"The Crown may be party to the Treaty, but its cost is widely disbursed to you and me, ordinary Kiwis."

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ARTICLE AD BOX
"The Treaty process, currently unbounded in scope and duration, has been artificially propped up by a widespread illusion: that the Crown's capacity is infinite, and that every new round of obligations—whether in co-governance models, cultural consultancies, or environmental concessions—can be sustained indefinitely because the burden is shared silently by non-Crown actors. Citizens pay the consulting fees, councils interpret planning law through cultural lenses, engineers and teachers undergo training, businesses fund dual-language signage, and ratepayers finance Treaty-based infrastructure conditions. The Crown may be party to the Treaty, but its cost is widely disbursed to you and me, ordinary Kiwis.
    "In the 2020s, this model still functions because few question it. The Crown, in effect, outsources its obligations—not through explicit legislative transfer, but by institutional habit and moral framing. But when the public begins to refuse this arrangement, to assert that Treaty duties are not theirs to bear, the load returns to where it lawfully belongs. In that moment, iwi will see the Crown as it is: a finite entity, not a metaphysical benefactor."
~ Zoran Rakovic from his post 'When the Crown Stands Alone'
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