america is going through an identity crisis.

Nationally, early in 21st century, the

white population is expected to go from groups- especially Hispanic and Asian
are increasing due to immigration, and already there more interracial marriage,
especially in such trendsetting states as California and new york

Sociologists and others ponder: How will all these people with different roots get
along? time magazine celebrated the Fourth of july last year with a cover story
about the nations ethnic diversity and asked the questions "Who are we?" and
"What Do We Have in Common?"
To someone in hawai, all this concern about ethnic diversity seems like so
much fuss. For most of this century , Hawai has been a multicultural society a
community of different ethnic groups where no one group is the majority
Back in 1961, Sociologist lawrence fuchs came to Hawai and wrote "Hawai
pono" A very good book about islands march toward statehood. In it, he
concluded:
"This is the promise of Hawai, a promise for the entire nation, and indeed, the
world , that people of different races and creeds can live together, enriching
eeach other, in harmony and democracy
But not many people beyond Hawai shores have paid much attention to what
going on socialy here
So when New York based playwright David Henry Hwang spoke at university of
Hawai last summer about hawai being a model multicultural community for the
rest of the country, it raised the obvious question
What could others learn?
THE HAWAI MODEL

Gov, John Waihee likes to call Hawai "a market place bazaar". He's made
several speechs recently the hawai model to mainlad audiences
"In Hawai, You have something a little different, in which people are encourage
to be proud of their heritage, "Says waihe. "there's a pride in that kind of society
that allows you to pick and choose and enjoy the cultural contributions and
uniqueness of different group"

"in a way, we've tried to call that culture which allows everybody to kind of
exchange, go in and out of enjoy various things..in its best sense, local culture,"
he says.. "what glues it all together is the native hawaiian culture"

UH professor and political analyst Dan Boylan is an even bigger cheerleader for
Hawaii's Multiculturan model, pointing out multicultural societiest in Southeast
Asia and the Pacific where ethnic groups dont get along.
" We are the nations experiment in multiculturalism. I dont think anybodys paid
attention to that at all," Boylan says
We get along because no one groups has enough people to be in the majority
and the dominate, Boylan adds, and the extends into politics
"Our political model is no one constitutes that 50,1 % thats necessary to
oppress anyone else." he explains. "Whoever has wanted to governin this state
has had to form a coalition across ethnic lines. (Unlike the Mainland) politicians
have to appeal to different ethnic groups to win elections