The interrelationship of race relations and education in Hawaii and Fiji

Abstract

This thesis is an attempt to study the connection between education and race relations. It is a comparison of the racial and educational climates of Fiji and Hawaii, concentrating on the Indians in Fiji and the Japanese in Hawaii. Both are island groups and their economies, although at very different levels of development, have similar bases, with considerable reliance on the production of sugar. Both have multiracial populations developed through the arrival of Europeans—first as explorers, traders and missionaries, and later as a dominant group of administrators and entrepreneurs—and through the importing of Asian labourers. While Hawaii has developed a modern economy, Fiji still exhibits an economic structure typical of most under-developed countries. Changes in race relations have varied in the two areas also. While both had large numbers of Asian labourers who were virtually controlled by the sugar companies and treated as semi-slaves, Hawaii is now often lauded for exemplary race relations while in Fiji interaction between the races is still very strained, creating an ever-present potential for intergroup conflict.