He pūnaha ora: Digital collections as living ecosystems

Whakapapa of collections

Māori Data Governance Pou 8: Data Classification

Items in our collections have a lineage and carry meaning below the surface. In technological systems, we can provide context to data through the use of metadata. When the metadata honours cultural significance, we can also make it easier for people to find, organise, and interpret our data. We can reimagine metadata as extensions of whakapapa, ensuring digital collections maintain connections to their cultural origins and communities.

As a starting point, metadata should include fields that describe the basics:

• Where did this record come from?
• What language does it use?
• Who submitted the record and when?

For Māori data, we also need to be able to disaggregate data using units of analysis that are important in te ao Māori, such as iwi, hapū, or rohe. The data solution for your collection must enable you to store this kind of metadata.

Managing collections with cultural context

Pictured: Record metadata editor within Koha showing a custom dropdown list of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages available to assign.

A trusted solution for managing collections with cultural contexts is Koha. Koha is an open source library management system that offers flexible and configurable metadata functionality.  The system comes with a framework feature, where an administrator can define the fields relevant to record types or use the dropdown list of possible values for a field.

Everything from the values, to the options, to the field labels, to the default language can be configured in Koha to suit the needs of the organisation. Therefore, metadata can reflect cataloguing frameworks suitable for the collection. This is often one of the key considerations for organisations when choosing suitable library management software. 

Pictured: Example of record metadata using Aboriginal language which is searchable.

However, metadata can be biased, and proprietary technology can restrict cultural expression. There is a recolonisation that happens when Māori metadata is forced into Western knowledge constructs. Stories that continue to shape Indigenous worldviews and ways of life are often found on the ‘Myths and Legends’ shelf, diminishing their cultural significance when categorised incorrectly.

Pictured: A screenshot from Ngā Upoko Tukutuku or the Māori metadata project, providing a structured path to a Māori worldview within library and archival cataloguing and description.

Collections containing mātauranga Māori must use tikanga-based metadata for culturally appropriate data classification, and the management system must support the configuration of this. As language and culture evolve, the system should also be able to flex for changing knowledge systems. Technology should not restrict how Indigenous knowledge is classified, organised, or developed.

Māori Data Governance Pou 3: Data Collection

It’s important that Māori data collection is not extractive and will support the priorities of iwi-Māori. Organisations should ensure their data collection practices involve asking questions such as:

• What are the purposes of collecting and digitising this data?
• Who does it benefit for the organisation to manage this data?
• Will this strengthen relationships with whānau, iwi and other Māori collectives, and how will we measure this?
• How long should we be responsible for these items, kaitiaki of this knowledge, before it is removed from the catalogue or even returned to Māori?

Māori Data Governance Pou 5: Data Access, Sharing, and Repatriation

Whakapapa is central to Māori identity, connecting people and place in ways that provide a crucial sense of belonging and relation.

It could be said that the purpose of having a collection is to then provide access to materials that a community cares about. When the whakapapa of a collection is properly honoured and catalogued (through collaboration with iwi-Māori and culturally appropriate metadata), the resources become much easier to find and use. Plus, requirements about storage and preservation become clearer.

Access should be viewed as a relational, ongoing process. The simple availability of data isn’t enough – organisations must consider the experience of interacting with the system, and what barriers a user might encounter.

Auckland University of Technology’s platform Ia ~ The Rainbow Collection, honours whakapapa. Ia centres Rainbow research and researchers, so those whose lives are reflected in the content of the collection can access resources in a space designed for them. This also demonstrates how the Māori Data Governance Framework can translate to uplift many marginalised communities.

Learn more about how AUT and Catalyst partnered to create this rainbow research portal.

Digital sovereignty as environmental practice

Māori Data Governance Pou 2: Data Infrastructure

Typically, data sovereignty refers to legal jurisdiction. The decisions we make about our data infrastructure directly determines what laws it may be subject to. 

However, we know that Māori data sovereignty also includes considerations about controls, benefits, and harms. Just as the collection and use of data should not cause harm to Māori, the storage of data should not cause harm to the lands. By nature, data centres are high-energy users. In Aotearoa, we can choose infrastructure providers who are powered by renewable energy. Our collection governance can still be underpinned by principles that align with our environmental values.

Māori Data Governance Pou 6: Data Use and Reuse

The Model's directive to "collect only what is needed" carries significant environmental implications. As stated in section 3.2:
"Not all data is good data. Some information should not be collected... Before collecting data, agencies should carefully consider why data will be collected, what it will be used for, and whether the collection of new data is required to achieve the intended outcomes."

This principle directly reduces the computational resources required for data storage and processing. When agencies avoid unnecessary data collection, they:

• reduce server storage requirements and associated energy consumption
• decrease bandwidth usage during data transmission
• minimise the carbon footprint of data processing operations.

The environmental benefits of Pou 6 reflect deeper principles of kaitiakitanga - the responsibility to care for resources for future generations. By implementing ethical data use practices, agencies not only respect Māori data sovereignty but also contribute to environmental stewardship through:

• reduced digital waste and energy consumption
• more efficient use of computational resources
• sustainable research practices that avoid duplication
• future-focused decision-making that considers environmental impacts.

As the Model emphasises: "Data should support transformative outcomes and should uplift and strengthen our relationships with each other and with our environments." These environmental co-benefits demonstrate how respecting Māori data sovereignty naturally aligns with broader ecological wellbeing for Aotearoa.

Māori Data Governance Pou 7: Data Quality and System Integrity

The environmental benefits of Pou 7 demonstrate how Indigenous data governance principles naturally align with ecological stewardship. As the Model emphasises: "Data quality has often been seen as synonymous with accuracy, the focus now tends to be on fitness for use in terms of user perspectives."

This user-centred approach to data quality prevents the accumulation of digital waste, reduces unnecessary computational processes, and creates sustainable systems that serve both current needs and future generations. The Model's integration of monitoring, standards, and accountability reflects traditional Māori resource management practices that maintained ecological balance for centuries.

By implementing rigorous data quality practices guided by Māori values, agencies contribute to a digital ecosystem that operates with the same principles of restraint, respect, and intergenerational responsibility that characterise traditional kaitiakitanga.

The Model's vision extends beyond mere technical efficiency to encompass a holistic understanding of how digital systems can either burden or benefit te taiao, making data quality governance an essential component of contemporary environmental stewardship in Aotearoa.

Intergenerational collection care

Māori Data Governance Pou 1: Data Capacities and Workforce Development

The Model advocates for a Māori workforce with the resources and skills needed to sustainably manage their own data. Until we’ve achieved that, organisations should foster cultures that nurture their Māori workforce and ways of working. Applying te ao Māori frameworks to the workforce enables caring for digital taonga to become a collective, intergenerational responsibility.

As the Model states: “Growing and accelerating Māori data and digital capacities and leadership is a key success factor for Māori Data Governance”. This goes beyond increasing the number of Māori in your workplace, but expanding the skillset for working with data to include Māori knowledge and tikanga. For example, it could look like incorporating tuakana-teina into your mentorship and succession planning.

At Catalyst, we advocate strongly for open source software such as Koha. In fact, the open source model aligns closely with Māori values, with community foundations supporting a collective good.

Open source gives users the ability to view and modify the software so it can look and behave exactly as needed. Aside from building something brand new from scratch, open source is the only way to achieve code sovereignty. When planning for the future, we should choose solutions that will survive the people who implemented them. An open source, community-driven platform is the sustainable choice over clinging to custom-built technology, generating technical debt over years of neglect. Open source reduces bottlenecks caused by the limitations of a technology that users have no control over. It is even a way to develop the Māori technology and data workforce as it gives them a look under the hood and provides the toolbox.

Māori Data Governance Pou 4: Data Protection

Pictured: A screenshot showing an item in Koha that is restricted to members who whakapapa to Kāi Tahu. For data protection reasons, this is a fake example.

With growing interest in open access and open standards, access control becomes an increasingly critical conversation. While open data can produce benefits, Indigenous communities are less likely to share in those benefits equitably. Indigenous communities are often excluded from governance decisions about their own data. This is particularly important in the case of Indigenous knowledge and its applications. Data is a responsibility, not an entitlement, so as kaitiaki of digital collections, we need to ask questions like “can this be accessed by someone who shouldn’t?”

In te ao Māori, sometimes whakapapa is what gives you access rights to a resource. This means your system requires:

1. the ability to designate whakapapa information to a resource, such as through metadata, and 
2. the ability to specify access controls, so at the very least, an administrator or librarian can see "this is a restricted item". 

In Koha, an organisation can mark items as restricted and choose what those restrictions or access protocols are based on local tikanga and culturally sensitive rules. Restricted items will require confirmation before they can be shared with a user.

Māori Data Governance Pou 5: Data Access, Sharing, and Repatriation

Technology can be a tool for giving knowledge back. Catalyst recently supported Te Kotahitanga o Te Atiawa Trust to launch their Koha, which would “preserve knowledge and provide access to Te Ātiawa uri”. The Koha system, coupled with Catalyst Cloud hosting, hit all of its key objectives:

• security and scalability
• ease of use
• data sovereignty, and
• the ability to provide the interface in te reo Māori, in a system that would support Māori metadata and knowledge structures.

The Trust went ahead with this project with their mokopuna in mind. They have used technology to repatriate stories and knowledge for future generations, in a platform that will support the revitalisation of te reo Māori.

A personal element of this Koha implementation was that Wainui Witika-Park, Developer in Rōpū kohinga at Catalyst, was able to lead the project. This relates to Pou 1, as there was Māori leadership from all directions throughout the implementation, ensuring tikanga was correctly embedded. Wainui is an uri of Te Ātiawa, so it was incredibly special that she could use her technical training in a project that would see a fulfilment of Pou 5, for her own whānau.

Learn more about how Te Kotahitanga o Te Atiawa are using Koha.

Decolonisation of collections

When digital collection infrastructures are designed to embody values from te ao Māori, this is a form of decolonisation. It involves collections which honour whakapapa and support iwi-Māori aspirations. It treats digital sovereignty as an environmental practice. It has policies and processes that promote intergenerational care. Most of all, it means collections will reaffirm and strengthen connections to identity, place, and te reo Māori. The Māori Data Governance Model provides the blueprint for this shift in mindset when handling Māori data – from ownership and custody, to responsible stewardship and kaitiakitanga.