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A geomorphic perspective on the rights of the river in Aotearoa New Zealand
Author(s) -
Brierley Gary,
Tadaki Marc,
Hikuroa Dan,
Blue Brendon,
Šunde Charlotte,
Tunnicliffe Jon,
Salmond Anne
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
river research and applications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.679
H-Index - 94
eISSN - 1535-1467
pISSN - 1535-1459
DOI - 10.1002/rra.3343
Subject(s) - aotearoa , indigenous rights , drainage basin , personhood , indigenous , river management , sociocultural evolution , agency (philosophy) , geography , sociology , environmental ethics , environmental resource management , human rights , political science , law , ecology , social science , environmental science , philosophy , cartography , biology
The granting of rights to the Whanganui River in 2017 emerged as an outcome of Tribunal hearings relating to breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi, signed between Māori chiefs and the British Crown in 1840. As this expression of a river as having legal personhood with rights reflects a distinctively Māori perspective upon river systems, it offers the prospect for a new era of sociocultural approaches to river management in Aotearoa New Zealand. Using the Whanganui River as a case study, this paper explores prospective geomorphic meanings of river rights. The paper asks, “What role can geomorphology play in identifying, articulating and protecting the rights of a river?” Ancestral Māori relations to the river based upon mutual codependence (reciprocity) are juxtaposed against geomorphic understandings of a river's agency as expressed through self‐adjustment, diversity of form, evolution, and catchment‐scale connectivities. Relations between river science and indigenous concepts of rivers, framed under the auspices of river rights, present opportunities for different approaches to river management.