WP 2020/05 Self-Determination and Electoral Geography in New Caledonia: Political Stasis or Independence?
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Only six months after the first referendum on selfdetermination on 4 November 2018, New Caledonians were invited to vote in provincial elections on 12 May 2019. In the wake of a historic first referendum, which anti-independence parties won with 56.7 per cent against independence,1 and although the provincial electorate is not exactly the same as the referendum electorate, the provincial election constitutes the ultimate barometer before the final two referendums.This paper aims to reveal the electoral cartography of the provincial election in order to determine the probability of a change in the balance of power with the next two referendums, the first of which has been tentatively scheduled for 4 October 2020 after having been postponed due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
In June 2019 in Nouméa, the University of New Caledonia’s LARJE (Research Centre for Law and Economics) and the Australian National University’s Department of Pacific Affairs co-convened a PIPSA (Pacific Islands Political Studies Association) conference with the theme of ‘Democracy, Sovereignty and Self-Determination in the Pacific Islands’. This Working Paper is part of a PIPSA special series building on that theme.
