Redio Niuklia Fri Pasifik: Critical and Creative Histories of the Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific Movement

Abstract

This thesis by creative works explores how diverse articulations of dissent against nuclear colonialism reverberated across the Pacific Islands through both formal and informal channels. It situates the Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific (NFIP) centrally, as both a formal organisation, and as a broader ephemeral movement through which its concept was transmitted far and wide. I have limited this study to focus primarily on the formal organisation of the NFIP, its associated secretariat the Pacific Concerns Resource Centre (PCRC), and its predecessors, during the period 1975 to 2006. Through the creative artefact Redio Niuklia Fri Pasifik (a dedicated radio channel with a looping 3-hour broadcast comprised of archival recordings, music and quarter-hourly maintenance breaks, hosted on a webpage) and this exegesis, I demonstrate how Pacific Islander activists generated a resonant politics for nuclear abolition and collective liberation. This politics emerged from recurring NFIP/PCRC conference gatherings and the persistent work of a robust, active and dedicated media and resources wing, which published a regular periodical, and a range of educational materials. In addition, I explore the relationship between Pacific activist periodicals and pro-independence radio stations in the Pacific, and the personal and solidarity networks that sustained them, and argue for a creative trans-disciplinary and justice-inspired Pacific studies. This approach is at the centre of popular education and the historical struggles of grassroots peoples across Oceania. I contend that the efforts of the activists of the NFIP/PCRC fostered a regionalism from below, that has shaped, inspired and challenged regional leadership throughout this period. Show more