Can stewardship bring First Nations’ knowledges to the centre of being a public servant in Australia?

Today’s piece explores the possibility of a uniquely Australian approach to stewardship in public policy informed by First Nations ways of knowing. It is by Andrew Morgan, who is a Sir Roland Wilson Scholar at ANZSOG and the Crawford School of Public Policy at ANU, with contributions from Craig Ritchie and Lisa Conway.

Sunset over Ngunnawal in the ACT. — Sunset over Ngunnaway. Spelio, 2021 CC By-NC-SA 2.0

In public policy, ‘stewardship’ has become one of those special words that we all agree is important, but there isn’t a clear definition of what this means in practice. So it’s positive that the last review of the Australian Public Service, known as the Thodey Review, called for it to be defined in legislation. Following the government’s reinvigorated enthusiasm for APS reform, it might be time for a more ambitious approach. The time is right to have a discussion about a uniquely Australian vision for stewardship that looks beyond the academy and recognises First Nations ways of knowing. By engaging with other forms cultural knowledge, we can reflect on ways to strengthen our approach to public stewardship. In doing so, we can create an institutional nudge that moves policy practitioners from a deficit-based understandings of First Nations’ knowledge to placing it at the centre of how we build a new vision for the public service.

The Thodey Review offered a potential definition of stewardship to start from:

Stewardship. Looking ahead to the medium and long term to identify and meet current and future challenges and take future opportunities, with the interests of all Australians in mind. Protecting the institution of the APS. Providing a repository of wisdom and experience, including maintaining the capability to serve successive governments, ensuring continuity of public service, sustaining core expertise to tackle multifaceted policy issues, being self-critical, building and sustaining genuine partnerships and remaining steadfast to the public interest.

Thodey wasn’t the first review to mention stewardship. The Moran Review raised the idea in 2010, and said:

Stewardship relates not only to financial sustainability and the effective and efficient management of resources, but also to less tangible factors such as maintaining the trust placed in the APS and building a culture of innovation and integrity in policy advice.

Both these ideas point to stewardship having an intangible quality that requires a different kind of thinking – or an element of doing something more than routine management. They point to a concept of stewardship that is more than market steering. But this makes it difficult to define. If we get our approach to stewardship right, we can strengthen strategic capabilities to deliver public outcomes and foster trust.

To achieve the promise stewardship raises we should look to different paradigms of public good, collective wisdom and sustainability. This is both an institutional and an epistemological challenge. This means not just looking to the future but understanding how our knowledge has been formed. It requires not just looking at the path ahead, but also asking, what are the stories on either side of the path and how does this interact with the centre? What are the signals our institutional frameworks have been blind to? I think this is what Thodey refers to when he said in the report, “The APS will look out, not in. It will understand the needs of the Australian people better and will partner with others to achieve outcomes. It will be confident and open in what it brings to the table but humble in learning from others; it will not assume it has all the answers.” (2019, 54).

These values may not be well understood by our current institutional settings, but are often central to First Nations knowledge and relationships to country. This is a strength we can learn from. Althaus (2020) suggests public administration is dominated by western positivism, and new avenues for policymaking can be found by embracing respectful practice with First Nations People and their knowledge. There is a lack of mainstream engagement with First Nations’ ways of knowing. Mintrom and O’Neil (2022) show there is insufficient understanding of First Nations knowledge in public policy courses taught at universities. From the starting gate, we are not successfully building future public bureaucrats to recognise other forms of knowledge and traditions. It’s not core a core value of Australian public administration. But could it be?

If stewardship is at the heart of how we can define our vision for managing public administration in Australia, can we consider how to humbly acknowledge the wisdom that has come before us in First Nations’ knowledge? How can we recognise the forms of wisdom that exists in our community that is untapped? What possibilities might this bring if we think about this as a defining element of Australian public stewardship?

Image of Parliament House Forecourt featuring Kumantje Jagamara’s artwork ‘Possum and Wallaby Dreaming’ — *Parliament House Forecourt featuring Kumantje Jagamara’s artwork ‘Possum and Wallaby Dreaming’ (1985).* Joseph Fox, CC BY-SA 3.0

Craig Ritchie is an Aboriginal man of the Dhunghutti and Biripi nations and the Chief Executive Officer at the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) who writes about the limitations of dominant policy paradigms. I asked him for his thoughts.

Western ideas about knowledge along with managerialism are central to how we think about policy and public outcomes despite their successive failure in shifting complex problems. If we are to really think about what stewardship means, we need to have a conversation that recognises other forms of knowledge that can equip the public service to think differently.

Across the Tasman Sea, the New Zealand Government has shown such an approach can be successful, with Maori principles used in framing mainstream public services values and policy. The Reserve Bank of New Zealand’s overarching strategy being framed around its role as a kaitiaki (guardian) of the nation’s economy and finical system. The NZ digital transformation is informed by its five data principles, communicated through Maori ways language. First nations’ knowledge is shaping how the work of the public service is undertaken as it forms its knowledge and strategy.

A starting point may be to recognise the First Nations’ values and experiences of custodianship as a way to inform a discussion about what it means to be a public steward.

Lisa Conway, is a proud Yorta Yorta woman, a National Manager for Services Australia and a PhD candidate at ANU. Lisa is researching how to build cultural capability in public administrations with a focus on policy decision making in the APS. She says:

I have spoken to 46 current and former public servants and analysed our policies and processes. Despite good intentions, the APS has a long way to go in creating an environment that is culturally safe for both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander staff and services users. There are many complexities to achieving the right outcome, but as a starting point, embedding First Nations’ knowledge at the centre of how we define what it means to be a public servant, we can begin to build understanding into the system and draw on the strength of First Nations Cultures in Australia.

If we are to take a bolder approach, it will require changes in our thinking at the individual, organisation and system levels. It will not be enough to define stewardship, we need to think about the institutional and cultural change required to embed it. And the conversation must be genuine. We cannot simply use a word like custodianship in place of stewardship. We need to recognise the idea of custodianship as a value, expressed differently in Australian’s First Nations cultures that can inform learning and a fresh approach. First Nations Peoples’ knowledge can shape a path to define the stewardship role of public servants and improve policy management and, with humility and cultural understanding.

As the government is taking a fresh crack at the reform agenda, First Nations knowledge and values of custodianship can help to provide a new way to think. It’s a timely reflection to think about how to craft long term public policy and we can recognise the contributions of First Nations culture and knowledge to enhance our understanding of delivering public outcomes in all facets of public management.