Little of the existing literature on Pacific migrants’ transnational practices looks beyond remittances. An early exception is Evelyn Kallen’s The Western Samoan kinship bridge (1982) which examines the kinship networks sustained by Samoan migrants, mainly in the USA, with Samoans remaining in the islands. Like much of the literature on the Pacific diaspora it is particularly focused on the issues of kinship and identity, but unlike many other authors, Kallen is interested in the role of transnational ties in shaping diasporic identities and experiences. Small’s Voyages: from Tongan villages to American suburbs (1997) has a similar focus, in this case tracing the ties of a particular extended family group between members in different locations in the USA and their village in Tonga. My own work on the Tongan diaspora (Lee 2003, 2004b) also shares Kallen’s concern with kinship and identity and examines how transnational ties affect migrants and their children as they negotiate the challenges of life as members of a minority ‘ethnic group’ in the host nations.
Another exception is the work by Macpherson on Samoan migrants in New Zealand. Over the years he has traced the changes within the Samoan community in New Zealand, particularly Auckland, describing how continued migration and ongoing ties to the homeland have gradually transformed aspects of fa’a Samoa (the Samoan way) in the migrant communities (1984, 1991, 1994, 2002, 2004; Macpherson and Macpherson 1999 and this volume). Macpherson has shown that over time there has been a significant shift from the early years of migration in which there were ‘expatriate nodes’ sending remittances and maintaining other ties with ‘the center, which was, of course, the village of origin in which the family’s landholdings, its chiefly title, and the core of its members resided’ (Macpherson 2004, 168). Now, he argues, ‘the nodes have become centers and Samoan culture has become a global one’ (ibid, 179; see also Lilomaiava-Doktor this volume).
Beyond such case studies there has been little discussion of transnationalism in relation to the Pacific as a whole. Spoonley has addressed this broader issue from the perspective of transnationalism’s challenge to the nation-state:
Transnational communities by their very nature further contribute to what some interpret as the destabilisation of the nation and the state. They transcend national boundaries by their activities, and their members typically have divided loyalties between their country of residence and their ethnic community, or between the countries of origin and current location. The movement of people and goods across borders, especially when those movements are undocumented and part of informal networks, confirm the increasing permeability of borders and emphasise the significance of multiple loyalties—to place of residence, place and culture of origin, to diasporic communities, and to evolving identities…We can add that the communities also change the nature of the metropolitan societies in which they reside by virtue of their transnational activities. They are one further and important element in the subdivision of the nation and the declining sovereignty of the state (2001, 84–85).
In a later paper, Spoonley, Bedford and Macpherson discuss the transnationalism of Pacific Islanders in New Zealand and conclude: ‘The state in New Zealand has yet to grasp the significance of the transnationalism of Pacific peoples’ (2003, 43). They argue that this is partly because Islanders themselves have not engaged fully with the possibilities of transnationalism, such as political mobilisation, and partly because of New Zealand’s ‘openness in both immigration and economic access’ (ibid, 43). There have been changes even since their article was written, such as the response of Tongans in New Zealand to ongoing political problems in their homeland, including the public servants’ strike in 2005 and a riot in Tonga’s capital, Nuku’alofa, the following year. Not only did Tongans mobilise to stage public protests in New Zealand but they also rallied to pressure the New Zealand government to intervene. Nevertheless the argument that New Zealand has not grasped the significance of Pacific transnationalism holds true and could be extended to both the Australian and American governments. To give just one example, a detailed Senate report on Australia’s relationship with the Pacific produced in 2003, A Pacific engaged (Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade References Committee), did not mention the Pacific communities dwelling in Australia or their role in maintaining ties with the island nations.
There is clearly a need for more work on Pacific Islanders’ ‘long distance nationalism’ (Fouron and Glick Schiller 2002) to explore migrants’ involvement in the processes of nation-building in their countries of origin.
Long distance nationalists may vote, demonstrate, contribute money, create works of art, give birth, fight, kill, and die for a ‘homeland’ in which they may never have lived. Meanwhile, those who live in this homeland will recognize these actions as patriotic contributions to the well-being of their common homeland (Fouron and Glick Schiller, 2002, 173).
Pacific migrants may have not had reason to die for their countries, but they have been active for many years in a range of contexts including politics, business and the churches (see the chapters by Hoëm and Nosa in this volume). Hau’ofa pointed out that ‘from their bases abroad they are exerting significant influences on their homeland’ (1994, 423). He cites their use of media and information and communications technologies to share information and maintain contact. ‘National issues are internationalized through transnational networks of a highly mobile population, making it difficult for the powers that be to keep track of, let alone contain, any social movement with tentacles spread across the globe’ (1994, 423).
Studies of Pacific people’s use of the internet support Hau’ofa’s argument. The work by Alan Howard and Jan Rensel on Rotumans (2004; Howard 1999), Marianne Franklin’s work on Pacific internet discussion forums (2001, 2003, 2004), and my own work on Tongans online (Morton 1999, Lee 2003, 2006b), has revealed the many ways in which Pacific Islanders scattered across the globe share information and create and maintain transnational networks. This cyber-transnationalism is constantly expanding and changing and the emergence of social networking sites such as MySpace, Facebook and Bebo, and video-sharing sites such as YouTube have opened up new ways for ties to be established and for networks of connections to become increasingly complex.