Search results

Activism in the sport world is often connected to iconic images like the raised fists of John Carlos and Tommie Smith in a Black Power salute at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics or the figure of Cathy Freeman, wrapped in the Aboriginal flag, taking her victory lap at the 1994 Commonwealth Games and the 2020 Sydney Olympics. Activism, be it individual or through collective action, is a contemporary reality in sport. These actions reverberate out, sometimes joining with or magnifying other significant social and political currents to create waves that shift society. They may take the form of supporting mental health conversations, developing sporting infrastructure and support to expand opportunities for the next generation, concerted efforts at changing governance representation, or challenging sexist policy in sports, for example. This chapter draws from a talanoa on activism in Pacific sport, bringing these various activities together in order to surface the activism taking place, and better understand and reframe how we think about sport activism in Pacific communities. On the one hand, we recognize that particular cultural values like humility, respect, and orientations to servant leadership naturally encourage activism in the form of everyday advocacy and grassroots interventions. On the other, we discuss whether these values also prevent more outspoken and disruptive forms of activism which are often required to challenge systems of injustice and enact structural change. In this preliminary look at Pacific activism in sport, we surface some insights and raise questions for future research.

The purpose of this study is to examine the views from Pacific addiction service providers with the aim of exploring perceived barriers and solutions for Pacific substance and behavioural addiction services in Aotearoa, New Zealand.

One-on-one semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight Pacific alcohol other drugs and gambling health professionals in New Zealand. Interviews were audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. A general inductive thematic analysis was then used to identify themes.

Pacific alcohol other drugs (AOD) services have adapted well to the COVID climate; stigma and time remain persistent barriers to access for clients. Pacific AOD services expressed concerns regarding their disconnect with primary health care and the need for collaboration and partnership. Pacific AOD models of care and workforce development would be encouraged, supported and provisioned with increased and stable funding within the sector.

The lack of prioritisation and adequate funding that Pacific AOD services continue to face needs to be addressed. This will ensure that the expansion of Pacific AOD services is not only sustainable in regards to growing the Pacific AOD workforce but can also safeguard the responsiveness of the Pacific AOD sector to the changing demographics and increasing AOD needs of future Pacific populations in New Zealand.

Stigma, timing of AOD services and the disconnect between primary and secondary Pacific addictions continue to hinder accessibility to AOD services for Pacific people. The findings highlight that Pacific AOD services require a health system embedded in equity, operating to protect, foster, enhance Pacific models of addiction care and service delivery.

The lack of prioritisation and adequate funding that Pacific AOD services continue to face needs to be addressed. This will ensure that the expansion of Pacific AOD services is not only sustainable in regards to growing the Pacific AOD workforce but can also safeguard the responsiveness of the Pacific AOD sector to the changing demographics and increasing AOD needs of future Pacific populations in New Zealand.

It has been over a decade since the last study identifying the effectiveness of Pacific AOD services. The findings highlight that Pacific AOD services require a health system embedded in equity, operating to protect, foster, enhance Pacific models of addiction care and service delivery. The lack of prioritisation and adequate funding that Pacific AOD services continue to face needs to be addressed. This will ensure that the expansion of Pacific AOD services is not only sustainable in regards to growing the Pacific AOD workforce but can also safeguard the responsiveness of the Pacific AOD sector to the changing demographics and increasing AOD needs of future Pacific populations in New Zealand.

Research in critical disaster studies stresses the urgency to explore alternative ontological framings (Gaillard and Raju, 2022) that encourages researchers and practitioners, especially Indigenous communities, to nurture spaces where Indigenous voices are well represented. It is imperative that research in the Pacific should be guided by Pacific research methodologies to maximize positive outcomes (Ponton, 2018) and break free from limited Eurocentric ideologies that are often ill-suited in Pacific contexts. Hazards in the South Pacific region have become more frequent and volatile. This has created a growing interest in the study of disasters in the region. However, current disaster studies in the Pacific are often problematic as they often fail to challenge the implicit coloniality of the discipline.

This paper will expand on these arguments, suggesting ways to overcome the limits of common Eurocentric research frameworks in disaster studies and to illustrate the significance and relevance of Pacific methodologies.

It is pertinent that critical disaster studies encapsulate Pacific worldviews and knowledge as valued and valid to reconstruct Pacific research. Decolonizing disaster research will ultimately liberate the discipline from limitations of its colonial past and allow for truly engaging and critical research practices.

This paper will illustrate and articulate how Talanoa, a pan-Pacific concept, could offer a more culturally appropriate research methodology to disasters, seen through a Samoan lens. Talanoa is an informal conversation that is widely shared among Pacific communities based on pure, authentic and real conversations which are crucial elements in building relationships with Pacific communities (Vaioleti, 2006).

Climate change is recognised as a severe threat to human and planetary wellbeing. Many children and young people around the world have chosen resistance as their form of resilience in the face of the climate and biodiversity crises that threaten their current and future wellbeing. Their activism has widened the discourse pertaining to the climate emergency from a narrow focus on technical and scientific sources, bringing the discussion into broader public consciousness. In Aotearoa (New Zealand), the context for youth climate activism also reflects commitments to Māori, the Indigenous people, and to Pacific Peoples, given the ongoing impacts of histories of colonisation. This chapter draws from a range of focus group interviews with young Aotearoa (New Zealand) high school climate activists, and Māori and Pacific children and young people ranging in age from 10 into their 20s. Data were gathered during a recent small-scale project to develop a wellbeing guide which accompanies a climate change education programme for schools. It identifies the collective, collaborative leadership exhibited by these young people of diverse backgrounds, as well as their sophisticated analysis and advocacy for urgent remedies to address the climate crisis. It is argued that, instead of focussing on the blinkered continuation of restrictive assessment-driven pedagogies, teachers need to meet the moment of the current convergence of inter-related crises which include, along with the climate emergency, biodiversity loss, pandemic related exacerbation of socio-economic inequities, global conflict, and the unsustainable agenda of current global neoliberal economics. This can be done by supporting children and young people with knowledge and skills for climate action as they seek hope through active participation in endeavours to reshape their potential futures.

Since 2018, millions of students have mobilised as organisers, advocates and activists for action on global warming in movements like the School Strike 4 Climate. In Australia, an estimated 500,000 school students, some as young as five, and predominantly girls and young women, have taken part in coordinated school strikes, protest actions online and in cities and towns around the country (Hilder & Collin, 2022). While children and young people have long been central to politics, this more recent mass mobilisation raises new questions about how the various new forms of political participation and expression adopted by young people are significantly reshaping political norms, values and practices in ostensibly liberal democratic regimes like Australia. In this chapter, we propose that close attention be given to whether young people’s political views and demands for political recognition, rights and climate justice is re-constituting politics and whatever passes for ‘democracy’ in contemporary societies. Drawing on a study of the student climate movement in Australia, this chapter briefly describes the emergence of the movement globally and locally. Deploying Isin’s notion of ‘acts of citizenship’ (Isin, 2008), we examine the ways young climate activists are engaged in critical, performative, political practice, making claims for political recognition, rights and climate justice.

Māori are the indigenous people of Aotearoa/New Zealand and have a history of experiencing discrimination, which occurs similarly for Pacific peoples. While both ethnic groups have lower pay and higher unemployment issues, their workplace experiences around perceived discrimination are seldom explored. Consequently, this study tests the influence of perceived discrimination on work outcomes (job satisfaction and work engagement) and well-being outcomes (job stress, job anxiety and job depression). Further, potential buffering effects of perceived organizational support (POS) and gender are conducted to test the symbolic interaction perspective (gender differences towards the potential buffering effects of POS).

The study uses data from Māori employees (n = 437) and Pacific employees (n = 148) for a total sample of 585 employees across a wide range of occupations and industries. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) of the data was used, and two-way and three-way moderations were conducted.

Overall, perceived discrimination was detrimentally related to all outcomes. Further, significant three-way interactions were found towards all well-being outcomes. This supported the symbolic interaction perspective, whereby high POS buffered perceived discrimination best for females, but low POS was key for males.

This research is important because the authors provide much-needed empirical evidence around ethnic discrimination in Aotearoa/New Zealand workplaces and extend the outcomes explored in the discrimination literature. Implications for organizations include establishing the rate of discrimination and developing human resource management (HRM) practices to address this.

Beyond the unique findings towards Māori and Pacific employees, the strong support for the symbolic interaction perspective provides useful insights into understanding that support benefits differ by gender.

This chapter presents a survey of education development in Oceania, a region of diversity held together by its commonalities, shaped by the largest ocean on the planet. The chapter outlines the regional contexts of Oceania and offers a brief historical overview of formal education. Oceania, like most regions, has struggled to mediate between global agendas and national and regional aspirations for sovereignty and self-determination. The chapter recounts ongoing efforts to navigate education in the post-colonial period, efforts to negotiate some of the aspirations of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Education for All (EFA), and other global agendas of the early 2000s with, more recently, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In this survey, we hope to demonstrate collective efforts to respond to global agendas, to shape and strengthen regionalism, while maintaining sovereignty in a globalized world. We also highlight the evolving identities of the region, in particular the relationships between Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand and the Pacific countries that collectively make up Oceania.

Many psychiatrists and trainees in Aotearoa New Zealand used telepsychiatry during COVID-19 lockdowns, despite minimal experience and training in the area. Research on a culturally safe telepsychiatry framework is lacking in Aotearoa. This study aims to provide a better understanding of telepsychiatry in the Aotearoa context and identify potential gaps with the current practice, with a focus on exploring telepsychiatry use with Maori, Pacific peoples and Asians.

This qualitative study was guided by the principles of the Kaupapa Maori methodology and the “Give Way Rule” from Pan-Pacific studies, to ensure culturally appropriate analysis and outcomes. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a sample of psychiatrists and trainees recruited from Aotearoa members of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists. The qualitative data were then analysed using general inductive thematic analysis to identify the major themes.

In total, 18 participants were interviewed. Three key themes were identified: cultural safety such as preparation for a telepsychiatry session, cultural practices and equity issues; clinical practice such as continuity of care, patient selection and limitations; and process of running a telepsychiatry service.

The analysis of the main themes gives both practical ideas for providing a culturally safe telepsychiatry appointment, as well as a wider base for developing a telepsychiatry service that works particularly for Maori, Pacific and Asians mental health users. Issues around resources and expertise in the field are lacking and further frameworks to support infrastructure and training are needed.

Health risks associated with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have severely affected the financial stability of airline companies globally. Recapturing financial stability following this crisis depends heavily on these companies’ ability to attain efficient and productive operations. This study uses several empirical approaches to examine key factors contributing to carriers sustaining high productivity prior to, during and after a major recession. Findings suggest, regardless of economic conditions, that social distancing which requires airline companies in the Asia Pacific region to fly with a significant percentage of unfilled seats weakens the performance of those companies. Furthermore, efficient operations do not guarantee the avoidance of productivity declines, especially during a recession.

Rule of law is essential in reducing corruption in a country. This study aims to investigate the factors contributing to corruption in 41 of the most competitive countries in the Asia-Pacific region by focusing on judicial effectiveness, property rights and government integrity. The moderating role of regulatory quality was also considered in the attempt to explain the association among rule of law and corruption.

This study used pooled ordinary least squares regression and generalized method of moments-dynamic panel for the robustness test on data of 41 Asia-Pacific countries spanning from 2013 to 2021.

Property rights and government integrity were found to be negatively significant in explaining corruption. In contrast, the interaction between rule of law and regulatory quality had a significant positive association with corruption. The findings bring to light Asia-Pacific countries’ need for more effective control of corruption.

The authorities should work towards enhancing the countries’ image as corruption-free nations by creating a stable economic and political environment and preserving macroeconomic stability through strengthened rule of law.

Previous research looked at The Association of Southeast Asian Nations and South Asian countries, but little attention was given to Asia-Pacific countries in examining the relationship between rule of law and corruption.