The creation of—or even the existence of—a “Pacific World” is a question that has preoccupied scholars to a much greater degree than existential doubts have bothered historians of other oceanic basins. Economic historian Eric Jones and colleagues have written that “there can be no meaningful history ofthe whole Rim or Basin [ofthe Pacific] since there…
This book tells the story of power and diplomatic agency in Pacific regionalism against the backdrop of a changing global order and a changing political situation within Pacific societies and states. Its purpose is to explore the political significance of this region-building activity for Pacific societies and its political meaning withi…
Centuries before the Pacific was revealed to Europeans, flotillas of ves-sels carried thousands of men, women, and children, together with plants and animals, to virtually every island in a vast ocean that covers about one-third of the surface of the globe. They settled in homelands with con-siderable diversity, ranging from the high islands of Papua New Guinea to small volcanic pe…