Songlines

There seemed to be a kind of resigned and general agreement amongst several experts at the PNG 2005 forum that the likelihood of ‘success’ for PNG becoming a stable modern nation-state was low.

Hugh White, in giving the concluding remarks, outlined what he saw as two phases of Australia’s attitude towards the experiment in PNG.

In the first 15 years from independence the working hypothesis which underwrote Australia’s policy aims was that ‘this thing could work’ – the thing in question being the creation of a modern nation-state in PNG after the removal of the colonial administration.

That is, with the withdrawal of the support of the Australian colonial administration there could emerge a separate, sovereign, stable and economically self-sustaining country of the sort found in countries like Australian and New Zealand.
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LEARNING FROM OUR CULTURAL PARTNERS.

The Ways of life in North and South America, in Pacific Islands, and in Australia have already been forced, to a large degree, into straightjackets fashioned to European specifications. Many of the people affected by these imposed arrangements cannot breath freely.

Given the extent to which so much of life has already been forcefully transformed to comply with these ill-fitting European specifications, it would be an additional and unnecessary tragedy, in my opinion, to attempt to force New Guinea life into the models provided the modern nation state.

What is required in the next chapter of life on Earth is for European peoples to creatively fashion new practices which, taking into account the wisdom kept alive in other Ways of Being, are aimed to ensure the well-being of the whole of life.

Learning to relate with people from PNG on terms which value and respect their Ways is part of that next healing chapter.

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MISSING VOICES

It was clear that what was missing from the Papua New Guinea 2005 public forum held in Sydney during July 2005, was a range of critical indigenous and alternative perspectives.

On the face of it, since 1975 – after time belong Masta – life in PNG has suffered, to varying degrees, from a process of remote control which might be considered as “time belong Western master narrative”.

The dominating voices of Western master narratives have continued throughout the 20th century.

As we enter the 21st century, it is time to fashion new ears so that Western people can hear indigenous voices.

The addition of these voices and perspectives is a necessary corrective if vitally important matters for peoples in both countries are to result in arrangements which incorporate a spirit of cultural partnership.

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NEW GUINEAN MASTER NARRATIVES

Some creative thinking is required by people across PNG in order to find local and regional solutions to the problems which are imposed upon them by the chaos which comes into their lives from other places.

Long before Europeans arrived, people in PNG had been masters of social life for thousands of years. They do not need to enrol in a degree from a Western university to be able to have this ‘prior learning’ recognised and acknowledged.

It is also an appropriate time for other people in the region to review our relationships – or lack of them – with our New Guinea neighbours.

In putting forward my alternative views about the future, I offer some thoughts for sharing in a spirit of cultural partnership and in the hope that, if there is anything of value in what follows, that it may make a small contribution to the well-being of PNG people.

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