Heritage transactions at the Festival of Pacific Arts

The Festival of Pacific Arts, hosted by a different Pacific Island state once every four years, is a prime site for the reproduction of the global discourse on heritage. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted at the festival, this paper focuses on how the concept of heritage is employed at the festival as both an instrument of statecraft and a tool for the assertion of grass-roots political and economic agency. We conclude that heritage in the context of the festival is a form of cultural practice involving relationships of power and inequality, expressed in transactions of ownership and value transformations that have become over determined by economic logic and the concept of property.     

Reviews

SPECIAL STUDY ON ECONOMIC CONDITIONS IN NON‐SELF‐GOVERNING TERRITORIES. United Nations, N.Y., 1960. Pp. v + 42. $1.50.

LAND, “WATER AND FOOD. Herbert Addison. 2nd edition, London, Chapman & Hall, 1961. Pp. xii + 284. Stg. 21/‐.

THE ATTACK ON WORLD POVERTY. Andrew Shonfield. London, Chatto & Windus, 1960. Pp. x + 244. Australian Price 34/9.

THE ECONOMICS OF DEFENSE IN THE NUCLEAR AGE. Charles J. Hitch and Roland N. MeKean. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1960. Pp. xiv + 422. Australian price 98/3.

DEFENCE BY COMMITTEE. F. A. Johnson. London, Oxford University Press, 1960. Pp. viii + 416. Australian price 81/3.

EMPIRE INTO COMMONWEALTH—the Chichele Lectures, Oxford, May 1960. Earl Attlee. London, Oxford University Press, 1961. Pp. 54. Australian price 12/6.

TANGANYIKA AND INTERNATIONAL TRUSTEESHIP. B. T. G. Chidzero. For the Royal Institute of International Affairs. London, Oxford University Press, 1961. Pp. xii + 286. 2 maps. Australian price 57/9.

MULTI‐RACIAL SOUTH AFRICA. Z. J. de Beer. For the Institute of Race Relations. London, Oxford University Press, 1961. Pp. vii + 69. Australian price 10/‐.

POLITICAL AFRICA: A WHO'S WHO OF PERSONALITIES AND PARTIES. Ronald Segal. London, Stevens, 1961. Pp. xii + 475. Australian price 72/‐.

INDIA'S CONSTITUTION IN THE MAKING. B. N. Rau. Calcutta, Orient Longmans, 1960. Pp. 510. Rs. 25.

OIL IN THE MIDDLE EAST. S. H. Longrigg. For the Royal Institute of International Affairs. London, Oxford University Press, 1961. Pp. xiii + 401. Australian price 55/6.

TRADE PROTECTION IN AUSTRALIA. A. J. Reitsma. Leiden and Brisbane. H. E. Stenfert Kroese and University of Queensland Press, 1960. Pp. xi + 195. Australian price 40/‐.

NEW MEN OF PAPUA: A STUDY IN CULTURE CHANGE. Robert F. Maher. Madison, University of Wisconsin Press, 1961, Pp. xii + 148.     

Sharpening Advocacy Coalitions

The concept of “advocacy coalitions” is the bedrock of the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), one of the most established and successful approaches for understanding policy processes across the globe. This article revisits and sharpens the conceptual definition of advocacy coalitions. We summarize the lessons from its theoretical emphases under the ACF and specify its five attributes (policy actors, shared beliefs, coordination, resources, and stability). Through this specification, we identify the ideal coalition type and several coalition subtypes. We then clarify and make a distinction between how we think about coalitions as a concept and how we approach coalitions empirically. This article sharpens the lens for describing and explaining coalitions toward better observations, theorizing, and measurements. It ends with next steps for further deepening and broadening knowledge about advocacy coalitions.     

Brideprice and Prejudice: An Audio-Visual Ethnography on Marriage and Modernity in Mt Hagen,Papua New Guinea

The relationship between bridewealth and women's autonomy is not only discussed amongst anthropologists, development practitioners and other scholars but also amongst brides themselves. Women continue to embrace such marital exchanges, despite their knowledge of ‘modern’ development discourse about the constraints of the practice on women's status and its links to gender-based violence. This paper provides a visual exploration of contemporary brideprice practices and women's autonomy in Mt Hagen. We draw on scenes from our ethnographic film (An Extraordinary Wedding: Marriage and Modernity in Highlands PNG) to explore deliberations and developments that occurred in the case of a particular marriage that took place in 2012. We argue that the institution of brideprice has the potential to enhance the visibility of some women and the importance of their contribution to their own and husbands' kin groups. Despite current tensions regarding brideprice, it can serve as an avenue for the enhancement of women's political participation. The particular brideprice exchange featured in our film, raised concerns for the participants, which we consider in terms of three questions: Does brideprice commodify women? Does it play a role in gender-based violence? Is it inimical to aspirations for modernist individuality? We discuss the importance of bekim (‘return gift’) and suggest that this practice challenges the notion of brideprice as a commodity transaction. We argue that, while there may be an association between brideprice and gender-based violence, brideprice, in and of itself, is not causative of violence. The marriage represented in the film, and discussed in this paper, reveals the creativity of participants in adjusting the values inherent in the customary practice of brideprice to their contemporary aspirations.