Re-storying Law and Development in Oceania

The Pacific is vast, and its people and places woven into a rich array of cultures, ecologies, and legal systems. However, development discourses emanating from Global North institutions consistently portray the region in homogenised terms, as a series of small, underdeveloped, and under-governed islands dotting an empty expanse of ocean. This chapter draws on a rich vein of Pacific scholarship to highlight the effects of these dominant portrayals. It does so with reference to three key areas of concern for Global North institutions: state-building and securitisation of borders, the regulation of Indigenous land and sea, and gender inequality. The chapter then focuses on efforts to ‘decolonise’ and ‘re-story’ mainstream development, and highlights three key characteristics of these efforts: they are emplaced in landscapes, seascapes, and skyscapes; they are founded on Indigenous customs, languages, and the arts; and they are expansive, linking diverse struggles through time and space.