ABSTRACT
Maori, the Indigenous peoples of New Zealand, represent a sizeable percentage of the country’s total population, almost 1 in 5. In terms of a growing awareness of the need for different approaches to development within New Zealand in order to respect Maori cultural difference, recent years have seen the adoption of a new policy approach to Maori development. Entitled the Maori Potential Approach, this new policy framework – which is strongly resonant with the aims and ethos of the capabilities approach – offers a way in which Maori developmental aspirations can be appropriately enabled within a Maori worldview. However, the journey to the adoption of this policy approach to Maori development has not been without its tribulations. In looking at the journey towards the adoption of this new type of policy strategy, this chapter attempts to break down some of the false divisions between the concept of development in the developed and developing worlds as well as link these policy shifts, including the emergence of the capability approach itself, to broader global shifts at both a theoretical and policy-specific level.
