Its Racial Future

     The story about the New Zealand All Black rugby team leads us to the more important question of miscegenation, an issue affecting many countries, including the U.S. Michael Bassett clarifies the New Zealand situation:
     The question about whether the All Blacks are black is difficult to determine these days. Some say that two thirds of the team have some Polynesian blood. But there are only a handful of full-blooded Polynesians in the team. New Zealand claims a Maori population of nearly 600,000 out of a population of 3.8 million. In addition there are slightly more than 100,000 Samoans, nearly 50,000 Cook Islanders, and 32,000 Tongans, not to mention several thousand Niue and Tokelau islanders. Those of European descent or birth living in New Zealand numbers nearly 3 million. The Chinese population is growing rapidly and will soon pass 100,000, and there are nearly 50,000 of Indian birth.
     What is of interest is that the rate of intermarriage between the ethnic groups in NZ has always been very high. Prior to 1974, to be classified as a Maori, one had to be half or more Maori. That requirement could be met by a declining percentage of those calling themselves Maori. Since 1974 a Maori has been defined as someone with Maori blood who chooses to call him/herself a Maori. In terms of the Treaty of Waitangi 1840 between the Crown and Maori, and the 1867 Electoral Act at which point seats were reserved in Parliament for Maori, everyone except Maori is categorized as Pakeha - a Maori term used to describe a pale skin, an immigrant or a foreigner. This complicates matters. Maori are adamant that they want to retain their exclusive Maori seats for which anyone calling themselves a Maori (and having however little Maori blood) can vote. What used to be called the Pakeha seats are now usually referred to as General seats (they constitute the overwhelming number in the Parliament) if only because whites, Chinese, Indians and all the Pacific Islanders can ONLY vote in those General seats. Maori, however, have always had a choice and are free to enroll on Maori or General seats.
     If you are still with me, you will see that the racial mix in NZ is complex, and the categorizations for electoral and Treaty purposes, even more so. I sit on the Waitangi Tribunal which deals with grievances going back to 1840 brought before it by Maori. Many of the claimants appearing before us are the same color as I, and I have no Maori blood. They do have a little bit, just like my granddaughter. I hate the word miscegenation, but it accurately describes the huge mixing process that is modern New Zealand. In my view, the rate of mix is such that in two hundred years New Zealanders will nearly all have lost their largely European look that a declining number of them has today. I see that in the area that I used to represent in Parliament, nearly 30% are now non-Pakeha.
     All that by way of explaining that the All Blacks represent a still largely All White New Zealand society which will soon be Half White or Half Black, depending on your vision. And in the current rugby team is one lad who is part Samoan, part white, and part Chinese, having brought the last of the three with him from the islands where there was always a considerable number of Chinese shopkeepers and traders from early times. He looks a bit like a Mongolian emperor when in full flight, dreadlocks flying behind him. Such is modern New Zealand.


     My comment: I work surrounded by maps, but this account has strained my resources and my eyes. I found Niue, a speck south of the Samoa Islands, and, like the Cook Islands, east of the International Date Line; the Samoan Islands bestride it. This must make keeping a diary difficult of travelers. I could not find Waitangi.
     I am happy to distribute this account, because few of us know New Zealand, and because the problem of miscegenation is everywhere bothersome. It is now said that an American Indian is anyone who thinks he is an Indian, and this has serious consequences in this age of affirmative action. I know well-to-do people who claim to be Indian or Hispanic to qualify for minority contracts. This has given rise to trouble in San Francisco.
     It has been proposed that the U.S. census should drop the racial categories entirely. How would that work in New Zealand?

Ronald Hilton - 11/4/99