Indigenous Knowledge and Transdisciplinary Science: Some Remarks by Te Ahukaramū Charles Royal

Thank you for the invitation to speak today and to share with you some of my thoughts regarding indigenous knowledge and transdisciplinary science. I would like to begin by stating that I am not a scientist, in the conventional sense, and I do not claim standing in science. Rather, I am a researcher of traditional indigenous knowledge in New Zealand - what we call mātauranga Māori. I have been a researcher of this knowledge since the late 1980s motivated by both a desire for a greater understanding of my Māori identity and also by the creative possibilities I see in this body of knowledge. I have held formal roles in the academy, however, today I work as an independent researcher located within my tribal community. This is for a number of reasons. First, I was taught by a number of my tribal elders who asked me to take care of their treasures and to pass those treasures on in due course to other, usually younger, members of our community. These treasures include our traditional stories, songs and dances, genealogies which define our tribal communities, our rituals and ways of doing things and much more.

A second reason arises from the heavy involvement of my family in the redevelopment of our communities over the past 40-50 years or so. My parents, uncles, aunties, cousins and more have all had some role to play in our communities with respect to healing history and creating a future. I was acculturated, at an early age, into an ethic of tribal community service.

A third reason relates to the immediacy of the impact of one’s contributions. I have worked in large institutions and one of the frustrating things I found in those places was the lack of clarity regarding the impact of my efforts. I have put my energy into large institutions and have a felt mixture of lack of recognition together with a vagueness about whether I was making a difference anyway. Working in my community, however, I see the impact of my efforts in a more immediate way. 

So I work in my tribal community seeking to create value there and make my contribution. It is not that I do not contribute to things outside my community, for indeed I do (such as this meeting today). However, I do so on the basis of my work within my community first - and it is this ‘in-community’ work I suggest adds to the value and authority of my work when I speak about it to audiences beyond my community. 

There is another reason for working in my tribal communities and that is the potential that exists there to design and advance an entirely different way of organising and managing the affairs of our nation to supplement those provided by our Government. Please note that I am not anti-democratic nor do I suggest that the Government has no legitimacy. I see tremendous value in democracy and an open and fair society. I also respect the right of the Government to exist, a right derived from our indigenous Treaty of Waitangi, signed in 1840 by representatives of the Crown of England. I also see, however, the limitations of the ‘top down-centre out’ approach which is typical of our conventional governmental structures. There is much to say about this and I do not wish to cover all points here. Rather, I wish to say that there is much value in exploring a ‘ground up, localised, community driven approach’ to the management of our nation to sit alongside that presented by the Government.

Such a way of organising the world, in my mind, is based upon ideas found within our traditional indigenous knowledge concerning deep identification with the natural world. The cultural ideas and viewpoints that underpin our tribal communities - often referred to as indigeneity, or indigenous worldviews - represent a set of ideas that could yet make an important contribution in the 21st Century. Hence, my work is motivated by both a need to engage pragmatically with the world as we experience it - to understand what our communities tangibly and practically need to address the issues before us - together with a desire to make use of key wisdom found in our indigenous traditions and experience in that pragmatic engagement with the world.

(Regarding a poetic, artistic engagement with the world, that is the subject of my other career in the arts as a composer and storyteller. )

The Presence of Science in Indigenous Knowledge

Turning now to questions of knowledge, it is in this tribal community context that my ideas about indigenous knowledge and transdisciplinary science arise. In the first instance, I am focused on what my community needs to successfully address and navigate the complex issues of the 21st Century. My tribal community is working hard as a collective to secure our future. We are reorganising our representative structures, redeveloping our cultural centres, improving the management of our assets and resources, developing new business enterprises and more. At the same time, we are facing a host of issues typical of our times such as rising sea water and flooding, diminishing water quality and species loss, social fragmentation and alienation, and much more. 

The reorganisation of our communities and the ability to address the issues of our times all require ‘good knowledge’ and from the outset we can say our indigenous communities need both indigenous knowledge and science. It is our indigenous knowledge that explains, among other things, who we are, where we come from, what is our place in the world, our values, what a meaningful life looks like and more. Science too is critical for my tribal community as it enables us to engage effectively with the issues and challenges before us and to build high quality, useful knowledge about the world. Building better knowledge leads to better decision making. Like any community, indigenous communities need many different kinds of knowledge to help them successfully address and navigate the complexities of 21st century life, including science, arts, humanities and more.

One of the interesting issues that I have been engaging with recently is the question of the presence of science in indigenous knowledge. It has been often said that indigenous knowledge does not include science asserting that indigenous knowledge is enamoured with a mystical participation in the world (confer Levy Bruhl) and can therefore be regarded as mythological and religious knowledge only. This is not true. While there is much in indigenous knowledge that is not science, there is a dimension within it nonetheless that we can call science. Elsewhere I have written the following:

My position regarding science and mātauranga Māori (indigenous knowledge) is… nuanced. While I do not believe that our pre-European ancestors developed a mature science such as we understand today, there are aspects within traditional mātauranga Māori which represent the seeds, at least, of science. These include observation, hypotheses and the testing of hypotheses. It also includes collective knowledge creation (conclusions are adopted by others through their own testing) and the passing of efficacious knowledge over time, each generation adding their contributions.

Pacific navigation, for example, involved the observation of phenomena, the forming of hypotheses (including predictions) and the testing of these hypotheses upon the ocean, sometimes as a matter of life and death. In these islands, our people had to figure out which plants and animals they could eat, could be used as medicines, could be used to fashion clothing and building materials and more. They observed patterns and occurrences in the natural world which enabled them to predict the right time to fish or when to plant. They created bodies of useful knowledge - the Maramataka being an example - tested and refined over time, and which served generations of Māori well.

(Letters to the Listener, 15 January 2022)

I suggest that there is a pragmatic dimension within our traditional knowledge concerned with the realities of living in the world. And I suggest that this pragmatic dimension represents the ‘seeds’ of science if not a kind of science itself. It is also important to note that this is not a mature or advanced science such as we understand today. However, nor could it be given the history of colonisation which prevented Māori culture generally and our traditional knowledge specifically from growing and moving through a positive encounter with other knowledge traditions (as is the case with many knowledge traditions and legacies around the world).

(There is no reason to suggest that the science pre-existing in mātauranga Māori could not have grown and matured through joining with science from elsewhere. The fact that it did not reach a level of maturity such as we see in other nations and communities is not proof suggesting science never existed within mātauranga Māori, nor that the capacity and capability to mature its science was absent as well.)

In my classes in my home tribal community, I like to say to my fellow community members that to engage scientifically with the world, with reality, is as much a part of our indigenous knowledge and tradition as is religion, mythology, the arts and the like. (I like to challenge the simplistic view that Europeans ‘do’ science and Māori do not.) I also suggest that it is possible to establish a ‘new way’ of conducting science in the context of indigenous communities which both honours and nurtures indigenous identity, culture and tradition together with undertaking reputable science; it is possible to be both independent of and participant within worldwide science. Such an endeavour is already underway in indigenous communities worldwide anyway.

International Science Council Paper on Transdisciplinarity

https://futures.council.science/publications/transdisciplinary

Finally, I would like to offer a number of brief comments in response to the discussion paper entitled ‘Looking at the Future of Transdisciplinary Research’ by Matthias Kaiser and Peter Gluckman, released just a day to two ago by the International Science Council. I would like to congratulate the ISC on this paper and wish to highlight this comment:I would like to congratulate the ISC on this paper and wish to highlight this comment:

Transdisciplinarity is an approach that enables science and other knowledge systems to interact in a constructive way. Its strength is, firstly, its inclusion of stakeholders from the beginning to help define the question and, secondly, the avoidance of hubris as to which knowledge systems count.

This is an important comment particularly with respect to the emphasis placed upon the ‘inclusion of stakeholders from the beginning to help define the question’ and ‘the avoidance of hubris’. In the experience of my community, too often external parties (particularly Government structures) have described and defined problems for us and we have had to make do and cope with events as they flow from that decision. This is a very disempowering place to be and it does not necessarily lead to better outcomes anyway. Second, a confrontational approach between knowledge systems will simply not work. An approach that says “I am right and you are wrong” will not lead anywhere. Further, it does not recognise the fact that no person or persons live in a purely scientifically informed worldview. We are a mixture of rationality and emotion, intellect and intuition. It does not help science to dismiss this reality or just assume that it doesn’t matter.

I see the overall thrust of the paper is to articulate a more inclusive and broader vision for science while strengthening and honouring its core principles. It does this by, for example, locating science within the age old universal human desire to know and understand the world, by noting that some aspects of the ‘principles of science’ were expressed in some cultures outside of Renaissance Europe and that scientists have to wrestle with realities when their creations are brought into the public domain. It also helps to humanise science by acknowledging that science has been advanced through such things as warfare. Science has not always been used for benevolent purposes.

Regarding the five ‘Main Points’ of the paper (pages 5 and 6), here are some brief notes:

1. It is refreshing to see this description of science commencing with the universal human desire to know the world which has been with all human communities and at all times. It serves to strengthen the connection of science with our humanity and broaden our view of science as something that many diverse people can do. To a very significant degree, science is still seen by many as an activity undertaken by elites who are resourced and empowered to do so. While, of course, this is very true in many instances, science has also been conducted by diverse people in a variety of circumstances, both historically and today. The description also leans toward a more embracing view of knowledge and ‘sets up’ the discussion regarding the development of the principles of science during the Renaissance era while at the same time acknowledging the presence of some of these principles in cultures and societies outside of Renaissance Europe. The description also makes an important distinction between the principles of science and science systems. Many of the complaints and objections that some have with science are, I suggest, are actually to do with the structures and vehicles by which science is conducted rather than with science itself. I think that in the minds of many people, science is equivalent to its structures. There is an important task to ‘humanise’ science, to liberate it out of the constraint of its structures and re-establish it as a universal human activity and endeavour.
2. This passage makes the important point regarding industrialised science, where so much scientific advancement has taken place over the past 200 years or so. It points out that the use of science in times of war has, among other things, produced an understandably ambivalent attitude in some regarding science. There is also the matter where some scientists have to perform roles beyond that purely of a knowledge creator and they are not always well equipped to undertake this role. The issue is that the ‘products of science’ have to interact with and find meaning within a ‘…complex social reality. Consequently, the role of scientists in this complex web of interactions became as multi-faceted as the products itself.’
3. Transdisciplinarity, as envisaged here, is an exciting theme. It continues the generally open attitude of the paper by once again recognising that science has to form positive relationships with a variety of non-academic parties and knowledge to ‘realize more demanding goals’. The paper avoids providing definitions and inflexible frameworks preferring (and probably wisely) to present its ‘normative aspirations… presented as a general framework rather than a specific method.’ I found much in this passage that is relevant to my work. In my tribal context, with its intersection and overlap between indigenous knowledge and science, between people/community, knowledge holders and knowledge creators, transdisciplinarity is a useful concept and I look forward to working further with it.
4. The emphasis upon ‘fit for purpose’ aligns well with my work in my tribal community - for the primary focus of my work is upon ‘what does my tribal community need, in terms of knowledge, to help them successfully address the complex issues before them in the 21st Century?’ The inclusion of indigenous knowledge is applauded as well as the acknowledgement of the importance of professional and experiential expertise.
5. The theme of building the capacity and capability of those involved in transdisciplinary science will need to be uplifted. The paper acknowledges that transdisciplinary science is challenging in various ways and so there will need some particular effort which is about enabling parties to undertake this kind of science.

Finally, I would like to conclude with the question which asks, to what degree is transdisciplinarity a vision for the future of science overall?

Notes
A Presentation to Session 3.3 entitled ‘Advancing Transdisciplinary Science’ of a meeting entitled ‘Capitalizing on Synergies in Science’, International Science Council, 10-12 May 2023, Paris, France