La Nouvelle-Calédonie face à son destin

09/12/2016 - Article

New Caledonia is about to take an institutional and political corner in a world that has changed radically since the start of the fight for decolonization. This remarkable book is the fruit of a unique multidisciplinary study. On the eve of a decisive consultation, it provides keys to understanding the economy of New Caledonia, its changes over the past 30 years or so, and the issues and prospects for the future.

Twenty-eight years after the Matignon-Oudinot agreements, with a new key date for its institutional and political future on the horizon with the planned exit from the Nouméa agreement, where does New Caledonia stand? Has its economic model changed fundamentally? Is its development pathway sustainable? As the country continues along a negotiated pathway to decolonization, what are its assets and strategic options for coping with globalization in its many new forms?

The country is increasingly integrated into liberalized, deregulated global markets; urbanization is increasingly marked, but has taken forms and had impacts that give the lie to some forecasts and patterns observed elsewhere; twenty-five years of sustained growth have boosted the domestic market; alongside the growth in movements, non-commercial and customary systems have remained crucial to human development; transfers of responsibility from the French State to the territory over the past twenty years have transformed the forums for and the players involved in policy-making; industrialization through metallurgy has changed the situation as regards distribution of the income from nickel; political bipolarization has given way to greater pluralism, and so on, to quote just a few of the most emblematic changes.

On the eve of the consultation on the transfer of the last remaining responsibilities, what are the possible futures for the highly politicized economy of New Caledonia? What institutional and economic achievements along its recent pathway can it fall back on? What growth drivers should be triggered, and above all, what development model is required and what "social contract" needs to be negotiated?

La Nouvelle-Calédonie face à son destin
Quel bilan à la veille de la consultation sur la pleine souveraineté ?
S. Bouard, J.-M. Sourisseau, V. Geronimi, S. Blaise, L. Roi (eds.)
Editions Karthala
2016