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Pacific Regionalism and Decolonisation: Thoughts from the 54th CRGA

19 Nov 2024
By Richard Herr OAM
Pacific Islands Forum 2023, Rarotonga, 6-10 November 2023. Source: U.S. Embassy New Zealand / https://t.ly/W37nQ

The fact that the Pacific Community (SPC) has been forced to hold its annual executive meeting thousands of kilometres away from its headquarters in Noumea this year was an unsettling reminder that decolonisation in the Pacific Island region is still an unfinished project. These challenges underscore the need for an inclusive and resilient regional framework as the Blue Pacific seeks a united future.

The 2024 Committee of Regional Governments and Administrations (CRGA) convened on schedule in early November in Tahiti because anti-colonial social upheaval in the French territory of New Caledonia made travel to Noumea unsafe. The extent of the violence that broke out on 13 May 2024 has profoundly affected the operations of the SPC’s headquarters in Noumea’s beachside suburb Anse Vata.

Some staff were stranded in Noumea unable to go to assignments in parts of the region. Others were unable to return. Some local employees had to travel by boat rather than by road to reach their offices. About ten percent had to be relocated temporarily overseas to work remotely.

The continuing strife is such that the SPC does not expect to be able to fully resume work at its headquarters before mid 2025. The ghostly hand of unresolved colonialism impacted regionalism in more ways than just the SPC’s current difficulties in effectively servicing the development needs of its Pacific members.

Its grip affects New Caledonia’s relationship with the region’s principal political agency, the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF). The PIF has been drawn into seeking to mediate between a member and the colonial metropole in a way that posed challenges the Biketawa Declaration, which provides a dispute resolution mechanism and for PIF assistance to members in times of crisis.

France finally agreed for PIF involvement to proceed and, in October, a delegation of PIF leaders undertook a three-day mission to New Caledonia that was part fact finding and part regional consolation for a PIF member. However, France was the dominant element not a co-equal partner in this engagement, making the PIF’s capacity for influencing the eventual resolution likely to be marginal. The spectre of colonialism was more muted elsewhere but nevertheless its presence was suggested on several occasions  during the Tahitian CRGA.

One arcane aspect, concerning the same linkage between the SPC and the PIF that has contributed to New Caledonia’s place in the regional system, now relates to America’s Pacific territories. The pathway into the PIF for New Caledonia was based on its membership of the SPC. Indeed, the pool of potential new PIF members has long been defined by the Island ambit of the SPC, which was founded in 1947 as a technical aid body to assist the region’s colonies. Its colonial origin became an obstacle within the regional body by 1970 when the SPC was unable to address emerging post-colonial issues—particularly nuclear testing in the region.

Creation of the PIF by the newly independent island states in 1971 partially addressed the bar on political debate in the SPC but at the expense of a unified regional architecture. Anticipating further decolonisation, the PIF provided for the island members of the SPC an avenue for inclusion in the PIF at independence or on reaching their final political status.

Over the last quarter century, the PIF has sought to speed regional inclusivity by allowing ineligible Pacific territories to participate in the PIF by entry earlier as observers and then associate members before becoming full members. The 2024 PIF Leaders Meeting upgraded both American Samoa and Guam from Observer status to Associate Membership after a communication from the US that it would support this change provided it did not require them “to take on or exercise any rights or responsibilities inconsistent” with their status as a US territory.

This presented an optics problem as the American territories have been somewhat desultory participants in the SPC for some time. Thus, their general commitment to Pacific Island regional affairs is important to allay geopolitical concerns that their role is to amplify US influence in the PIF.

Arguing that they do not use/receive much in the way of assistance from the organisation, these territories have been somewhat lax not only in participation but also in meeting their assessed contributions to the SPC. There is an experiential contrast here with the way Britain, France, and New Zealand have supported the engagement of their small territories in the SPC.

France has always ensured the francophone voice of Wallis and Futuna has been present. Even when it briefly left the SPC itself, Britain paid for and continued Pitcairn’s seat at the SPC table. Tokelau similarly has been sustained by New Zealand for participation.

American Samoa returned to active participation in the SPC in 2023, and Guam attended this year’s CRGA as well. The SPC’s Director General Stuart Minchin made a special trip to Saipan in mid-2024 to encourage the Northern Marianas (CNMI) to re-engage. The CRGA has been advised that CNMI will attend in 2025 if a way to finesse its 15 years arrears can be found.

A proposal before the CRGA this year to consider a new assessment formula that might be more manageable for the smaller states by balancing capacity to pay with the territory’s use of SPC services could be part of this accommodation. Another area where an echo of the region’s unresolved colonial experience resonated in the CRGA was the question of using the SPC’s technical expertise to assist the International Atomic Energy Agency in monitoring nuclear risk in the Blue Pacific.

France questioned whether this was an attempt to insert a new competency into the SPC’s mandate. The challenge served to remind delegations of a similar sensitivity that led to the establishment of the PIF.

At the 1970 SPC Conference, the Island members wanted to discuss their concerns over the environmental risks of nuclear weapons testing in French Polynesia. France argued that this was a security issue beyond the Conference’s health mandate and walked out.

It was this that led to the establishment of the PIF the following year, to provide a vehicle for the region’s political concerns to be addressed outside the constraints imposed on the SPC by its metropolitan founders. The continuing reappearance of such wraiths are not just inconvenient reminders of the region’s past.

Both the SPC and the PIF are engaging in renovating the regional architecture to ensure it is fit for purpose, particularly in meeting the sweeping aspirations of the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent. The CRGA meeting in Tahiti provided a potent reminder that renovating the regional architecture cannot be done on a clean slate.

Richard Herr OAM is a member of the AIIA and inter alia a former President of the Tasmanian Branch. He has served as a consultant on various aspects of Pacific Island a regional architecture for four decades.

This article is published under a Creative Commons Licence and may be republished with attribution.