geographic region of the Pacific Ocean. The term is commonly accepted as including all of those islands in the Pacific that are collectively referred to as Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia, also sometimes known as Oceania. This usage rules out the Australian island continent, the Asia-related Indonesian, Philippine, and Japanese archipelagoes, and the Ryukyu, Bonin-Volcano, and Kuril island arcs that project seaward from Japan. Neither does the term encompass the Aleutian chain connecting Kamchatka and Alaska nor such isolated islands of the Pacific Ocean as Juan Fernández off the coast of South America.
Although the Pacific Ocean makes up nearly one-third of the Earth's surface, the Pacific Islands discussed in this article add up to a little less than 500,000 square miles (1,300,000 square kilometres) of land area. New Guinea, the largest island in the world after Greenland, represents 70 percent of this total, and New Zealand accounts for 20 percent. The remaining 10 percent of the land area of the Pacific is divided among more than 10,000 scattered islands.
The Pacific Islands lie mainly in the area bounded by latitudes 23° N and 27° S and longitudes 130° E and 125° W. Exceptions to this are New Zealand, which lies in the southern temperate zone, and Easter Island, which stands in isolation at longitude 109° W, almost halfway to South America. (Australia, New Zealand, and Hawaii are treated in separate articles.)
For convenient reference, the Pacific Islands are customarily divided into three ethnogeographic groupings. The great arc of islands located north and east of Australia and south of the Equator is called Melanesia (from the Greek words melas, “black,” and nēsos, “island”) after the predominantly dark-skinned peoples of New Guinea, the Bismarcks, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides), New Caledonia, and Fiji. North of the Equator and east of the Philippines is another island arc that ranges from Palau (Belau) and the Marianas in the west through the Carolines and Marshalls all the way to Kiribati (formerly the Gilbert Islands). This is Micronesia, so named because of the smaller size of these islands and atolls. In the eastern Pacific, and largely enclosed within a huge triangle formed by Hawaii in the north, New Zealand to the south, and Easter Island far to the east, are the “many” (poly-) islands of Polynesia. Other components of this widely scattered collection are Samoa, Tonga, French Polynesia (including the Society, Tuamotu, and Marquesas Islands), and the Cook Islands. In this, the last section of the Pacific Ocean to be inhabited, the islanders share a cultural tradition that relates them closely to many Fijians. Fiji, indeed, is actually a transitional territory between Melanesia and Polynesia.
Since the 16th century, the Western world has shown an interest in the Pacific Islands that has been expressed in the activities of explorers, scientists, artists and writers, missionaries, commercial entrepreneurs, and imperialistic statesmen. The variety of the Pacific's environments, both physical and biotic, continues to be a laboratory for experimenting in social and cultural adaptation. Though insularity has often dominated this process, its effect has been offset by the opportunities for human contact and exchange in many directions across the ocean's expanse. In the 20th century, the islands and their inhabitants have continued to attract international interest, although for new reasons, such as their strategic significance in the relationships of the world powers in Europe, Asia, and America. Attention has also centred on the problems created for Pacific islanders by nature's limitation of land and resources in the face of expanding populations and rising standards of living.
To know what it is like to live on a Pacific island, the intermixture of physical and biological characteristics of the particular island must be considered. Each of the myriad ecological systems in the Pacific is a unique complex of living organisms and their nonliving environment. Each is a functional system of interacting components that tends toward an equilibrium that is never quite achieved. The limited size of most Pacific islands makes it probable that almost any change, whether by human action or by some natural agency, will have repercussions elsewhere within the ecosystem. The landform, climate, soils, vegetation, and animal life all are elements to which people who live on an island must relate, for they, too, occupy a niche in the total ecological scheme.
Relief
The islands may be classified as either continental or oceanic. The former are associated with the ancient continental platforms of Asia and Australia, now partially submerged. Oceanic islands, located eastward in the deeper Pacific basin, are differentiated as high volcanic-based islands or low coral islands and atolls. A coral island may be single, or two or more coral islets may be part of an atoll if connected by a reef ringing a lagoon. The “high–low” distinction is misleading as the two types occur in many combinations, and some coral islands have been elevated considerably by changes in the ocean level.
Continental islands
The islands of the broad western Pacific margin, formed mainly of metamorphosed rocks, sediments, and andesitic volcanic material, are separated from the basaltic volcanic islands of the central and eastern Pacific by deep ocean trenches along the eastern borders of Japan, the Marianas, New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Fiji, and New Zealand, a demarcation that is commonly called the Andesite Line. These continental islands, faulted and folded in mountainous arcs, tend to be higher and larger than those farther east and have rich soils that support almost every kind of vegetation. New Guinea, 1,500 miles long and with a maximum width of nearly 500 miles, is a good example. Its snowcapped mountains rise to about 16,400 feet (5,000 metres), its interior is dissected by high plateaus and extensive river systems, and its slopes and coastal margins contain dense forests and vast swamps.
High oceanic islands
Extensive volcanic mountain ranges in the central and eastern Pacific rise abruptly from the ocean deep, their cores of dense black basalt built up from lava flows from the fractured seafloor. Where summits stand in high relief above sea level, they represent most of the islands that constitute Polynesia and Micronesia. Small to intermediate in land area, nowhere do they match the extent of continental islands. Hawaii's snow-topped Mauna Kea reaches 13,796 feet, though most oceanic islands have peaks of somewhat less than 5,000 feet. Topography is extremely rugged, with sharp ridges, deep canyons, high cliffs, and waterfalls abounding. Human communities occupy the more congenial lower slopes, floodplains, and wide strands. The islands, rich in iron and magnesium oxides, are densely forested but lack the mineral wealth of continental islands.
Most Pacific islands are coral formations, although all rest on volcanic or other cores. In the shallow waters of the tropics, both continental and oceanic islands attract coral growth in the form of fringing reefs, partially submerged platforms of consolidated limestone, with coral organisms at the ocean edge feeding on materials carried in by waves and currents. Coral-building polyps and algae secrete calcium carbonate from seawater, forming skeletal frameworks that adhere to land surfaces or to the rock remains of coralline ancestors. Many islands have been gradually submerged through a combination of sinking, caused by geologic action, and flooding, caused by the melting of ice caps. As islands were flooded, coral growth continued outward, producing barrier reefs farther from shore and separated from it by a lagoon.
A coral atoll results when still further flooding reduces an island to a submarine condition. The usually irregular reef continues to build up in the warm shallows. It encircles a clear-surfaced lagoon of moderate depth and in time supports a number of islets, known locally as motu, built up from reef debris to 20 or 30 feet above sea level. Atolls exist in all shapes and sizes. Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshalls is the world's largest, being about 80 miles long and 20 miles wide, with a lagoon area of 655 square miles. Openings, or passages, which commonly occur on the leeward side of Pacific atolls, permit access to the lagoon by ocean shipping. The only source of fresh water is rain.
Successive elevations of an island above sea level by geologic action have created a variety of “raised” coral formations. The northern half of Guam, for example, is a coralline limestone plateau rising to 850 feet, while the mountains in the southern half of the island, formed by volcanic activity, reach elevations up to 1,300 feet. Nauru and Banaba (Ocean Island) are raised coral islands that stand at elevations of about 210 and 265 feet, respectively. They have deeper soil and a more adequate water supply than atoll islets, as well as surface deposits of phosphate rock (derived from guano) that have been mined commercially.
Soils
Pacific island soils develop through the action of temperature, rainfall, and organic matter on the original rock materials. This process is further influenced by factors of time and land relief. Coral island soils are the least mature and are deficient in organic materials and low in fertility. The mineral-bearing soils of the continental islands are more complex and, being favoured by a longer period of weathering, are richer than those of the volcanic-based high islands. The most productive soils on high islands occur in the lower valley slopes, alluvial floodplains, and deltas and in some instances are further enriched by volcanic ash deposits of recent age. Tropical temperatures and rainfall have produced laterite soils from which nutrients have been leached. These soils, of only moderate fertility, decline rapidly after two or three years of crop use. Fertilizers must then be added, or else the land must be abandoned to allow it to recover by natural processes while other land is cleared and planted in its place.
Climate
To describe the climate as tropical and oceanic is to stress the influence of the lower latitudes and the tremendous expanse of the sea. Humidity and temperature tend to be high and are generally uniform throughout the year. Regional differentiation in climate is linked principally to rainfall patterns. Here, factors of altitude and longitude, as well as latitude, come into play as they relate to the various systems of air circulation prevailing in the Pacific.
Across the eastern and central Pacific, air currents, moving from the north and south toward the Equator, trend westward and form the northeast and southeast trade winds. These brisk winds bring light to moderate showers interspersed with brief but often heavy downpours or clear skies. The windward sides of high islands are cloudier and wetter than the drier leeward coasts. Seasonal shifts in wind direction frequently presage stormy weather. Where the trade winds meet near the Equator lie the doldrums, a region often of little or no wind, considerable clouds, and high humidity. The trade winds merge or give way to the monsoon winds in the far western Pacific, where the alternate cooling and heating of continental Asia produces a seasonal reversal of winds. From about November to March, the northwest monsoon from Asia brings rain to the northerly slopes of the western Carolines, New Guinea, and the Solomons. In summer the southeast monsoon reverses the process.
Typhoons, or hurricanes, occur frequently in western Micronesia from July to November and are active south of the Equator from Australia to the Society Islands four to six months later. These winds of gale force are accompanied by torrential rains and high waves and cause extensive damage to crops and buildings, especially on low-lying coral islands. Atolls in the equatorial region, however, have suffered droughts lasting as long as two or three years. In 1982–83 the entire western Pacific was devastated by extreme aridity caused by an anomalous meteorologic and oceanographic phenomenon known as El Niño. The unusually warm ocean conditions at the same time brought about extensive flooding in the easternmost parts of the Pacific basin.
Plant and animal life
Most island vegetations reveal Asian ancestries stemming from Indonesia and New Guinea. Generic variety declines eastward across the Pacific, providing evidence that seeds and fruits carried by ocean currents, birds, winds, and island voyagers encountered mounting obstacles to acceptance. The easternmost islands were host to limited plant dispersal movement from South America. Plant adaptation to local differences in moisture, soil, salinity, and temperature resulted in countless new, endemic species. Plant introductions from other world sources during the past century have, however, markedly altered island vegetations.
The seacoast, or strand, vegetation is the most widespread of Pacific zonal types. Depending on the availability of moisture, this relatively unfavourable setting supports shrubs, herbs, woody vines, and trees that have a high tolerance for the salt spray that is borne by ocean winds. Mangrove thickets proliferate in brackish swamps. On coral islands, coconut and pandanus trees flourish. Breadfruit, banana, and papaya may also be grown farther inland, as may marsh taro (Cyrtosperma), a root crop cultivated in pits dug to groundwater level and enriched with plant debris.
On high islands primary forests still survive in valley bottoms, on intermediate slopes, and on lowland plains. The ever-present rain forest is a community of huge trees that overlook smaller trees and shade-tolerant ferns, vines, and shrubs. Species differentiate enormously. Yam, taro (Colocasia), cassava (manioc), and sweet potato, in addition to those crops already noted, are important staples in high-island economies. Secondary forests and grasslands have replaced virgin forests destroyed by fire and by shifting cultivation. Grasslands are also associated with areas of poor soil and little rain, as on leeward slopes.
Bats, rats, and, in New Guinea, wallabies, flying opossums, and spiny anteaters were the only mammals to precede humans into the Pacific, after which pigs, dogs, poultry, goats, deer, and cattle were introduced. Most islands have some snakes and lizards, but crocodiles are restricted to the west. Seabirds, such as terns, frigates, albatross, petrels, and boobies, supplemented by migratory ducks, plovers, and curlews, are found almost everywhere. While oceanic islands support only a few land birds, New Guinea has unusual species such as the cockatoo, hornbill, bird of paradise, and cassowary.
The abundant marine life is infinitely valuable for human subsistence. Reefs and lagoons provide lobsters, shrimps, clams, oysters, snails, eels, octopuses, turtles, and innumerable species of fish. In deeper waters beyond the reefs are found skipjack and yellowfin tuna (which are fished commercially), swordfish, marlin, and many other sport fishes. Sharks predominate as predators. Schools of whales and porpoises are seen frequently at sea. Insects are the most numerous of island fauna; the more pestiferous include centipedes, cockroaches, lice, houseflies, and the malaria-carrying Anopheles mosquito, which exists in Melanesia from coastal New Guinea to Vanuatu. Scorpions are also found.
The people
Humans in the Pacific have had to adapt to island environments just as other species have done. The technologies and organizational systems introduced into the Pacific by migrants were established in habitats that varied from receptive to hostile. The earliest arrivals, as food-gathering peoples, probably provoked little disruption of the environment. Their successors, practiced in horticulture and skilled in sea transport, were more able to fashion and control local environmental conditions after their own customs. Later, Western practices, part of an advanced technology and civilization, threatened the balance of the inherently vulnerable island ecosystems.
Aboriginal groupings
Natives of the Pacific tend to identify themselves by their home island or their mother tongue, saying, for example, that they are from Nauru or that they speak Fijian. Occasionally, however, they may invoke another, and larger, identity, claiming to be Polynesian, Micronesian, or Melanesian. As a geographic designation this representation has value, but as a mark of racial, linguistic, or cultural affiliation it is apt to be misleading. While Melanesians appear to be more Australoid and Micronesians more Mongoloid, with Polynesians demonstrating characteristics of both physical types, a great deal of racial intermixture has taken place throughout the Pacific since the first immigrants arrived in the southwestern islands. The linguistic pattern is also complex. Some valid generalizations about cultural practices and institutions in the three regions may nevertheless be made, although it must be remembered that overlap among the traditionally ascribed areas is common and that there are exceptions to every statement.
Polynesia
Polynesians are the most homogeneous in speech, custom, and physical appearance, although western Polynesians (Samoans and Tongans) are moderately distinct from the rest. Accomplished as cultivators and fishermen, they have directed their principal energies to nonmaterial pursuits. Epic mythology, copious genealogies, sophisticated social etiquettes, hereditary aristocracies, and elaborated religious formality, with varying degrees of emphasis, characterized society in pre-European Polynesia. A kinship system that recognized the worth of both maternal and paternal family ties supported group solidarity in community enterprises. Secular leaders, regarded as lineal descendants of deified ancestors, served gods and humans alike. The social-religious-political hierarchies encouraged and rewarded aesthetic creativity in wood and stone sculpture, featherwork, tapa (bark cloth), and tattooing, according privileges to the artists commensurate with those accorded warriors, navigators, herbalists, and seers.
Micronesia
Eight or 10 cultural-linguistic areas in Micronesia attest to its greater heterogeneity. Palau, Yap, and the Mariana Islands, in western Micronesia, suggest affinities with Melanesia, Indonesia, and the Philippines. The customary siting of island farmsteads and hamlets near the shore reflects the prevailing interest in fishing, canoeing, and interisland trade. Except in Kiribati (the Gilbert, Phoenix, and Line Islands), matrilineal clans and lineages, requiring marriage outside each group, influence property inheritance, succession to traditional titles, and intracommunity competition. Local political autonomy was formerly overshadowed by loose confederations and tribute allegiance in western Micronesia, as well as in Pohnpei, Kosrae, and the Marshall Islands, where class stratification is still observed. Indigenous religions lacked formality and were largely of personal or family concern. Art is mainly decorative and is manifest in mat work, shell ornaments, loom weaving, tattooing, and functionally crafted wood and shell artifacts.
Melanesia
This is a region of unending contrast. “Beach” populations, who maintain advantages from coastal trading and cultural exchanges, may be compared with more traditional and isolated “bush” populations in the interiors of the larger islands. Polynesian influence touches Fiji and a few outlying islands to the northwest. The massive extent of New Guinea, with its thousands of indigenous tribes, requires separate consideration.
Melanesians are all cultivators, with a penchant for pig raising. Descent groups, usually patrilineal, are the basis for community organization. In most Melanesian societies, leadership depends on the local “Big Man,” who, aided by his many relatives, gains support within his own village and enhances his influence in others nearby by hosting more and bigger feasts than his rivals and amassing wealth through ceremonial exchanges of valuable goods. Opportunities for upward mobility are better for the sons of an established “Big Man,” assuming they can prove themselves. Head-hunting and raiding of neighbouring tribes continue in the interior of New Guinea. The animistic religion of Melanesians, a mixture of magic, sorcery, totemism, and ancestor worship, is dominated by elaborate initiations, secret societies, and men's clubhouses. Although males dominate most cultural activities, the roles of women are substantial in certain religious and exchange systems. Art forms associated with these activities include dance masks, sculptured figures, body scarification, and carved mortuary standards.
Interaction with Western societies
During almost five centuries of contact with, first, Europeans and, then, Americans and Asians, island societies fluctuated between change and disorganization on the one hand and stability and reintegration on the other. Relatively balanced ecosystems of prehistoric times were disrupted when islanders, reacting to the novelty and authority of Western civilization, redirected traditional skills to serve new economies and, under pressure from missions and alien governments, adopted practices and beliefs that were strange to them. From this initial confusion there emerged reasonably stabilized island societies that, while preserving the traditional ethos, reflected a fusion of specific elements from both cultures. European, American, and Asian residents continued to maintain their own cultural identities in social enclaves. Meanwhile, influence toward change was exercised by an increasing mixed-blood population, reflecting the needs of culturally marginal individuals.
The direct impact of World War II stimulated many island communities to seek greater participation in Western society. Their efforts were expressed in chiefly two ways. The first was in a proliferation of mystical cults. Occurring principally in Melanesia, where they are called cargo cults, these cults blended traditional and Christian elements in systems aimed at materialistic bounty, but they provided solutions largely in fantasy. The second, a more rational effort toward economic betterment and political nationalism, was promoted by both native and part-native persons, many of whom had been educated overseas and who lived in the more urbanized centres. Opposed to assimilation, most islanders argued for more independent status within the structure of a Westernized “Pacific way.”
Killing epidemics of introduced diseases contributed to population decline until around 1900, when they were checked by modern medical treatment and health education. Many island populations almost trebled during the next five decades. Family planning programs and economic pressures have not been very effective in slowing the rate of population growth. Many islanders have migrated to the port towns and island capitals, reacting to overpopulation in the smaller outlying islands or, more often, seeking gainful employment or further education. The urban centres are built around business, school, hospital, mission, and administration facilities; government is the largest single employer.
In some island states, more than half of the population live in the towns. Poor housing and sanitation, underemployment, scarcity of land for residential use, and decline of the extended family structure are common features of island urbanism. Alcoholism and crime are widespread, and suicide among young men has increased. Meanwhile, communities in the outer islands are less able to function, economically or socially depleted as their populations are by the exodus of able-bodied, middle-aged adults who have left for the towns. The urban centres link the hinterland communities by sea and air transport and by radiotelephone networks; they also serve as a point of departure for overseas destinations such as Guam, Nauru, New Caledonia, American Samoa, and Hawaii, where employment opportunities in the private sector are greater. Although most of those who migrate are unskilled, a significant number have technical and professional talents that are needed in the island centres, and their migration constitutes an undesirable drain on their communities.
The economy
Agriculture and natural resources
Coconut products, including copra, from which oil is extracted, form the principal export from most islands. Agricultural production depends as much on native family enterprise as it does on plantation systems, which predominate in the larger islands. Perishable fruits, such as pineapples, bananas, and citrus fruits, require markets close at hand unless they are locally processed or can be assured of prompt delivery to overseas destinations. Sugar, exported mainly from Hawaii and Fiji, requires careful management, costly machinery, and specialized labour. Experiments in growing coffee, cacao, spices, and other cash crops have been undertaken to stimulate diversification and to minimize the hazards of a one-crop economy. Timber and wood by-products are processed commercially on some islands.
Marine resources, although almost unlimited, require skilled labour and capital facilities for commercial exploitation. Deep-sea fishing, mostly for tuna, is conducted throughout the Pacific, mainly by Korean, Taiwanese, Japanese, and American fishing fleets. Canneries employing islanders are operated in American Samoa, Fiji, and Solomon Islands. Local cooperatives have been successful in marketing fresh fish.
Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Irian Jaya (a province of Indonesia comprising the western half of the island of New Guinea and its offshore islands), and Solomon Islands have profited from either gold or gold and copper discoveries, and New Caledonia is rich in nickel ores. Oil reserves and their exploitation are restricted to Irian Jaya, although prospecting in Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands is encouraging. Natural phosphates on Nauru continue to be mined, but those on Banaba were depleted in 1979. In 1979 the South Pacific Forum, an organization of independent and self-governing countries, established the Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) to facilitate mutual cooperation and assistance in fisheries and policing the 200-nautical-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of each member state. This group of 16 entities in 1987 concluded a multilateral treaty with the United States, whereby the United States agreed to pay $60,000,000 in license fees and assistance to the fishing industry in return for permission for American fishing fleets to operate in the EEZs of the FFA member states. The latter are free to negotiate further agreements with other nations on the Pacific Rim.
Trade
Pacific islanders, as producers of agricultural, marine, and mineral commodities, face problems of market demand, labour supply, management skills, and transport that restrict them to an insignificant role in world export trade. Neither do the small, scattered populations present an attractive consumer market to overseas entrepreneurs. The combination of limited exportable products, heavy dependency on food imports, high cost of fuel imports, and overreliance on foreign aid makes each island state's economy extremely vulnerable.
More than half of the exports from the Pacific Islands are sent to Japan, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and members of the European Economic Community (EEC). Imports are received mainly from the United States, Australia, New Zealand, France, Japan, and Singapore. Almost all island groups import far more, in dollar amounts, than they export. External financial aid for economic development is received primarily from Australia, New Zealand, the United States (for Guam, American Samoa, and the U.S. interests in Micronesia), France (for New Caledonia, Wallis and Futuna, and French Polynesia), and from international organizations (the Asian Development Bank, the United Nations Development Programme, and the EEC). Most grants-in-aid are made on a bilateral basis; few are negotiated on a multilateral or regional basis. Most employment opportunities for islanders are in government service agencies, except where mining or agricultural production contributes significantly to national income.
In the 1970s tourism opened up new employment opportunities and sources of revenue. By 1980 Guam, the Northern Marianas, Fiji, French Polynesia, and New Caledonia, among others, had followed Hawaii's earlier lead in attracting visitors by air and sea to enjoy the tropical scenery, handicrafts, and friendly hospitality of the Pacific Islands. Australians made up the largest group of tourists traveling to destinations south of the Equator, while Japanese made up the majority of vacationers to the north. However, the increasing ability of international airlines to bypass midway island stops, the devastation of hotel facilities by more frequent hurricanes, the fluctuating currency values in Pacific Rim countries, and political disorders in Fiji and New Caledonia slowed the growth of the tourist industry. In some cases island labour was mostly restricted to the menial services, and management posts and industry profits were more often enjoyed by expatriate personnel and foreign-based corporations. The degree of government and private involvement and investment in tourist accommodations and entertainment varied with each island state. Some island populations, indeed, were more concerned with safeguarding their traditional cultures than deriving income from their commercialization.
Transportation and communication
Most islanders, by resorting to some combination of road, canoe, motorboat, interisland freighter, local air service, or international airline, can travel within a week or two to such distant cities as Sydney, Auckland, San Francisco, Vancouver, Tokyo, Manila, Hong Kong, or Singapore. Because of infrequent or irregular travel schedules, inhabitants of more remote islands may need two months or more to make such a journey. More than a score of shipping and airline companies offer carriers to move outbound and inbound cargo and passengers through such island centres as Guam, Port Moresby, Honiara, Nouméa, Suva, Pago Pago, Papeete, and Honolulu. This readier access, in both directions, has developed largely because islanders have demanded better facilities for travel and commercial expansion.
Radio, radiotelephone, cable, and satellite services have greatly improved communications. Two-way radio transmission is used, even in distant islands, to inform central authorities of emergencies and other critical needs. Radio broadcasts and news publications in English, French, and indigenous languages (such as Samoan, Fijian, and Tok Pisin [Melanesian Pidgin]) keep the island public informed about local and world events. Commercial television or videotaped programs from the metropolitan nations are available in urbanized centres.
Administrative institutions
By the mid-20th century, overpopulation in a region of fragmented land areas, widely scattered communities, poor communications, inadequate resources, and rising costs of living posed a fundamental dilemma. Political responsibility for the situation rested largely with the five metropolitan nations (Australia, France, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States) administering the possessions, protectorates, and trusteeships that perpetuated a colonial heritage that was no longer popular. The amelioration of social and economic conditions seemed to await changes in the political environment, while the question of the five nations' willingness to share their territorial interests with the emerging native elites remained undecided.
Changing administrations
Two United Nations trust territories were the first to achieve sovereignty as independent nations—Western Samoa (now Samoa) in 1962 and Nauru in 1968. The first continued to rely on New Zealand in foreign affairs, while Nauru ended its trusteeship ties with Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. New Zealand, a Commonwealth member with a self-conscious Maori Polynesian population surviving inside its borders, continued an active relationship with other Polynesian groups—the Cook Islands, Niue, and Tokelau. Cook Islanders in 1965 and Niueans in 1974 became self-governing in free association with New Zealand, from which they required only support in certain aspects of external affairs and financial aid.
In 1975 Australia, a Commonwealth country with territorial interests in Melanesia, relinquished its hold on Papua, which it had acquired from Great Britain in 1906, and its trusteeship in northeastern New Guinea, which the United Nations had granted in 1946. The fully independent nation of Papua New Guinea was thereby created. British Fiji and Tonga gained their independence from the United Kingdom in 1970. Other British colonies achieved freedom in subsequent years—the Solomon Islands in 1978; the Ellice Islands, renamed Tuvalu, also in 1978; the Gilbert Islands, which then became Kiribati, in 1979; and the New Hebrides, which Britain administered jointly with France until 1980, when the island group assumed nationhood as Vanuatu.
France is represented in the Pacific by three overseas territories—French Polynesia, New Caledonia, and Wallis and Futuna. Each of these territories enjoys a degree of local autonomy and is represented in the French parliament by elected delegates. Popular movements toward greater self-government or independence are active in both French Polynesia and New Caledonia.
The United States is interested primarily in the islands north of the Equator. Hawaii, formerly a territory, became the 50th U.S. state in 1959. Other U.S. territories are Guam and American (eastern) Samoa, both of which have been under civilian administration since 1950–51, after a half-century of naval rule. The United Nations Security Council established the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (TTPI) in 1947, covering the Northern Mariana Islands, the Caroline Islands, and the Marshall Islands, and granted administration to the United States as a strategic-area trusteeship.
Micronesians in the TTPI have since negotiated in separate groups with the United States about their status. In 1975 the Northern Mariana Islands elected commonwealth status with the United States, and a formal constitution went into effect in 1978. Three other political entities emerged in the remaining islands—the Republic of Palau (Belau); the Federated States of Micronesia, composed of Kosrae, Pohnpei (formerly Ponape), Chuuk (formerly Truk), and Yap; and the Republic of the Marshall Islands. Constitutional governments were established in the Federated States of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands in 1979, and Palau followed suit in 1981. Each of these then negotiated a Compact of Free Association with the United States, which in 1986 proclaimed that the trusteeship was terminated for the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands. In 1990 the UN Security Council dissolved the UN trusteeship for all three. Palau, the last territory in the TTPI, became independent in 1994 after formally approving the compact in a referendum.
Two Pacific island territories are politically peripheral to contemporary Oceania. Western New Guinea, which was formerly a part of the Dutch East Indies, became a province of Indonesia in 1963 and was called Irian Barat until 1973, when it was renamed Irian Jaya. Easter Island has been a dependency of Chile since 1888, and development of its indigenous population is strongly oriented toward the interests of Chile.
Regional cooperation
The average Pacific island state is too small and limited in human and natural resources to function well on the world stage and has sought the advantages of joint action through regional cooperation among governments, churches, educational institutions, businesses, workers' unions, and cultural organizations. Over 200 regional bodies operate in the Pacific Islands. Notable among them are the South Pacific Forum Fisheries Agency, the South Pacific Regional Environment Programme, and the University of the South Pacific.
The first significant attempt at regional cooperation came in 1947, when the major powers that had dependencies in the region agreed to form the South Pacific Commission (SPC) to provide research and consultative services in health, social, and economic development to island governments. Members now include the five metropolitan powers—Australia, France, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and the United States—and 21 island states and dependent territories.
Proposals to add a political dimension to the SPC's activities failed, and by the mid-1980s its image as a metropolitan body had seriously weakened its impact in the region. In part to fill this political gap, the South Pacific Forum was organized in 1971 by leaders of five independent and self-governing island countries and Australia and New Zealand; by the early 1990s the forum's members numbered 15. In 1973 the forum established the South Pacific Bureau for Economic Cooperation (SPEC) to promote regional alliances in trade, shipping and air services, telecommunications, and external aid. SPEC assumed secretariat duties for the forum in 1975, and in 1988 it was renamed the South Pacific Forum Secretariat. The SPEC has also provided liaison with other regional organizations, such as the EEC and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific. The forum has taken strong positions in support of the Law of the Sea and its 200-nautical-mile Exclusive Economic Zone concept and of the acceleration of the decolonization process in French Polynesia and New Caledonia, and in 1985 its members adopted the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty.
Leonard E. Mason
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