our islands

How do our islands rate?

Freedom House files its report on the Pacific as it concludes the annual state of democracy survey

By David North

The small nations of the Pacific were praised, albeit backhandedly, by Freedom House in its annual survey of the state of democracy around the world.

In its report on Asia and the Pacific, the New York based think-tank had many harsh things to say about the lack of freedom in nations such as capitalist Singapore and communist North Korea.

It berated the Burmese dictators and worried about the lack of progress in China, while giving good marks to

Japan, South Korea and, surprisingly, Mongolia (formerly a wholly owned subsidiary of the Soviet Union).

Then to cap off its essay on the region it asked: “So where can one find the largest col lection of democracies in Asia?

“In the South Pacific, where 11 of 14 countries, mostly poor and isolated, are free democracies. Never heard of Nauru, Kiribati, Vanuatu and Tuvalu?

“Neither apparently have many of Asia’s ruling elites ... nor their Western apologists ... who don’t seem to believe that ordinary Asians can handle democ racy.”

As usual with the Freedom House rat ings, freedom from a colonial power (like the US or France) does not seem to be part of the formula. Individual politi cal and civil rights are what counts.

Freedom House gave totally free rat ings to all the jurisdictions in the Pacific except Papua New Guinea, Fiji and Tonga, which it called only partly free. At the very bottom of the region’s list is Indonesia’s Irian Jaya which occupies the western end of the island of New Guinea. The 7.0 rating that area received is the worst available in the Freedom House system and is the same rating held by places like Iraq, Libya and Sudan.

The rationale for the ratings of the smaller nations, unfortunately, was not released at the same time as the ratings, beyond the regional essay quoted in full earlier.

Among the interesting elements of the lists were: Easter Island is now listed by Freedom House by its Polynesian name, Rapanui, which is not the name used by Chile there has been some tension between the Polynesian residents of the islands and its Spanish-speaking mainland gov ernors.

Vanuatu’s rating on civil liberties dropped in the last year presumably because Freedom House got wind of what it regarded as restrictions on the freedom of the press and of expression.

For some unrecorded reason Australia’s Norfolk Island, home of some of the descendants of the Bounty muti neers, got a less than perfect 1.5 rating; though Australia (along with the U.S. and New Zealand) got 1.0, the best rat ing available.