Resistance: An Indigenous Response To Neoliberalism

摘要

What a difference a regime-change makes. Until recently, Aotearoa, New Zealand, constituted the quintessential nanny state that fiercely protected its citizens from external competition and internal pressures. But, with the recent introduction of a neoliberal agenda, the land of the 'long white cloud' earned the somewhat dubious sobriquet of 'a Chile without the guns'. With a vehemence and commitment comparable to the Chilean regime, a series of wide-ranging structural adjustment reforms were introduced that exerted a predictable impact: as the market mechanism infiltrated into domains previously organised and governed in different ways, the rich got richer and the poor got poorer. And few groups endured as much disruption and demoralisation as the indigenous Maori peoples, given their already vulnerable status as long-suffering victims of internal colonialism.