The New Caledonian referendum: Events, processes, decolonization

Abstract

This article considers the referendum on self-determination held in New Caledonia on 4 November 2018. It sets this vote in context by reviewing previous referenda in this French overseas collectivity, beginning in 1958. The vote in the recent referendum was closer than many, Kanak included, expected (43.33 per cent in favour, 56.67 per cent against). The article analyses this result and takes into account aspects of social change in New Caledonia. It examines different approaches, by Kanak and Europeans resident in New Caledonia, to the question of events and processes, leading to a discussion of underlying attitudes to decolonization and historicity. It concludes by presenting some of the factors and forces in play in the Provincial elections in New Caledonia in May 2019. These elections will determine the composition of the local parliament (Congres), and through it the New Caledonian government, for the period 2019–24. It is this new government that will be in place for the remainder of the Noumea Accord that includes potentially two further referenda on independence, and in the case of a NO vote prevailing, for the post-2022 process of further negotiations with France over arrangements for the future of New Caledonia.