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This chapter studies the French penal colony on the Melanesian island of New Caledonia and the ways that policy makers both imagine and instigate settlements and marriages for convicts with the hope of creating communities of affection and devotion to France from prisoners. This model of idealized French country farmer households transposed to the South Seas is challenged not only by the stories of the convicts themselves, but by the indigenous Kanak peoples who resist the encroachment upon their lands. The final section follows both a violent 1878 rebellion led by the chief Atai against the French colonizers, yet one set within a series of stories that demonstrate how some Kanak and European men and women tried to create domestic lives together in settings hostile to both.

This chapter examines the history and nature of French colonialism and postwar decolonization, with particular emphasis on how and why the post-World War II development of local self-government in New Caledonia was interrupted and reversed in the 1960s. It first provides an overview of French colonial state building in the nineteenth century before discussing the “Neo-Europes” indigenous policies for settler colonies and Kanak resistance to French colonialism. It then considers France's political reforms in its overseas territories after World War II, along with Union Calédonienne's electoral victories in New Caledonia and its political experiment with autonomy. It also analyzes how France's annexation of New Caledonia interrupted the autonomy, self-determination, and decolonization of the islands.

Visions of a Christian society in the South Pacific varied within Protestantism, as well as between Protestants and Roman Catholics. Some settlers argued for a secular society, as distinct from one without religious tests or an established church. Primary education was the main area of disagreement, with secular systems established in most colonies by the 1870s, leaving Roman Catholics and Lutherans to finance their own schools. Pressures for political and religious cooperation were strong, leading to Methodist and Presbyterian unions and federation of the Australian colonies. Land wars in New Zealand and New Caledonia left a bitter legacy.

From Equatorial French Africa to the penal colony of New Caledonia, the French administration of Indochina used various territories within the expanse of the French colonial world as sites of exile and labour for convicts from Indochina. Between the first transport in 1863 (to Réunion) and the last in 1941 (to Madagascar), nearly 7000 prisoners of different penal categories were sent to eleven different geographic sites spanning the French colonial globe. While these deportations were an attempt to defuse political and intellectual movements, they also inadvertently created some fascinating trans-colonial societal contexts. This chapter first explores the sites, systems, and social categories of exile from Indochina before examining three case studies from Réunion and the penal colony of New Caledonia.

New Caledonia was the site of a huge American presence during the Pacific war years, beginning in 1943. Gender relations between local women and U.S. servicemen were affected by preconceptions on both sides and barriers to marriage existed. Some women did marry and immigrate to the United States. A case study is presented of one such marriage and the fates of the children born to a New Caledonian woman and her American husband.

This chapter explores the incidental gestures of face-making and the landmark feats of history-making in New Caledonia, a Melanesian archipelago annexed by France in 1853, and how they complicate the nation-making process. It considers the link between facial representation and ethnic politics in New Caledonia. It discusses two modes of face-making that both acknowledge history while somehow escaping its project, effecting a potent gesture of nation-making that steers away from historicity. It also looks at the “drawn strips” of 1878 that manage to shift from the repetition of history’s ethnic binaries toward an exploration of potential national character. In addition, it analyzes the low-register bande dessinée drawing of 1878 as a genuine contribution to nation-making. The chapter concludes by assessing the documentary regime in which history and photography play important roles in relation to an epistemology of bande-dessinée.

This book investigates the rise of Kanak nationalism in New Caledonia in the period after World War II, along with the events and factors that influenced it. It shows that the rise of Kanak nationalism is connected to a long history of anticolonial movement rooted in Kanak cultures and was also influenced by movements and discourses outside of New Caledonia, especially in metropolitan France. The book locates the New Caledonian experience within broader discussions of colonialism, decolonization, nationalism, and nation building. This introduction provides an archaeological and anthropological overview of Kanak cultures and societies, as well as their interactions with foreigners over the centuries. In particular, it considers three historical changes that pushed New Caledonia to the breaking point; one of which was the establishment of a protest group, the Foulards Rouges (Red Scarves), in what became known as the Kanak Awakening (Réveil Canaque). France's annexation of New Caledonia in 1853 is also discussed.

This chapter focuses on the Kanak revolt of the 1980s, a decade marked by violent confrontation as the would-be nation-state of Kanaky rejected being an overseas extension of France. It briefly revisits the growing violence and missed opportunities of the 1980s and goes on to consider why now-autonomous leaders in New Caledonia are pursuing a “common destiny” through negotiation. It examines how the Kanak revolt turned local anticolonialism into a mass movement and ushered in what Jean-Marie Tjibaou called a “green revolution” of economic and educational development. It also discusses the UN General Assembly vote that put New Caledonia back on the list of Non-Self-Governing Territories who had an “inalienable right…to self-determination and independence”; the results of the 1987 referendum on the issue of independence for New Caledonia; the conflict on Ouvea in the Loyalty Islands; and the Matignon-Oudinot Accords.

This chapter examines the Matignon-Oudinot Accords of 1988 and the Noumea Accord of 1998, along with efforts at nation building in a globalizing world. The consensual peace accords of Matignon-Oudinot in 1988 and of Noumea in 1998 proposed economic “rebalancing” between the Kanak and non-Kanak communities and working toward a shared future in a context of restored autonomy. The Front de Libération Nationale Kanak et Socialiste's (FLNKS) confrontation with France and the settlers “created a nation where one had never existed before,” that is, Kanaky. This chapter first considers the results of the provincial elections of 2004 and the emergence of a new anti-Lafleur loyalist coalition called Avenir Ensemble. It then asks whether New Caledonia might become a Pacific-centered country, perhaps even a hybrid nation called Kanaky New Caledonia. It also explores the idea of a “Caledonian personality” and the adoption of new symbols expressing Kanak identity, such as a flag and a name.

The bagne retains an ambiguous status as a lieu de mémoire, in part because of its predominantly extra-metropolitan location, in part because most understandings of the institution rely heavily on representations freighted via literature, film and graphic fiction. In French Guiana and New Caledonia, the bagne was nevertheless the major driver in the attempted mise en valeur of those colonies in the face of varying degrees of resistance to settlement. Moreover, France’s carceral archipelago extended beyond those key sites to include penal colonies in North and Sub-Saharan Africa as well as Indochina. The essay scrutinizes the rich body of material that has served as a vehicle for memories of the institution, but uses a focus on contemporary memorial practices in French Guiana and New Caledonia to suggest a distinct divergence in forms of interpretation, especially regarding the place of the penal colony in colonial expansionism. Although until recent years the bagne has often acted as more of a postcolonial lieu d’oubli, in a context of complex postcolonial politics and of growing interest in penal heritage its status as a lieu de mémoire is becoming increasingly apparent.

This chapter focuses on New Caledonia, an example of a decolonial movement. It tracks the development of the movement since the 1960s and follows the different tactics it used at different points in time. The chapter also elaborates the tactics of compellence of New Caledonia, which involved nonviolent civil resistance, the use of violence, and electoral capture. It details how French democracy gradually enfranchised the indigenous group, the Kanaks, and gave them political voice. The chapter presents the independence effort in New Caledonia led by the Kanaks and other ethnic groups including immigrants from France, elements of the white settler community, and Wallisians. It then introduces a new period of cultural movement known as the Kanak Awakening, and its greatest leader, Jean-Marie Tjibaou from the east coast of Grand Terre. Ultimately, the chapter argues that Caledonia differs most from the other movements in this study, for, unlike them, it is classified as a non-self-governing territory and therefore eligible for independence via the path of decolonization.

This chapter focuses on the formation of two major political blocs that articulated rival multiethnic visions of the nation. In the 1970s, Michel Foucault advocated “an insurrection of subjugated knowledges” in order to “establish a historical knowledge of struggles” and thereby liberate suppressed voices. The anticolonial movement in New Caledonia engaged in just such a campaign as they pushed the idea of independence into the public political discourse. This chapter first discusses the Melanesia 2000 arts festival held at Magenta beach in September 1975 and organized by Kanak cultural leaders such as Jean-Marie Tjibaou. It then considers the radicals' agenda, which included socialist restructuring and redistribution, sovereign independence, and the reorientation of the country's identity around a Kanak center. It also looks at the creation of the Parti de Libération Kanak, or Palika, and the Parti Socialiste Calédonien; the Association des Canaques en France's occupation of the foyer and declaration of a strike in 1976; and Overseas Minister Paul Dijoud's proposed recognition and promotion of Melanesians.

This chapter examines the emergence in New Caledonia of anticolonial protest groups in what became known as the Kanak Awakening of 1969. The riot of 1969 was led by Jean-Paul Caillard, Jean-Pierre Devillers, and Jean-Claude Suet. The young radicals of 1969 named their own bulletin Réveil Canaque (or Kanak Awakening) because they felt that the recolonization of their country required direct action. The chapter first considers the link between the anticolonial protests and labor militancy in New Caledonia's nickel mining sector before turning to the protest group called Foulards Rouges (Red Scarves). It also discusses the question of whether the anticolonial movement could create a new syncretism of Kanak cultural nationalism and Third World socialism; the demand for self-government by the Union Multiraciale de Nouvelle-Calédonie, led by Yann Céléné Uregei, and Foulards Rouges; and the implications of the UN General Assembly's Resolution 2621 for decolonization efforts in New Caledonia.

This chapter examines the debates among New Caledonia's radicals over paths to sovereignty and the growing polarization between loyalists and supporters of restored autonomy or full independence. The radical anticolonial movement had split into two ethnic groups in 1970 to work within their own communities, but ties between leftist Caledonians and Kanak activists endured in various meetings, protests, and publications. Their symbiosis became an ongoing dialogue due to the potential contradictions between Kanak cultural nationalism and visions of class liberation. This chapter first considers the formation of a new movement called the Union des Jeunesses Calédoniennes before turning to Kanak intellectuals and their own concept of sovereignty, along with the proclamation of “Kanak Independence” by Groupe 1878 and the Foulards Rouges. It also discusses Territorial Assembly President Yann Céléné Uregei's request for a statute of internal autonomy for New Caledonia and Premier Jacques Chirac's response, sparking a debate about what “Kanak independence” meant.

This chapter presents extracts from the works of Jacqueline Sénès, Jean Vanmai, Catherine Régen, Ismet Kurtovitch, Claudine Jacques, and Alban Bensa. Among these are Sénès' Terre violente (Violent land, 1987), which sketches out the dramatic history of the colony through the fortunes of the pioneering Sutton family; Vanmai's historical fiction Pilou-Pilou: Chapeaux de paille (Pilou-Pilou: Straw hats, 1998), the first volume of a trilogy that puts the writer into the skin of deportees; and Régent's popular historical romance, Justine ou un amour de chapeau de paille (Justine or in love with a straw hat, 1995), the story of an impossible love affair between the daughter of a colonial dignitary and a “straw-hat”—a convict and her father's house servant, deported for murdering the man who raped his sister.

This chapter examines the intellectual influences on the small cohort of Caledonian and Kanak students who attended universities in France and experienced the May 1968 student–worker uprising. It first discusses the arrival of a number of New Caledonian students in France in the early 1960s, including Jean-Paul Caillard, Nidoish Naisseline, and Max Chivot, and how they actively imagined revolutionary utopias in China, Cuba, Vietnam, Africa, and perhaps even the Caillou. It then considers how the Algerian conflict inspired francophone intellectuals to reflect on colonial settler psychology, and especially Third World decolonization and liberation. It also explores how Third World nationalism interacted with a radical West that had millenarian dreams of victory over “the establishment,” with particular emphasis on New Caledonian anticolonial activitists' views about socialist revolution. Finally, the chapter takes a look at the May 1968 student–worker protests in France, led by the so-called enragés (angry youth).

This concluding chapter puts nation building in perspective and reflects on the New Caledonia radicals' legacy and future hopes. It considers how metropolitan French politics and changing regional and international contexts, along with divisions and changes within loyalist and independence blocs, have complicated the decolonization of New Caledonia since World War II. It discusses the legacy of the Matignon-Oudinot and Noumea Accords, both of which have recognized the double legitimacy of settlers and Kanak and enacted significant decentralization with economic rebalancing and the institutionalization of Kanak identity. It also examines the contributions of the Foulards Rouges to the decolonization process, such as rallying international support for local self-determination. Finally, it explores how diasporas have helped to define the Kanak sense of nationhood in the face of France's conquest and discriminatory policies.