RACE RELATIONS IN NEW ZEALAND

New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 822, 29 April 1955, Page 5

RACE RELATIONS IN NEW ZEALAND

Sir.-The relationship between Maori and Pakeha is not frequently enough a matter of comment, and it is therefore all the more gratifying to see The Listener giving prominence to it. For those not actually engaged in study of the Maori the most common report concerns the criminal. This in itself is an indication. of how badly he is adapting himself to the European communityor perhaps how little the European community is allowing the Maori to adapt himself. Dr. Winiata, Mr. Ritchie and Professor Piddington are all obviously aware that the situation is not as desirable as it might be. The Maori may not want to be wholly Europeanised, but let us also face the situation where most Pakehas would resent his demanding the social, cultural and economic equality that is the principle of the Welfare State. In the state which he has reached in transit from his Stone Age tribal culture

there is obvious confusion of values. A segregation or conscious effort to preserve what is left of his culture will not help him to solve the conflict. Historically, peoples that are overrun in such numbers by a later aggressive culture as to become a minority group do not survive ag an intact culture unit. I cannot help agreeing with Mr. Ritchie that some at least "of the finer esoteric products of the Maori past (will achieve) their place functionally," but that the resultant society will be European. Titis is not a matter of ethnocentricity but one of cultural process. Dr. Winiata himself understands the situation when he refers to "an illusion that they count for something in New Zealand society, that their supposed and real rights are being preserved, that their culture is being held intact, and that they are being heard as a group in the councils of the nation." And again when he mentions "the confined scope

. . . for talented Maoris," and the fact that the Maori is being kept "out of the main stream of things in a place the Pakeha thinks the Maori should occupy in the community." The dual system may indeed be a safety valve, but I would consider that if there is need of a safety valve there is also need of a drastic and truthful study of the conditions that make that valve necessary. I do not deny that there "will be a distinct Maori section of the population in New Zealand for many years to come," or that "for purposes of full social and psychological satisfaction the Maori group offers (and in fact, gives) far more than the Pakeha side." The Maori is an alien in Pakeha society and naturally gets more pleasure from his own group, especially since the community belongingness of the marae has survived to a large degree. But I doubt very much the success of such confinement "by being a good Maori" in solving the wider problem of the interaction of the two peoples. In the results of Mr. Ritchie’s community studies might be found a more realistic solution. His advice to Dr. Winiata, far from being presumptuous, might well prove to be wise in prophecy. It is unlikely that the Maori will be assigned a status superior to the low one he now occupies unless he is successful within the European culture boundaries.

MARIE

RAE

(Christchurch).