Urban Policy and Research

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Regionalism and Resilience? Meeting Urban

Challenges in Pacific Island States

Meg Keen & John Connell

To cite this article: Meg Keen & John Connell (2019) Regionalism and Resilience? Meeting
Urban Challenges in Pacific Island States, Urban Policy and Research, 37:3, 324-337, DOI:
10.1080/08111146.2019.1626710

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/08111146.2019.1626710

Published online: 24 Jun 2019.

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URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH
2019, VOL. 37, NO. 3, 324–337
https://doi.org/10.1080/08111146.2019.1626710

Regionalism and Resilience? Meeting Urban Challenges in Pacific

Island States
Meg Keena and John Connellb
a
Department of Pacific Affairs, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia; bSchool of Geosciences,
University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

Urbanisation in PICs is rapid. Urban planning and management capacity Received 30 April 2018
are limited. Economic and environmental pressures are mounting and Accepted 7 May 2019
eroding urban resilience and livelihoods. Because urban planning and KEYWORDS
regulatory frameworks are weak, national politics and elite interests Pacific; urbanisation; policy;
strongly influence urban development, and inequities in cities are grow- regionalism; sustainable
ing. No regional organisation has responsibility for urban issues, urban cities; island states;
resilience frameworks are poorly defined, so fragmented and ineffective resilience
urban strategies persist, while national policies and practices are reso-
lutely anti-urban. Concerted regional action could enable sharing of
knowledge and successful strategies, coordinate urban action to build
resilience, and enable a more proactive political and policy agendas for
more sustainable and resilient cities.

PIC的城市化迅速，而城市规划和管理能力有限。经济和环境压力骤
增，侵蚀了城市的承受力和生计。由于城市规划和规管框架薄弱，国
家政治和精英利益严重影响城市发展，城市地区的不平等正在上升。
没有任何区域性组织负责城市问题，城市承受力框架界定不明确，城
市政策一直处于碎片化和无效的状态中，而国家政策和实践始终对城
市不利。区域性联合行动能够分享知识和成功的策略，协调城市行
动，提高城市承受力，并促成较为主动的政治和政策日程，建设更加
可持续和具有更高承受力的城市。

1. Introduction
Pacific island countries (PICs) are in the midst of a substantial urban transition, with rates of
population growth at globally high levels, in some cities exceeding 4 per cent per annum (Table 1).
In the most rapidly growing capital cities in the Pacific – Honiara (Solomon Islands) and Port Vila
(Vanuatu) – urban populations are currently set to double in the next 15 to 20 years, further
overwhelming already inadequate infrastructure, services and employment opportunities. Pacific
cities are connective hubs within these countries, and with the rest of the world. Their capitals are
primate cities, housing government, commercial, transport and communication facilities, essential
to national and regional economic growth and functionality.
There has been scant attention by Pacific regional agencies to the implications of pervasive,
rapid and problematic urbanisation across the Pacific islands region (Figure 1) and whether
concerted regional action could reshape urban development. A few attempts have been made to
enable regional coordination on urban issues to boost development benefits, such as through the
Pacific Urban Forum (UN-Habitat and CLGF 2015), but none have gained political and policy

CONTACT John Connell john.connell@sydney.edu.au University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

© 2019 Editorial Board, Urban Policy and Research
 URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH 325

Table 1. Urban population and growth rates based on last census.

Country Population (at last census) Urban Population at last census (%) Urban Growth Rate (%)
Melanesia
Fiji 837,271 51 1.5
PNG 7,059,653 13 2.8
Solomon Islands 515,870 20 4.7
Vanuatu 234,023 24 3.5
Micronesia
FSM 102,843 22 −2.2
Kiribati 109,693 57 2.1
Marshall Islands 53,158 74 1.4
Nauru 10,084 100 1.8
Palau 17,661 78 −1.0
Polynesia
Samoa 187,820 20 −0.3
Tonga 103,252 23 2.4
Tuvalu 10,782 57 3.1
Source: The data presented are from the SPC Pacific Islands Population Database and are based on the last census information.
Accessed 4 November 2018 at: https://sdd.spc.int/en/stats-by-topic/population-statistics. Note: In some cases census date can
be up to 10 years old, so numbers and percentages are only indicative. PNG’s population is now well over 8 million. In PNG
and Solomon Islands, government estimates put urban populations as a proportion of the total population rather higher
because of continuing in-migration and urban growth after the census period. Designations of urban boundaries vary, with
“urban” growth happening in nominally rural areas in several PICs, and commuting becoming increasingly significant. In all
cases, therefore, percentages are likely to be underestimates of urbanisation.

Figure 1. Pacific Island Countries.

traction. This paper outlines the urban challenges facing Pacific island cities, assesses the value of
an urban resilience framing to advance action, and considers whether local and national devel-
opment initiatives would benefit from stronger regional support consistent with the key principles
of urban resilience, thus far largely absent.
The drivers of rapid urban growth in the region are continued rural-urban migration and high
fertility rates that contribute to social and physical pressures on urban and peri-urban
326 M. KEEN AND J. CONNELL

environments and have persisted throughout this century (Connell and Lea 2002, Connell 2011).
People migrate in search of jobs, services and modernity: moving from rural areas as land
pressures escalate, education and other services fall short of needs, and sources of income are
too few, especially in the archipelagic nations as Kiribati and Tuvalu. Rural shortcomings have
been disincentives to return migration, even where urban livelihoods are precarious (Petrou and
Connell 2017, McDougall 2017, Kolshus 2018). Most PICs have a significant rural subsistence
economy, so youth especially move to cities in search of advancement and access to technology,
consumer goods and different social worlds. Environmental hazards have increasingly become
another catalyst of migration. As people move into the cities, infrastructure, housing and employ-
ment have all proven inadequate to meet demand, increasing urban vulnerability (Trundle and
McEvoy 2015, 2016). Consequently, Pacific cities are largely unsustainable and unmanaged; the
planning that occurs often serves narrow political and business interests through elite capture
(Foukona 2015, Connell, 2003).
One implication of both political and policy neglect, and of biases in the policies and practices
that do exist, is a growing urbanisation of poverty. An increasing number of urban residents are
marginalised, unemployed and living in informal settlements. Most settlements have inadequate
basic services such as water, sanitation, electricity, waste collection, drainage and roads (World
Bank 2015). Public and recreational spaces are rare. Unemployment remains high, especially
among youth, which has bred tensions and resentment, with socio-economic inequalities and
uneven development becoming more evident. As Connell noted in his seminal article on Pacific
urbanisation, the urban transformation of the Pacific Islands, and the concomitant problems that
have emerged, remain the very large “elephant in the room”, neglected but growing steadily for
decades (2011).
The result is uneven and missed development opportunities, national economic costs and
inadequate urban livelihoods. Improving performance will require that urban planning is better
integrated with national development strategies, alongside a more systemic approach which is
inclusive, multi-sectoral and multi-jurisdictional. Infrastructure and governance arrangements
need to reach beyond the cities and create backward linkages to rural areas that feed the city
and provide inputs to economic activities and livelihoods, with forward linkages to global export
markets. With limited local resources, a strong case for regional support exists, if urban resilience
is to be enhanced.
The State of Pacific Regionalism Report 2017 (PIFS 2017a) recognised that urbanisation, uneven
development, unemployment and access to scarce land are shared and interrelated socio-
economic pressures across the region. If left unmanaged, they have the potential to spark social
tensions and conflict, most evident in the Solomon Islands tensions (1998–2003) where a key
driver of violence was distributional issues affecting access to land and employment opportunities
in and around Honiara. More generally in New Caledonia, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu: “A
unifying factor from each of the Melanesian examples is in continuing conflict over resources and
the problems of social dislocation, lingering grievances that undermine attempts at sustainable
urban governance” (Storey 2003, p. 274). These multi-sectoral and jurisdictional urban grievances
were reflected in the urban riots in Tonga in 2006 and the 2018 urban protests in Port Moresby
over the evictions of squatters from Paga Hill for high-end accommodation and a modern urban
look for visitors attending the Papua New Guinea (PNG)-hosted 2018 APEC meeting.
Symposiums in the Pacific Islands on urban development, in preparation for the 2019 Pacific
Urban Forum, have highlighted the need to deal with unresolved urban social and governance
issues, with a focus on the key issues of: social equity, governance, resilience and economic
development, all of which cut across local-national-regional jurisdictions and sectors (CLGF 2018,
Keen and Bryar 2018).
Biophysical changes have accentuated social pressures in Pacific cities. Intensification of
climate change impacts increases urban challenges and the urgency for action. Pacific island
cities sit at the confluence of pervasive and concerning global environmental and climate
 URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH 327

change pressures: their low-lying, coastal locations coupled with poor drainage and densely
populated land areas, make them highly vulnerable to extreme climatic events, notably floods
and cyclones. As migration has risen and urban land become more crowded, “coastal squeeze”
problems have worsened. Newer migrants in settlements in marginal areas are most at risk, for
example alongside the Mataniko river in Honiara, in low-lying Ba and Nadi in Fiji (Brown
et al. 2017), and in the city centres of atoll states, like Kiribati (Storey and Hunter 2010), each
flooded in this century. Future urban food security is becoming a concern as coastal city land
and ocean environments are degraded. With the exception of PNG, where several large towns
are inland, these problems are shared throughout the region, with different degrees of intensity
and urgency.
The regional nature of urban impacts is not all negative. Pacific cities contribute significantly to
national and regional economic growth as transport, financial, telecommunication and business
hubs. However, benefits have been spread unevenly and externalities (unpriced social and
ecological costs) are high. If not the crucibles of nationhood that were once hoped for, towns
and cities are centres for processing plants, retail services and small import substitution industries,
though industrial estates have largely failed. Formal employment remains limited and strongly
concentrated in the public sector. The informal sector is dominant; in Solomon Islands it accounts
for 85 per cent of employment (ILO 2017, p. 4), but the sector is largely unsupported, and often
challenged by vested urban political and economic interests. Smaller capital cities, like Funafuti
(Tuvalu) and Majuro (Marshall Islands), are now centres of bureaucracy and administration as
much as economic activity.
Significant variations occur across the PICs. Melanesian towns and cities (i.e. Honiara, Port
Moresby, Port Vila and Suva), and some microstate cities, such as South Tarawa (Kiribati), are
growing fast, unrelieved by significant international migration opportunities, whereas Polynesian
and Micronesian cities are smaller and growing more slowly largely because of international
migration to distant metropoles with which they have special relations. Despite the diversity of the
12 independent PICs, they share more characteristics than differences: all Pacific cities have
service and employment shortfalls, significant environmental degradation, and high rates of rural-
urban migration, non-communicable diseases and crime. Despite existing and emerging trends
and similarities, regional agencies such as the Pacific Island Forum Secretariat (PIFS), the Pacific
Community (SPC) and the Secretariat for the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP)
(with rare exceptions elaborated below), have given little attention to urbanisation and to regional
opportunities for coordinated action, nor have PICs been able to collaborate on urban policies and
programmes. This paper examines the regional dimensions of urbanisation in PICs, assesses the
value of applying an urban resilience framing to the analysis of urban challenges, and considers
how regional agencies could leverage their power and knowledge-brokering capabilities to elevate
urban issues on policy agendas and make gains for collaborative action. Addressing urban
challenges and vulnerability will require community, local and national government action across
sectors, and benefit from systems analysis, sharing experiences and strategies, and supportive
regional institutional arrangements. This paper is less a call to add another issue to the regional
agenda, but rather to recognise that rapid urbanisation sits at the nexus of many of the current
issues on that regional agenda and without greater attention can undermine development
progress.

2. Urban Resilience: Taking a Systems Approach

The Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilient Cities Program (2015) defined resilience as “the
capacity of individuals, communities and systems to survive, adapt, and grow in the face of stress
and shocks, and even transform when conditions require it.” Underlying this definition is an
acknowledgement that achieving resilience, especially in the urban context requires the integra-
tion of social, ecological and economic systems; is adaptive across scales and time, addresses
328 M. KEEN AND J. CONNELL

equity, and when necessary is transformative. True to sustainability approaches, the principle of
subsidiarity applies, that action is best taken at the lowest scale possible. However, the multi-scalar
nature of urbanisation drivers and impacts suggests that higher order framing and action will
complement and strengthen lower level actions through the integration of efforts. Increasingly
urban issues are being seen as more than a “local problem” with recognition that a “systems
approach” is needed that moves beyond the physical and takes account of the political economy of
urbanisation (Bai et al. 2016, Béné et al. 2018). Urban resilience provides a framework in which to
conceptualise and act on urban issues.
The challenge in PICs, and globally, in applying urban resilience in practice has been the lack
of conceptual clarity. Resilience, drawing on its origins in the disciplines of ecology, engineering
and psychology, often describes the ability to resist change, to stabilise the existing system, or to
bounce back to the original state. In the urban context, there are times when resistance and
persistence have value, for example for food and water security, but these characteristics are not
always desirable in socio-political contexts because resistance to change can create urban instabil-
ity and vulnerability. As indicated earlier with respect to social tensions, the status quo can be
socially unjust, driven by elite interests, and environmentally unsustainable, as in exclusive urban
land allocation and property rights arrangements in PICs (Foukona and Allen 2017, McDonnell
2017, Trundle 2018).
Approaches to enhance urban resilience are often system reinforcing and based in “formal
system solutions”, characteristically hierarchical, rigid and top down. They are frequently derived
from plans and policies driven by global and elite stakeholders who arguably have other values
and motivations than those of the people and communities most in need, many of whom live in
informal or squatter settlements (Keen and Jones in press). A key element of effective socially-
orientated resilience thinking is recognition that urban resilience policy and agendas are political
and can affect equity and the rights of local people (Bahadur 2016). Operationalising urban
resilience in the Pacific context must take account of who is involved in urban decision-making
and who allocates resources for urban development. The key questions of “resilience for whom?”
as well as “resilience of what” can reveal the hidden human and political dimensions of policies
aimed at achieving resilience, and how different types of institutional arrangements, such as
planning processes, land allocation systems and service provision, affect cities and sustainable
development.
We situate our analysis within this resilience framework that is cognisant of the interplay
between social, political, economic and ecological systems, and the important role of agency. This
framing is consistent with the new narrative currently driving action at the regional level, the
“Blue Pacific” (PIFS 2017b). It calls for inspired leadership, inclusive development and a regional
policy commitment to collaborate and act as one “Blue Continent” when dealing with regional
issues that connect and empower countries, and focus on critical coastal, climate and ocean
environments. That urban problems are most intense at the coastal and densely populated
margins of PICs, and are exacerbated through climate change, indicates the value of conceptualis-
ing these towns and cities as “blue (coastal) cities” where similar problems might benefit from
complementary approaches and solutions. We explore below the regional dimensions of Pacific
urbanisation, consider how a “blue city” and resilience framing might fit within a regional agenda,
and argue that urbanisation would benefit from more regional attention to elevate it on the policy
and political agenda, enabling shared benefits from concerted action across the region. The paper
calls for a stronger recognition of the transformative and system aspects of urban resilience, and
argues that these are strengthened by a more systemic approach that better incorporates regional
action.
 URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH 329

3. The Pacific Islands Urban Transition and the Urban Agenda

The regional dimensions of rapid urban development in the Pacific Islands and the implications
for human, social and ecological resilience have been intermittently considered in this century. In
the 1990s, the forward looking Pacific 2010 series called for better management of rapidly growing
and largely unregulated Pacific Island cities and their peri-urban areas, noting that coordination of
urban management policies was conspicuous by its absence. The Pacific 2010 report identified
both the similar challenges that Melanesian cities were facing and the lack of collaboration
between cities and countries (Connell and Lea 1993). Similar conclusions and pleas for attention
to urban issues arose even before independence in most PICs but were rarely acted upon. These
reports and academic literature have held little policy sway because political attention was focused
on the more populated rural areas which have stronger political representation and cultural
importance; donors, like governments, shied away from urban agendas and investment, not
wanting to encourage growing rural-urban migration and informal settlements (ADB 2016,
Barbara and Keen 2017, Mecartney and Connell 2017).
When ad hoc investments occurred in cities, they were, and continue to be, poorly linked to
other aspects of regional development. For example, urban transport systems are poorly integrated
with regional ones, upgrades to urban food markets rarely address urban-rural value chains that
are critical to urban food security, and urban water and electricity supply systems fail to service
rapidly growing peri-urban areas, adding to regional tensions about urban externalities. Raising
public awareness of the advantages of strong urban centres and ensuring multi-sectoral and spatial
linkages exist require coordinated interventions at the national and regional level where policies
are set, and donors engaged – to date these have been lacking from urban initiatives in the Pacific
islands. This neglect is partially a product of who is setting the urban agenda, which is largely
urban elites with vested interests as noted above with respect to urban property rights, planning
and policy, and donors with externally set agendas. The latter is particularly important in this
region, with a high per capita aid ratio, and where urban development is driven often by aid.
Community engagement and contextual urban policy-making and planning are often neglected in
the rush to secure and deliver aid despite the lack of, or misfit with, national strategic plans,
compromising the ownership and content of strategies (Overton et al. 2019).
Weak economies and institutional arrangements coupled with limited resources undermine
a systemic approach to urban planning that better deals with linkages between urbanisation,
environmental change and vulnerability; one means of overcoming these challenges would involve
better regional cooperation in support of local and national efforts (Cocklin and Keen 2000).
Growing pressures on urban environments in the region and resulting institutional deficits
indicate the value of linking local to global action to re-enforce strengths within communities,
enhance urban governance and leverage the convening power of regional and global agencies
(Storey 2005).
Multilateral agencies, including UNDP (1996) and the United National Economic and Social
Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP 2004), have sporadically turned their attention
to urban transitions in the Pacific Islands from the end of the last century and through the 2000s
and have highlighted the challenges, as well as the value of a regional policy agenda on urbanisa-
tion issues. The World Bank (2000) recognising the value of multi-jurisdictional convening power,
argued for national and regional urban summits to facilitate exchanges in support of a collective
approach to urban issues. Consistent with urban resilience approaches which emphasise social
learning, integration and transformation, these summits were intended to be an opportunity for
policymakers and practitioners to share experiences and approaches of relevance to government
and non-government actors engaged in urban spaces in support of adaptation and change, as
occurs in other sectors such as health and agriculture. Summits could also lay the foundations of
regionally tailored monitoring and evaluation systems to assess urban progress across the region
and contribute to critical reflection.
330 M. KEEN AND J. CONNELL

The first Pacific Regional Workshop on Urban Management was held in Nadi in 2003, funded
by UNESCAP and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), but responded to external agendas and
failed to address crucial issues related to the political economy of cities, such as urban resilience
for whom, for what, and by whom? Participants supported the concept of a Pacific Urban Agenda
and made a commitment to encourage leaders to include urbanisation in the Pacific Plan, the
regional action strategy at the time. However, when leaders later came to consider action items for
the Pacific Plan, urban issues were not identified as a priority – the analysis did not have local
ownership or resonance. In 2007 a second urban summit was held, from which emerged an Urban
Regional Action Framework (UNESCAP 2007), but urban issues still failed to gain traction with
Pacific Island leaders – nearly all from rural constituencies. Another forum was held in 2011 and
finally one in 2015, but tangible outcomes have been few (Kiddle et al. 2017).
Inaction on urban issues has been a function of three overriding factors; firstly, most countries
had no great interest in developing urban strategies where these might ameliorate urban condi-
tions and contribute to more rural-urban migration: migrants were to be discouraged rather than
encouraged (Koczberski et al. 2001). Secondly, no regional organisation focused on urban issues,
unlike the focus that regional technical agencies such as the Secretariat for the Pacific Regional
Environment Program (SPREP) and the South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission (SOPAC)
brought to bear on environmental and conservation issues, or that the Pacific Community (SPC)
and the Forum Fisheries Agency brought to health and fisheries. Urbanisation simply had no
champion to bring together or enthuse regional agencies or national leaders to consider housing,
infrastructure and social policies. Thirdly, to deal with urban issues Pacific nations had to establish
urban authorities but these were seen as a direct challenge and threat to the powers and finances
of national politicians who lived (usually rather well) in these cities, and were thus not well
resourced or given adequate authority. National agencies, such as lands departments, were also
unwilling to devolve responsibilities or expertise to local authorities. Put simply the lessons of
history and resilience thinking were ignored – there was little attention to political economy,
inclusive processes of policy development, and the transformation of inequitable or unsustainable
urban arrangements.
The 2015 Pacific Urban Forum was organised by UN-Habitat and the Commonwealth Local
Government Forum, and once again largely externally driven. However, this time round the
Forum acknowledged that dominant top-down urban management models dealt poorly with
indigenous concerns that saw cities as places of exclusion due to colonial land alienation,
unaffordable housing, costly services and scarce jobs. This mirrors other policy areas in PICs
that are also characterised by heavily top-down processes predominantly controlled by political
elites and external (often donor) interests, leaving civil society as the neglected element (Aiafi
2016). These exclusions raise questions about “urban resilience for whom?” and how urban rights
are conceptualised in countries and cities where land tenure and the colonial alienation of urban
land for cities often create fixed, but contested, boundaries with limited space for newcomers,
spawning social discontent. Models exist both within and outside the Pacific for participatory
urban development, but to date supportive institutional frameworks and political dialogues have
failed to generate change or transformation in the face of powerful interests supporting the status
quo. Urban resilience thinking in the Pacific has not engaged with important processes and issues
of urban transformation.
Despite political leaders endorsing the Pacific Urban Agendas and regional agencies like UN-
Habitat, the Commonwealth Local Government Association and UNESCAP facilitating the
processes, no Pacific Urban Agenda has ever been formalised and implemented, and no agency
tasked to implement it. Consequently, urban development has only received fleeting mention in
subsequent regional declarations and strategies, for example the Waiheke Declaration to bolster
economic development (2011), the Palau Oceans declaration (2014), the Framework for Resilient
Development in the Pacific (2017), the State of Pacific Regionalism 2017 report (PIFS 2017a) and
the ongoing Pacific Roadmap for Sustainable Development. While the PIFS has clear priorities for
 URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH 331

regional action, urbanisation is not one of them. However, issues given priority, such as fisheries,
climate change, business facilitation and health, are all significantly affected by urban population
growth and urban infrastructure, hence an opportunity to adapt a systemic approach and
accommodate this cross-cutting issue that is having a huge effect on the current development
agenda is lost, and vulnerabilities in cities are growing.
A fundamental challenge therefore remains that of securing political traction and system
responsiveness. Leveraging adaptation and transformation in support of urban resilience requires
a stronger engagement with the political economy that shapes the urban agenda. Most leaders
were, and remain, under little pressure to act since few represent urban electorates, other than in
Fiji where more than half the population live in urban areas and there is some evidence that the
last national election was influenced by urban issues (Lal 2014, Phillips and Keen 2016). The
widespread inability to develop effective urban policies is a function of several factors, under-
pinned by a “shallow urban politics”, arising from low political representation of urban voters
(Barbara and Keen 2017), and large and growing informal settlements that lack political voice and
legal recognition (Foukona 2015, Asian Development Bank 2016). In Kiribati, just six of 45
members of parliament represent the more than 50 per cent of the population living in urban
South Tarawa and a similar situation exists in Vanuatu (Butcher-Gollach 2018).
While the 2015 Pacific Urban Forum seemed consistent with an integrated approach to
building urban resilience and sought to “harness the strong positive correlation between economic
growth and urbanisation”, governments are effectively slowing the rapid growth of cities through
neglect and turning a blind eye to the rapidly growing informal settlements. Most dominant in the
region are policies to decentralise development and boost regional growth, with little attention to
rural-urban linkages. Moreover, “harnessing economic growth” is usually done for the benefit of
a few, where political intervention in decision-making is almost inescapable (Talbot and Ronnie
2007, McDonnell 2017). In practice rural and regional development advances have only occurred
sporadically, and barely at all in the atoll states, so migration has not declined.
Urban planning, even land use planning, is largely absent, and unregulated urban expansion
has increased the costs of urbanisation, especially for infrastructure provision which occurs mostly
after land is occupied. Policies that once had some ephemeral success have been overwhelmed by
rapid changes, especially urban population increases, bureaucratic inefficiency and land shortages,
as in Kiribati, Samoa and Solomon Islands (Jones and Lea 2007, Storey and Hunter 2010, Keen
et al. 2017). Few effective housing policies exist, and state housing is undeveloped and beyond the
reach of the poor, so that people have had little option but to provide for themselves, often settling
illegally on land. Class formation has emerged even in ethnically diverse Melanesian cities
(Gewertz and Errington 1999). People are effectively urbanizing and segregating areas of towns
themselves, in the face of formal intransigence and neglect; rather than system management,
urban system fragmentation is occurring. National attempts to manage urban development
continue to be disappointing, because of policy gaps, scarce capital and expertise, conflict with
national authorities (for capital and primacy) leading to opposition rather than collaboration, and
regional agencies offering little guidance or support.
In cities, and between cities and regions, social divisions and economic competition and
conflict need mitigation and mediation mechanisms to facilitate adaptation and, when necessary,
transformation. The increased uneven development and complexity of urbanisation, from urban
villages and settlements to modern suburbia, and from gated communities to high-rise apartments
has brought issues of social and economic exclusion to the fore. Shared experiences and challenges
across the region could well benefit from greater opportunities for regional analysis and problem
solving. As in other cross-cutting issues such as gender, coastal resource management and climate
change, proactive agenda setting at the regional level can shape action at the national and local
levels, and reveal narrow system biases and neglect where strictly local processes fail.
In 2016, the UN “New Urban Agenda” was launched at Habitat III and, coupled with the
Sustainable Development Goal (SDG 11) on Sustainable Communities and Cities, it creates
332 M. KEEN AND J. CONNELL

opportunities to re-visit the role of urban resilience and Pacific regionalism in managing mount-
ing urban pressures. Its focus on social inclusion, urban prosperity and sustainable development
fits comfortably with the challenges and opportunities outlined in the Pacific Urban Agenda –
social equity, resilience, governance and urban economic development. What is still missing is
a clear regional champion to advance the urban case, translate positive words into meaningful and
needed action on the ground, link grand international goals with established urban development
needs in the region, and translate global goals into effective local action with strong community
engagement. Also missing is feedback in the system based on rigorous monitoring, evaluation and
learning, to inform urban development and political dialogue.

4. Creating Responsive Urban Systems

Rapid urbanisation has generated a legacy of problems for future urban and regional govern-
ments. Cities have ecological footprints that reach far beyond their boundaries, but impacts are
often unmonitored and unmanaged (Rees 1992). In Pacific island countries this is particularly
pronounced in the impact of urban growth on food and water security, and on land in peri-urban
areas outside urban boundaries. Thus, in Solomon Islands coastal fisheries surrounding the capital
of Honiara are being rapidly degraded as demand for fish by urban dwellers rises (Brewer 2011),
an effect that also occurs around smaller urban centres but is rarely well monitored over space and
time (Aswani and Sabatian 2009). Pressure on water resources is particularly critical in the context
of climate change and urban expansion, and yet here too rigorous monitoring of extraction,
contamination and sustainability across the full range of urban water supplies remains weak,
particularly for ground water (Connell 2013).
Improving the responsiveness and resilience of urban systems requires more inclusive and
participatory management. In Honiara and Suva, new approaches to supplying urban water
services to informal communities are being piloted to reduce urban vulnerability and leverage
cultural and community governance networks where government ones are failing (Gooden
2017; Phillips and Keen 2016). The approach draws on African experiences with broader
applicability, including provisions for water supply to squatter settlements via advanced
payments, agreements with traditional landowners, and community-organised payment
mechanisms. Key lessons from recent water supply initiatives are that steps need to be taken
to tailor arrangements to the limited resources of clients, convey clear community messages on
why water charges are necessary, and work with communities and non-state actors to build
relationships of trust and understanding between service providers and urban residents. It thus
constitutes one particular example of how issues of urbanisation must be considered across
sectors, social groups and scales, and how positive developments might be shared internation-
ally and regionally.
The social consequences of large urban ecological footprints and degrading ecosystem services within
and around cities are magnified by social inequalities and inequities. In many Pacific cities urban poverty
rates exceed national rates (ADB 2013). Security for most urban dwellers depends on kin and commu-
nity relationships that provide social networks in times of need, but these social relationships are
becoming weaker as second and third generation urban dwellers form new networks, and traditional
ones become harder to maintain (Monsell-Davis 1993, Numbasa and Koczberski 2012). Increasing
numbers live in urban settlements, often with insecure land tenure and a mixed ethnic composition,
most evident in Port Moresby, where about 50 per cent of urban residents reside in informal settlements
(Jones 2012). Insecure land tenure adversely affects local adaptive capacity and increases vulnerability to
climate change (McEvoy et al. in press). Urban residential areas are also spilling onto customary land in
peri-urban and rural areas where urban planning regulations have little reach or relevance. Adapting
urban planning to the reality of Pacific contexts requires urgent attention, yet no forums exist where
planners and policy-makers can meet to exchange ideas and innovate. The status quo is being main-
tained, although the system is socially and ecologically unsustainable.
 URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH 333

Urban planning responses to environmental vulnerability, rapid urban growth and rising social
tensions remain dominantly reactive. The rise of urban poverty, informal settlements and the informal
economy has been marked by stepping up controls, rather than by positive welfare and employment
policies, rural development strategies, and flexible labour markets. Illegal settlements are bulldozed,
illegal markets removed, and basic services such as water and sanitation denied to informal settlements:
continued repressions of the poor and marginalised in anti-urban policies, where residents are forced
out of urban areas, rather than supported. In Pacific cities, local governments and national agencies with
responsibility for urban areas are in a continual “catch up” cycle with few resources available for
proactive activities, hence the need for better synergies between local and national planning, and regional
expertise and assistance, again becomes evident and necessary.

5. Building Resilience: A Role for Regionalism?

Global experience suggests that better access to place-based and experiential information can yield
insights into opportunities for co-benefits and synergies. For example, action on climate change in
cities can yield important urban policy gains across several sectors (Puppim de Oliveira and Doll
2017). More efficient urban public transport and electricity generation can reduce national energy
demand, and water and sanitation service provision to urban squatter settlements reduces disease
and strain on public health systems as well as expanding the client and revenue base of the water
authority. Better urban waste management not only reduces public health problems, but can
generate employment and even resources for industrial and agricultural inputs. Such examples
apply across urban jurisdictions with minimal adaptation. Regional agencies that can create and
broker knowledge about co-benefits of urban investments could shape both national policy and
regional donor engagement, potentially opening up more windows of opportunity for sustainable
urban development.
In some areas of urban management regional action and agencies overlap, evident in the face of
increasingly severe climate events impacting on cities with inadequate infrastructure, drainage and
disaster preparedness. Four major cyclones have devastated parts of the region in the past three
years; towns, and especially settlements, are rarely cyclone proof. Similarities across countries are
evident, and regional endeavours and support have the greatest prospects of success, in urban
environmental management, the mitigation of climate change and thus urban resilience. Regional
responses to urban hazard mitigation and recovery are invaluable, and the strategies and out-
comes are similar. Rigorous hazard and vulnerability analyses are keys to generating stronger
system feedbacks and better prioritised investment, including setting building and infrastructure
standards and preserving ecosystem functions to enable greater urban resilience in the face of
climate change. The critical challenge is setting in place, through adaptation or transformation,
the political and institutional arrangements to deliver outcomes. Calls for a systems and integrated
approach to urban planning, inclusive and participatory processes, and capacity development
require critical reflection on the nature and politics of urban resilience. They also call for a politics
of positive regional support without invasive intervention, where regional agencies could play
a role in generating arguments and options for change, and support capacity development.
The need for a multi-scalar, systems approach constitutes the rationale behind the push for the
new UN Sustainable Development Goal on Sustainable Cities (SDG 11) and the UN-Habitat New
Urban Agenda. These initiatives concern setting an urban agenda, leveraging regional agency
“convening power” and resources, and developing platforms to share experiences. The unique
circumstances of the PICs and their “blue cities” require outcomes from such global forums to be
translated into meaningful regional actions and targets. Regional agencies, such as the SPC and
SPREP, have a role to play in this translation process, through drawing attention to the relation-
ships and linkages affecting urban development through their national networks. This work could
guide, and be supported by, the region’s development partners, none of whom have been closely
involved in implementing the Pacific Urban Agenda.
334 M. KEEN AND J. CONNELL

Recent developments suggest that the PIFS has started to take a lead on a regional approach to
urbanisation, recognising that urbanisation issues have long been neglected nationally and
regionally, and that important policy advocacy undertaken at an Asia-Pacific and global level
should be shared with Pacific governments. The Framework for Resilient Development in the
Pacific (SPC 2017) has useful parallels, analogies and relationships to urbanisation, but a regional
agency with a genuine focus on urbanisation is still lacking (Keen and Bryar 2018). Nonetheless, it
remains unclear whether regional agencies can, and will, provide useful leadership on urban
issues, and whether work at the regional level can influence practice at the national and local
levels. Successful regional approaches to such diverse themes as gender, climate change and
fisheries, suggest the potential, and offer a model, for reshaping approaches to urban issues.

6. Conclusions
Although urbanisation in the Pacific has been problematic, it has largely escaped effective policy
formation and practice. That has contributed to cities becoming and remaining places of uncoor-
dinated and uncontrolled expansion, with high levels of poverty, rising inequality, social tensions
and occasional violence. This has imposed social costs and reduced options for economic devel-
opment, and resulted in policies that oppose urbanisation rather than manage it more effectively.
Informal settlements, markets and employment are often stigmatised and denied basic services
despite their growing prevalence. Progress is also limited because regional support and regional
cooperation have been lacking and PICs have been unable to take advantage of, and share,
effective regional approaches in contexts where local expertise and urban policy champions are
thinly spread.
Population growth and rural-urban migration have raised challenges, especially in Melanesia
and the atoll states without neo-colonial political relationships that enable labour migration. For
the elites, in politics, the bureaucracy or the private sector, urban life has proved successful. For
those without incomes, or the education to acquire formal employment or appropriate connec-
tions, and residents in overcrowded informal housing without services and the income to obtain
them, urban life can be risky and unsatisfying. Pacific cities and towns are currently far from
models of economic and social resilience, rather they are increasingly contested spaces of uneven
development.
Given the problems of employment generation, service provision and environmental manage-
ment in urban areas, it is unsurprising that the former United Nations Secretary-General, Ban Ki-
moon, argued that: “Our struggle for global sustainability will be lost or won in the cities”. That is
particularly true in the Pacific where urban places face double exposure to globalisation and
climate change. A more systemic and multi-scalar approach to building urban resilience would
enable greater attention to cultural norms, political agency and access to services and resources.
Linkages between issues within the functioning urban system would also benefit from a more
integrated policy approach, for example, climate change strategies concurrently addressed with
other concerns and priorities such as economic development, housing and health. Recognition
that connectivity supports urban, and national resilience could be a strong mobilising catalyst for
Pacific towns and cities to explore and share their experiences and potentially shared solutions.
Difficulties exist within a lingering political antipathy to cities, but shared circumstances bind the
blue cities of the Pacific together, and indicate why regional support and intervention for urban
planning in small island states is invaluable, and increasingly crucial.
Regional interventions that have been valuable elsewhere offer possibilities for progress and the
strengthening of national capacity in policy formation and implementation. A range of problems
face urban planners, and the consequences of continued inaction and/or imbalanced policies are
considerable. Real possibilities exist for developing and sharing policies, for example on water
policy, waste disposal and recycling, housing policy, infrastructure provision and cost recovery, all
of which require coordinated rather than fragmented provision across sectors, analogous to
 URBAN POLICY AND RESEARCH 335

increasingly important flood risk management (World Bank 2017). However, policy directions
shaped by external players, many who may have values and motivations different from, and less
relevant to, those living in PICs, highlight the importance of the region itself setting the urban
agenda, especially given the distinctiveness of Pacific urbanisation contexts.
Urban resilience frameworks provide both opportunities and challenges for realigning policy
and programming approaches across sectors and scales in the Pacific islands (Jones and Sanderson
2017). Pacific cities are ecosystems and social systems under pressure. A resilience framework fits
comfortably into the PIFS integrative Blue Pacific approach when dealing with the confluence of
urban, climate and ocean issues. Recent efforts, still tentative, from PIFS to advance a regional
approach to urbanisation are timely and welcome. If able to better identify risks, initiate planning
and establish priorities, this will contribute to reducing the problems of double exposure to rapid
urbanisation and climate change. Difficult tasks remain, including addressing the political econ-
omy of urban land management, recognising transitional urban cultures, and challenging elite
capture of urban planning processes, but an urban resilience framing underpinned by strategic
conversations is invaluable.
Global and regional networks can expand options and support policy innovation, but the
Pacific also has insights to offer the international community. It could play a greater role in
shaping regional and international urban agendas, as it has done for climate change and ocean
governance. The Regional Sustainable Development Report 2018 and the ESCAP Asia-Pacific
Sustainable Cities report, intended for 2019, could all be vehicles for projecting a Pacific perspec-
tive on urban resilience, as well as starting a critical reflection process on current trends in small
island states. In a region where the future is increasingly recognised as being urban, blue cities face
a range of threats and challenges. Committing more strongly, regionally and locally, to building
urban resilience creates pathways that can support urban adaptation, resilience and sustainability.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

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