‘Falling off the Map?’ The changing Dynamics of Security in the

South Pacific

Greg Fry

Australian Institute of International Affairs   Canberra, 19th April, 1999

The strategic context in which South Pacific island societies find themselves since the end of the Cold

War is often characterised by the contention that the region has ‘fallen off the map’. It is an image that   appears to have been endorsed by regional institutions, World Bank studies, academic analysts, western   states, and many island leaders. It suggests a reversion to ‘backwater’ status after the high level of   international interest in the mid to late 1980s when local developments in island societies could prompt   close attention in distant capitals in the search for signs of vulnerability to Soviet entreaty, or fear of   losing western alliance solidarity as in the case of anti-nuclear policies. The ‘falling off the map’ thesis

suggests not only that Oceania is no longer viewed as part of any global grand strategy but that, as a   consequence, the region is in the process of being marginalised economically because much of the   assistance that flowed to the Pacific island countries because of the Cold War will not be forthcoming in   the new strategic circumstances. The thesis also embraces the proposition that the post-Cold War   trading order will further marginalise island economies if they are not radically restructured. And finally,

pictured as ‘the hole in the Asia-Pacific doughnut’ or ‘the eye of the Asia-Pacific cyclone’, Oceania is   seen as having failed to become part of the new map of Asia-Pacific development.

This perspective, then, posits the end of the Cold War as constituting a fundamental change in regional   security. It is a structuralist explanation seeing the global balance of power as providing the main logic   underlying regional order and local security dynamics as derivative of that logic. With the lifting of the   lid of the Cold War order at the regional level, it predicts marginalisation and economic insecurity for

South Pacific states unless they adjust their social and economic organisation to accord with the needs   of the global trading and economic structures and the dominant ideologies sustaining them. One   prominent variant of the ‘falling off the map’ thesis, held in Australian government circles, is that in   these new circumstances the only remaining power is Australia, and therefore the region is to be seen as

an Australian hegemonic sphere, or post-nuclear testing (from late 1995) as a French-Australian lake.

For many of those propounding this characterisation of the post-Cold War relationship between island   states and global structures, this assumed marginalisation is seen as prompting a grim situation for the   survival and security of Pacific island states and society. This is captured in the phrase the ‘fatal   farewell’ to refer to the diminishing interest of traditional donors, and also in the ‘doomsday’

projections of the Pacific 2010 academic project. It is also present in the World Bank and Australian   government characterisations of non-viable and potentially ungovernable states. For many observers   ‘the coming anarchy’ would not be too extreme a description for post-Cold War prospects. These   characterisations in turn inform policy approaches, backed by aid conditionality, broadly in accord with

the governance and sustainable development agendas of the World Bank. It is therefore important to   look carefully at this prevailing metaphor for the changing relationship between the South Pacific and   global order.

This chapter challenges, or at least attempts to complicate, this structuralist characterisation of the   security dynamics of South Pacific security after the Cold War. It posits a more complex interaction   between global structures and local political forces and suggests that the end of the Cold War is not the   fundamental turning point or determinant assumed in the dominant interpretation. The discussion is   developed in five steps. Firstly, it explores the impact of the end of the Cold War on the interests and

involvement of large powers, international agencies and corporations to see whether the end of the   Cold War is the watershed often claimed and whether it did really amount to the region ‘falling off the   map’ and being marginalised in new arrangements. Secondly, it explores the regional security   implications of the changing configuration of global interests, focussing on how we might characterise   the relationship among the external interests in relation to their South Pacific involvements. Thirdly, it   examines the local political and social forces that are influencing the security of Pacific peoples.   Fourthly, it examines the role of regional identity and organisation and its relationship to regional

security. Each of these first four steps helps us to define the possible and the probable in the security   dynamics of the region. The final step attempts a more focussed exploration of the interaction of global

structures, regional organisations and local forces in several important security issues in the

contemporary South Pacific: economic security; ‘good’ governance, and environmental security.

The use in this discussion of the contested term ‘security’ needs some clarification at the outset. On the   question ‘security for whom?’ the argument proceeds on the premise that security for states has to be   weighed against, or alongside, security for individuals and groups within states on the grounds that   security of states, may not guarantee, and may well work against, security for particular individuals or   groups, or even whole societies. Secondly, with regard to the question ‘security from what?’ I employ

security threats in a broad sense to encompass not only military but also environmental and economic   threats and threats of political instability and public and domestic violence. Unlike some mainstream   writings, I do not look at environmental threats only to the extent that they affect military security, but   in their own right as threats to life. This needs little justification in a region where the survival of several

atoll countries is threatened with sea-level rise and where atmospheric nuclear tests have had a fatal   impact on some societies and individuals. In relation to the question ‘what is being secured?’ I do not   embrace a broad conceptualisation, of anything that might affect well-being, but a meaning closer to   more conventional connotations to do with the preservation of life, and safety, and of a degree of   control over existence.

Central to the position taken here is that security is a contested concept, rather than an objective agreed   condition that can be revealed through analysis. It is not just that there are different views of what the   security problem is and of what approach should be taken; it is that invariably one person’s or state’s   security is another’s security threat. It follows that there is not one security dynamic for the South   Pacific as is often implied by conventional analyses; there are different and often competing   interpretations of the energising forces and the consequences of their interplay.

We have to this point been proceeding as if there is an agreed notion of what constitutes ‘the South   Pacific’. However, as a political concept its membership and boundaries have varied over time and   according to the issue. Even the regional institutional arrangements are not helpful in establishing a   fixed idea of regional boundaries. At the core of the idea of the ‘South Pacific’, however, are the   thousands of islands scattered across the central and southern Pacific ocean, some to the north of the

equator. They stretch from the Micronesian islands just south of Japan and east of the Philippines south   to Papua New Guinea and south-east along the Melanesian chain to New Caledonia and then east   across the Polynesian Pacific to Tahiti. These societies are organised into twelve independent states   (Federated States of Micronesia, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nautu, Palau, Papua New Guinea,

Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu), two self-governing territories (Cook Islands and   Niue) and the eight remaining territories of France (New Caledonia, Wallis and Futuna and French   Polynesia), Britain (Pitcaim islands), New Zealand (Tokelau) and USA (American Samoa, Guam and   the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands). It also includes, importantly, the sea around   them, up to 200 miles for some purposes, and the high sea ‘pockets’ within the remaining area, for

others. This area, which is recognised as constituting the boundaries of the oldest regional organisation,   the South Pacific Commission (renamed The Pacific Community at its 50th anniversary conference in   October 1997), is over 30 million square kilometres (not including Australia and New Zealand), or   roughly the size of Africa.

In terms of politically weighty decision-making, such as treaty-making and collective diplomacy, the   South Pacific island membership is a little smaller because they each only recognise fellow independent   states. This is the case, for example, in the South Pacific Forum, the other large regional institution. But   even here, the regional boundaries seen as relevant for political action include the dependent territories,   such as when the organisation takes a collective position on decolonisation in New Caledonia or   nuclear issues in French Polynesia. Australia and New Zealand, although members of the South Pacific   Forum, do not always put their own territories within the boundaries of the South Pacific. This in/out   behaviour is an important variation in what is seen as constituting the South Pacific. Australia, for

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example, sees itself as part of the Southeast Asian and Indian Ocean regions as well as the South

Pacific. But despite its significant region-making initiatives in the other two areas, it is the South Pacific   where it sees itself as having a leadership and management role. Finally, for some purposes, and   particularly for sovereignty movements and regional non-government organisations, such as the Pacific   Islands Association of Non-Government Organisations (PIANGO) and the Nuclear-Free and

Independent Pacific movement (NFIP), the cultural and political identity of the South Pacific stretches   to an outer boundary incorporating Hawaii in the north, New Zealand in the south, Easter Island (a   territory of Chile) to the east, and Irian Jaya, a province of Indonesia, in the west.

Changing External Interests

I contended at the outset that the dominant representation of the impact of the end of the Cold War   depicts the change in global balance of power as the watershed event for the security dynamics of the   South Pacific, causing the region to fall off the strategic map, and consequently the diplomatic and   economic map. There are some major strategic developments which support this thesis. However, there   are also indications that the logic behind the pattern of power in the region is much more complex. The   region remains on many global maps, not least an economic one. To understand the degree to which we

should regard the end of the Cold War as a fundamental turning point, and what outside interests are   seeking to be involved in the post-Cold War South Pacific, we explore just where the region is situated   in relation to several global maps: that of the nuclear strategist, the military planner, the diplomat, the   aid-givers, the traders and investors, the international agency bureaucrat and the International Non-   Government Organisation office.

Nuclear Involvement

In terms of the grand strategies of the world’s largest powers, it was the nuclear issue that made the   South Pacific important during the Cold War. From the 1940s until 1963, the United States used Bikini   and Enewetak atolls, and Johnston and Christmas islands, for atmospheric testing of atomic and   hydrogen bombs, and Britain briefly used Christmas Island from 1957 until 1963 for its nuclear testing   program until it moved, with the United States, to the Nevada desert. In the same year, France   established its Centre d’Experiments du Pacifique, and conducted 41 atmospheric tests at Moruroa atoll

in the Tuamotus before regional opposition and changing international expectations forced the testing   underground in 1975. Moruroa continued until 1995 to be the only place where France tested its force   de frappe. For the last thirty years, then, this nuclear involvement placed the South Pacific at the very   highest security interest of the French government, to the point where its agents were ordered to blow   up a Greenpeace protest ship in Auckland harbour in July 1985. For the United States, Kwajalein atoll   in the Marshall Islands became the main testing site for anti-ballistic missiles fired from Vandenburg

airbase in California, and Guam a site for nuclear weapons storage and for nuclear- armed B52s to be   on alert on the runway at Andersen Airforce Base. These interests, together with keeping fall -back   options for the stationing of ships and planes that might be nuclear-armed, impacted greatly on political   developments in Micronesia.

But it was the developments in nuclear policy south of the equator that made regional security of the   highest importance for the grand strategy of the United States. New Zealand’s prominent refusal to   accept nuclear- armed and nuclear-powered vessels and the resultant strains on the ANZUS alliance   sent alarm bells ringing in Washington. This was seen against the background of significant anti-nuclear   feeling throughout the island Pacific and in a significant part of the population in Australia. It was seen

not only to challenge the port calls of nuclear-armed ships in the region more generally but also to   encourage a ‘nuclear allergy’ that could undo the global nuclear alliance. And for Pacific islanders the   nuclear issue provided the main shared security issue of the post-colonial period.

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Against such a background, the impact of the end of the Cold War is significant. It amounts to falling

off the nuclear map, at least in relation to weapons. The end of East-West rivalry changed American   perceptions of its strategic needs in Micronesia. The nuclear-armed B52s were withdrawn from Guam   and the fallback needs in Palau reassessed, allowing Palau to gain independence under a constitution   incorporating anti-nuclear provisions. The testing of anti-ballistic missiles into the Kwajalein lagoon in   the Marshall Islands has continued, but as it does not involve warheads or nuclear materials, it has not   attracted the same level of opposition. More importantly, in terms of issues occupying anti-nuclear

states and groups in the South Pacific, anti-nuclear feeling looked less threatening to Washington after   the end of the Cold War. The issue that had most worried the United States, the possible export of the   idea of stopping nuclear-armed ships from entering port, seemed to disappear. The United States did   not change its ‘neither confirm nor deny’ policy (despite having removed nuclear weapons from surface

ships), but neither did New Zealand’s conservative government change the anti-nuclear policy of its   social democratic predecessor. In March 1996, Washington signed the South Pacific Nuclear-Free Zone   Treaty which it had opposed in the Cold War context of the 1980s thereby opening the way for the   Micronesian countries to be included in the zone area. In the post-Cold War context it is ‘the domino   effect’ of nuclear-free zones as anti-proliferation measures which is important for US policy.

This dramatic change was accompanied from 1992 by a change in the other major nuclear involvement   of the Cold War period: the French government announced a suspension of testing at Moruroa. Over   the next three years the nuclear issue disappeared from view. The region seemed to be truly off the   nuclear map and relations between France and the region were at an all-time high. But in 1995   President Chirac announced a new series of tests. Although he claimed these would be limited, and the   last before France ceased underground testing altogether, the region was outraged. The South Pacific   Forum, and Australia and New Zealand, in particular, adopted a series of measures including the   withdrawal of France’s right to be part of the post-Forum dialogue meetings. The tests ceased at the

end of that year and the test sites at Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls were closed down permanently.   France signed and ratified the protocols to the South Pacific Nuclear-Free Zone treaty in 1996, and   even before the completion of the tests the Australian Minister for Pacific Islands Affairs talked of the   South Pacific as a French-Australian lake in the post-Cold War period. The end of French nuclear   testing has removed a major security issue for South Pacific societies, although the genetic impact of   past atmospheric testing remains a threat to the health of Polynesian and Micronesian populations.

Military Intervention

A second area in which we might ask whether the region has fallen off the global map is that of the   possibility of outside military intervention. During the 1980s western security policy towards the South   Pacific was predicated on a perception of the possibility of Soviet threat. But this was seen more in   terms of the possibility of a military base or access gained through influence rather than hostile military   intervention. While part of western propaganda to island elites was to emphasise that the islands were   in reach of an air strike from the Soviet bases in Vietnam, it is doubt&J that western security analysts   actually thought direct military threat to the Pacific islands a real possibility. Their concerns focused   instead on the possibility of fisheries access as a cover for future military basing. The end of the Cold   War, and the collapse of the Soviet Union, brought an end to this western perception. For western

security planners, the region fell off the military intervention map more generally as no likely   replacement candidate was seen as tilling the void created by the Soviet Union. For island governments,   the end of the Soviet Union did not have the same security connotations. While anti-Communist, and   wary of close involvement with the Soviet Union, they never embraced the Soviet military threat thesis

in relation to the South Pacific.

While Soviet military involvement did not eventuate (there was not even a Soviet warship in South   Pacific waters during the Cold War) other external interests did intervene: there was French military   involvement in New Caledonia to suppress the 1984-85 ‘troubles’ and incursions by the Indonesian

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military into Papua New Guinea territory in ‘hot pursuit’ of Organisasi Papua Merdeka (OPM) rebels in

1984 and later. There was also the very real possibility of military involvement by Australia and New   Zealand after the first Fiji coup in 1987, the possibility of involvement by Australia in Vanuatu in 1988   during the land demonstrations in the capital, and in the Bougainville conflict in Papua New Guinea   from 1989. In 1988-89 the Australian government went as far as developing a public rationale for

intervention. Furthermore, over the previous hundred years, in varying circumstances, Australian force   had been deployed to the islands: to annex southeast New Guinea in the 188Os, to take Nauru and New   Guinea from Germany early in World War 1, to help wrest New Caledonia from the Vichy French in   World War II, and to re-establish colonial authority in Nauru and Papua and New Guinea after World   War II; and to assist in putting down a secessionist attempt at the time of independence in Vanuatu in

1980. However, the experience of the late 1980s has made the Australian government extremely   reluctant and unlikely to again contemplate direct intervention. There has been a questioning of the   capacity, the ethics and the efficacy of military intervention. The result is a propensity to contemplate   intervention only where Australian lives are at risk and with the limited purpose of evacuating   Australian citizens rather than seeking to change the political situation. There has also been a   developing recognition that such tasks in the region would be better undertaken by police rather than by   the military, and by an ad hoc regional peacekeeping force rather than an Australian one.

Although the South Pacific has mainly fallen off the Australian map for direct military intervention, it   remains ‘on the map’ for Defence assistance and cooperation. This program is multifaceted ranging   from military training and equipping, to the stationing of Australian naval personnel in various island   capitals and Defence attaches in key cities, to the popular patrol boat program and overflight   surveillance of island state exclusive economic zones by the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) in   order to detect fishing infringements. Where such assistance became controversial is in relation to the   Bougainville conflict. For the Papua New Guinea Defence Force (PNGDF), and the Papua New Guinea   (PNG) government, Australian Defence assistance has had too many conditions attached and has, they

have argued, forced them to look elsewhere for assistance. For the Bougainville Revolutionary Army   (BRA) and some other Bougainvilleans, Australian Defence assistance has been seen as propping up an   attempted military solution to the conflict and thereby making possible human rights infringements   against Bougainvilleans. For the Solomon Islands government, suffering border infringements by the   PNGDF in ‘hot pursuit’ of rebels and attacks on alleged rebel supply bases, and even deaths of its   citizens at the hands of the Australian-supplied PNGDF, the Australian assistance to PNG has been   untenable. This has led to the paradox of Australian Defence assistance to the Solomon Islands   government to patrol its border against Australian-supported forces on the PNG side, each in the name

of ‘security’.

In January 1997, frustration with Australian conditions on Defence cooperation (most prominently, the   Australian limitations on PNG’s battle use of the Australian-donated Iroqouis helicopters) and the   failure of previous attempts at a military solution to the Bougainville secessionist conflict, led the Chan   government to contract Sandline International, headquartered in London, to provide military training   and other assistance to the PNGDF. The arrival in Papua New Guinea of the mercenaries under Colonel   Tim Spicer prompted an outcry from the Australian government who saw the introduction of

mercenaries for the first time in ‘the region’ as threatening the norms of a broader regional security, as   well as having the potential to escalate the war on Bougainville. The Sandline involvement was also   opposed by the acting Prime Minister of the neighbouring Solomon Islands, Francis Saemala. But it   was a rebellion by a major section of the PNG Defence force, sparked by hostility to their displacement   by outsiders, which changed the situation. Led by their commander, Brigadier-General Jerry Singirok,   they detained the mercenary force and called for the resignation of the Prime Minister, his Deputy and

the Defence Minister. Despite Singirok’s removal by the Cabinet as commander, the rebellion   continued, and the mercenaries were sent home. The soldiers’ refusal to serve under the new acting   commander and the public demonstrations demanding the resignation of the Prime Minister led to him   standing aside for the duration of a judicial inquiry into the allegedly corrupt dealings surrounding the

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employment of the mercenaries (which quickly became known as ‘the Sandline affair’). In the upshot,

the Prime Minister, Sir Julius Chan, lost his seat in the June 1997 election. He was, however, cleared of   corruption by the initial Sandline Inquiry but the new government has initiated a second inquiry with   much broader terms of reference.

The army reaction and the public outrage were based on the gradual realisation that the intention was   that the mercenaries would fight in Bougainville. This was a shaming for the PNGDF. General Singirok   directly tapped into a public concern about corrupt politicians while using a popular radio program on   the national network. Entering the world of privatised security has challenged some fundamentals about   national security and has had significant political consequences. Private security firms are well   established in PNG, particularly as an adjunct to mining, other businesses and private home protection.   However, the use of mercenaries for state security is not likely to recur as a government-sponsored   enterprise.

For the first decade after Papua New Guinea’s independence in 197.5, it was felt that the most likely   military intervention in the South Pacific might be that of Indonesia into Papua New Guinea. This   scenario had all the ingredients: a common border difficult to patrol, a West Papuan rebel movement   seeking to overthrow Indonesian sovereignty over Irian Jaya which often used Papua New Guinea as a

sanctuary; a PNG population generally sympathetic to the West Papuan cause; a perception on the part   of Jakarta that it could not rely on the PNG government to patrol its side of the border, and a history of   Indonesian preparedness to intervene militarily outside its border, most recently in Timor. Such   intervention seemed very possible in 1984 when Indonesian forces did cross the border in pursuit of   rebels and when 12,000 refugees sitting in camps just inside the PNG border seemed likely to tempt a   strike from Indonesian forces seeing them as potential rebel bases. But since this time arrangements   between the Papua New Guinea and Indonesian governments, and their militaries (particularly

concerned with toughening up the PNG response to rebel groups), seem to have made deliberate or   large scale intervention unlikely.

For our broader purpose, what is striking about each of these intervention possibilities during the Cold   War, and their falling off since, is that - unlike nuclear involvement - these developments have little to   do with the Cold War or its ending.

Diplomatic Interest

A third area of inquiry about a possible post-Cold War disappearance off global maps concerns   diplomatic involvement and general strategic interest. Undoubtedly, the end of East-West rivalry, and   of the conceptual frameworks associated with it, lowered the level of outside attention to South Pacific   developments. The most obvious lessening, if not disappearance, in diplomatic interest was that of the

United States, the Soviet Union, Britain and, less significantly, Israel. This was most notable because of   the relatively high levels of interest on their part just prior to the ending of the Cold War, in the late   1980s. The Soviet Union, after years of trying, had broken through the unofficial ban on Soviet   embassies in Oceania, establishing an embassy in Port Moresby in 1988. It closed it three years later,

partly for reasons of fiscal stringency. The Russian fishing fleet had also left South Pacific tropical   waters by the beginning of the 1990s.

The United States, with relatively little diplomatic interest in Oceania below the equator during most of   the Cold War (although it had had diplomatic posts in Suva and Port Moresby since the 1970s)   suddenly raised its involvement dramatically in the mid to late 1980s opening new sub-posts in Apia   and Iioniara to supplement its Suva post. It also increased economic assistance from a low base and   began a more determined effort to influence regional norms and policies on political, security and

nuclear issues. In 1990 President Bush called a summit of Pacific island heads of government in Hawaii,   and had proposed a Joint Commercial Commission with the area. Just a year earlier the Solarz report

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had examined the significance of the area to US interests. The subsequent moves to close the new sub-

posts, close all USAID of&es, and to reduce US Congressional funding for the Pacific Islands   Development Program based at the East-West Center in Hawaii, suggest an almost complete loss of   strategic interest south of the equator. North of the equator, however, the US has retained its interest in   denying Micronesia to other powers. Britain also signalled a loss of diplomatic interest. It withdrew   from the South Pacific Commission in 1995, and wound down its bilateral economic assistance

substantially. But in 1997, following the election of the Blair Government, Britain announced in 1997   that it would henceforth ‘resume’ its membership of the South Pacific Commission.

The other powers involved in the Cold War era have for various reasons retained their interest in   influencing developments in Oceania. China and Taiwan continue their long-standing interest in   competing for the diplomatic recognition of island states (four island states- Tuvalu, Nauru, Marshall   Islands and Solomon Islands- recognise Taiwan). Each also has substantial fishing interests in the area.   Japan has increased its profile with the funding of a Pacific Islands Centre in Tokyo in 1996 and the   holding of a summit for Pacific Island Prime Ministers in Tokyo in October 1997. It retains its interest

in the marine and timber resources and in the voting weight in international fora of the small island   states. French regional diplomacy has continued as a means of promoting the integration of the French   territories with other parts of Oceania, particularly now that the political forces in New Caledonia have   agreed to a form of political development which will involve France until at least 2013. At that time, or   certainly before 2018, a referendum on independence is to be held.

Australia and New Zealand retain their interest as the larger countries in the neighbourhood. Australia,   although closing its diplomatic representation in Nauru as part of broader economy measures, has   continued its efforts to support and strengthen regional organisation and to influence the social   organisation and economic prospects of the island states. It has moved to a much more unapologetic   hegemonic role post-Cold War and is arguably even more involved in the region than during the Cold   War. Malaysia has increased a long-standing interest but more as a result of the burgeoning investment   in Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands by Malaysian companies than as a response to the end   of the Cold War. Malaysian timber companies had become very influential in the national politics of   Papua New Guinea, and of Solomon Islands (where taxes on timber exports are the principal source of   government revenue). The largest company, Rimbunan Hijau, set up one of the two main daily

newspapers in Papua New Guinea, The National. In Fiji in a move of enormous symbolic significance,   Malaysian interests - MBF Holdings Berhard - took over one of the old colonial trading firms,   Carpenters Fiji. This higher profile in regional affairs has been recognised in the invitation to Malaysia   to become a partner to the post-Forum Dialogue from 1997.

Also evident as an increasing diplomatic presence are the United Nations agencies, the World Bank, the   International Monetary Fund and the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The global governance agenda   has been vigorously pursued in the South Pacific in the 1990s. International agency discourses of   sustainability, good governance, bio-diversity, gender equality, conservation, population control, have   all been influential and backed by significant resources. Moreover, the World Bank and ADB have   competed in their substantial involvement in nearly all independent island states in the 1990s. World   Bank reports in the 1990s have been influential in setting frameworks and normative standards, images   and judgments, while alternative judgments and images have come from the competing United Nations   Development Program with its less market-driven ‘human development’ approach. International NGOs,

notably Greenpeace, Amnesty and World-Wide Fund for Nature, have also increased their involvement   in the 1990s both with regional programs of their own and by seeking to influence government and   regional organisation agendas.

Overall, one could say that although the South Pacific region has descended on the priority list of all   states, now ending up in the desk officer’s in-tray rather than on the president or prime minister’s travel   itinerary as in the late 1980s there is in the 1990s a more complex array of global actors seeking to

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influence developments in the area. If one had to generalise then we could distill, with the partial

departure of Britain, and the increased diplomatic efforts of Malaysia, Japan, Korea, Taiwan and China,   a move away from the traditional colonial order towards a more complex and fluid order with the shift   generally towards Asia. The South Pacific has become increasingly attractive to Asian governments and   companies as a supplier of resources -particularly of tuna, timber and minerals; its isolation and vast

spaces have also been seen as a place for dumping the waste products of rapid industrialisation by   Taiwan and Japan in particular, and as a site for a satellite station - on Tarawa in Kiribati - in the case   of the PRC. And despite the small size of Pacific states, their numbers do count when it comes to a vote   in international organisations. This is not the ‘Australian-French lake’ of the official Australian

imagination, nor a falling off the global diplomatic map more generally.

Economic Involvement

A more particular claim of the conventional account is that with the decline in strategic interest after the   end of the Cold War, the South Pacific has fallen off the economic assistance map. It is argued that the   western powers largely gave assistance as part of their rivalry with the Eastern bloc and now that that   rationale has gone there is a decline of economic assistance demonstrated, for example, by the closure   of USAID ofices, and British withdrawal. They argue that this has affected assistance to both island

states and regional institutions. This position, which is widely held, is open to question. It overestimates   the importance of the Soviet Union and the United States in economic assistance during the Cold War.   The Soviet Union offered assistance to island countries from time to time from July 1976 but it was   never accepted by any government in the region; and the United States came very late to regional

economic assistance outside its own territories and the amounts were relatively small. Furthermore, in   the post-Cold War period, although the US has closed down the USAID offices, American aid has   actually increased to the island Pacific. The only significant reduction in aid is that of the United   Kingdom. And even here, the British Government argues that this is to be seen more as a re-channeling

of assistance through the European Union (EU), and that Britain has been a key player in achieving a   boost on EU aid to the area.

The other important donors involved in development assistance to the South Pacific during the Cold   War have remained, reflecting other motivations that were operating during the Cold War. Japan in fact   doubled its level of assistance between 1987 and 1995 becoming, from 1992, the largest donor to the   independent island Pacific outside Papua New Guinea where Australian aid remains predominant.

Taiwan and PRC have continued to give economic assistance as part of their competition for diplomatic   influence in the region, and the European Union has increased its economic assistance since the end of   the Cold War. France, Australia and New Zealand have also maintained their level of commitment.   Overall, far from the region falling off the economic assistance map, ODA to the independent island

states including Papua New Guinea has actually increased since the end of the Cold War. This is the   case for ODA to regional institutions as well as to countries. Far from having diminishing resources as   often claimed, the regional institutions have had an increased level of funding since the end of the Cold   War. The South Pacific Forum, for example, has seen its income double in the period 1989 to 1995.   Whether for good or ill, for there is a powerful case against the distorting effects of such high levels of

per capita aid, the end of the Cold War has not prompted the marginalisation from economic assistance   flows which is usually assumed. The other common claim concerning economic marginalisation, that   existing island exports will be affected by trade liberalisation under the WTO or APEC, remains an   unsupported claim.

The foundation for the notion of post-Cold War economic marginalisation is not only found to be   wanting in the case of aid and trade; it also misses the continuing importance of investment. Parts of the   region are very much on the global investment map and it is the rapid increase in this investment rather   than its absence, which has often caused security issues, The 1990s have seen a doubling of Australian

investment in Papua New Guinea mining and an increased investment by Malaysian companies in Papua

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New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Fiji. The important changes in the patterns of investment have had

significant implications for economic, political and even personal security, particularly in Papua New   Guinea, Solomon Islands and New Caledonia. These changes have not been driven by geopolitical   changes associated with the end of the Cold War but by the logic of the market.

Ideas

While we have focused on the external interests and their material involvement in the form of capital,   resources, aid, trade access, colonial presence and military power, we need also to recognise the   importance of the ideas such interests promote about island life, and the security of island peoples and   states. It is here that the end of the Cold War has had its greatest impact. The shift from a Cold War   mind frame to a World Bank neo-liberal frame on the part of Australia in particular has been a

significant influence not only on Australian policy but on the regional reform strategy pursued through   the regional institutions. Island life and societal organisation, whether political, economic or cultural,   have suddenly been seen very difierently. It was as if as the security crisis of the 1980s ended, a new   crisis suddenly began, this time focused on governance and economic issues. What had changed was the

conceptual framework through which the Pacific was viewed rather than the material reality. This crisis   was said to threaten the very survival of island states unless neo-liberal solutions, involving economic,   governmental and cultural change, were implemented. While these are the dominant post-Cold War   ideas coming from influential outside interests, there are also other influential discourses concerning

sustainability, bio-diversity, gender equality, human rights, democratisation, and population control   which are also part of the powerful influences on security outcomes in the post-Cold War South   Pacific.

The end of the Cold War, then, has had an important, but not determinative, effect on the various   global involvements in South Pacific affairs. There are some important changes in the interests and   activities in particularly important areas that we can trace to the end of a bipolar balance of power. The   most important is the near end of nuclear involvement, at least as it relates to weapons, and a

diminished British, American and Russian diplomatic interest south of the equator. But this should not   be mistaken for the region having ‘fallen off all diplomatic maps, or for sparking a decline in economic   assistance, or for causing marginalisation in a changing trading order. Moreover, the gradual shit? to a   regional order in which Asian powers play a larger role and the western ex-colonial powers, a

diminishing one, is to be seen as a continuation of a trend already under way during the Cold War,   although one accentuated by its ending.

The Relationship Among External Interests

The foregoing discussion has suggested who the major external interests are, and the nature of their   interest in the South Pacific, and given some sense of the extent and type of involvement. It has also   suggested that we are viewing a complex set of entanglements rather than a simple hegemonic system   dominated by one power, yet within that complexity we would have to note both the assertive role of

Australia and the general trend away from a post-imperial order dominated by the ex-colonial western   powers to an order in which Asian interests become increasingly important. Finally, it has drawn   attention to the trend in security thinking in the dominant discourse away from military threat to   questions of state breakdown and economic insecurity.

To explore the implications of these changing external interests for South Pacific security we need first   to consider the relationship among them. We will later examine their entanglement with local political   forces. The most obvious change in the relations among external interests is that since the end of the   Cold War they are not based on a fear of military threat or the perceived need to counter territorial   ambitions of other powers. From the late 1700s to 1945 and again from 1976 to 1989, the relations

9

among powers involved in the South Pacific were governed by perceptions of the military intentions of

other powers- of France, Germany, Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, the United States, or   Russia. In this respect the close of the twentieth century is exceptional. The only remaining motive of   this kind is the maintenance of the US strategic denial policy in Micronesia but this is not directed at   any particular power but rather to unforeseen future circumstances.

Most significantly, China has not replaced the Soviet Union as a possible military threat in the minds of   other powers as it has in relation to Southeast Asia or Northeast Asia. This is so despite a new and   substantial presence of the Chinese fishing fleet in the South Pacific and an active diplomatic and   economic presence in the region. The only conflictual relations among powers in their involvement in   the South Pacific are those of Taiwan and PRC. While not a military conflict or about taking territory,   this contest is about winning hearts and minds. This new situation takes away the high security   imperative that often had deleterious effects on the security of Pacific islanders over the past three   hundred years.

Given there is not generally a conflictual relationship among external interests, what other   generalisations can be made? Is there a relationship among these interests at all? Are there groupings of   interests and divisions between them? One obvious candidate for a grouping of dominant interests is   ‘the West’. As the South Pacific’s regional balance of power during the Cold War was often depicted in   East-West terms (with France, Britain, USA, Australia, Japan, Taiwan and Israel on one side, and   Russia, Libya, Cuba on the other, with China and New Zealand outside the categories as seen in some

quarters), it prompts us at least to ask ‘what happened to the West’? We might also expect a western   grouping in relation to post-Cold War neo-liberal agendas in both political and economic arenas, ‘The   West’ also has another powerful historical guise in the South Pacific context, as a grouping of colonial   and ex-colonial powers.

But against this, we should note that far from the western powers acting in concert during the Cold   War, they were at loggerheads with each other. There were major tensions between Australia and New   Zealand over ANZUS and anti-nuclear policies, between Australia and France, and New Zealand and   France, over nuclear testing and decolonisation issues, between the US and New Zealand, and between

Australia and France, Britain and the US over the Australian-initiated South Pacific nuclear weapons-   free zone. These tensions, which led to a breakdown in diplomatic relations in several cases, meant that   there were in fact several competing ‘pro-West’ regional orders being promoted in the South Pacific   during the 1980s. Each was seen by the promoters of the others as dangerous to western interests. Thus   there is no recent history of a western concert of power even though the Cold War experience in the

South Pacific is sometimes represented in this way.

The 1990s has seen the departure of the US and Britain as interested players, and with it, the tension   between them and the local western countries, Australia and New Zealand. And, as we have seen,   rapprochement between Australia, New Zealand and France became possible with the cessation of   nuclear testing in late 1995 and France’s signing of the Treaty of Rarotonga. As Canberra sees a

lessening of outside interest in the region, it sees continued French involvement in the French Pacific as   an important adjunct to its own regional efforts. The relations between Australia and New Zealand   concerning South Pacific matters have remained slightly strained, first because of differences over the   style rather than the objectives of regional economic reform policies, and secondly, because of New   Zealand’s successful 1997 initiative in acting as an honest broker in the Bougainville conflict, even   though Australia has since been able to commit greater resources to sustain the peace process. If there

is a western grouping of interests, it is in relation to the regional economic reform agenda and includes   the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank, and Japan as well as Australia, New Zealand and   France.

10

The significant long-term shift from European to Asian external interests in the islands region, suggests

that the other major candidate for a concert of power is ‘Asia’. Even more than in the case of ‘the   West’, however, the collective label should not be confused with common action or interests. As we   have seen, China and Taiwan have conflicting interests. China, for example, has opposed Taiwan’s right   to participate as a Forum Dialogue Partner. As a result, dialogue is conducted at an informal meeting   away from the site of the Forum. Taiwan, Korea, China, and Japan all compete in the South Pacific   tuna fishery, the largest in the world. Although not directly competing in the way of Taiwan and PRC,

one could argue that Japan and China are also keeping a watching brief on each other’s areas of   influence within Oceania. While there is no common purpose among Asian countries, they are seen by   Australia and possibly other western countries and international agencies, as constituting a group in one   particular regard, that of introducing a new form of capitalism to the region, with significant political   implications. That is, there is an association commonly made in the minds of western observers and   some Melanesians between ‘Asian capitalism’ and the introduction of corruption in the Melanesian   states of Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands,

Another seemingly plausible characterisation of external relationships is to see, in the parlance of   balance of power theorists, a ‘unipolar balance’, with Australia as the hegemon. Seen in this way, while   there may be many and complex entanglements, there is only one that matters in terms of a substantial   diplomatic commitment. Certainly, the marked contrast between Australia as a former coloniser, which   is a predominantly European society occupying a large continent, with a sophisticated armed force and   a significantly industrialised economy, which acts as a donor nation, and the island states, former

colonies, which have among the world’s smallest economies, populations and land areas, most often   without a military force, and which are aid recipients, suggests that the main feature of security   dynamics would be one of hegemony. This suggestion is encouraged by the desire of successive   Australian governments to assert such a role. Furthermore, for much of the post-colonial period larger   western powers have acknowledged Australia as the agent for western interests or a ‘gatekeeper’ of

regional affairs. And in the post-Cold War period, Australian governments have asserted a leadership   role in shaping a new regional order.

Such a characterisation overstates Australian influence in the region, and understates the continued   interest and influence of others. Australia has had relatively little success in influencing the actual   practices of states in areas where it has aggressively attempted to do so, and the imposition of aid   conditionality has done little to affect the result. During the closing stages of the Cold War, the failure

of Australian influence on security issues- whether to do with the Fiji coups, or denial of Soviet links   with the island states- was so marked that it led to the Australian Foreign Minister, Gareth Evans,   recognising, at least rhetorically, the need to eschew a hegemonic role and to adopt a ‘partnership’   approach with island states. In the post-Cold War period, the inability of Australia to significantly

influence the main security issue, that of the Bougainville conflict, and to influence governance isjues   within island states, and particularly Papua New Guinea, suggests that the asymmetry in capacity   between Australia and the islands does not translate into hegemonic power. Rather, as earlier argued,   there exists a more complex array of outside interests with a complex dynamic among them in relation   to their South Pacific interests. Moreover, influential outside interests are not confined to states; they

include investors and international organisations.

lndi~enous socia: sfid r;o!itiea! forces

These global interests and ideas form one part of the contemporary dynamic of South Pacific security.   A conventional analysis would perhaps say that they in fact constiiuie the South Pacific security order.   Iiowever, this discussion proceeds on the assumption that the issues, agenda and ideas of island states   and societies also continue to matter, just as they did during the Cold W’ar. In the 1980s the island

states were ai various times able to prevail on issues of highest security concern to the world’s mosi   powerful states. The preferred orders of these powers, for there were several, were always mediated

and contested by local leaders and groups. At other times developments within these societies

introduced a set of security issues unrelated to the Cold War.

A characterisation of the South Pacific experience with indigenous political forces can be gained as   much by an undersianding ofwhat is abseni as of whai is present. An observer familiar with other   regions would note the absence of a receni history of interstate war, the absence of the capacity, or will,   on the part of all island states, to threaten neighbouring siates (only Fiji and Papua New Guinea have an   armed force of a significant size). They woeuld also note that there is no country preparing to defend

^-.^-- against another in the region, with the excepiion of Solomon Islands under the Kamaloni guvcclulleni   which, before it lost power, had in the mid 1990s begun io arm to defend against border incursions by   the Papua New Guinea forces. Our observers vvo~ld also note that there is no ideological or other   major codlict among any of the fovurteen island states. This eliminates the possibility of a good deal of   what preoccupies other regions in the name of security.

Turning to security within states, again there is a very different experience from other regions. There   are a number of feaiures ofthe post-colonial Pacific that have made some security issues almost   unthinkable and others UIICO~~IOII. The forceful overthrow of government or suppression of the society   by the military is a next io impossible outcome in nearly all island societies. AS we have seen, the   capacity is simply not there in most societies. Furthermore, there are only two societies where two large   groups make up ihe socieiy. Others are SO heterogeneous or SO homogeneous that the constitutional

system based on majority rule retains its legiiimacy. Thus there is an impressive record of constitutional   change of govemmeni, and leaders accepting such a change, when compared with other post-colonial   states. The Fiji case of 1997 is ihe obvious exception and also Tonga where under the 1875 constitution   it is not possible to change the execuiive power of the king. Papua New Guinea is becoming an   impotiani grey area where the military has displayed an increasingly powerful role in politics though it   has not technically siaged a coup. Separaiism and secessionism are also non-starters for much of the

region. But in some parts of Melanesia and Micronesia it is a force

wiih security implicaiions for states

and socieiies. BOW..gzk-de is the prime example, but ihere is a long-standing history of ‘micro-   naiionalism’ elsewhere in Papua Ne-w Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.

. . .

Where democratic succession or acco-uniabiliiy has not been possible, in Tonga, and in Fiji &er the   I---^-.C:^-*:,.-. . . COUPS, SGC~Z~ movements fGi UCIUULI~LI~LIUII have been a prominent part ~fpdit~cs, pitted against   political movements of traditionalism which are amalgams of Christian and customary practices. In   Tongs, this has I--’ cu to demonstrations, anti-corruption publicity, and demands for change in the political   system. In Fiji ii has iaken ihe fom~ of demands for a restoration of democratic practices and rights for   non-chiefly F ijians and other races. In e--b a~ I case the issue has been seen as a fundamenial security issue;   for both sides what is perceived to be ai siake is the security of a w-ay of life and the security of   individual and group rights. While such politics has led to a military takeover in Fiji and the suppression

--z---- of the rights of the eihnic Indian seciion of ihe populaiion, ii has not led io killing or irnp~~u~~~lleni. In   1997-8 there were encouraging signs of major steps towards reconciliation around a new constitution   requiring a pull-back from the exclusionist line of 1987 and the 1990 constitution.

Another important influence on contemporary indigenous political currents is the legacy of colonialism.   WC ShOUld fiGie hii ihe kkiiid SCXieiieS iii ihiS iegiofi have 211 experienced colonial rule, Oi in Tonga’s   case, colonial ‘protection’. This legacy is felt in various tensions over the political organisation of   independent states built on colonial boundaries; in the post-colonial relations with Australia; in the   differences in the language and cultural identities of the former British, American, Australian and New   Zealand colonies; and in the tensions felt in relation to the continuing French colonial presence.

A related feature is ihe commiimeni to state sovereignty on the part of the elites. They do not invite   external intrusion into their domestic security issues and other island state elites respect this principle.   This means that regional security concerns for state elites tend to be outwardly oriented towards the

12

actions of larger powers in the region or to the internal affairs of territories of colonial powers. But this

is not necessarily so for non-government groups, such as churches and women’s groups, who value a   shared identity with islanders across the region and feel empowered to attempt to infhrence security   issues wherever they occur.

These features set up conditions in the South Pacific region for a series of security concerns around the   issues of development, colonialism and post-colonial identities, ethnicity, dependence, intervention,   hegemony and sovereignty. Taken together with changing global interests, these characteristics also   generally rule out most of the major security issues of significance in other areas of the world: military

invasion from outside the region, military conflict among the states in the region, border disputes,   territorial disputes, military coups (outside PNG and Fiji), genocide, development of nuclear weapons,   and conventional amls races.

Repional Identitv and Security

The ‘South Pacific’ is not simply a convenient scholarly boundary in which we can view distinct   security issues in a number of societies. ‘The region’ has become an important site where the values and   practices pertaining to the lives and safety of Pacific islanders, and to the operations of states, are   contested. The idea of ‘region’ has come to be valued as a source of power, a managerial concept, as a   lobbying group, as an agent of change, and as a provider of resources. There is a tendency to see a

perceived external security threat to one part of the region as endangering the region as a whole.   French nuclear testing at Moruroa and Fangataufa atolls, while as distant from some parts of the region   as Chinese testing at Lop Nor, was regarded by South Pacific governments and anti-nuclear Pacific   societies as part of a collective space. The same was true of the Japanese government’s proposal to

dump radioactive wastes in the Marianas Trench in the early 1980s that of the United States   government to incinerate chemical weapons at Johnston Island in 1990, and of the Marshall Islands   Government to store Japanese radioactive wastes at Bikini atoll in 1996. Each was seen as a threat to   ‘the region’. For Australia and New Zealand in particular, there has also been a tendency to see

developments within island countries as linked to ‘regional security’, a notion that has generally been   resisted by the island governments which hold to a strong discourse of sovereignty as part of their   notion of security.

Security solutions have also been viewed regionally, but with the same limitations concerning respect   for sovereignty. Environmental threats, such as nuclear testing, waste dumping proposals, and driftnet   fishing have prompted strong collective diplomatic campaigns. The island states have also responded to   a Papua New Guinea request for a regional peacekeeping force in Bougainville in 1994 and 1997, have

negotiated regional legal instruments such as the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty, and have   held regular meetings of police chiefs, customs officers and foreign affairs officials to devise common   strategies on drug runners, financial ‘carpetbaggers’ and organised crime.

Western countries have seen regional organisation as a way of managing security across the island   states along lines tl- 1at suit western interests. In receni years they have been joined by international   agencies which regard a regional approach as essential to their reform agendas. Island governments   have found regional approaches to be central to their own efforts to counter, mediate or accelerate   outside influences on their security broadly defined. Further, non-government groups from what we   might call the civil society of the South Pacific states also think regionally. For example, during the

Cold War their efforts to promote a non-aligned and anti- nuclear approach was focused on influencing   regional norms and practices.

Finally, in policy-oriented academia, the large depictions of security issues in economics, security   studies and environmental studies contain region-wide generalisations and prescriptions, There is, then,

good reason to see normative debates at the level of region and the dynamics of the practices they

inform as important influences on the security dynamics affecting particular island societies.

There is a vast and complex array of regional institutions that promote cooperation in most functional   areas. Under the rubric of a South Pacific Organisations Coordinating Committee there is the Suva-   based Forum Secretariat (that carries out the high-level political decisions of the annual summit of   Pacific leaders in the South Pacific Forum and coordinates the post-Forum dialogue with the United

States, PRC, France, EU, Malaysia, and Canada), the Honiara-based Forum Fisheries Agency, the   Apia-based South Pacific Regional Environmental Program, the Noumea-based Pacific Community   focused on ‘grass roots’ development issues, the Suva-based University of the South Pacific, and the   Honolulu-based Pacific Islands Development Program focused on research. These agencies, in turn,

have spawned a network of regional committees and councils of ministers and officials charged with   promoting cooperation in such areas as customs, legal process, policing, fisheries conservation and   access management, education, shipping, airlines, finance, economics, tourism, trade, investment, waste   management, environmental protection, health and community development.

Regionalism was seen as an important vehicle for promoting a pro-West region during the Cold War.   The early efforts at regional economic integration in the 1960s and 1970s were not successful and by   the 1980s it was clear that the strength of regional cooperation related rather to collective diplomacy,   that is, to the joint efforts of the island states (both with Australia and New Zealand and without them)   to influence the relationship of the region with the outside world on a range of security, political and

economic issues. This was reflected in the impressive list of regional treaties that appeared in the 1980s.

The end of the Cold War did not see a change in the significance attached to regionalism by outside   interests. Australia, in particular, as the predominant financier of regional institutions maintained a   strong interest in a multilateral approach to South Pacific policy. As we shall see below, Canberra   governments have seen the regional institutions as central to the promotion of a regional economic

reform agenda, its priority foreign policy toward the island region. The more economically stringent   post-Cold War environment within Australia did, however, spark a change in Australia’s willingness to   tolerate what were seen as inefficiencies in the regional institutions. It has wanted greater accountability   for the Australian taxpayers’ dollar.

The long-standing experience with regional cooperation and regional summitry provides a strong   foundation for dealing with issues affecting the security of the region, particularly if the perceived threat   is posed by the outside world as in nuclear or fishing issues. It is less successful in dealing with issues   within states because of the doctrine of sovereignty that dominates regional deliberations. It can,   however, be useful when an island state asks for regional assistance as in the case of PNG requesting a

regional peacekeeping force. At the same time, the regio nal experience has also made evident the main   c

I:+:," +L,e ~ISSUieS iG iQ$OiiCil ~OIILICIS uku Eiii ZiiiSZ XO*Lifi d issties in regional politics. Resource endowments,   cultural identity and historical experience make for some differences between Polynesian and   Melanesian societies (which are organised as the Melanesia Spearhead Group) on some issues; the very   small states also collectively assert, through the Small Island States caucus, different interests from the

larger ones.

The Inierp!ay of the global, regional and local

We are now in a position to explore the interplay between global interests, regional identity and local   forces in relation to particular contemporary issues and its implications for different Oceanic futures.   We focus on three: economic security; governance, and environmental security.

14

Economic Security

As we have seen, the dominant conceptualisation of the security problem in the post-Cold War period,   associated particularly with the World Bank and the Australian government, but also with other   countries and agencies, has focused on the vulnerability of island economies to the global liberal   economic structure (or to globalisation) as perhaps the main security threat for the South Pacific, and   economic and cultural reform, together with ‘good governance’, as the solution. From the early 1990s   this became the basis of conditionality in World Bank and ADS dealings with the island governments,   and in Australia’s bilateral aid to the region. From July 1994 it also became the basis of an Australian   campaign to radically transform the regional economic order through the regional institutions,   particularly the South Pacific Forum.

In language reminiscent of the Cold War, the new framework speaks of ‘crisis’ and even ‘doomsday’ to   describe the prospects of the Pacific islands region in the changing economic order if radical   restructuring is not undertaken. The main technique whereby security solutions are being put forward is   also reminiscent of the height of the Cold War period. All island states, however varied, are reduced to   a typical island state, solutions are pursued as a regional reform agenda and the right to manage is   assumed by larger states, mainly Australia, and international agencies. The new dominant

conceptualisation of regional security, then, focuses on the political capacity of island states, their social   organisation and the sustainability of their development practices. The solutions promoted through aid   conditionality, World Bank conditions and so on are the f--’ ‘_- a~rhal approaches elsewhere in the world:   privatisation, ‘downsizing’, liberalization of trade, transparency, accountability, and management   reform.

At the centre of the dominant conceptualisation of the security problem is an ambivalence about the   involvement of ‘Asian capitalism’. Asian influences have been seen in some influential quarters as the   greatest contemporary threat to island state security through their impact on Pacific economies, polities,   social practices and the environment, but paradoxically, by the same interests, as the most important   way out of insecurity, as a model for change, and a connection that will deliver island societies from   marginalisation, poverty and breakdown in the post-Cold VT*- v al environment. For Australia in particular,   as self-appointed manager of South Pacific security, there is a strong ambivalence towards this recent   Asian involvement. Australian ministers have cited Asian growth models as the answer for island states,

and for Australia itself, if they are not to be marginalised in the new global economic order. However,   the political influence of ‘Asian’ investors is seen as particularly detrimental to reformist policies.

This regional conceptualisation of the security problem and solution is contested just as its Cold War   forerunner was. While there is generally agreement that the security agenda lies somewhere near the   confluence of economic and political organisation rather than military threat, and concerns many of the   problems listed in the dominant approach by ‘the international community’, there is contestation over

how to secure Oceanic societies, and for whom and from what. Like the Cold War contestations this   can amount noi only to different emphases but to fundamentally antithetical conceptualisations. The   dominant scenario emphasises acute insecurity for the region, for states and for peoples, if present   policies continue in a changing international environment. Others see the solutions proffered by these   approaches as threatening the security systems on which Pacific islanders have relied, offering only a   gamble on the market in return. A mid way position which provides a view of the strengths as well as   the weaknesses of island societies and economies, as well as a suggested approach which builds on this   balance is provided by the UN Development Program’s Pacific Human Development Report, and the   Pacific Human Development Declaration signed by Pacific islands leaders in 1994.

The regional reform agenda pursued by the Australian government through the South Pacific Forum   from 1994 has focused on four straiegies: to provide a mechanism of peer review to oversighi a set of   regional norms concerned with structural reform within each country; to institute a regional timber code

I 5

as a way of encouraging sustainable practices in the forest industry of Solomon islands, Vanuatu and

Papua New Guinea; to promote a collective approach to negotiations with distant water fishing nations   such as Japan to increase the percentage of total value ending up in Pacific hands; and to rationalise the   Pacific island airlines. While the last three had little success beyond a statement of intent, the first has   had limited impacts through the deliberations and decisions of the regional finance ministers and

economic ministers meetings from 1994 to 1998. These decisions have focused on trade liberalisation,   investment codes, and public sector reform.

The reform agenda has had more influence as part of conditions attached to aid and loans to individual   countries by the World Bank, the ADB, the International Monetary Fund and Australia and New   Zealand, following the economic and financial crises during the 1990s in Papua New Guinea, Cook   Islands, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu in particular. Many of these conditions are aimed at influencing   not only the content of policy in the direction of neo-liberal ideas but to affect the implementation of

policy, the accountability of policy makers, and the efficiency of delivery. This takes us to a related   security issue of governance.

‘Good Governance’

From the laie 198Os, prompted by the experience of the Fiji coups, the Vila riots and the Bougainville   conflict, some outside observers began to accept the idea that security issues were not only to be seen   through Cold War lenses. The political stability of these states was seen to be threatened by local   factors to do with ethnic identity, separatism, tensions surrounding development, land and resource   issues. There was concern about the politics of traditionalism, about the relevance of western   institutions and the capacity of the state to maintain order. It was at this time that Australia developed   an intervention option. Some Pacific island leaders saw the possibility of such intervention as a major

security issue alongside economic vulnerability, dependence and maintaining sovereignty.

This concern with political instability and the capacity of the state faded somewhat in the early part of   the 1990s only to reappear mid-decade as part of the dominant economic security perspective   promoted by the international agencies and the Australian government. This perspective has presented a   picture of poor governance throughout the region seeing this as an obstacle to economic growth and   the proper implementation of the neoliberal economic package discussed above. It points to lack of

accountability, corruption, law and order problems, a failure to deliver programs, and general   mismanagement as areas which need to be rectified if investment is to be attracted, and aid efliciently   disbursed. It is then concerned with how policy is implemented, and with the efficiency and   management aspects of good governance rather than with democratic governance per se. These   concerns have informed new policies of management reform attached to aid and loan packages.

The increasing focus on governance by the Australian government in p articular follows a shift in this   direction in World Bank thinking and is further encouraged by frustrations with aid delivery and   economic management in the Pacific island countries. But there is also the view that in some cases there   is the possibility that this not only obstructs development but actually could cause the complete   breakdown of the state, thus leading to security problems as more conventionally conceived. The Papua   New Guinea and Solomon Islands experience of political instability is particularly important in   understanding how the Australians reached their assumptions about the region as a whole. They are

seen to be particularly serious examples of states lacking the capacity or will to carry out policies   already agreed by representative government.

In some countries - Fiji and Tonga in particular - the governance issue has been seen by significant   sections of the ciiizenry as ultimately a debate about democracy, about who participates in government   and on what terms citizens. Democratic institutions are seen in the new orthodoxy as not only   delivering security for various groups currently perceived as being denied their rights but, in the

16

process, as delivering ‘good governance’ in the public policy management sense used by the

international banks and the Australian government Pro-democracy supporters in Fiji and Tonga see   corruption and the failure to deliver services fairly, or at all, as a product of the absence of democracy.   It is increasingly clear, however, that for some other countries in the region where we find what would   normally be regarded as the basic prerequisites for democracy (fair elections, one person one vote, and   peaceful changes of government), these have not been sufficient to ensure ‘good governance’ in the   sense of effective delivery. In some senses the ways in which politicians respond to local groups (but   only a section of their electorate) can be said to work against equitable service delivery. Politicians are   electorally rewarded for appealing to particularistic loyalties rather than encouraging civic responsibility

In three states - Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Vanuatu - there is the possibility that rather than the   security issue being how to achieve ‘good governance’ while mainiaining democratic institutions, the   democratic institutions themselves may come under threat, or further threat from the intervention of   the military. Supported in the past in the name of security, these militaries are increasingly becalming   involved in the political process. In Fiji, with the memory of the two coups in 1987, the potential threat

of military intervention will always be in peoples’ minds. In Vanuatu elemenis in the Vanuatu Mobile   Force and the police kidnapped the President of the country in 1996 to force the government to pay   outstanding wages. Despite the subsequent successful arrest of these personnel by the police, the   intervention sets up possibilities of such action in the future. Finally, in Papua New Guinea in 1997,   following earlier hints of miliiary intervention, the commander of the PNG army forced the resignation

of the prime minister. While a general election followed on schedule, and there was no overthrow of   parliament, the Sandline crisis at times demonstrated fairly crude military pressure as well as the grey   area of influential ‘non-intervention’, in this case with popular participation in mass demonstrations.   Clearly, more active military intervention is now a real possibility.

Fiji’s experience with dealing with ethnic identity, governance and democracy issues is at once   depressing and encouraging. The resort to military force and the subsequent moves towards   entrenching an eihnocracy built on the denial of rights to the non-Fijian population, both Indian and   others, represented a low point in balancing the security concerns of different communities within the   post-colonial state. On the other hand, the 1996 Fiji Constiiution Review Commission provided a   model attempt at coming to grips with the structures necessary to protect the security interests of each   community, while at the same time encouraging a wider crosscutting responsibility to the community of   Fiji as a whole. It also provided an attempi at promoting democracy without creating the problems for

‘good governance’ prevaleni elsewhere in Melanesia. In July 1997 the Fiji government passed an act   promulgating a new consiitution based largely on the principles and struciures recommended by the   Cornmission but with some important modifications watering down the incentives to move away from   communal poliiics. This constituiion came into operation in July 1998.

The Bougainville conflict provides the oiher extreme case of this set of issues to do with governance. It   has been the only serious conflict in the South Pacific in the post-colonial era. Since it began in 1988,   coincidentally just towards the end of the Cold War, this conflict between the Papua New Guinea state   and secessionist rebels has claimed several thousand lives and at times forced an estimated 70,000   people to leave their homes. The Bougainville Revoluiionary Army, led by Francis Ona, demands full   independence from Papua New Guinea. Beginning as a local dispute over environmenial damage and   the distribution of royalties from the Panguna~ copper mine, the conflict escalated to affect the safety   and livelihood of all Bougainvilleans. It also came to influence the way in which the military conducted

iiselfwithin mainland PNG and especially in relation to civil government. It has also seriously affected   the economy ofthe couniry. The security of Solomon Islands citizens in the Western Province across a   sea border from Bougainville has been a significant diplomatic dimension.

Throughout the conflict, the Australian government has supported the position of the Papua New

Guinea government in seeing the maintenance of the national integrity of Papua New Guinea as not   negotiable. It has done so out of concern for a possible demonstration effect within Papua New Guinea   and the wider Pacific. The stability of the post-colonial states system of the region is a fundamental   premise of Ausiralia’s regional security concept. Despite the ambiguities and tensions of the Defence   relationship, as the main supplier of Defence assistance to PNG, Australia has been closely implicated in   the conflict from the beginning. As a consequence, Australia’s peacemaking activity has been viewed   with suspicion by the BRA at least until late 1997.

The latesi and most promising p-c- eabe effort, from July 1997, has eventuated from a mix of unusual   developments: the change of govemmeni following the Sandline afTair, the public revulsion againsi a   military solution following the Sandline affair, the initiative of the NZ government to offer itself as   honest broker; and the war weariness of most Bougainvilleans -along with a belated realisation in the   PNG government that they cannot win militarily. This resulted in a cease-fire in October 1997, followed   by a decision to send an unarmed regional truce monitoring group (from New Zealand, Australia,

Tonga, Vanuatu, and Fiji) in December This became a Peace Monitoring Group from April 1998   creating the conditions for the first stage in the negotiation of a political settlement.

Errvironmeriiat Security

A third sei of issues on the contemporary security agenda is concerned with environmental security.   Natural disasters have always provided the most serious security threat to Pacific island peoples in   terms of threai to life, economies and society. In the decade from 1987 to 1997 nearly all Pacific island   countries experienced serious cyclone damage. The threat posed by the El Nino phenomenon has been

demonstrated in 1997 by the severe droughi that has plagued both Irian Jaya and Papua New Guinea.   At the end of 1997 there were over 500, 000 people threatened with starvation in PNG if assistance   was not forthcoming. This threat to food security and water supply became a threat to societal security   as people moved to the towns. The drought stopped production at some key Papua New Guinea mines   and threatened the water supply and hydro-power supplies of the capital. The lack of an effeciive   response by the PNG state has shown up the way in which poor governance can further threaten

security of the people. In normal times the ability of a very high proportion of Pacific populations to   provide nearly all of their nutritional requiremenis through subsistence agriculture, fishing and hunting,   would be a source of immense security. But the drought has also shown the vulnerabilty of this   situation to natural disasters particularly when government is ineffective.

It is the human-made environmental threats coming from large powers that have traditionally been seen   by island governments and peoples as among the most significant threats to their security. Principal   among these have been the threat from nuclear testing and the dumping of radioactive wastes (an issue   of the 1980s). But since the cessation of French testing in late 1995, the focus of concern has been the

effect of greenhouse emissions on sea level. The projected sea level rise will threaten the very existence   of several island states. The island states accordingly have taken a strong line in their collective position   seeking with other small island states, through the AOSIS, a 20 per cent reduction on green house gas   emissions over 1990 levels by year 2010. This position has created serious political tensions with   Australia, which as the world’s fourth largest per capita emitter, is seeking to actually increase its   emissions by 18% placing it at the other end of the political spectrum on climate change. The grounds,   it claims, are Australia’s high dependence on coal for energy generation and export income. To agree to

serious limits would it is argued cost the Australian economy thousands ofjobs and slow economic   growth.

This issue is a priority issue for the Small Island State sub-grouping within the Forum. Their caucusing   before the Rarotonga Forum in September 1997, ensured that the issue would be the principal one   faced by Pacific heads of government. The efforts of Australia to gain support for a resolution that

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would not work against its own position to be put before the Kyoio conference on climate change later

in the year sparked a bitter controversy between Australia and the island states. Although Australia   represented the outcome as a win for Australia because the final communiquC did not go against the   Australian position, or support the island position, it was a Pyrrhic victory. The ultimate result was an   angry and determined island Pacific. The President of Nauru, Kinza Clodumar, subsequently questioned   Ausiralia’s right to remain as only one of two developed countries in the South Pacific Forum if it

continued to display such a lack of commitment to the region.

Conciusions

The end of the Cold War has not been the dramatic turning point in security terms assumed for other   regions. It has not created new states or new conflicts or the prospect of new military threats. It has   nevertheless been an important in%ence on the dynamics affecting securiiy, however defined. It   removed the nuclear weapons issue as a security quesiion and it has seen the end or reduciion ofthe   diplomaiic inieresi of Russia, the Umted Siaies and Briiain, thereby con%ming a long term slrtit? away

from the colonial order to one in which Asian inieresis now play a greater part. The most important   impaci was on the lens through wlrrch the iniemaiional community and particularly Ausiralia viewed the   region, It was not that the end of the Cold War created the new agenda of security issues around   governance, ideniiiy and developmeni but that these long-sianding post-colonial processes could be

seen for ihe first time in iheir own light raiher than as part of Easi-West rivalry.

There is now general agreemeni on this new agenda being the main dynamic that affecis peoples   security in the South Pacific but there are different views about what consiitutes threai and solution in   relation to it. The global influences are ideas aboui social organisaiion thai have the power of   knowledge and are backed by economic assistance. There are also, importantly, flows of capital to   develop resources which on occasion challenge the donor’ reform agenda. And there are also local   ideas and structures thai may resisi, or encourage, these developmenis. Some would see resource   invesiment as the saviour for dependent economies; others only remember the conflict which developed   around the Bougainviile mine or the ir-p II act ofthe Ok Tedi copper mine over an extensive river system.   These are complex entanglemenis that make it impossible to distill one shared view of security in the

South Pacific. But the ultimate decisions made about the social, economic and political organisation of   Pacific island countries will be made by people within the region. The global structures and influences   both material and ideational will remain powerful but - as seen during the Cold War - there will be a   great deal of scope for local agency.

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