Such gains as M\u0101ori have made are no accident, but the result of a willingness to fight for what is rightfully theirs \u2013 a struggle that continues to this day<\/p>\n
Hannah Arendt, the political philosopher, once wrote that \u201cpower always stands in need of numbers\u201d. That insight, made in the context of a study into the nature of violence, is one that commentators often turn to when explaining why M\u0101ori appear to fare so much better than Indigenous peoples in other parts of the Anglosphere. M\u0101ori make up more than 15% of the New Zealand population \u2013 more than five times larger than the Aboriginal Australian or Native American share of their national populations \u2013 meaning M\u0101ori are in a better position to press for guaranteed representation in parliament and local government, for dedicated television channels and radio stations, for native language schooling, and more. Indigenous peoples in other countries, to paraphrase Arendt, stand in need of numbers.<\/p>\n
The argument is seductively simple. Social scientists sometimes call it the 3.5% rule. In other words, if enough people engage in active struggle \u2013 from workers\u2019 strikes to street protests \u2013 the disruption they cause is almost always enough to guarantee political change. In the 1980s socialist organisers were turning out tens of thousands of people on the streets to protest the Springbok tour<\/a>, nuclear warships, and racism against M\u0101ori<\/a>. It\u2019s impossible to measure whether the 3.5% threshold was met, but it\u2019s obvious enough that the many thousands who took part in demonstrations and advocacy were enough to cancel any further Springbok tours, to prohibit nuclear warships from New Zealand waters, and to strengthen the Treaty of Waitangi\u2019s position in the New Zealand constitution.<\/p>\n