Paul Spoonley
Paul Spoonley is a New Zealand sociologist and emeritus professor at Massey University where his specialist area is social change and demography and how this impacts policy decisions at the political level. Spoonley has led numerous externally funded research programmes, written or edited twenty-seven books and is a regular commentator in the news media. Educated both in New Zealand and England, his work on racism, immigration and ethnicity is widely discussed in the wake of the Christchurch mosque shootings and the COVID-19 pandemic.
Education
Spoonley earned a Bachelor of Arts from Victoria University of Wellington in 1973, which he followed a year later with a postgraduate diploma in geography at the University of Otago. In 1976 he obtained a Master of Arts again from Otago, studying Niuean migrants, and then a Master of Science from the University of Bristol in 1978. He completed a Bachelor of Education at the University of Auckland in 1979 and finally a doctorate from Massey University in 1986, with a thesis on the extreme right in New Zealand.Career
From 1974 to 1978, Spoonley was a teaching fellow, in the Department of Sociology at the University of Auckland and a part-time lecturer at the School of Architecture and Department of Town Planning in the University of Auckland. He began lecturing at Massey University in 1979 and was the college's research director and Auckland regional director until 2013 when he became pro vice-chancellor of the university's College of Humanities and Social Sciences. He is a fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi, and a member of the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity.In 2010 Spoonley was a Fulbright senior scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, where he completed research on second-generation Latino identities. He said gaining a Fulbright award was "an opportunity to work with some of the best academics in the US to look at how identities evolve once immigrants are established in a new country".
In 2019, he stepped down from his position as pro vice-chancellor at Massey University and has reverted to a position as a research professor in the college to allow him to re-focus on writing and research. In 2021 he was made distinguished emeritus professor in recognition of "his extensive contribution to both academia and Massey University".
In early June 2022, Spoonley, along with fellow sociologist Professor Joanna Kidman, was appointed as a co-director of the Centre of Research Excellence for Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism He Whenua Taurikura. The research centre was established in line with the recommendations of the Royal Commission of Inquiry report into the Christchurch mosque shootings. Its main purpose is to sponsor research and scholarships into countering terrorism and extremism. In early June 2024, the National-led coalition government reduced the Centre's funding from NZ$1.325 million a year to NZ$500,000 in the 2024 New Zealand budget. The cuts amount to $3.3 million over the next four years. In mid October 2024, the Government ended the remaining NZ$2 million in funding to the Centre.
Selected research projects
- The Institute of Labor Economics is a nonprofit research institute that works internationally with scholars and focuses on labour economics. Spoonley joined IZA as a Research Fellow in January 2013, and in the same year, worked with Trudie Cain on a discussion paper that explored the importance of immigrant entrepreneurs being embedded in their own social networks but also in the socio-economic and politico-institutional environment of New Zealand as their new country.
- Superdiversity, social cohesion, and economic benefits is a paper by Spoonley that summarised key findings of the pros and cons of superdiversity created by increased numbers of immigrants and minority ethnic groups in a culture.
- Nga Tangata Oho Mairangi, funded by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, is a project mapping the regional impacts of demographic and economic change on Auckland and other regions from 1986 to 2013, and to provide projections out to 2038. Spoonley contributed to a literature review on Immigrant Entrepreneurship and Tax Compliance to clarify the issues around compliance for immigrants in New Zealand, and in 2014, co-authored Temporary Migrants as Vulnerable Workers: A literature review. The review concluded that although more research was needed, evidence showed that in some industries temporary migrant workers were vulnerable in work situations that could be hazardous and in which they may be exploited by their employers. Other research conducted by Spoonley while working with Nga Tangata Oho Mairangi, included Population Change and Its Implications: Auckland , and Population Change and Its Implications: Southland . The purpose of the research was to gather and interpret data to inform discussion about how the areas were managing rapidly growing and changing populations. The data for each of these reports were collected by household interviews, employer surveys and school focus groups.
- Capturing the Diversity Dividend of Aotearoa New Zealand was an MBIE-funded research programme, aimed at identifying how New Zealand could better prepare for changes resulting from demographic challenges including migration, ethnic diversity, population ageing, changing fertility patterns and urban growth. In this project Spoonley worked with Robin Peace and produced the article "Social Cohesion and Cohesive Ties: Responses to Diversity".
- Spoonley participated in the Integration of Immigrants Programme, a five-year research initiative funded by the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology to gain a better understanding of the economic integration of immigrants into New Zealand. A document, to which Spoonley contributed, explained that the programme had the "key aim of contributing to progressive improvements in the utilisation of immigrant human capital, to the advantage of migrants specifically and New Zealand society more generally". During this period, Spoonley collaborated on a research project that focussed on the effect that diversification of immigration has had on relational embeddedness of immigrants in Auckland, post 1987. The paper argued that as a result of neo-liberal policies, purpose-built ethnic precincts developed to meet the needs and philosophy of free-market economic development without recognition of their cultural importance. The researchers concluded that "local neo-liberal politicians and business organisations gained ideal recruits to a city economy and they were reluctant to recognise the specific ethnic nature of their activities......it remains to be seen whether and when there will be recognition of the distinctive nature of these ethnic precincts and the contribution they make to economic growth and development".
- B'nai B'rith is an international not-for-profit Jewish community services organisation that supports human rights and anti-discrimination and has a branch in New Zealand. Spoonley, on behalf of B'nai B'rith, was one of a team, including Jim Salinger that completed four surveys of the New Zealand Jewish community, the last one published in 2020.
Advisory roles