The ‘Pacific way’ of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT

The coronavirus pandemic has required those that are most vulnerable to protect themselves as best they can. This includes vulnerable states, among which are the island states of the Pacific, where resources to fight the pandemic are severely limited. Recognising the need to act quickly, Pacific island states closed borders, restricted travel and implemented ostensibly draconian measures. Examining some of these measures in the context of the countries in which they were applied and the extent to which the curtailment of human rights was justified and accepted by those who were subject to these restrictions, we focus on four strengths of these states: faith, capacity, collaboration and community.

KEYWORDS:

• COVID-19
• Pacific Island states
• emergency powers
• community
• collaboration
• resilience

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. On understandings of vulnerability see Feeny et al. (2013).

2. Mainly Australia. Germany was present in NE New Guinea pre-WWI and Britain in Papua pre-1906. There was also Japanese control of large areas during WWII.

3. Some PICs have yet to gain full independence, for example, those under French rule: New Caledonia and French Polynesia. Tokelau has, for the moment, chosen to stay under the governance of New Zealand, while Pitcairn as an overseas territory of Britain is unlikely to ever be independent.

4. The Cook Islands and Niue are self-governing and responsible for their own internal affairs, though in free association with New Zealand – see Dumieński (2019) who argues that these should be regarded as largely sovereign states.

5. Earlier legislation, notably the 1999 Human Rights Commission Act, conferred various functions on the Human Rights Commission additional to those set out in section 42(1) of the 1990 Constitution as amended under the 1997 Constitution (Amendment) Act 1997.

6. Samoa State of Emergency (2020). Retrieved 24 November 2020, from, <www.samoagovt.ws/2020/03/state-of-emergency-declared/>.

7. Solomon Islands State of Emergency (2020). Retrieved 24 November 2020, from www.policyforum.net/together-or-apart-against-COVID-19-the-solomon-islands-state-of-emergency/.

8. Kiribati State of Emergency (2020). Retrieved 24 November 2020, from <www.micttd.gov.ki/news/kiribati-declares-state-public-emergency-and-partial-lock-down-response-corona-virus-pandemic>

9. Fiji State of Emergency (2020). Retrieved 24 November 2020, from, <https://reliefweb.int/report/world/why-has-COVID-19-turned-structural-crisis-pacific>.

10. Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners Adopted by the First United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders, held at Geneva in 1955, and approved by the Economic and Social Council by its resolutions 663 C (XXIV) of 31 July 1957 and 2076 (LXII) of 13 May 1977, as revised and adopted by the General Assembly in 2015 as the Nelson Mandela Rules, A/RES/70/175.

11. The UK government response drew on their 2011 Influenza Pandemic Plan, refined after testing nationally (Exercise Cygnus 2016 and by the WHO in 2011, <www.gov.uk/guidance/pandemic-flu≥ and issued its ‘Coronavirus: action plan, A guide to what you can expect across the UK’, Emergency and Health Protection Directorate on 3 March 2020. For evaluations, see, inter alia, Parliamentary Accounts Committee, Thirteenth Report: Whole of Government Response to COVID-19, HC 404, published 23 July 2020.

12. Biketawa Declaration 2020 <https://www.forumsec.org/biketawa-declaration/> accessed 16 November 2020.