‘Pacific isolation’ breeds failure
AN academic who claims Pacific students are underachieving because of ‘‘cultural isolation’’ is stirring controversy – again.
Lincoln University senior lecturer Greg Clydesdale previously stoked a war of words when he suggested New Zealand had a ‘‘Pacific underclass’’.
Now he claims society is ignoring the cultural roots of poverty because it feels like ‘‘victim blaming’’, allowing a ‘‘romance with cultural diversity’’ to shape ineffective education policies.
However, Minister for Pacific Peoples Alfred Ngaro questioned Clydesdale’s research, saying Pacific Islanders are achieving more than ever.
Clydesdale’s argument, outlined in a chapter of his new, self-published book The Politically Correct Economy, is that geography, not institutional discrimination or teachers’ abilities, is to blame.
Pacific Islanders mastered their own environment but were historically isolated from ‘‘technology flows that create a better level of prosperity’’, he says.
‘‘It determined what they taught their children and the behaviours that occurred inside the family. Parental behaviour can act like genetic material, passing on behaviours from one generation to another.
‘‘It has nothing to do with evil white men and they [Pacific Islanders] are not racially inferior ... You don’t know what you don’t know.’’
A 2015 UNESCO report says statistics around school attendance in the Pacific Islands are hard to come by, but estimated primary school enrolment at 89 per cent and 77 per cent at secondary school.
Minister Ngaro said Clydesdale needed to ‘‘look beyond stereotypes to see the real success of our Pacific communities’’.
‘‘I raised my children with an adage my grandmother always said to me: ‘We are not problems for people to solve but potential to be realised’.’’