Pacific Perspectives on the World
Pacific Perspectives on the World
Listening to Australia’s island neighbours in order to build strong, respectful and sustainable relationships.
To secure our place in the Pacific, Australia needs to listen better.
The Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University is pleased to launch new policy research into the relationship between Australia and some of its closest neighbours. The research shows a broad range of people in three of Australia’s closest Pacific countries – Solomon Islands, Fiji and Vanuatu – are concerned Australia does not know how to engage successfully as part of the Pacific community.
Late last year, the Whitlam Institute commissioned peacebuilding NGO Peacifica and Pacific specialist Tess Newton Cain to explore how people in these three island nations perceive Australians and the Government’s policies and interventions in the Pacific.
The research, Pacific Perspectives on the World: Listening to Australia’s Island Neighbours in order to build strong, respectful and sustainable relationships, will be launched this afternoon at the Australasian Aid Conference.
This qualitative, participant-led research drew on focus groups and one-on-one interviews with 150 Pacific Islanders from varying backgrounds, including people from urban and rural settings, women, young people, business people and those engaged in civil society and government. These conversations were then followed by expert seminars in Canberra and Suva.
A number of clear messages surfaced:
The quality of Australia’s relationships matter more than the quantity of our aid or trade;
Our values, norms and ways of doing things are a vital part of how we conduct our engagement with the Pacific;
Australia, and its historical relationship, is valued but we are one of many partners for Pacific Islanders.
“What our research has shown is that the Australian Government initiative, Pacific Step Up, is a step in the right direction, but any commitment to building strong and respectful relationships in the region is going to take time. Australia must be prepared to listen, engage respectfully and demonstrate solidarity on issues of importance to the region,” said Leanne Smith, Director of the Whitlam Institute.
“While Australia is perceived to have a long-term historic relationship with the region, and the Pacific Step Up brings a focus to that relationship, one of the critiques that our research has revealed is that it is perceived to be a unilateral Australian initiative, something being done `to’ the Pacific rather than with countries of the region.”
“There was also a perception of a certain level of racism and disrespect directed towards people from the Pacific. As one participant said, the relationship is ‘layered over and stifled by a degree of parochialism that is not only unnecessary, it’s counter-productive’. Interestingly, our research shows Australian domestic politics are also important to our relations with the region – our policies toward Indigenous people, and their invisibility in our relations with the Pacific were criticised.”
“We commissioned this research to support the direction the Australian Government is taking by proving some nuanced feedback directly from affected communities in order to help inform policy going forward. Pacific Perspectives contains key recommendations that we hope are constructive and useful to the Australian Government and other important stakeholders.”
Our thanks to authors Dr Tess Newton Cain, James Cox, Dr Geir Henning Presterudstuen and our research partners Citizens Constitutional Fund, Development Services Exchange and Linda Kenni.
L-R: James Cox, Linda Kenni, Leanne Smith, Dr Tess Newton Cain and Dr Geir Henning Presterudsten
L-R: Dr Geir Henning Presterudsten, Dr Tess Newton Cain, Leanne Smith, Linda Kenni and James Cox launch the report at the Australasian Aid Conference
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Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade
Australia's relationships with the Pacific
Whitlam Institute Director Leanne Smith and lead researcher Dr Tess Newton Cain were invited to give further evidence from this Pacific Perspectives on the World research at the Join Standing Committee on Foreigh Affairs, Defence and Trade on Friday, 19 June 2020.
Read the Hansard record of the roundtable discussion here:
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Listen to Director Leanne Smith speaking to the ABC program, Pacific Beat, about our new research into Pacific Perspectives. Segment starts at 15:05
Listen to the discussion of Pacific Perspectives on the World at the paper’s Australasian AID Conference launch in February 2020. With thanks to Devpolicy Talks and the Development Policy Centre at ANU for recording and production:
Further reading:
Lead researcher Dr Tess Newton Cain writes further on our relationships in the Pacifc along with Dr Wesley Morgan in the policy report Strengthening Australia's relationships with countries in the Pacific islands region, produced by Griffith University. Read it here.
