Social Control in Maori Society

Social control in pre-European Mâori society was maintained through the use of a complex system involving the concepts of mana, utu, and tapu, the transgression of which usually earned one and one's kinsmen the penalty of death. Such a system of social control was strongly tied with spiritual beliefs. These strict regulations began to be eroded following contact with Europeans who did not understand the rules and did not act according to them but experienced no negative effects, sowing doubt in the minds of Mâori as to the validity of their own beliefs and the power of their deities. European imposed rules, laws and Christian codes of conduct were misunderstood by many Mâori, whose world view did not accommodate such beliefs and practices. Any casual observance would have shown that many Pâkeha (whites) also clearly disregarded the rules that their "kinsmen" were trying to impose on Mâori which led to much confusion and misunderstanding. With the introduction of the musket, leading to the musket wars and devastating population loss among the Mâori people, many chiefs attempted to save their people by asking the missionaries for help. Missionaries agreed but only if the chief and tribe agreed to convert to Christianity and do as the missionaries said they must in order to be "saved." This, in turn, diminished the mana of the chief in the eyes of both his own group of people and outsiders because he was now being told what to do by others and was not ruling through his inherited/acquired authority. This again weakened the pre-European social control that had existed before their arrival, as it had relied vastly on the authority of chiefs and the knowledge that this mana was of divine origin and therefore closely tied with spiritual beliefs, the same spiritual beliefs that the missionaries were determined to destroy.

Like most customs and social conventions in pre-European Mâori society, the rules of social control were seen as having been first practiced and put in place by the gods. Stories of gods and their deeds were more than just stories, they explained the reasons for certain behaviors and the consequences that would take place if these rules were disregarded. These (hi)stories spoke about a respect for nature, a respect for other creatures, a respect for elders, a respect for individual sanctity, and the founding bases for respecting laws. Although these rules and laws were not written, they were strictly adhered to and known by all. They were so much a part of the Mâori way of life that it was difficult for the missionaries that later arrived to change them.

Laws were governed mainly by tapu and mana, as well as utu. Tapu meant several things: something that was sacred, something that was under religious restriction, something that was beyond one's power, as well as the condition of being subject to restriction. It was not a 'is/is not' concept and could vary in intensity, from situation to situation, from person to person and from place to place. It also governed how people behaved towards other people, for example, a person with weaker tapu would not even be allowed to address a person with stronger tapu, for that person's tapu could negatively affect the weaker person's. Mana was power and authority and meant one had prestige and influence. It could be inherited, acquired and lost. A fearless warrior or a skilled speaker could build up their mana, while a poor leader's mana would diminish. A person with more mana was more likely to be listened to and taken account of than one with less mana. The chief's mana was what kept him influential and important in the eyes of his people. The knowledge of whakapapa, or lineage, was needed to ensure that one knew who he was descended from, his ancestor's deeds and therefore his inherited mana. This knowledge was important to validate the person's position within the group. The mana system may be considered to be related to the 'big man' system of some Micronesian islands where the leader has no coercive power but leads by example through his prestige and goodwill. Finally, utu, or 'satisfaction' was the punishment for transgressing the laws of Mâori society and it was usually death, although such an outcome could be avoided through the use of muru where instead of killing the offending person and his kinsmen, the injured party could take whatever possessions they liked from the offender's home, thus avoiding violent conflict.

Like all functional societies everywhere, these laws made Mâori society livable by basically making sure that survival took place. For example, death penalties for the transgressor and his kinsmen prevented further transgression on the part of the perpetrator, who may be unstable or more prone to violence, and also acted as a deterrent since it was not only he that was liable but his whole tribe. Murder and killing are never good for society and therefore such rules existed to keep such acts to a minimum so that the population would not suffer. Laws that governed sacred and tapu sites can also be traced to the ultimate protection of survival. Places such as burial grounds or battle grounds must not only be respected because of their nature, but should be avoided for health reasons. A person who spends time digging around a burial site may contract some sort of bacterial or viral infection (possibly even what killed the person buried there) and therefore endanger the entire tribe's health. For the same reason, a lake in which someone drowns would become tapu for a period of time and swimming, washing and fishing in the lake would be forbidden. Different societies have different codes of conduct regarding these matters partially because of different environmental contexts and partially because of the vast amount of ways that the same problem can be approached or solved. Unfortunately most societies tend towards the ethnocentric belief that their way is the best possible way because it works so well for them. Difficulties begin to be encountered when one group of people decides that they will impose their solutions for the problems of survival onto another group within a completely different context.

European arrival in Aotearoa meant that for the first time Mâori people were exposed to a completely alien culture. Initial encounters were mixed, some resulting in death and others in trade, but the rich resources of the land and surrounding seas meant that they would not be the last. There are many factors that led to the scenario that took place in New Zealand which caused so much devastation in Mâori society. One was the changing perception of concepts such as imperialism and colonization on the part of the European powers where, after seeing what happened to indigenous people in America and Australia, among other places, they were more reluctant to get involved in New Zealand in a similar way. This meant that whalers, sealers and assorted other ship's people arrived in a land without an official European legal framework, not recognizing or understanding the Mâori framework of social control, these people came to assume there was no law and did as they pleased. In many instances, Europeans, ignorant of concepts such as tapu and mana, both knowingly and unknowingly, broke these rules. Sometimes revenge would be swift and ordered by the chief, but other times, when it was decided to let the gods handle the retribution nothing bad would happen to the transgressor. This began to make many Mâori think that the god of the whites may be more powerful than their own gods. Early sailors often found themselves in conflict with Mâori which led to the widespread use of utu to avenge grievances, which, from the point of view of the European sailors, was just plain, unprovoked, murder.

This explosive mixture of people operating under different systems while relating to each other on a daily basis earned New Zealand a reputation for lawlessness and danger. This attracted the attentions of missionaries who, upon hearing the stories of what went on in New Zealand, decided to come and 'save the heathens' from the cycle of violence. The teachings of the missionaries further weakened the system of social control that had been in place before contact by denigrating the belief system of the Mâori people on which that social control was based. The missionaries made little headway in their efforts to convert the Mâori to Christianity until the musket wars began to decimate the population. The effects of the musket wars were widespread and horrific. Not only did they directly cause the deaths of hundreds, they contributed to many more because of the new insistence on getting firearms by any means necessary to the detriment of traditional economic practices, food production and health. The chiefs of some tribes felt that it was necessary to turn to the missionaries in order to keep from being wiped out by rivals with muskets. The missionaries insisted that the chief and his tribe convert to their religion and begin to live by their laws which meant that the traditional system of mana and tapu had to be abandoned and also led to a lowering of the mana of those particular leaders.

This abrupt abandonment of such ancient and deeply imbedded customs caused the undoing of traditional Mâori society. Christianity, a religion that promised everlasting life to the true believer and emphasized forgiveness was in direct opposition to utu, where punishment for a transgression was meted out immediately. It also had the effect of encouraging bad behavior since it was reasoned that one could do anything one wanted as long as one repented before death. And that is what it seemed like all the white sailors were doing.

The collision between Mâori social control and first European non-law, then European religious regulations, has had long lasting effects on Mâori society to this day. The dissolution of the belief system that lay beneath the system of social control caused doubt to seep into the Mâori consciousness about the validity of their beliefs and of their way of life. In some instances this way of life was abandoned and ties to the land and to other people through whakapapa were forgotten. Generations were lost to their own roots in their own land. In other instances, Mâori began to behave like the early sailors, only to find themselves in trouble with the European law after New Zealand had become an official colony of the British Empire. Today, vestiges of this system of social control still operate but only as guidelines. There is no longer any reason to fear retribution through utu because European law has become the only system of social control in operation in New Zealand.