Wealth of the Solomons : a history of trade, plantations and society, Solomon Islands, c.1800-1942

Abstract

BEFORE 1800 the Solomon Islands were visited rarely by Europeans. The few explorers had found little to attract them. In the early and mid-nineteenth century there was increasing contact by whalers who came to the Islands for food and refreshment. In most areas they received a welcome because Solomon Islanders knew from experiences within their homeland that trading could be beneficial. The whalers traded metal goods which, in some areas, altered the indigenous technology and, in turn, the economy and polity. Whalers found valuable supplies of tortoiseshell in the Solomons. By the 1860s and 1870s Sydney traders learned of this and came to the Islands to start regular trading. The industrial revolution and its consequences were increasing the demand for raw materials which the west could not produce in sufficient quantities. Consequently, the mid-1870s saw traders seeking, along with tortoiseshell, copra and other tropical produce. Increasing numbers of Solomon Islanders became more and more dependent on the manufactured goods of the Europeans. In the less-productive eastern Solomons, men offered themselves as labourers on overseas plantations in order to obtain such goods. Interest by Germany and France in the western Pacific was interpreted by Britain as a possible threat to her Australasian colonies so a Protectorate was declared by the British over the Solomons in 1893. A rudimentaryadministrationwas established in 1896 under C.M. Woodford. He wanted to convince Treasury of the economic viability of the Solomons (and thus his government), so he set about encouraging investment in the Islands. Trading alone could not return sufficient revenue; consequently, the development of commercial plantations had to be promoted. In time, Levers and Bums Philp became the leading planting companies. They, along with smaller concerns, found the government co-operative in obtaining land for their plantations and in pacifying the population. However, despite the indenture system they were never able to get the amount of labour they wanted. Although conditions on plantations were far from ideal the existing labour supply signed indentures because, for most of the men, this was the only way that they could get the trade goods they desired. In the western Solomons most people could produce copra or collect shell to sell and thus did not offer themselves for plantation work. Although they wanted to participate more in the new economy the socio-economic structures erected by the government and the European commercial firms confined the Islanders to being no more than small-scale producers and consumers. The only new institution which made any real effort to help the people was the Christian church, but what the various mission bodies did in education and health was often circumscribed by lack of resources and a limited vision of the future of the Melanesians. Pacification and the imposition of colonial law had robbed many societies of their leaders and destroyed aspects of traditional culture. In 1921-22 the government imposed a head tax on adult males, thus adding to the people's difficulties, especially in the eastern Solomons. They found that the government continued to maintain peace, but returned little else for the taxation. Underlying discontent with this and other aspects of the colonial order surfaced during the 1930s as the World Depression diminished the profits of the planters along with the wages and prices paid to Islanders as labourers and minor producers. The nature and expression of this discontent varied with the past experience of particular groups. In the west, where the standard of education and indigenous economic activity was highest, protest took ordered form in boycotts, assemblies and petitions, involving the mediation of white missionaries. In the east, where men, in economic terms, were merely labourers and had little formal western education, strikes and boycotts were also used, but, because of poor timing and organization, had small effect. The westerners won partial success, but in the east little was achieved. Some, in the east, turned to traditional religious forms for help and found consolation in the prophecy of the demise of Britain and the advent of a bountiful America. The war and contact by Islanders with sympathetic Americans intensified this long-standing discontent. Following the war, many groups of people were able to organize themselves in concerted protest against the colonial order on an unprecedented scale. Although the government ultimately contained this, it and other European-introduced institutions for the first time were forced to accommodate some of the demands of the Islanders on major political matters. Show more