Paper short abstract:

Bryant and Knight’s perspective on how future as imagined affects social relations and conditions at present, is used to discuss how a new referendum, though still only a rumour, already affect relationships and strategies in Tokelau and its diaspora.

Paper long abstract:

Tokelau, an atoll society in the Pacific, comprising about 1500 people, has since 1925 been in a political relationship with New Zealand. Coming under the New Zealand Administration of then Western Samoa, Tokelau has been on a path to an act of eventual self-determination since entering the UN list of decolonizing territories.

The first ever referendum on the atolls’ future political status was held in 2006, followed by another in 2007 (Hoëm 2015, Ickes 2009, Huntsman and Kalolo 2007). The referenda were occasions for intensive infrastructural investments, and lengthy consultation, with villagers and the diaspora. However, perceptions of the issues at stake, and particularly the consequences of the different alternatives on the table varied greatly.

The two referenda made visible both distance and complex entanglements between village and national political institutions, and between these and the public service. They also made old allegiances relevant in new ways, and re-awakened issues of mistrust between different communities and associations.

As the 100-year celebration of the relationship between New Zealand and the still “non-self-governing territory of Tokelau” is coming up in 2025, plans of a new referendum is emerging. I use Bryant and Knight’s perspective on how future as imagined affects social relations and conditions at present, to discuss how this new referendum, though still only a rumour, already affect relationships and strategies in Tokelau and its diaspora.