Volunteer!

I'm a bit late in mentioning this, but this week is Volunteer Week in New Zealand.

New Zealand is a leading nation in contribution made by volunteers. A 2008 study of the New Zealand non-profit sector estimated that volunteers make up 67% of the non-profit workforce. This is equal to 133,799 paid positions, a higher proportion than in any of the other forty world countries participating in the research project on volunteering.

Volunteer rates between different ethnic groups in the country don't differ greatly:

34.8% of Pacific people
34.5% of Pakeha
34% non NZ-born Europeans
33.4% Asians
33.2% Maori.

More women volunteer than men, but in the retirement age groups, men do more unpaid work outside the home than women.

Most volunteers are in the 30-49 age group but young people are active as volunteers. The average young person aged between 12 and 24 does over 708 hours of unpaid work outside the home a year, with young Maori giving significantly more of their time in unpaid roles than other young people.

Volunteers keep people safe by being unpaid fire fighters, St John ambulance officers, Red Cross volunteers, community patrollers, surf lifesavers, coastguards and search and rescue volunteers.

Over 820,000 people do volunteer work in sports compared to 41,000 who get paid.

These are just a few stats from Volunteering New Zealand and Office for Community and Voluntary Sector.

Kaiapoi Pa

In recent weeks one could be forgiven for thinking that Pakeha in New Zealand are either continually at odds with Maori (or vice versa) or that our history together has been one of contention and nothing else. It might also be thought that the history of the church vis-a-vis Maori had always been fraught.

News, like that about Hone Harawira, doesn't tend to help much. (See Wikipedia for a very up-to-date summary of his situation.)

However, today I came across a blog post written by Steve Taylor which draws out three stories that present a rather different picture of our mutual history. They each connect to the Kaiapoi Maori pa, which was put to seige and finally destroyed by Te Rauparaha; the other link in the stories is Christianity, and its power to change and bring forgiveness and peace.

Check this sermon out (and don't be too picky about the lack of proofreading!)

Fighting Shadows

Fighting Shadows: Self-Stigma And Mental Illness: Whawhai Atu te Whakamâ Hihira incorporates the experiences of 76 men and women from around the country; including Pakeha, Maori, Pasifika, Chinese, young people and refugees.
This study, produced by the Mental Health Foundation was launched on 9th July, 2008. It shows that "negative messages about mental illness in society shape and reinforce attitudes people hold toward themselves,” said Judi Clements, Chief Executive of the Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand. “These attitudes hold people back from full participation in society, and create a cycle of internalised stigma, or ‘self-stigma’"
Participants in the study described experiences of isolation, self-doubt, rejection by family and peers, and pessimism about their prospects of recovery.
However, participants also identified actions or ‘circuit-breakers’ to counter discrimination and negative thought patterns. These included: more visibility of people with mental illness, building peer support networks, affirming human rights, challenging negative attitudes, and encouraging mental health services to focus on recovery.
The full report can be read online. It's also available in book form, from the Mental Health Foundation.

What makes a Maori a Maori?

Just catching up on a couple of Grapevine magazines, and found another article of interest. For those who puzzle over what makes a Maori a Maori, and many other issues relating to Maori and Pakeha in New Zealand, this is an accessible and readable interview with Sam Chapman, who, with his wife Thelma, is the founder of Houhanga Rongo and Project Awhi

Sam and Thelma live in Otara, South Auckland, and since 1978 have offered their love and their home to the kind of people no one else wants: people from prisons and gangs, and other people who are socially not in the right status quo.

You can find the article on Grapevine's website (amongst a host of other good material).

Photo courtesy of the NZ Herald

Two recent books on the Future

New Zealand Unleashed: the country, its future and the people who will get it there, by Steve Garden. Looks at the changes, looks at our history and particularly at our ability to innovate – both from a Maori and a Pakeha perspective. Sees creativity as a vital force in taking us forward. Published 2007 Random House.

Futurehype, the myths of technology change, by Bob Seidensticker. Spends a lot of time telling us how the future can’t be predicted, and how previous predictions have often been wrong. Message seems to be to not to take everything as gospel in terms of hype and media promotion. Published Berrett-Koehler, 2006