‘Aristocrats of Knowledge’: Māori Anthropologists and the Survival of the ‘Race’

Abstract

This chapter explores the significant role played by well-educated Māori politicians in the racial and bio-political debates of early twentieth-century New Zealand. Māori leaders such as Āpirana Ngata and Peter Buck contested the idea, promulgated by some colonial intellectuals and politicians, that the Māori race was doomed to disappear before the incoming Briton. They argued instead that government policy should enable Māori to flourish alongside settlers of British descent in a bi-racial society. They did, however, express concern about and opposition to reproductive relationships between Chinese men and Māori women, echoing the concerns of politicians such as William Pember Reeves.