Pacific citizens: Though 50 years ago there was not much contact ...

Pacific Cooperation Foundation: Just as the Asia 2000 Foundation was ...

Tackling Pacific Island problems from within the Parliament: Strategic thinking about ...

The agenda: THEN: Social issues were important ...

Improving partnership: There is a need to revive the Pacific Islands ...

Tackling blindness among Pacific peoples: Tongan public health specialist ...

HIV AIDS - moral and medical solutions: Public health and other policy planners...

Tongan job solution: Managed employment is a Tongan New Zealander's private ...

The new tertiary landscape - what's in it for Pacific peoples?: Education is ...

Making good citizens: In our Pacific region, and elsewhere in the world ...

Involving Pacific peoples in local decisionmaking: The question all New Zealand ...

Tangata Pasifika? Michael Powles, who has worked ...

Endorsing good governance: Former New Zealand career diplomat Gordon Schroff ...

Need not be conflict: Issues in Pacific governance - where one size does not ...

Cooperation wins: Greater regional cooperation on common issues might ...

APEC and PECC: Though New Zealand seeks to be a good international ...

Advocacy on market access: The Pacific Islands Trade and Investment ...

Being Pa'alagi: The Being Pa'alagi programme, in which I looked back ...

Collaboration key to achieving vision: The vision of the Ministry of ...

Talk to all pacific cultures with one voice:
Ethnic Communications

Pacific citizens

By Roger Peren

Though 50 years ago there was not much contact between islands of the Pacific, and even less cooperation, since 1947 the South Pacific Commission, the Pacific Islands Forum (now with 16 members) and specialised regional organisations – plus education, aircraft, communications and migration – have changed all that.

Today, independent members benefit from cooperating on a steadily widening range of issues and projects – trade, development, fisheries, the nuclear free zone – and work together in the UN General Assembly and elsewhere. Interdependence has become a fact of life.

Though basic problems of resources and small populations remain, great advances have been made, not just in health and education, but in standards of living and higher expectations: Islanders know much more than they did about the outside world. Cooperation has paid off handsomely.

Nevertheless there are, of course, some matters that can only be settled within, and by, individual countries.

And though international donors and non-governmental organisations are willing partners in development, final responsibility must lie with national authorities.

New threats

Today, unfortunately, members are facing some newly emerging threats and problems which could hardly have been foreseen 30 years ago, and which may call for a different level of cooperation. In places, outside assistance has been sought and this has been forthcoming. Neighbours should be prepared to help neighbours: we are all in this region together. But “intervention”, however much it may be welcomed, is always difficult to manage, and new problems may be created. Nevertheless both Australia and NZ can help, and so can the Pacific migrant communities in those countries.

Citizenship education

Part of the solution to some of the region’s problems, however, may be the teaching and fostering of good citizenship and good governance. Here too, a contribution can be made.

Elsewhere in the world, and already in parts of the Pacific, more and more effort is going into explaining to citizens how they fit into their society, how they can make their voices heard and what their responsibilities are. How should they participate in local affairs? Values and standards need to be widely discussed and accepted. Active local groups – youth, sporting, women’s, religious, health – help to strengthen national societies, which in turn can take their place in a broader regional association.

Now, more than ever, citizenship and governance are recognised as being important for the welfare and progress of our community of interdependent states.

Good citizenship, seen broadly, is the subject of the reports in this DecisionMaker edition.

Think citizens. Think regional.

Published 3rd qtr, 2003

Roger Peren is a member of the Centre for Citizenship Education and a former New Zealand diplomat.

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