The Maori Party had three related objectives for the 2008 campaign: to win all seven Maori electorates, gain greater recognition as the ‘Treaty partner’ in Parliament, and have a role in the next government. Thus the party sought to project itself as the independent kingmaker of the election, hoping to take up the same strategic position that New Zealand First had held as an important player in past coalition negotiations, able to leverage disproportionate policy gains from the major parties. In order to gain this position, the Maori Party had to carefully construct an image of political neutrality between Labour and National. These are the issues that I focus on in the section on the Maori Party within my chapter entitled ‘Party Strategy and the 2008 Election’ which is part of the recently published book Informing Voters? Politics, Media and the New Zealand Election 2008 (edited by Chris Rudd, Janine Hayward and Geoff Craig). This blog post is the 12th of a series of explorations of the chapters from the new book, and it constitutes the original draft section about the Maori Party that I wrote for my chapter. Subsequently this draft was substantially reworked, edited, and condensed for the final book, so please see the published book for the final and ‘authoritative’ version. [Read more below]