This memoir summarizes the current knowledge of New Caledonia’s geology, geodynamic evolution, and mineral resources, based on published and unpublished information. It comprises 10 research papers, each addressing a particular geological assemblage or topic. After an introductory chapter, and a review of the published geodynamic models of evolution of the SW Pacific, chapters 3 to 5 focus on the main geological assemblages of Grande Terre: the Pre-Late Cretaceous basement terranes, the Late Cretaceous to Eocene cover, and the Eocene subduction-obduction complex, one of the largest and best-preserved in the world. Chapter 6 is devoted to the Loyalty Islands and Ridge. Chapter 7 deals with the mostly terrestrial post-obduction units including regolith. Chapter 8 deals with palaeobiogeography and discuss plausible scenarios of biotic evolution. Chapters 9 and 10 provide an comprehensive review of New Caledonia’s mineral resources. The volume will interest stratigraphers, sedimentologists, marine geologists, palaeontologists, palaeogeographers, igneous and metamorphic petrologists, geochemists, geochronologists, and specialists in tectonics, geodynamic evolution, regolith, ophiolites, and economic geology.

New Caledonia is a French territory located in the South Pacific Ocean. It consists of a main island, known as Grande Terre, and several smaller islands. The population of New Caledonia is around 280,000, with the majority of the population living in the capital city of Noumea on Grande Terre. The official language is French, but the indigenous Kanak people also speak several indigenous languages. The economy of New Caledonia is largely dependent on the mining industry, specifically nickel production, which accounts for around 80% of the country’s export revenue. Tourism is also important, with visitors attracted to the country’s beautiful beaches, coral reefs, and unique cultural heritage. New Caledonia has a complex cultural and political history. It was originally inhabited by the Kanak people, who had their own distinct cultures and languages. The territory was then colonized by the French in the 19th century and used as a penal colony. In the 20th century, the decolonization movement led to a rise in Kanak nationalism and demands for independence. This resulted in a period of violence and conflict, known as the “Events” of the 1980s, which eventually led to the signing of the Noumea Accord in 1998. The accord provided for a gradual transfer of power from France to New Caledonia, with a referendum on independence planned for 2021. The political situation in New Caledonia remains contentious, with sharp divisions between those who support independence and those who wish to maintain ties with France.

In 1853, France annexed the Melanesian islands of New Caledonia to establish a convict colony and strategic port of call. Unlike other European settler–dominated countries in the Pacific, the territory’s indigenous people remained more numerous than immigrants for over a century. Despite military conquest, land dispossession, and epidemics, its thirty language groups survived on tribal reserves and nurtured customary traditions and identities. In addition, colonial segregation into the racial category of canaques helped them to find new unity. When neighboring anglophone colonies began to decolonize in the 1960s, France retained tight control of New Caledonia for its nickel reserves, reversing earlier policies that had granted greater autonomy for the islands. Anticolonial protest movements culminated in the 1980s Kanak revolt, after which two negotiated peace accords resulted in autonomy in a progressive form and officially recognized Kanak identity for the first time. But the near-parity of settlers and Kanak continues to make nation-building a challenging task, despite a 1998 agreement among Kanak and settlers to seek a “common destiny.” This study examines the rise in New Caledonia of rival identity formations that became increasingly polarized in the 1970s and examines in particular the emergence of activist discourses in favor of Kanak cultural nationalism and land reform, multiracial progressive sovereignty, or a combination of both aspirations. Most studies of modern New Caledonia focus on the violent 1980s uprising, which left deep scars on local memories and identities. Yet the genesis of that rebellion began with a handful of university students who painted graffiti on public buildings in 1969, and such activists discussed many of the same issues that face the country’s leadership today. After examining the historical, cultural, and intellectual background of that movement, this work draws on new research in public and private archives and interviews with participants to trace the rise of a nationalist movement that ultimately restored self-government and legalized indigenous aspirations for sovereignty in a local citizenship with its own symbols. Kanak now govern two out of three provinces and have an important voice in the Congress of New Caledonia, but they are a slight demographic minority. Their quest for nationhood must achieve consensus with the immigrant communities, much as the founders of the independence movement in the 1970s recommended.

Accompanying videodisc, entitled La nuit des contes : mise en image de textes calédoniens / produced by Deborah Walker-Morrison and Neil Morrison in 2008, contains ... "approximately three hours of recorded material ... Texts included in the DVD are indicated within Nights of storytelling[.]"--Page 10.

La biodiversité calédonienne, reconnue comme l’une des plus exceptionnelles avec son fort taux d’endémisme, est largement menacée par l’introduction de nouvelles espèces. Il est donc important de protéger l’écosystème calédonien, à la fois riche et vulnérable, des espèces envahissantes, l’une des principales causes de perte de la biodiversité à l’échelle mondiale. Face à cette menace, le Gouvernement et les trois provinces de Nouvelle-Calédonie souhaitent mettre en place une structure collective afin de définir les orientations stratégiques nécessaires pour préserver et conserver leur biodiversité. Elles ont ainsi voulu qu’un état des connaissances soit dressé et qu’une réflexion soit menée sur la prévention, la détection précoce, l’intervention rapide, l’éradication, le confinement et le contrôle des espèces envahissantes. Cette expertise collégiale apporte les éléments nécessaires à la construction d’un système de biosécurité pertinent et efficace pour l’archipel néo-calédonien.

I spent four months in New Caledonia in 1971 with the object of making a quantitative survey of the night-flying macrolepidoptera with light-traps and an assessment of the Rhopalocera and microlepidoptera. This fieldwork was financed by a Government Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Investigations adminis tered by the Royal Society, and by a grant from the Godman Fund. I devoted a further three weeks to sampling on Norfolk I. , and, with the help of local naturalists, Mr. and Mrs. F. JOWETT, was able to produce a detailed account of the biogeography and ecology of the moth fauna (HOLLOWAY, 1977). This book is an account of the results of the New Caledonian work, together with reviews of the geology, phytogeography and general zoogeography pre sented as background for the Lepidoptera fauna and its geography. Previous work on the macroheterocera, primarily papers by VIETTE (1948- 1971), had recorded not many more than a hundred species, a very low total considering the area of the island relative to that of the Fiji group where the moths were being studied by Dr. G. S. ROBINSON when the New Caledonian expedition was at the planning stage. The Fijian fauna then promised consider ably to exceed three hundred species. Evidently many more species awaited discovery in New Caledonia.