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Indigenous data sovereignty: Challenges and opportunities in Aotearoa NZ
presentation
posted on 2019-05-15, 00:26 authored by Tahu KukutaiData is the 21st century’s most valuable resource. Aotearoa NZ is a world leader in linking
administrative data, and an early adopter of data-driven policy-making but has yet to develop
innovative models of data governance and ethics, value creation and benefit-sharing. Many of the
assumptions underpinning Aotearoa NZ’s data ecosystems rest on Anglo-European legal concepts
(e.g. individual privacy and ownership) which translate poorly into the big and open data
environment. What is needed is a radically different way of conceptualising rights that relate to
massive quantities of data. Indigenous data sovereignty (IDSov) marks an important departure from
current theory and practice. At the heart of IDSov is the right of indigenous peoples and nations to
control the collection, ownership, and application of data about their people, territories, lifeways and
natural resources. This talk provides an overview of developments in IDSov with a specific focus
on the opportunities and challenges in Aotearoa NZ.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Tahu Kukutai (Ngāti Tiipa, Maniapoto, Te Aupōuri) is Professor of Demography at the National
Institute of Demographic and Economic Analysis, University of Waikato. Tahu specialises in Māori
and indigenous demographic research and has written extensively on official statistics (including
census methodologies), Māori population change and Māori identity. She has undertaken research
with and for government agencies, hapū, iwi and NGOs. Tahu is a founding member of the Māori
Data Sovereignty Network Te Mana Raraunga and is Vice President of the Population Association
of New Zealand. She is co-editor (with John Taylor) of Indigenous Data Sovereignty: Toward an
Agenda (free download on ANU Press website). She was previously a journalist.
