I picked up this book with genuine curiosity, the history of Māori judges on the New Zealand bench is a subject that deserves serious treatment, and Harvey and Warren largely deliver it.

The authors trace the appointment of Māori judges to the New Zealand bench from the nineteenth century through to the present day, situating each within the legal and political conditions of their time. The stronger chapters move beyond mere biography to consider what the presence and at times the conspicuous absence of Māori judges has meant for areas such as land law, tikanga, and Treaty jurisprudence. There is a genuinely thought-provoking argument running through the book about the relationship between judicial composition and the development of the law itself.

Harvey and Warren handle their material with care and evident respect for their subjects. The book strikes a thoughtful balance, neither reducing individual judges to mere symbols of progress nor shying away from the broader institutional questions their careers raise. It is a genuinely considered piece of scholarship, and a credit to the authors.

Worth a place on the shelf of any practitioner with an interest in the courts and te Tiriti o Waitangi. The book has also been added to the collections of the Auckland, Wellington, and Canterbury Law Libraries.