Kinship Ties and the Preferred Adaptive Strategies of Urban Migrants11The original research reported in this chapter was conducted under a grant tendered by the Vocational Training Council, Government of New Zealand, to the Polynesian Advisory Committee and the Department of Management Studies, University of Auckland. Their support throughout this work is acknowledged with appreciation. The authors also want to thank the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, California, and the National Science Foundation (BNS–76–22943) for providing a fellowship year (1977–1978) during which the more general implications of this work could be considered. The Center for South Pacific Studies, University of California at Santa Cruz, and the South Pacific Research Institute, Auckland, New Zealand, have also provided office space and logistical support during this work.

Abstract

This chapter presents a theoretical framework within which diverse and contradictory ethnographic reports can be synthesized and interpreted, to illustrate the use of this framework in the research among migrant workers in New Zealand, and to explore some of the theoretical and research implications of this framework. Arguments over the persistence of the extended family among urban migrants are futile. The role that these kin relationships play for those involved in them, needs to be examined. Extended family ties can serve important instrumental and affective functions for a newcomer to the city. Some migrants might choose to elevate these relationships to the status of a major adaptive strategy; others might downplay them, preferring instead to depend on their own resources or those of their friends. The reasons why groups and individuals differ in this choice of emphasis is a major research problem for the future. Urban kin relationships can then be viewed not as the persistence, modification, or diminution of an earlier cultural form, but as part of an active, ongoing adaptation that individuals are making to their changing world.