The implications of the French presence in the South Pacific for interstate relations in the region

Abstract

This sub-thesis examines the implications of the French presence in the South Pacific for interstate relations in the region. As such it is concerned with the condition and evolution of France’s relations with the South Pacific countries from the 1960s, when most were still not independent, until the present day and with the effects that the French presence in the South Pacific has had both on relations between Forum members and on regional stability and unity in general. The South Pacific regional system is a relative newcomer to the world political scene. The South Pacific Forum, the organisation which groups together the independent states of the region, was not established until 1971 and even then it was rather limited in scope with only four of the twenty-three colonial temtories in the South Pacific having achieved independence. Indeed, it was not until the end of the 1970s, by which time membership of the Forum included three of the four Melanesian entities and two other Micronesian states, that the Forum could be said to have achieved the dimensions of a regional system. Only on becoming independent were the South Pacific Island states free to determine their own foreign policy and the nature of their relations with other states from both within the region and outside it.2 Yet at the same time these states, in order to guarantee their economic survival, were seeking additional sources and, in certain cases where traditional donors had been estranged, even alternative sources of economic aid. This study then undertakes to examine the effect of the French presence not only on interstate relations in the region but on the stability of the regional system at a time when traditional economic and political ties were being questioned and new ones being forged.