DECOLONISING TRUTH: SOLOMON ISLANDS

Joseph Foukona, Sofía Macher, and Daniela Gavshon explore the work of the Solomon Islands Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the horizons opened up through the truth-telling process.

DECOLONISING TRUTH GLOBALLY

The Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation (ADI) and the Institute of Postcolonial Studies (IPCS) are running a series of seminars on international experiences of truth-telling with particular relevance to the unfolding conversation in Australia following the release of the Uluru Statement calling for Voice, Treaty and Truth in 2017.

The seminars have sought to foster a conversation about the possibilities and challenges of truth-telling by drawing on the experience and processes in other relevant contexts. The series has focused particularly on truth processes that have impacted on Indigenous communities in order to share knowledge that may help inform an Australian truth-telling process. 

Thus far, globally, truth-telling has often been linked to discourses of recognition and reconciliation within a multicultural project. While recognition and reconciliation remain important, our series explores what truth-telling with an explicitly decolonial focus may look like. We ask specifically how truth telling can restore sovereignty and ensure reparations – what initiatives are necessary for this to happen?

PART 3:  TRUTH-TELLING IN THE SOLOMON ISLANDS

join Sofía Macher, Joseph Foukona and Daniela Gavshon as we explore the work of the Solomon Islands Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the horizons opened up through the truth-telling process.

The Solomon Islands Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) was the first truth commission in the Pacific. Launched in 2008 by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former Chair of the South African TRC, it began its work in 2010.

The Solomon Islands TRC was established to investigate the violence in the Guadalcanal Province between 1997 and 2003. Access to land, and social and political economy issues shaped the tensions leading to armed conflict between settlers from the Malaitan Province living on Guadalcanal and the island’s Indigenous residents. An estimated 200 people died and 35,000 people or 10 per cent of the population were displaced from their homes, with many suffering torture, abduction and sexual violence.

See the original event details.

See the related 2020 recordings, part of the same ‘Decolonising truth’ series.