Since 1848, Native Hawaiians have been systematically dispossessed of their land, cultural sovereignty, and means of production through legal deceit, settler violence, and imperial expansion. The Māhele — often misrepresented as a step toward modernization — marked the beginning of large-scale land alienation that severed Hawaiians from their ancestral stewardship. What followed was the accumulation of land and capital by missionary descendants, American businessmen, and eventually the U.S. federal and state governments, all at the expense of the Indigenous people of the islands.
Today, the consequences are clear: Native Hawaiians are overrepresented among the houseless, underrepresented in land ownership, and chronically excluded from the wealth generated on their own homeland. “Recapitalizing Hawaiʻi’s People” is not a metaphor — it is a concrete, moral, and political imperative. It means restoring land to stewardship, returning economic agency, and dismantling the legal and political structures that have upheld colonial theft for generations.
The Theft Began with Paper: The Great Māhele
In 1848, under pressure from Western advisors, King Kamehameha III enacted the Great Māhele — a Western-style land division meant to formalize ownership and protect Hawaiian lands. But the shift from communal stewardship to private property devastated the Indigenous population. Most Native Hawaiians, unfamiliar with the Western legal system and unable to pay survey fees or navigate court bureaucracy, lost their lands within decades.
Lands that had been stewarded collectively for centuries were now parceled out, bought, and sold — primarily to foreign interests. By the early 20th century, Hawaiians held less than 1% of their ancestral land.
The Māhele was not a modernization — it was an economic weapon of settler colonialism. It disempowered Hawaiians, separating them from ʻāina, ancestors, identity, and the sacred source of life.
The Overthrow and Plantation Capitalism
In 1893, a coup led by American businessmen — with the support of U.S. Marines — overthrew Queen Liliʻuokalani and the sovereign Hawaiian Kingdom. What followed was a full-scale colonial transformation: the islands were annexed without consent in 1898 and absorbed into a U.S. economic system centered on sugar, pineapple, and military infrastructure.
Hawaiians were reduced to laborers on lands they once owned, their governance replaced with corporate boards and appointed U.S. officials. Large plantations, often owned by missionary descendants or American capitalists, extracted wealth while Native people faced dispossession, poverty, and cultural suppression.
The means of production — land, water rights, labor power, and even language — were violently seized and monetized. Extracted wealth grew as Hawaiians’ autonomy shrank.
Statehood Stole Sovereignty
When Hawai‘i became a U.S. state in 1959, it was presented as a democratic milestone. In reality, it solidified colonial control under the guise of citizenship. Vast tracts of “ceded lands” — taken from the Hawaiian monarchy and meant to benefit Hawaiians — were transferred to the State of Hawai‘i or held in trust by the federal government and has never been returned.
Public policies further displace Native Hawaiians. Urban development, tourism expansion, and military bases occupy vast lands while pushing Hawaiians into poverty and diaspora. Native communities are bulldozed for resorts, highways, and missile ranges. In Honolulu, houseless encampments — often filled with kanaka maoli — stand in the shadows of luxury condos.
Statehood offered representation without restitution, and Hawaiian colonization was complete.
Recapitalization: What Does It Mean
To recapitalize people is not charity.
It is a plan to undo documented theft and to rebuild economic, cultural, and commercial sovereignty. This does not require change to statehood. It only requires a change of values and principles upon which policy is decided.
This means:
- Land Back. Transfer control of large tracts of public and “ceded” lands to Native Hawaiian trusts, cooperatives, and cultural institutions to restore stewardship.
- Economic Capitalization. Establish state and federal programs to directly fund Hawaiian-owned enterprises, agricultural restoration, housing cooperatives, and cultural revitalization efforts.
- Housing Justice. Address the houseless crisis among Native Hawaiians with urgency and priority access to affordable, ancestral, and self-determined housing.
- Control of Natural Resources. Return water rights and agricultural land to Native Hawaiian hands. End the commodification of sacred resources by luxury developers and military contractors.
- Political Empowerment. Support Native Hawaiian self-determination, including options for greater autonomy, federal recognition (if desired by the community).
This is not radical. It is long overdue.
Hawai‘i’s Economy Still Extracts — But for Whom?
Tourism, the military, and real estate development remain the pillars of Hawai‘i’s economy. Yet none of these industries meaningfully empower the Hawaiian peoples. Tourism packages culture while ignoring its living bearers. The military occupies over 200,000 acres of land — including sacred sites — producing toxic pollution, continued gentrification, and further displacement.
Meanwhile, Hawaiians continue to rank among the lowest in income, health, and educational access in their own homeland.
Recapitalizing Hawaiians means flipping this structure. Hawaiians must not be labor for the economy; they must be authors of it.
A Moral Imperative, A Political Responsibility
Justice demands more than symbolic gestures or cultural inclusion. It demands redistribution — of land, wealth, and power. The U.S. and the State of Hawai‘i owe a debt. That debt is not paid with apologies, monuments, or holidays, but with deeds, investments, and restoration.
“Recapitalizing Hawaiians” is not a slogan — it is a path to justice. The resources exist. What is missing is the political will to return what was taken and invest in the people who have endured centuries of erasure.
Conclusion: Land, Power, Dignity
Hawaiians are not victims of the past. They are survivors of an ongoing system designed to displace and extract. To recapitalize Hawaiians is to reverse that system — to shift from theft to restoration, from exploitation to sovereignty.
If Hawai‘i is to be a place of justice, the people of this land must not be its servants. They must be its stewards — with land beneath their feet, wealth in their hands, and the dignity of self-rule.
It is time to return the ʻāina, restore the wealth, and recapitalize the nation that has never died — and continues to resist.
Leave a comment