72
F. Gelves-Gómez and S. Brincat
see in individual land holdings the best way to develop a territory (Fingleton 2005;
Scheyven and Russell 2012). They have also played a peculiar function in protecting
the metaphysics of spirit in iTaukei lands also. That is, despite the rupture involved
in the change from traditional to colonised peoples, and the contrived retrofit of
land law to iTaukei practices, the land policy and the yasana administrative unit
ensured the ‘old gods’—located in the ancestral lands and natural places of each
group—were never lost. Arguably, more so than Christianity’s uneasy ‘confirmation
by subordination’ of local gods and ancestral spirits, it was these colonial land reforms
that kept aspects of the traditional metaphysics alive though in hybridised form (and
arguably in ways unrecognisable to iTaukei culture now largely lost to history).
The spirit world was always there and remained so, subordinate but not subsumed
to Christianity or Crown lands. In the next section, we will see how this hybrid
metaphysical system has influenced the more recent policies concerning climate
change adaptation in Fiji.
Disconnects Between Vanua and Climate Change Policies
in Fiji
In Fiji, top-down climate change action is driven by political measures and strategies
that are often aligned with the global discourses of development, sustainability, and
resilience – key components of what has elsewhere been described as the ‘economic
rationalist’ discourse on climate change (Pascoe et al. 2019). Such elements come
in a package and cannot be disassociated from supposedly global conceptions of
Nature, what society is, or how religion and spirituality are to be located (Latour
2017). These functional assumptions of economic rationalism have their roots in
the human/Nature binary inherent to Western and Christian metaphysics, already
discussed, and the hierarchical relationship between humans and Nature that they
assume. As such, they seem widely at odds with the deep relationalism of vanua
especially in terms of ongoing processes of recognition/respect owed to ancestors
and spirit in iTaukei communities.
One of the most obvious examples of this tension between vanua and climate
policy is found in the Republic of Fiji National Climate Change Policy (2018–2030).
5
This legislation follows directly from Western (and Judeo-Christian traditions) ideals
expressed in the Sustainable Development Goals (United Nations 2015a) and the
Paris Agreement (United Nations 2015b). It focuses on discourses of development,
sustainability, and resilience that largely ignore alternative worldviews/metaphysics
that frame human-Nature relation as reciprocal, thereby restricting the capacity of
iTaukei to respond to climate change. At the same time, it locks in adaptation policy to
external systems of validation. For example, Fiji’s current National Climate Change
Policy is supported via investments and financial resources that together complement
5 The Republic of Fiji National Climate Change Policy 2018–2030 replaces the previous policy
launched in 2012.
F. Gelves-Gómez and S. Brincat
see in individual land holdings the best way to develop a territory (Fingleton 2005;
Scheyven and Russell 2012). They have also played a peculiar function in protecting
the metaphysics of spirit in iTaukei lands also. That is, despite the rupture involved
in the change from traditional to colonised peoples, and the contrived retrofit of
land law to iTaukei practices, the land policy and the yasana administrative unit
ensured the ‘old gods’—located in the ancestral lands and natural places of each
group—were never lost. Arguably, more so than Christianity’s uneasy ‘confirmation
by subordination’ of local gods and ancestral spirits, it was these colonial land reforms
that kept aspects of the traditional metaphysics alive though in hybridised form (and
arguably in ways unrecognisable to iTaukei culture now largely lost to history).
The spirit world was always there and remained so, subordinate but not subsumed
to Christianity or Crown lands. In the next section, we will see how this hybrid
metaphysical system has influenced the more recent policies concerning climate
change adaptation in Fiji.
Disconnects Between Vanua and Climate Change Policies
in Fiji
In Fiji, top-down climate change action is driven by political measures and strategies
that are often aligned with the global discourses of development, sustainability, and
resilience – key components of what has elsewhere been described as the ‘economic
rationalist’ discourse on climate change (Pascoe et al. 2019). Such elements come
in a package and cannot be disassociated from supposedly global conceptions of
Nature, what society is, or how religion and spirituality are to be located (Latour
2017). These functional assumptions of economic rationalism have their roots in
the human/Nature binary inherent to Western and Christian metaphysics, already
discussed, and the hierarchical relationship between humans and Nature that they
assume. As such, they seem widely at odds with the deep relationalism of vanua
especially in terms of ongoing processes of recognition/respect owed to ancestors
and spirit in iTaukei communities.
One of the most obvious examples of this tension between vanua and climate
policy is found in the Republic of Fiji National Climate Change Policy (2018–2030).
5
This legislation follows directly from Western (and Judeo-Christian traditions) ideals
expressed in the Sustainable Development Goals (United Nations 2015a) and the
Paris Agreement (United Nations 2015b). It focuses on discourses of development,
sustainability, and resilience that largely ignore alternative worldviews/metaphysics
that frame human-Nature relation as reciprocal, thereby restricting the capacity of
iTaukei to respond to climate change. At the same time, it locks in adaptation policy to
external systems of validation. For example, Fiji’s current National Climate Change
Policy is supported via investments and financial resources that together complement
5 The Republic of Fiji National Climate Change Policy 2018–2030 replaces the previous policy
launched in 2012.