WHO OWNS MY PLACE?

Marc Tabani (CNRS- CREDO) Amundsen, Friday 7, 13.15 - 16.45 SESSION PROGRAMME:

13.15-13.45 Andrew Lattas: Normalizing states of exception: Corruption, logging and land appropriation in New Britain

13.45-14.15 Mike Wood: Between resistance and royalty dependence: re-negotiating permit conditions in a PNG logging concession.

14.15-14.45 Nick Bainton: Contested Places: divergent interests in a relational landscape 14.45-15.00 BREAK

15.00-15.25 Marc Tabani: When kastom is used for land alienation purposes in Vanuatu 15.25-15.50 Cato Berg: Land as contested value: a view from Solomon Islands

15.50-16.15 Paul Sillitoe: Prehistory of place 16.15-16.45 DISCUSSION

SESSION ABSTRACT:

Land and sea as sources of livelihood, identity, and creativity are basic for the citizens of the independ- ent island nations of the South-West Pacific, i.e. the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and Papua New Guinea.

Senses of emplacement within landscapes, both created by human activity and seen as belonging to a wider cosmos of being, are vital parts of these islanders’ perceptions of themselves through time and space and in relation to Outsiders. Spatial movement and emplaced fixity combine to produce dynam- ics of historical consciousness and adaptation to change. Indigenous creativity has for long dealt with various kinds and degrees of external intrusions and internal stresses caused by labour recruitment, trade, missions, tourism, and colonial and post-colonial governmental forces. A particular challenge is confronted when transnational and globalising business conglomerates impinge on local populations, seeking to exploit, or gain access to, very large forms of resources, whether in mining, plantation de- velopment, forestry, ranching, fishing and/or tourism. Confrontations between local populations and these transnational company actors, or inter-group conflicts among local groups themselves, frequently lead to threats of, or the actual outbreak of, physical violence. Demands for compensation are another

pathway that is sometimes followed, with mixed results in practice. Problems of this order have been experienced separately in the Solomons, Vanuatu, and Papua New Guinea, and they have generally been studied separately by experts on these three nation states. However, the people of these South-West Pacific societies share a considerable number of basic cultural and social features, amongst which a te- nacious set of attitudes towards the land itself is prominent, including the local and wider cosmological attachments to Place. Particularities of colonial and post-colonial history, as well as of cultural diversi- ties, mean that their historical trajectories have diverged in certain ways; but the problems of dealing with transnational companies bring these histories together in terms of comparative analysis. In this session we propose that an explicitly comparative framework, centering on the three countries selected, be pursued, and that both applied and theoretical perspectives be kept in focus. As a way of condensing the concerns at stake in a phrase that can be meaningful both to anthropologists and to the people at large, we have proposed the overall, actor-oriented, title of ‘Who owns my Place?’ (This session call was originally authored by Pamela Stewart and Andrew Strathern, but the organization of the session was handed over to Marc Tabani since they unfortunately could not attend)

ABSTRACTS:

Andrew Lattas (University of Bergen)

Title: Normalising states of exception: corruption, logging and land appropriation in New Britain.

In contemporary PNG, logging by large scale Malaysian companies has gone hand in hand with corrup- tion and an expanded use of militarised policing that uses state violence and terror to intimidate local opposition. Today, in Pomio, the riot squad is deployed to protect not just the export of logs but also the massive and indeed fraudulent appropriation of local land. Australian aid directed at strengthening the police force, good governance and law and order has helped to train and equip a police force which is hired out so as to become a private army that shows little respect for human rights. Earlier, in the 1990s, the Malaysian loggers were unable to gain the support of local state officials such as councilors, magistrates, and district administrators in the Kaliai area. Today this is not so in Pomio where it is no longer politicians who are seen to have been compromised. Many local state officials also participate in fabricating a law and order problem that can justify extra-judicial state actions. A new kind of capitalism is producing a new kind of state structure and also new kinds of resistances.

Mike Wood (James Cook University)

Title: Between resistance and royalty dependence: re-negotiating permit conditions in a png logging concession.

Through an analysis of a public meeting this paper outlines how landowner’s decided to place a ban on all felling operations in the Wawoi Guavi logging concession in the Western Province, PNG. At issue were negotiations with landowners over the renewal of the concession’s permit. Once the permit had expired the government gave the company an ‘indefinite grace period’ allowing it to operate without a permit. The paper contributes to on-going debates about the role of the PNG state and corporations in maintaining relationships with landowners that are fundamentally exploitative and ‘legal’.

Nick Bainton (University of Queensland)

Title: Contested places: divergent interests in a relational landscape

This paper explores the divergent interests in land and natural resources in the Lihir Islands of Papua New Guinea. I will focus on Lihir sacred topography, particularly the dwelling places of local chthonic spirits. These spirits provide both a source power and trouble to local custodians, but also reflect or

‘mirror’ the relational world of Lihirian society. The presence of a large-scale mining operation adds an additional layer of complexity to this landscape, fundamentally realigning society-environment re- lationships. My particular interest here lies in the way landowners negotiate and rationalise, among themselves and with outside agents, how their lands, especially those areas where local spirits reside, are to be used in the context of resource development. I argue that while the wealth generated out of this landscape creates unprecedented economic and social opportunities for local landowners, the is- sue at stake is the way that this new wealth (or capital) ultimately constrains choice, as landowners are required to choose between incommensurable systems of value.

Marc Tabani (CNRS, CREDO)

Title: When kastom is used for land alienation purposes in Vanuatu

“Mama graon” and “kastom governance” are two projects managed simultaneously and interactively by the World Bank and by Ausaid. The National Council of Chiefs (Malvatumauri) and the Vanuatu Cul- tural Centre are the main national institutions that have been targeted by these projects. In return for their moral caution, consequent funds have been promised to them. But since these projects have been engaged both institutions are trying to back off. Mama Graon seems to be mainly oriented toward de- veloping indigenous lands for business purposes, while Kastom governance is especially concerned by the power of chiefs and their responsibility and control/influence over land. Despite recent claims made at VBTC radio talkback by the Senior Program Manager for AusAid, that “Mama Graon is not a project to make it easier for Australian investors to acquire land in Vanuatu” the situation is becoming locally more tense. Behind this statement which sounds like a usual denegation, this paper will try to provide a survey of the challenges faced by Ni-Vanuatu peoples in regard of such neo-colonial processes.

Cato Berg (University of Bergen)

Title: Land as contested value: a view from Solomon Islands

The constitution of Solomon Islands grants full local ownership through customary laws and land ten- ure for all Solomon Islanders. At the same time, land and resources are alienated from these very same corporations both in urban and rural areas. In this paper I address themes such as ‘landholding unit’,

‘customary land law’ and critically assess trends in land usage by examining a series of cases from Vella Lavella in the Western Province and Honiara, the capital of the island nation. I am particularly interested in two trends. The first is the fate of matrilineal land holding groups in Vella Lavella as they face trans- national logging corporations and changing inheritance rules for land and chieftainship. The second pattern is land inheritance among urban youth battling the complexities and costs of urban living. These are people who have lived all their lives in the capital of Honiara and who do not have strong land rights in their home islands. Based on this series of cases I critically analyse concepts such as ‘ownership’, ‘ap- propriation’ and ‘corporation’ and their relevance for contemporary debates on space and place.

Paul Sillitoe (Durham University) Title: Prehistory of place

It is widely known that land features prominently in the livelihoods, identity and cosmos of South-West Pacific peoples, as the session outline describes. The outline goes on to state that “Senses of emplace- ment within landscapes . . . are vital parts of these islanders’ perceptions of themselves through time and . . . combine to produce dynamics of historical consciousness”. This paper probes this temporal as- pect of place further. Similar to people across Melanesia, those living in the Was valley of the Southern Highlands of Papua New Guinea evince strong connections to their suw ‘place’. But their interest in the history of places is strangely nonchalant, not extending beyond recall of relatively recent events within living memory. This was brought home to me when we came across an ancient settlement site and my friends responded to my eager questions with disinterested shrugs and protestations of ignorance. It is arguable that their behavior is of a piece with their lack of interest in ancestry generally, as evident in their shallow genealogies and their traditional conceptions of time. The apparent indifference to their region’s prehistory, even arguably the absence of such a notion, raises the question of the relevance of archaeology to such people’s worldview, and hence the relationship between archaeology and anthro- pology. This is an issue that has intrigued me for some time; following some fruitful collaboration with archaeological colleagues that has not fully yielded anticipated intellectual returns. Both anthropology and archaeology are interested in place. How can they more fruitfully complement one another?