The university network : Australian aid policy and education in postcolonial Fiji, 1968-1979

In 1968, the University of the South Pacific (USP) began to provide for the educational needs of nine, later 12, South Pacific nations: Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Kiribati, Tuvalu, Cook Islands, Vanuatu, Niue, Tokelau, Nauru and the Marshall Islands. This paper re- examines Australian aid policies directed at universities in the postcolonial nation states of Oceania, 1968-1979. Beginning in 1972, the changes initiated in Australian foreign aid policy were significant, some of which impacted on higher education in Oceania. This paper addresses and reflects on two significant issues during this particular historical period: (1) that aid relations in education were sometimes subtle, and (2) how changes in Australian official aid policy were consequently integrated into academic development during the early years at USP. There are many conflicting and confluent themes that can be extracted in terms of aid to a university. This paper examines aid to USP until the beginning of the 1980s. Aid intricacies and policies tend to get glossed over, which leaves a rather sporadic understanding of development. The author illuminates some gaps in the historical record by constructing a genealogy of official aid policy changes in Australia. [Author abstract, ed]