La coutume : idéologie de l'Etat océanien ?

We did produce, Joël Bonnemaison and I, a paper which was presented in Nuku'alofa at a colloquium organized by the UNDP in January 1990 : "State Needs and Stateless Societies in the Pacific". The central idea was to tackle the apparent antagonism between custom and state apparatus. This present paper develops that argumentation. Pacific Island States have clearly integrated custom and Christianity into their consititutions. What does this mean ? Some examples are provided by way of explanation. Cooption by the Island State of the customary sphere and vice versa implies that traditional values continue to operate for the benefit of the populations. (Résumé d'auteur)