The Meeting Place - A New Zealand History Blog

I have recently been developing an Aotearoa New Zealand History workshop that will cover Te Tiriti o Waitangi/the Treaty but also explore Māori and Tangata Tiriti relations much more broadly, from the late eighteenth century through to today, showing how this history continues to resonate in the present.   The workshop can be delivered online or in-person. And by way of rewarding premium subscribers to my newsletter, I am offering free and exclusive access to the very first online workshop.  Everyone who is a paid subscriber to Unsettling: Aotearoa New Zealand History as at 26 June 2025 will receive a Zoom link to the workshop to be held the following day at:  10.00am-12.00pm NZT Friday 27 June 2025  Just sign up as premium subscriber before then for access and that’s it. All I would ask in return is that, if possible, you provide feedback afterwards on the workshop so that I can make any necessary tweaks or adjustments for future sessions.   Meanwhile if ...

Submissions on the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill close on 7 January 2025 and can be made here . The Waitangi Tribunal has concluded that 'if this Bill were to be enacted, it would be the worst, most comprehensive breach of the Treaty/te Tiriti in modern times'. I have posted my submission to the Justice Committee on the Bill below.   At the Hīkoi mō Te Tiriti, 19 November 2024 My name is Dr Vincent O’Malley. I am a Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi (FRSNZ), a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (FRHistS), a recipient of the Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement in Non-Fiction, besides multiple other awards and prizes. For more than thirty years now I have worked as a professional historian, researching and writing on Te Tiriti o Waitangi, the New Zealand Wars and related matters, including a number of acclaimed and best-selling books. I draw on this background and expert knowledge of the topic matter, in making the following submission stron...

Stuff recently ran a great series of stories as part of a special project called NZ Made/Nā Nīu Tīreni that included information about every modern Treaty of Waitangi settlement, maps of Māori land loss and explanations about how had this occurred. As John Hartevelt wrote in introducing the project : "New Zealand has not done well at grappling with its past. The unsettling truth about how this country was made is still not well understood. It has not been adequately taught in our schools. Our popular culture hasn't reflected it well enough. And our media has failed to tell it loudly and clearly. The Treaty of Waitangi, and its subsequent betrayals, is the heart of how New Zealand was made. We need to reckon with what happened in order to understand the Treaty settlements process that continues today." The theme of selective remembrance is one I returned to when invited to contribute an opinion piece as part of the series.           ...

Some time ago I was interviewed for the He Tohu exhibition that is located at the National Library of New Zealand . He Tohu is a permanent exhibition of three iconic constitutional documents that shape Aotearoa/New Zealand. The documents are: 1835 He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni — Declaration of Independence of the United Tribes of New Zealand 1840 Te Tiriti o Waitangi – Treaty of Waitangi 1893 Women’s Suffrage Petition – Te Petihana Whakamana Pōti Wahine. The full version of my interview (around 16 minutes long) has recently been released online. It traverses He Whakaputanga and Te Tiriti, but also the wider context of Māori and Pākehā relationships from the eighteenth century through to today. Many more videos with a wide range of experts and commentators can be viewed on the He Tohu website . 

The battle of Ruapekapeka, fought in January 1846, was the final engagement in the war that Britain lost, as James Belich famously described it. But whether that means Ngāpuhi won the Northern War that had begun nine months earlier is in some ways a moot point. After 1846 the Crown turned its back on the north, which was left to become a backwater as the rest of the New Zealand economy boomed. Arguably, it has never really recovered. And so the story of the war is one of neglect, but also of remembering those who died in the conflict and the enormous damage it caused. It is said that many generations of Ngāti Manu women have been named Te Noota, after HMS North Star, the naval vessel that destroyed their pā at Ōtuihu on 30 April 1845. The conflict also serves as a reminder of the remarkable leaders from this period and their efforts to protect and defend their rangatiratanga. And that is relevant today as Ngāpuhi contemplate a path ahead with their Treaty sett...