Hard on the heels of the hui to disseminate Te Waka Remu Huia, the Rapua team has published a new article entitled Hybrid Leadership for Māori Health: A Systematic Review in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health (IJEPH). The article draws on a systematic literature review that was undertaken by Summer Student Rachel McClintock (Waikato/Maniapoto, ko Ngāti Porou, ko Ngāti Mutunga, ko Ngāti Apakura) in the early years of the project.
The article is published as part of a Special Issue Collection on Social Equalities and Wellbeing in Community Health. In this special issue collection, the journal editors seek to showcase scholarship and practice that critically engages with community health at the intersections of social inequalities and systemic transformation. Specific aims of this collection include highlighting Indigenous knowledges and amplifying local voices and lived experiences.
At a time when Māori leadership is needed more than ever, especially in health care decision-making, the results of this review are especially pertinent. In the review we examined how leadership is conceptualised, enacted, and constrained, and what this implies for Aotearoa New Zealand’s health system. Across the studies that were included in the review we found that, unsurprisingly, Māori leadership is grounded in whakapapa-based legitimacy, tikanga and mātauranga Māori, and collective responsibility for relational, cultural, and intergenerational wellbeing. Furthermore, we found that these foundations persist across both what might be called “traditional” settings – the marae or tribal council and more “contemporary” ones – a health or hospital board.
An important finding of our work is that leadership is often exercised within Crown-dominated organisations where Māori authority is not the default, which requires our Māori leaders to navigate multiple accountabilities to iwi and communities, multiple organisational mandates, and multiple statutory obligations. As a consequence “hybridity” emerges. Māori leaders merge our practise of relational ethics with bureaucratic, professional, and governance requirements, so that Māori priorities remain at the forefront within institutional systems. We argue that, in the health sector, policy and other decision-makers shouldn't be relying on Māori leaders as “advisors” only, nor to expect these leaders to carry the entire cultural load for partnership boards. Rather we need to ensure Māori decision rights, resource Māori-led priority settings, embed tikanga in how decisions are made, and make equity/anti-racism accountable and measurable.
If you are interested in reading the paper it is available here: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/23/5/559
