This document summarizes research on identity and leadership among New Zealand Chinese youth. It discusses a leadership development conference organized by the New Zealand Chinese Association (NZCA) that aims to promote positive identity, integration, and leadership. Interviews with Chinese youth reveal themes of feeling most comfortable with other Chinese and having a sense of shared identity related to family, work ethic, and self-reliance. In terms of leadership, youth expressed influence, guidance, and building others up as important. The conference helps bridge Chinese and non-Chinese communities in New Zealand.

1. Identity and Leadership among New
Zealand Chinese Youth:
The New Zealand Chinese Association
and its Youth Leadership Conference
Prof. James H. Liu and
Anna Moughan
Centre for Applied Cross Cultural
Research
School of Psychology
Victoria University of Wellington

2. Youth Voices, Youth Choices:
CACR FRST BIS Portfolio
• “By 2015 the voices of youth from diverse ethnic, cultural
and religious communities will be heard and communities
empowered to determine ways in which youth can attain
integration.”
• “This research contributes by addressing two key questions:
1) How do these youth construct their identities and negotiate
issues pertaining to cultural maintenance and participation in
the wider society? 2) What strategies or interventions
promote positive identity, integration, cultural and social
connectedness, and leadership within and between ethnic
communities?”

3. New Zealand Chinese
Demographics
• Chinese as the Johnny-come-lately to NZ?
• In terms of overall demographics, yes:
– 1986: 26,523
– 1991: 44,802
– 1996: 81,312
– 2001: 105,057
– 2006: 147,570
But this does not count the disproportionate
influence in terms of societal demographics
of that 26,523 that were here before 1986 are
thoroughly rooted to NZ

4. The Multi-generational Kiwi
Chinese (www.nzchinese.org.nz)
• The first wave of Chinese arrived in NZ in the
1860s as part of the Otago Goldrush.
• First Chinese Association established in 1909 by
the Chinese consul; it fell apart when successive
consuls tried to get the assn involved in Chinese
politics, eg supporting Yuan Shikai to be emperor
• The present day NZ Chinese Assn is an umbrella
organization that came together in 1935 at the
Chinese Consul’s request to facilitate cooperation
between regional assns, and grew by supporting
the Chinese war effort in the Sino-Japanese War.
• It currently has 13 regional branches that are its
members all over the country. They are part of the
pluralistic quilt of Chinese demographics in NZ.

5. Chinese Subject to Egregious Discrimination
and Stereotyping in the early 20th
century

6. The issue of immigration has
regularly been contentious

7. Historical Legacy or Present Peril?
• Recently the Race Relations Conciliator Joris de
Bres highlighted that discrimination against
Asians is perceived as the highest among any
group in NZ.
• The evidence of the personal experience of
discrimination is not as thorough as third person
perspectives, but there is some data that
suggests that Asians experience discrimination
more than other ethnic groups in NZ as well
• However, some data provides a contrasting
story, where third person ratings of
discrimination/prejudice against Asian are
higher than first person ratings.

8. Creating Value from Historical Injustice
• An example of the activities of the NZCA is the
outcomes of the Poll Tax initiative. The NZCA
commissioned the research and the publication
of the book "The Poll Tax in New Zealand". It
initiated the dialogue and made submissions to
the NZ Government on the discriminatory
nature of the Poll Tax levied on early Chinese
settlers who migrated to New Zealand. This tax
was only levied on the Chinese.
• The outcome was a apology from the
Government and the establishment of a Chinese
Poll Tax Heritage Trust in 2002 ($5 million). Its
main objective is the maintenance of Chinese
identity history and culture so far as it relates to
Chinese New Zealanders.

9. Galvanising the NZCA
• This had the effect of galvanising the
NZCA to become much more proactive in
presenting themselves as Kiwi Chinese,
connected to but distinct from both NZ
Europeans and overseas Chinese.
• They have run several successful “Bananas
Conferences” in Auckland attended by
thousands

10. NZCA Leadership Development
Conference
• Originally conceived as a Summer Camp for NZ Chinese youth
in 2007, it morphed into a “Leadership and Development
Conference” in 2008 in Wellington, and spawned the brand
“DragoNZ” in 2009 in Auckland.
• Around 30-50 ethnic Chinese young adults ages 18-25
participate in the annual event. They vary in acculturation
background, with a majority being Kiwi Chinese, but a few 1st
and gen 1.5ers as well– all are fluent in English.
• The conference emphasizes Chinese culture (e.g. calligraphy,
lion dancing), sports/teamwork, and leadership. It draws
speakers from all sectors of the more acculturated NZ Chinese
community.

13. Action Research- Research with the
Community as an Equal Partner
• Dr James Liu’s portion of the YVYC project
was to document the processes that led to the
creation of the LDC, support LDC volunteers
to add value to the to conference, and interview
Chinese youth as to their identity and
leadership experiences in the conference and in
society at large.
• We have developed an interactive website that
is being trialled as a communication tool for
both the NZCA and future organizers of the
LDCs. Dr Liu has donated his time as a
speaker at all 4 LDCs so far, talking both about
leadership and Who’s Hot/Who’s Not.

14. A B C D
D E F G

15. A B C D
D E F G

16. Dating Preferences at UCLA
(Liu, Campbell & Condie, 1995)

17. The NZCA LDC Identity and
Leadership Interviews
• Dr Liu has interviewed a wide spectrum of
people involved in the NZCA LDC, from the
founder of the original camp in 2007 and
other senior leaders to the Youth Leaders
who have organized it subsequently to youth
participants.
• Anna Moughan has transcribed some of the
interviews and is currently analyzing the lot
for her Honours Thesis in Psychology.
Several of these theses each year in
international journals, and this research will
be fed back to the NZCA

18. Leadership and Identity
in Kiwi Chinese

19. Major Themes - Identity
Sense / feeling / intuition of
what it is to be a
Kiwi Chinese
Most comfortable in the
company of other
Kiwi Chinese
(& Asian New Zealanders)
Difficulty articulating
what it is to be a
Kiwi Chinese
Family Ties
Work Ethic
Self-Reliance

20. Major Themes - Identity
“I wouldn’t know what it would be
like to be any different, you know?”
“The fact that we are all Chinese,
it just feels much more comfortable,
that you can be yourself..”
“So if they are prepared to
come and join in our
activities that means they
are wanting to embrace that
NZ Chinese identity.
Because if they want to be
Chinese people just living
in NZ, they’ll stay within
those smaller groups.”

21. Major Themes - Identity
“I wouldn’t know what it would be
like to be any different, you know?”
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”
“So if they are prepared to
come and join in our
activities that means they
are wanting to embrace that
NZ Chinese identity.
Because if they want to be
Chinese people just living
in NZ, they’ll stay within
those smaller groups.”

22. Major Themes - Identity
“I wouldn’t know what it would be
like to be any different, you know?”
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”
“So if they are prepared to
come and join in our
activities that means they
are wanting to embrace that
NZ Chinese identity.
Because if they want to be
Chinese people just living
in NZ, they’ll stay within
those smaller groups.”

23. “I guess I thought I’ve been so
comfortable with identifying
myself as a Chinese New
Zealander, but never really
thought of myself as really
Chinese, or never put any
emphasis on that..”
Major Themes - Identity
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”“I wouldn’t know what it would be
like to be any different, you know?”

24. “I guess I thought I’ve been so
comfortable with identifying
myself as a Chinese New
Zealander, but never really
thought of myself as really
Chinese, or never put any
emphasis on that..”
Major Themes - Identity
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”“I wouldn’t know what it would be
like to be any different, you know?”

25. “I guess I thought I’ve been so
comfortable with identifying
myself as a Chinese New
Zealander, but never really
thought of myself as really
Chinese, or never put any
emphasis on that..”
Major Themes - Identity
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”
“I've had a bit of a split, ah, lifestyle
between, um, Chinese, and um,
oh a Western culture-
a Western lifestyle also”
“I get along with Chinese better, just
cause it feels like you have something
in common to start off with ..”

26. Major Themes - Leadership
Reluctance articulating
differences between
NZ Chinese and ‘Kiwi’
leadership
Non culture-specific
leadership
Paying your dues

27. Um...... It's hard to say… yeah, just,
um, depends on what your crowd is.
Major Themes - Leadership
“I think if you achieve what you set out
to do you get the respect for it, and
the next time it comes up people will
say, “Hey, this can happen. It’s happened
before and he’s done it before, so maybe
he’s worth listening to”
“Leadership to me is influence,
it's whether or not you can guide
someone somewhere, and, sort
of, take them somewhere, um,
or encourage them onto something,
um, it's about building someone
up, and, um I guess taking them
through challenges, yeah.”
“Um...... It's hard to say… yeah, just,
um, depends on what your crowd is.”

28. “Um...... It's hard to say… yeah, just,
um, depends on what your crowd is.”
Major Themes - Leadership
“Track record. I think that that’s something
that I’ve picked up on: “What’s your track
record? What have you been involved in?
Who are you? What have you brought?”
It’s got to start somewhere.”
“Leadership to me is influence,
it's whether or not you can guide
someone somewhere, and, sort
of, take them somewhere, um,
or encourage them onto something,
um, it's about building someone
up, and, um I guess taking them
through challenges, yeah.”

29. “Um...... It's hard to say… yeah, just,
um, depends on what your crowd is.”
Major Themes - Leadership
“Track record. I think that that’s something
that I’ve picked up on: “What’s your track
record? What have you been involved in?
Who are you? What have you brought?”
It’s got to start somewhere.”
“Leadership to me is influence,
it's whether or not you can guide
someone somewhere, and, sort
of, take them somewhere, um,
or encourage them onto something,
um, it's about building someone
up, and, um I guess taking them
through challenges, yeah.”

30. Major Themes - Leadership
“Um … kinda find it quite
hard to define.”
“Leadership to me is influence,
it's whether or not you can guide
someone somewhere, and, sort
of, take them somewhere, um,
or encourage them onto something,
um, it's about building someone
up, and, um I guess taking them
through challenges, yeah.”
“Track record. I think that that’s something
that I’ve picked up on: “What’s your track
record? What have you been involved in?
Who are you? What have you brought?”
It’s got to start somewhere.”

31. Major Themes - Leadership
“Um … kinda find it quite
hard to define.”
“Leadership to me is influence,
it's whether or not you can guide
someone somewhere, and, sort
of, take them somewhere, um,
or encourage them onto something,
um, it's about building someone
up, and, um I guess taking them
through challenges, yeah.”
“Track record. I think that that’s something
that I’ve picked up on: “What’s your track
record? What have you been involved in?
Who are you? What have you brought?”
It’s got to start somewhere.”

32. Major Themes - Bridging
“I want to proactively to do something
and so that's why I've tried to be the
bridge tried to- tried to bring you know
both Chinese and Pakehas together and
to help other Kiwi Chinese realise you
know what they can do as well and
umm it's hard, it's very, very challenging”
“I feel like I'm a bridge between
different groups of people, and
I try as much as I can to bridge
the gap”
“It's quite good to have
two cultures”

33. Life Satisfaction/SWB for Older and Middle
Aged NZ Chinese and Europeans: Benefits of
Integrated Double Identity for NZ Chinese
-0.3
-0.1
0.1
0.3
Born in NZ Born Abroad
NZ Europeans
NZ Chinese

34. A pattern of additive acculturation
New Zealand identity most strongly related to “respect” &
“retain contact”
Chinese identity most strongly related to “assist financially”
and “please + make them happy”

35. Policy Implications:
Speech from the Throne
• National Party’s policy agenda is to focus on
economic growth (for instance, the Building
an Inclusive Society portfolio which funded
this research is being closed)
• But is the business migration category all there
is? Previous generations of Asian business
migrants have had real difficulty building
connections in NZ, leading to astronaut
families and parachute kids.
• How to translate the social cohesion “magic”
of the NZCA to tangible policy outcomes that
enrich an economic growth agenda?

36. Bridging Capital
Robert Putnam talks about bonding capital and
bridging capital, and what the NZCA LDC is
building is bridging capital. There is a long term
vision to retain social networking component
among alumni and build leadership capacity
through interconnectedness.
This is what is going to be the key to opening up
the China market in an effective manner. You
must understand that the business environment in
China is entirely dependent on relationships and
not based on protection under the law. Weakness
of 2nd
gen+ Kiwi Chinese is their lack of Chinese
language fluency– but the Auckland LDC was
linguistically diverse in 2009.

37. Historical Affordances for Authority:
China and the West (Liu & Liu, 2003)
Liberal
Democratic
Law
Paternalism
Guanxi

38. Paternalistic Leadership in Chinese
Societies: Authoritarian, Moralistic, and
Benevolent Components

39. Authority->Efficiency, Moral Example->
Identification, Benevolence->Gratitude

40. Benevolent Authority as both
description and ideal