How does settler-colonialism problematise the concepts of infrastructure and sabotage? Insights from debates about the Treaty of Waitangi in Aotearoa

We problematise the concepts of ‘infrastructure’ and ‘sabotage’ using a decolonial lens based on insights from recent acts of political resistance in Aotearoa. 1 By tracing three case studies we ask: what is the infrastructure? Who is the saboteur? And how do temporalities inform these questions? We hold infrastructure as a contested concept in settler-colonial states that incorporates both state infrastructure which acts as the vehicle for colonial violence, and Indigenous infrastructures which have been subject to, and resist, that violence. This understanding provides the potential to read the state as a saboteur that continues to implement ways to challenge, undermine, and reduce Indigenous sovereignty, perpetuating colonial processes and world views. Using publicly available documents and media reports, we mobilise these insights using three case studies in Aotearoa that relate to debates about the place of the Treaty of Waitangi, Aotearoa's key constitutional document, in contemporary politics. We use these examples as a heuristic to trouble the boundaries of the concept of infrastructure sabotage in the context of settler-colonialism. We argue that there is value in considering how our understandings of infrastructure and sabotage enact colonial violence, and demonstrate this by examining state sabotage and resistance to it, while avoiding applying colonial terms to Indigenous movements for justice.