1X
How Hawaii was transformed from a racially stratified oligarchy into a multiracial society, and what that transformation left unfinished, was the subject of this 1994 episode. Tom Coffman, a journalist and author, traced the pivot point to World War II, when Japanese-American service members and the cross-racial bonds forged during the war years eroded the Republican-controlled establishment, producing the Democratic political realignment that led to statehood. Eric Yamamoto, a professor of law at the University of Hawaii, agreed on the significance of the war era but stressed that rapid post-statehood development had brought its own losses: the destruction of tight-knit urban neighborhoods, a sense of displacement, and a quality-of-life decline that 40 percent of residents reported in a 1977 poll. Yamamoto also argued that the unresolved question of native Hawaiian sovereignty represented the central unfinished task of that transformation, without which Hawaii could not move fully forward as a society. Coffman was broadly optimistic, viewing the current moment as the close of one historical era and the beginning of another. Both guests agreed that distinguishing quality of life from standard of living was essential to understanding what Hawaii had gained and lost.
Transcript
Read or download the full transcript (.txt). Speaker labels were assigned automatically and may contain errors.