I normally avoid writing about domestic issues of countries other than my own. Such writing requires insights and depth that I cannot even pretend to have. When actions that other countries take impact on the Blue Pacific, then these issues are no longer domestic. They are fair game.
Has the international environment been transformed?
When President Trump took office in January 2025, one of the very first acts of the new administration was to withdraw from the Paris Climate Treaty. U.S simply walked away from its obligations under this Treaty. In doing so, it undermined one of the foundational premises on which inter-state and international relations are framed. Did this brazen action embolden other countries to become equally reckless?
Not too long thereafter, the British Government hugely unexpectedly said that it was crushing its international development assistance – undoing development cooperation arrangements that UK itself had delicately negotiated with development partners across the World. Pacific’s leaders were first informed of this via the BBC.
Not too long thereafter, several senior political leaders announced their intention to ditch hosting the UN’s climate COP31. In so doing, they casually undermined Pacific’s aspiration to work with Australia to host the United Nations meeting on Climate Change (COP31) to bring focus on the World’s most climate vulnerable region. Again, the region learned of this through ABC news.
Another of our neighbours casually threatened to cut off development assistance to one of the most climate vulnerable nations in the Pacific because a meeting date between two leaders could not be secured. Just like that as if history and deep relations did not matter.
If these were not enough, the U.S in a single moment declared sweeping tariffs on the whole of the Blue Pacific – not even leaving poor Tokelau aside. Tokelau exports some US$150,000 of goods to the U.S – a US$30 trillion economy. Clearly there is someone or some alogrithm that believes that wiping out the US$150,000 trade surplus that Tokelau enjoys today will contribute to making America great.
Even More alarmingly, the U.S declared tariffs on the North Pacific states of FSM, Palau and Marshall Islands – as if the Compact of Free Association simply did not exist. This Compact had been shaped through years of quiet negotiations between sovereign state parties. All that simply did not matter.
It may seem that the world is becoming unhinged. No. Far from it.
It is certainly true, however, that we have entered an era where state behaviour and government actions have become more precisely centred on, more specifically shaped by some of the narrowest of domestic interests. If treaties, respect for other countries, obligations and historical responsibility gets in the way of these interests – than that’s just it. All these can be disregarded because narrow domestic interest trumps everything else.
Leaders of the Blue Pacific need to respond as skilfully as they must and as diplomatically as they can. History and empathy will matter for little. We have collectively entered is the business end of the Blue Pacific’s engagement with its external environment.
Not a time for alarm
Global stock markets are spooked. U.S markets alone lost nearly US$4 trillion within a day of the tariffs being announced.
The Pacific is surely made of greater stuff. The Pacific did not panic even when the spectre of whole countries ceasing to exist on their horizon became real. Vanuatu did not panic when it lost 70 percent of its economy in two hours. But this cannot be a time for business as usual. That would be suicidal. It is time for business.
Driving hard business bargains in not the natural instincts of Pacific diplomacy and of its leaders. But this is what the moment requires – a level headed commitment that the region is open for business, that the region will plug and play in this new era of business focussed international relations.
Pathways for the Pacific
Is this an epoch changing moment in international relations? I will leave that to our experts in international relations. But is no time for knee jerk reactions also. The risks are too high. It is a time for calculated, well thought through and a powerful collective regional response – a response that meets the scale of challenges.
A political strategy to drive Pacific’s Climate Urgency
In the short time since the U.S elections, we have seen how power plays with climate change. U.S’s intentions to annex Greenland is the crudest display of what happens at the intersections of climate change and power. The melting glaciers at 1.5 Celsius of global warming are opening up shipping pathways in the Artic; opening up seabed and other resources which were previously unreachable. The U.S having Greenland as an operating base is a crucial part of its strategy to gain control of this region, its seabed and its shipping lanes in face of stiff competition. This is the geoeconomics of climate change at work.
The Pacific should see this as a warning shot. Should states physically cease to exist above sea level, these sovereign waters may meet similar empires – committed to using might and capable of throwing laws and history into the dustbin to pursue economic and strategic objectives. Greenland is the climate story of our times. Greenland is the Pacific’s future story.
Our international climate diplomacy must become more business like. We need to maintain our solidarity with our friends across the developing world, but we should be clear-eyed – the last miles of our climate journeys may need to be walked alone. That will be lonely walk if we do not play are cards well now.
Our solidarity as a region has never mattered as much as it does now. The hope we offer to Pacific students and our climate activists leading the charge on all our behalf in international courts, on streets and in virtual chatrooms must be real. What more can Pacific’s leaders do to build on the energy that they provide to all of us.
What the Pacific needs is a carefully designed political strategy that gives all its leaders the firepower, the directions and the negotiating space to ‘cut a deal’ wherever they may have opportunities to engage with World leaders and international policy decision makers. An agile and multipronged approach that moves away from the set pieces of COP negotiation to more asymmetric business-like deals that adds up to something larger.
The Pacific’s political blueprint for its climate diplomacy should be clear about the range of options that lie ahead of the region. It should be clear of the region’s ask of its development partners and allies – crystal clear.
In the 2025-2026 period, this should deliver ring-fenced and protected climate finances for Pacific SIDS through all vehicles – from soft loans to global funds such as Green Climate Fund to bilateral development assistance.
The Pacific’s political blueprint for climate diplomacy should deliver a clear understanding of the adaptation priorities of the region with precision. It should be clear about its expectations of contributions that Pacific expects from its partners to its share of new climate finance over the medium term. This is business. For the Pacific this is the business of survival – for its development partners, it is the business of development assistance.
A strategy to respond to trade uncertainties
It is too early to say what the specific impacts of trade disruptions arising from the global tariff on Pacific economies will be. But there isn’t a lot of time. The region has already commenced work to understand its dependencies in critical areas like supply of medicines, construction materials, shipping and fuel.
Disruptions will occur with little notice. Plans B and C need to be in place to respond to market disruptions and uncertainties as our suppliers adjust to new global realities. The region needs to strengthen its trade representation in both Washington and China urgently to understand rapid changes underway in advance, present Pacific’s case before decisions are undertaken and convey our anxieties. The job of region’s leaders will flow from that.
A Pacific Rule Book
The Blue Pacific just can no longer be held hostage to the electoral cycles in its major development partners. This strategy has failed the region one too many times already. One of Pacific’s leading thinkers of these issues , Prof Sione Teketeki has proposed that the region takes its own steps to establish a “Pacific rules based order”. That time has come.
A Pacific playbook that tells all actors – those who seek to advance their own narrowest of interests such as narrowing the trade gap with Tokelau to those who are beholden to fossil fuels interests seeking a muted rather than a forceful Pacific voice on the international stage. The region should be able to tell all actors – these are our rules. These rules apply across our vast region. You can plug and play, or you can unplug. Brilliant simplicity in presenting a wonderfully complex idea.
A Development Supermarket
Another of the regions leading thinkers Prof Transform Aqorau proposal for the Pacific to have to a broader development-scape; a supermarket of options is an equally simple and powerful idea. The region needs to be able to explore alternatives when mission critical programmes are lost as a consequence of electoral cycles.
Fiji has had to postpone its rollout of 5G as a result of loss of USAID support. PNG is exploring new partners for its forest conservation programme similarly. We have similar stories from across this region – Kiribati, RMI to Tonga. This is the World’s most climate vulnerable region. This region does not need to add another layer of vulnerability arising from sudden aid cuts. The Blue Pacific has suffered for long from this start-stop-restart cycle of development assistance. Any development economist will tell you that is far worse for development than not providing development assistance in the first place. This nightmare must end.
Prof Transform has urged Pacific Governments to reduce their aid dependencies as rapidly as they can.
Leaders meeting
The answers to the pathways forward lie in the region – not in distance capitals or the neighbourhood. It would be great if Pacific Islands Forum Chair were able to convene Pacific small island states heads in the immediate future to firm up a new regional consensus on its pathways forward. This is an immediate and urgent step for the world has just become more uncertain and less empathetic to our unique and special circumstances.
