Promoting the Māori language to non-Māori: evaluating the New Zealand government’s approach

New Zealand’s main government Māori language planning agencies, the Māori Language Commission and the Ministry of Māori Development, have engaged for some time in language planning targeting the attitudes and behaviours of non-Māori New Zealanders. This activity is based on the belief that the attitudes and behaviours of majority language speakers exert an important influence on the health of minority languages. To date, there has been little evaluation of the effectiveness of this approach. This article examines the official policy and practice of the two agencies in this regard and evaluates their effectiveness, in terms of both internal factors and external responses. Based on this analysis, points for improvement and potentially effective future directions are discussed.