Enhancing cross-cultural evaluation practice through kaupapa Māori evaluation and boundary critique: Insights from Aotearoa New Zealand

Abstract

In Aotearoa New Zealand, concern about the impact of colonisation and experience of institutional racism has led to calls for evaluative practice to be firmly grounded in a Māori worldview to reflect indigenous values and avoid deficit framings. With this in mind, our evaluation projects have been informed by a blend of kaupapa Māori evaluation and boundary critique to ensure that our systemic inquiries were responsive to hapū aspirations. We focus on the role that boundary critique played in supporting our cross-cultural evaluation practice. Applying boundary critique enabled the expansion of the evaluand to encompass hapū values and outcomes from a te ao Māori/hapū perspective. We posit that boundary critique is useful when undertaking cross-cultural evaluations as it provides a way to make explicit the different values of te ao Māori (the Māori world) and te ao Pākehā (the Western World).