Ever since Attila the Hun's hordes swept through Europe, white people's fear and loathing of the Asian "Yellow Peril" has resurfaced every few years in different places, like an unexorcisable ghost.
One hundred and fifteen years ago, the US president signed the Chinese Exclusion Act into law; ninety-five years ago, Australia instituted its White Australia Policy; and fifty years ago, New Zealand still levied a poll tax on Chinese. Today, a new wave of anti-Asian sentiment seems to have arisen in all these places at once, and racial tensions have been escalating.
Why should this be? Is it because of the "great invasion" of Asians in recent years? Or is it some mysterious enzyme which inevitably takes effect at certain times and under certain conditions?
In this month's issue, Sinorama has chosen to focus on New Zealand, a country where the history of Chinese immigration is not long and the numbers of Chinese migrants not all that large, but where the issue of opposition to Asian immigration has become political dynamite in the runup to this year's general election. We examine the reasons behind the current wave of anti- Asian sentiment, along with its effects and the ways in which local Chinese are responding (see "Chinese Get Involved in Kiwi Politics"). In the coming months we will change our focus and report on some of the little-known contributions of Chinese people and resources to New Zealand: the journey of the Chinese gooseberry or Kiwi fruit; Chew Chong, the father of the New Zealand dairy products export trade; and some more recent migrants who have built new careers.
Perhaps the first step towards defusing the problem is to understand the reasons for hostility against immigrants, and the contribution they have made to the lands to which they have moved.
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