Anna Dziedzic residence, and retaining their Pacific Islander identity.123 The Tongan diaspora was primarily responsible for promoting changes to permit dual citizenship, citing the personal “anguish” of having to relinquish Tongan citizenship as well as their desire to contribute to Tonga through economic and social investments.124 In addition to more recent post-independence migration of this kind, several Pacific polities suffered from forced and indentured labour during colonial times. Solomon Islands and Vanuatu peoples in particular were targeted by ‘blackbirding’ and taken, often involuntarily, to work on plantations in Fiji, Samoa and Queensland. In discussing legal changes to recognise dual citizenship, law-makers in Solomon Islands and Vanuatu specifically noted the desire to reintegrate people of Pacific birth or ancestry who lost their citizenship in this way.125 This emphasis on dual citizenship as a way to recognise Pacific Islanders living abroad might reflect particularly indigenous understandings of migration. Indigenous scholars have sought to displace western conceptions of migration as motivated only by individualistic economic concerns, and have developed theories of migration based on Indigenous conceptions of mobility, place and social connection. For example, Sa’iliemanu Lilomaiava-Doktor has shown how Samoan understandings of migration are not so much about moving from one place to another, but are deeply embedded in Indigenous conceptions of kinship and obligation to one’s land and family.126 It is impossible to generalise across the diverse peoples of Oceania, and Indigenous peoples of other states will have different understandings of migration and values associated with belonging, 127 but dual citizenship does appear to be one way to recognise in law distinctive Indigenous connections between individuals, place and community as well as the realities of globalisation. The trend towards dual citizenship might also reflect the changing dynamics of decolonisation. As noted above, most constitutions made upon independence prohibited or sought to avoid dual citizenship. Again, the specific concerns differed across different states, but common arguments in favour of prohibiting dual citizenship focused on the struggle against colonialism and the need for nation-building. At the time of independence, the status of nonIndigenous people living in the territory was a fraught issue. In Papua New Guinea, for example, debates over citizenship became a way to respond to racially discriminatory policies of Australian colonisers. Dual citizenship was seen as conferring additional benefits on an already privileged group of non-Indigenous people and contrary to constitution-maker’s goal of equalising economic and social rights of Indigenous Papua New Guineans.128 While these concerns may no longer be as pressing in some states, they continue to inform debates in those states that continue to prohibit dual citizenship. For example, the former President of the Federated States of Micronesia, John Haglelgam, advocated against 123 ibid 12. ‘Double Trouble? The Question of Dual Citizenship in Fiji’ (Stuck in Fiji M.U.D, 11 February 2008) <http://stuckinfijimud.blogspot.com/2008/02/double-trouble-question-of-dual.html>. 125 ‘Dual Citizenship Bill Awaits Further Debate’ Solomon Star News (13 November 2018) <https://www.solomonstarnews.com/index.php/news/national/item/21105-dual-citizenship-bill-awaits-furtherdebate>; ‘Vanuatu Government Defends Changing Constitution to Allow Dual Citizenship’ ABC News (11 February 2014) <https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-02-11/an-vanuatu-defends-dual-citizenshipchanges/5252122>. 126 Lilomaiava-Doktor (n 6). 127 See eg Rebecca Monson and George Hoa’au, ‘(Em)Placing Law: Migration, Belonging and Place in Solomon Islands’ in Fiona Jenkins, Mark Nolan and Kim Rubenstein (eds), Allegiance and Identity in a Globalised World (Cambridge University Press 2014); and chapters in Helen Lee and Steve Tupai Francis (eds), ‘Migration and Transnationalism: Pacific Perspectives’ (ANU E Press 2009). 128 Constitutional Planning Committee Papua New Guinea, ‘Constitutional Planning Committee Report’ (1974) ch 4. 124 24 RSCAS/GLOBALCIT-Comp 2020/1- © 2020 Author