Na wai ka mana?—ʻŌiwi Agency and European Imperialism in the Hawaiian Kingdom

Abstract

The Hawaiian Kingdom has often been seen as a colonial institution. This dissertation challenges a colonial analysis of the Hawaiian Kingdom and its aliʻi, while illustrating the agency of aliʻi in grappling within and against Euro-American Imperialism. Special attention is given to the complex negotiations taking place in the Hawaiian Kingdom between aliʻi and haole and the ways in which aliʻi were modernizing through the modification of existing indigenous structure and through Hawaiianizing Euro-American structures to suit their own needs. This dissertation uses archival materials such as maps, laws, and letters to demonstrate that the Hawaiian Kingdom was not a colonial institution but rather a hybrid structure to resist colonialism and offers insight into how an indigenous society appropriated the tools of the other for their own means.