Session Description
In IA practice, Indigenous knowledge can seem ethereal or difficult to operationalise. This session aims to make one body of Indigenous practice tangible by inviting participants into a live application of an Indigenous impact method. Whiria Ngā Ara is a mātauranga Māori-grounded approach to impact assessment, premised on causal interrelationships as understood within a Māori worldview. It examines how social, economic, cultural, environmental and institutional determinants combine to shape trajectories over time, and helps practitioners move beyond assessing isolated initiatives to consider wider pathways, system interactions, cumulative effects and portfolio choices. Following a concise introduction to the approach, participants will work in small groups using Whiria Ngā Ara web tools on their own devices. They will apply the architecture to a live challenge from their own practice, initially identifying what their usual assessment methods make visible and then testing what changes when the challenge is examined through a determinants-based Indigenous lens. Scenario shifts and structured prompts will enable participants to revisit assumptions, trace indirect effects, identify overlooked leverage points and reconsider intervention, partnership and measurement choices. The session will culminate in a collective examination of what the approach surfaced, where it aligned with or challenged existing practice, and how well its methodological insights travelled. The session is both an experiential learning opportunity and a live methodological test: an invitation to encounter Indigenous knowledge as a source of practical analytical innovation.
Session Summary
Test a live impact challenge through an Indigenous assessment architecture. This interactive session invites participants to discover what becomes newly visible, where established methods are stretched, and how Indigenous knowledge can generate practical insight across contexts.
Additional Information
Whiria Ngā Ara has been developed through the collective insight and contribution of many Māori knowledge experts (pūkenga). We would greatly value the opportunity to share and test this work while IAIA is gathered on our whenua, and to contribute a distinctly Māori approach to the wider international conversation on impact assessment.
Session Chair
Sacha McMeeking
Te Wānanga o Aotearoa
New Zealand
Session Co-chair
Cazna Luke
The Impact Agency
New Zealand