Pacific Island Societies Research Articles

Foreign aid, human agency, and self‐reliance in the Pacific: Lessons from the pandemic

AbstractMotivationAmid the highly polarized discourse on development aid in Pacific Islands, few studies explore the perspectives of local people. Missing from the literature is how the subjective experiences of Pacific Islands people responding and adapting to a sudden global disruption influence their perceptions of foreign aid. Faced by the sudden shutdown of export markets, tourism, and labour migration, the COVID‐19 pandemic offered an opportunity to investigate how disruptions from international events affect Pacific Island peoples' perception of foreign aid.PurposeWe investigated how the lived experiences of people in the Cook Islands and Tonga during COVID‐19 may have influenced their perceptions of foreign aid.Methods and approachSemi‐structured interviews guided by open‐ended questions were conducted with 25 individuals in the Cook Islands and 24 in Tonga. Interviewees were purposively selected from staff in government ministries and environmental non‐governmental organizations; from people working in tourism and private enterprise; from members of youth empowerment groups; and from among traditional leaders, faith leaders, high school teachers, fisherfolk, and farmers. The interviews explored their subjective experiences during the COVID‐19 pandemic and the meanings they attributed to them.FindingsThe pandemic closed down tourism and interrupted labour emigration in both countries. In response, people switched to farming and fishing and found ways to redeploy their skills. The pandemic saw increased local innovation, strengthened traditional practices, increased local agricultural output, and enhanced collaboration between foreign donor partners and recipient countries in the development of local human capacity.Policy implicationsRather than repeating history by integrating Pacific Island societies into the globalized economy, or providing bail‐outs through economic restructuring, donors should strive to support the agency and self‐determination of Pacific Islands people. They should start by recognizing the resourcefulness and capacity to adapt shown by participants during the pandemic.

Fluid Frontiers: Oceania and Asia in Historical Perspective

ABSTRACT This article, like the special issue it introduces, presents an attempt to think systematically about the durable and complex relationship between Pacific Island and East and Southeast Asian histories. Settled by people whose languages originally took shape in East and Southeast Asia, the Oceanic Pacific has deep links with Asia. Given that the changes that have unfolded in the Pacific World since the 16th century arise from linkages between the Americas, Asia and Europe which emerged through the creation of a global economic system, it is logical to treat Asia as one of the core contexts for Pacific history. The intensified connections between Pacific Island societies in the 18th and 19th centuries were strongly influenced by Asian economic, political and cultural systems. The decades between the mid-19th and mid-20th centuries were a period of complex engagement of Pacific Island worlds with Chinese, Japanese, European, British, American and Southeast Asian influences. World War II, a conflict between the United States and Japan for domination of the Pacific, was a product of these earlier structures and a break with them. Today, Pacific peoples engage with powerful political, economic and cultural influences emanating from East Asia, most notably the People’s Republic of China.

Food Security in COVID‐19: Insights from Indigenous Fijian Communities

Food Security in <scp>COVID</scp>‐19: Insights from Indigenous Fijian Communities

COVID‐19 and Re‐Storying Economic Development in Oceania

<scp>COVID</scp>‐19 and <scp><i>Re</i>‐Storying</scp> Economic Development in Oceania

Fisheries science and marine education catalyze the renaissance of traditional management (rahui) to improve an artisanal fishery in French Polynesia

Coral reef fisheries provide important ecosystem services to coastal communities, yet in the Pacific Islands, many of these contemporary fisheries are threatened by overexploitation. Historically, Pacific Island societies successfully utilized community-based management and spatial temporal closures to regulate the harvest of marine resources. In recognition of their past success these actions are currently being reemployed throughout the region. However, in many communities, innovative approaches may be needed to revitalize such practices and adapt traditional management to contemporary societal needs and expectations. This study presents the case of Anaa Atoll, a remote Pacific Island in the Tuamotu Archipelago of French Polynesia, and the community’s efforts to conserve a culturally important but overexploited bonefish (Albula glossodonta) fishery. Ultimately, fisheries research, education, and the creation of Aire Marine Educative (a marine area that is managed by a local primary school) were successful in building social cohesion and supporting the renaissance of rahui (a traditional form of restricting access to resources and or territories) to manage this fishery. On March 1st, 2019, the community of Anaa reinitiated this tradition for the first time in centuries. Based on these experiences, and an ensuing increase in the Spawning Potential Ratio of the bonefish stock, it is proposed that nationally recognized local management systems that incorporate fisheries research, youth education, and the cultural practices of communities should be supported in the marine policies of the Pacific Islands and beyond.

The Hidden Affliction: Sexually Transmitted Infections and Infertility in History. Edited by Simon Szreter (Rochester, University of Rochester Press, 2019) 442 pp. $95.00

The Hidden Affliction is an interdisciplinary collection that explores the history of sexually transmitted infections (particularly gonorrhea and syphilis); most of its articles also link these diseases to issues of demographics and infertility. The collection is impressive in disciplinary and chronological scope, including work by historians, demographers, archaeobiologists, and virologists. It is divided into four sections—pre-modern sexually transmitted infections (sti), scientific approaches, and demography in the “Global South” and modern Europe. Although each of the articles stands alone, the overall editorial structure makes this collection into a cohesive unit that is worth reading as a whole book. Szerter’s introduction provides valuable insights about the topic and the importance of interdisciplinary work in the history of medicine more broadly. He argues that in order to obtain valuable knowledge about the ways in which venereal diseases led to historical infertility, we need not only to familiarize ourselves with the cultural and medico-social sources but also to “know as much as we can from today’s biological, evolutionary, and epidemiological sciences…. It is crucial not to restrict ourselves only to texts from the past but to embrace all available forms of relevant evidence” (12).Many of the chapters follow this logic, for example, by combining textual history with insights from ancient dna studies or epidemiology. Historians of medicine who want to familiarize themselves with scientific methodologies will find the second section particularly valuable. It offers a series of readable chapters about the virology and bioarchaeology of stis that serves as a useful introduction to these fields, although they may be too basic for experts. The fourth section, which includes Szerter’s own work, demonstrates the value of interdisciplinary scholarship most strongly. It examines attitudes to stis and declining fertility in Western Europe at the turn of the twentieth century. Each of the three contributions focuses on a different country (Germany, France, and Britain) and uses a different research methodology. The result is a thought-provoking examination of the subtle differences between medical views in these countries, as well as of the kind of historical knowledge gained from different scholarly approaches.Given the innovative nature of most of the work in this collection, it was jarring to find within it two chapters that make uncritical use of early twentieth-century anthropological descriptions of Pacific Islanders. These texts are not used as primary sources describing bygone attitudes but as acceptable descriptions of indigenous cultures to be cited by contemporary scholars. Tim Bayliss-Smith and Roy F. R. Scragg both argue that the demographic decline in some Pacific Island societies after colonial encounters was caused by the spread of gonorrhea, which can cause infertility in women while being otherwise asymptomatic. Their argument itself may be sound, but it is obscured by references to “Aphrodisian” and “Non-Aphrodisian” indigenous cultures, and descriptions of the “ritual promiscuity” and “sexual generosity” of indigenous women (206–209), or their reputation for “customary promiscuous behavior” (240). Substantial anthropological scholarship in the past several decades has criticized such descriptions of Pacific Island cultures, demonstrating that it obscures the true nature of colonial encounters.1Moreover, the other essays in the “Global South” section of this collection argue that colonial medical authorities tended to over-diagnose stis among indigenous populations due to false perceptions of promiscuity. The absence of a more critical engagement with these antiquated anthropological views is thus an unfortunate blemish on a collection that otherwise makes an important contribution to the history of medicine.

The land has voice: understanding the land tenure – sustainable tourism development nexus in Micronesia

Externally-generated prescriptions for development continue to be imposed on Pacific Island societies. Frequently lost in this process is provision for the idiosyncratic localized realities of the people actually living in these places. Using an interpretivist critical discourse analysis, this study examines Indigenous perspectives on land, and how these perspectives interface with such standardized development ideals. More specifically, this study explores how issues related to Indigenous land holding rights in Micronesia are at the core of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set forth by the United Nations in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The results elucidate how the current SDG targets lack sufficient provision for how Micronesian societies function, what is valued by the people that comprise these societies, and how Indigenous land holding rights form the bedrock of the sustainability of Micronesian livelihoods.

Basalt geochemistry reveals high frequency of prehistoric tool exchange in low hierarchy Marquesas Islands (Polynesia).

Exchange activities, formal or otherwise, serve a variety of purposes and were prominent in many Pacific Island societies, both during island settlement and in late prehistory. Recent Polynesian studies highlight the role of exchange in the region’s most hierarchical polities where it contributed to wealth economies, emergent leadership, and status rivalry in late prehistory. Building on this research, we hypothesized that exchange in low hierarchy chiefdoms (kin-based polities where there are distinctions between commoners and elites but ranking within the latter is lacking, weak, or ephemeral) would differ in frequency and function from that associated with strongly hierarchical polities. We address this hypothesis through geochemical, morphological, and distributional analyses of stone tools on Nuku Hiva, Marquesas Islands. Non-destructive Energy-Dispersive X-ray Fluorescence (EDXRF) and destructive Wavelength-Dispersive X-ray Fluorescence (WDXRF) analyses of 278 complete and broken tools (adzes, chisels, preforms) from four valleys identify use of stone from at least seven sources on three islands: five on Nuku Hiva and one each on Eiao and Ua Pou. A functional analysis demonstrates that no tool form is limited to a particular source, while inter-valley distributions reveal that the proportions of non-local or extra-valley tools (43 to 94%, mean = 77%) approximate or exceed results from other archipelagoes, including those from elite and ritual sites of Polynesian archaic states. Intra-valley patterns also are unexpected, with non-local stone tools being recovered from both elite and commoner residential areas in near-equal proportions. Our findings unambiguously demonstrate the importance of exchange in late prehistoric Marquesan society, at varied social and geographic scales. We propose the observed patterns are the result of elites using non-local tools as political currency, aimed at reinforcing status, cementing client-patron relations, and building extra-valley alliances, consistent with prestige societies elsewhere and early historic accounts from the Marquesan Islands.

The Dynamics of Mobility: New Perspectives on Child Circulation in the Pacific

Adoption, fosterage, and child exchange constitute major themes in the literature on Pacific Island societies. However, a world where the movement of people has both intensified and become more complex challenges existing approaches to the circulation of children. We examine diverse conditions of contemporary child circulation: the shift from rural to urban to international migration; the capacities of kinship systems to adapt to this change; and the significance of children's experiences in assessing the consequences of global circulation. Spanning Oceania, the subsequent five articles bring innovative theoretical and methodological approaches to the analysis of child circulation, focusing on the impact global circulation has on the well-being of the youngest generation of those who move, are moved, or are left behind. This collection asks how sturdy the meanings and the practices of adoption, fosterage, and child exchange are when individuals come into the nexus of international and nation-state laws and policies.

Rolling Tobacco in Banana Leaves, Newspaper, or Copybook Paper Associated With Significant Reduction in Lung Function in Vanuatu.

In addition to the widespread availability of packaged cigarettes, the inhabitants of island nations of the Southwest Pacific frequently smoke commercially available loose tobacco using manufactured rolling papers, as well as locally grown tobacco rolled in manufactured rolling paper or wrapped in leaves, copybook paper, and newspaper. In this study, Vanuatu men who smoked local tobacco rolled in leaves, copybook paper, or newspaper showed significantly lower forced vital capacity (FVC), forced expiratory volume in 1 second (FEV1), and FEV1/FVC ratios than men who smoked packaged cigarettes, store-bought tobacco rolled in manufactured rolling paper, or who smoked locally grown tobacco rolled in manufactured rolling papers. The addition of toxins from these unusual tobacco-wrapping media produces lung function deficits similar to the pattern noted among tobacco smokers who also inhale smoke from burning biomass. Thus, public health initiatives should consider including strategies addressing the use of wrapping media among smokers in South Pacific island societies.

Mental health in the island nations of the Western Pacific: a rapid review of the literature.

The aim of the study was to identify mental-health-relevant literature accessible to policy makers and healthcare workers in the island nations of the Western Pacific. Material collated to support the inaugural Leadership in Mental Health: Island Nations course held in Cairns in May 2015 was used as the basis of a "rapid review". The rapid review considered 303 documents identified by a search carried out using James Cook University's OneSearch, Google Scholar, and the authors' knowledge. Search terms included mental health and the like, and terms with Pacific and current Pacific island country names. Findings were classified by region/country, year of release/publication, mental health issue addressed, peer-reviewed or grey literature, and type of study. Almost half of the findings had been released in the previous five years. However, only 36% were peer-reviewed publications and only 3.6% of the findings were intervention studies. There is limited easily accessible documentation to confidently direct practice or policies regarding which strategies are likely to be effective in responding to the high rates of mental ill-health experienced in the Pacific island nations, or to plan for increases as a consequence of rapid social and demographic changes that are transforming Pacific island societies.

Rapid societal change as a proxy for regional environmental forcing: Evidence and explanations for Pacific island societies in the 14–15th centuries

AbstractGiven the unquestioned impacts of recent/future environmental changes on human societies, it is reasonable to posit that past societal responses could be used as proxies of contemporaneous environmental forcing and might help identify the drivers of these, particularly where independent evidence of the effects of these events is inadequate. Such areas include Pacific oceanic islands for most of which there is evidence of a societal perturbation in the 14th and 15th centuries that saw the outbreak of region‐wide conflict, abandonment of coastal settlements and the abrupt end of long‐distance cross‐ocean voyaging networks. The contemporaneity of these effects across a vast region requires a driver that is external to particular island groups with the only possibility that of oceanic origin, most likely large waves (tsunamis or storm surges) or rapid sea‐level change. The explanation is less important than the principle that societal changes can be used as proxies for environmental activity.

Envisioning South-South relations in the fields of environmental change and migration in the Pacific Islands - past, present and futures

Climate change poses severe threats to developing countries. Scientists predict entire states (e.g. Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Tuvalu, and Maldives) will become inhabitable. People living in these states have to resettle to other countries. Media and politicians warn that climate change will trigger migration flows in dimensions unknown to date. It is feared that millions from developing countries overwhelm developed societies and increase pressures on anyway ailing social support systems destabilizing societies and becoming a potential source of conflict.Inhabitants of Pacific Islandsahave been mobile since the islands were first settled not longer than 3,500 years ago. Since then people moved around, expanded their reach, and traded with neighbouring tribes (and later countries). With the event of European powers in the 15thcentury independent mobility became restricted after the beginning of the 19thcentury. From the second half of the 19thcentury movements of people predominately served economic interests of colonial powers, in particular a huge colonial appetite for labour. After independence emigration from Pacific Island countries continued to serve economic interest of metropolitan countries at the rim of the Pacific Ocean, which are able to direct migration flows according to their economic requirements.If climate change resettlements become necessary in big numbers then Pacific Islanders do not want to become climate change refugees. To include environmental reasons in refugee conventions is not what Pacific Islanders want. They want to migrate in dignity, if it becomes unavoidable to leave their homes. There are good reasons to solve the challenges within Pacific Island societies and do not depend too much on metropolitan neighbours at the rim of the Pacific such as Australia, New Zealand and the USA. To rise to the challenge requires enhanced Pan-Pacific Island solidarity and South-South cooperation. This then would result in a reduction of dependencies. For metropolitan powers still much can be done in supporting capacity building in Pacific Island countries and helping the economies to proposer so that climate change migrants easier can be absorbed by expanding labour markets in Pacific Island countries.

Diversifying the use of tuna to improve food security and public health in Pacific Island countries and territories

The large tuna resources of the Western and Central Pacific Ocean are delivering great economic benefits to Pacific Island countries and territories (PICTs) through sale of licences to distant water fishing nations and employment in fish processing. However, tuna needs to contribute to Pacific Island societies in another important way—by increasing local access to the fish required for good nutrition to help combat the world’s highest levels of diabetes and obesity. Analyses reported here demonstrate that coastal fisheries in 16 of the 22 PICTs will not provide the fish recommended for good nutrition of growing Pacific Island populations, and that by 2020 tuna will need to supply 12% of the fish required by PICTs for food security, increasing to 25% by 2035. In relative terms, the percentages of the region’s tuna catch that will be needed in 2020 and 2035 to fill the gap in domestic fish supply are small, i.e., 2.1% and 5.9% of the average present-day industrial catch, respectively. Interventions based on expanding the use of nearshore fish aggregating devices (FADs) to assist small-scale fishers catch tuna, distributing small tuna and bycatch offloaded by industrial fleets at regional ports, and improving access to canned tuna for inland populations, promise to increase access to fish for sustaining the health of the region’s growing populations. The actions, research and policies required to implement these interventions effectively, and the investments needed to maintain the stocks underpinning the considerable socio-economic benefits that flow from tuna, are described.

Development, global change and traditional food security in Pacific Island countries

While islands have been identified in numerous discourses as being highly vulnerable, food security was a cornerstone of many traditional Pacific Island societies from inland and coastal communities in large islands with considerable natural assets to those that occupied extremely small, low-lying atolls with little or no soil and limited water resources. This was sustained through agro-ecological biodiversity, the production of surpluses which enabled food preservation and storage to be practiced and underpinned networks of exchange and mutual support that were particularly important during times of hardship such as disruptive extreme natural events, the use of resilient crops and using ‘famine’ foods. Colonisation, the introduction of new religions, the spread of capitalism, most recently in the context of globalisation, has seen many of these practices decline (some have disappeared altogether) as crop diversity has been reduced (making way for export products such as copra), food storage and preservation are now rarely practised, resilient crops have been replaced, famine foods have lost their importance in the face of disaster relief, and many traditional networks have declined. Food imports have become critical, not only in the growing urban areas, but also in rural communities. The paper concludes by addressing key challenges facing Pacific Island countries in order to revitalise those traditional elements of food security in ways that are likely to find acceptance in contemporary society and enable them to adapt to the effects of climate change.

노니 뿌리 추출물의 매염제 및 매염 조건별 실크 염색성 고찰

Morinda citrifolia, commercially known as Noni, is a tree that grows widely throughout the Pacific, and is recognized as one of the most significant sources of traditional medicines among Pacific Island societies. All parts of the plant have traditional and/or modern uses, including roots and bark(dyes, medicine), trunks(firewood, tools), and leaves and fruits(food, medicine). The bark and the roots of the tree contain red and yellow pigments respectively, which are both used in the manufacture of dyes. Dyes from Noni are being used traditionally, to color clothing and fabrics. In this study, mordanting effects on the dyeing properties of Noni root extract on silk fabrics were investigated.

노니 뿌리 추출물의 pH 조건별 실크 염색성 고찰

Morinda citrifolia, commercially known as Noni, is a tree that grows widely throughout the Pacific, and is recognized as one of the most significant sources of traditional medicines among Pacific Island societies. The bark and the roots of the tree contain red and yellow pigments respectively, which are both used in the manufacture of dyes. Dyes from Noni are being used traditionally, to color clothing and fabrics. In this study, dyeing properties of Noni root extracts on silk fabrics at various pH conditions were investigated.

Re-estimation and synthesis of coral-reef fishery landings in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands since the 1950s suggests the decline of a common resource

Coral-reef fisheries play a central role in Pacific Island societies for their cultural, subsistence and economic values. Despite their importance, management of coral reef fisheries continues to be hampered by difficulties in estimating accurate fish landings. This study focuses upon both commercial and non-commercial reef-fish landings in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), using existing and new datasets derived from catch-based records and household interviews. We found that previous estimations of CNMI’s non-commercial reef-fish landings were rooted in a common misinterpretation of a key historical study that led to very low reported contributions from the non-commercial reef-fishing sector. Present evidence introduced from socioeconomic surveys suggested that non-commercial fisheries were between five and nine times commercial counterparts in the mid-2000s. Further, we introduce new commercial landing datasets based upon required reporting to CNMI’s Nutritional Assistance Program that appeared to offer improved estimates of reef-fish landings compared with an existing voluntary reporting system that has been in place since the late 1970s. Using an influential anchor point in the 1950s, we synthesize that modern reef-fish landings in CNMI are, at best, similar to those conservatively estimated for the past, with more likely scenarios suggesting a 39–73 % decline since the 1950s. These findings are consistent with a body of literature suggesting reduced catch success through time and negative impacts to coral reefs in proximity to population centers. Ongoing data collection improvements are needed to ensure accurate assessments of CNMI’s coral-reef fishery and sound fisheries policies.

Popular music, cultural policy, and the Festival of Pacific Arts

Pacific Island societies share many cultural similarities, one of which is the role of music as a vehicle for cultural heritage and expressions of identity throughout the region. This is reflected in the quadrennial Festival of Pacific Arts (FPA), managed by the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC). The SPC’s cultural policies are largely reflected in the FPA, especially through traditional (ancestral) Indigenous music and dance performances. Popular music is not directly mentioned in SPC cultural policy; however, there has been an increasing trend in popular music appearing in the context of the FPA, alongside and sometimes replacing more traditional types of performance. This article will examine this development, investigating some of the formal and informal processes leading to the inclusion of popular music in FPA events. It will centre on the 2008 and 2012 festivals, examining the performances of the Rapanui (Easter Island) delegations on these occasions.

“Such a Site for Play, This Edge”: Surfing, Tourism, and Modernist Fantasy in Papua New Guinea

Both sport and tourism are deeply modernist forms that rely on the circulation of people, media, and capital for their endurance. In this article, I analyze both forms through the ethnographic examination of surf-related tourism in Papua New Guinea. For many Papua New Guineans, surf tourism is an avenue for gaining positions in wage labor. For some the development of the industry is an attempt to foster “sustainable” economic development in the country. These forms of participation rely on international tourists who see the sport and the industry in Papua New Guinea as a site for recreation and play. This article deals with these people, surf tourists who visit Papua New Guinea and for whom surfing is a major part of their social identity. Surfing as an embedded, affective practice and a set of deeply socio-ecological propositions about people-in-nature is historically tractable to indigenous Pacific Island societies. It was deterritorialized, or removed from the context of its origin, by Australian and American youth who took up the practice as a sport in the early part of the twentieth century. Today surfing has been reassembled as a form of development in the very places from which it emerged. Through the analysis of the movements of media, people, and capital involved in the surf tourism industry in Papua New Guinea, this article demonstrates the new social assemblages that emerge when labor, development, and play intertwine.