reconstruction of the establishment in New Zealand of a rare case of Maori home-rule over their traditional domain, backed by a special statute and investigated by a Crown commission the majority of whom were Tūhoe leaders. However, by 1913 Tūhoe home-rule over this vast domain was being subverted by the Crown, which by 1926 had obtained three-quarters of their reserve. By the 1950s this vast area had become the rugged Urewera National Park, isolating over 200 small blocks retained by stubborn Tūhoe "non-sellers". After a century of resistance, in 2014 the Tūhoe finally regained statutory control over their ancestral domain and a detailed apology from the Crown.