Center for Pacific Island Studies

Terence A Wesley-Smith

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Associate Professor and Graduate Chair, Center for Pacific Islands Studies; PhD University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa (1988)

e-mail: twsmith@hawaii.edu

Terence Wesley-Smith, a political scientist with degrees from Victoria University of Wellington and the University of Hawai‘i, has been with the Center for Pacific Islands Studies more than twenty years. He writes and teaches about contemporary issues in the region, with a particular interest in development, the impact of globalization, and the political economy of mining in Papua New Guinea. As graduate chair he is responsible for curriculum development and handles much of the student advising. He usually teaches the MA program’s introductory seminar, Learning Oceania (PACS 601). Wesley-Smith is founding associate editor of The Contemporary Pacific, and from 1997–2003 directed the Ford Foundation–funded Moving Cultures project, which developed innovative ways of teaching and learning about the Asia-Pacific region. He is a member of the planning team of the Ford-funded Islands of Globalization project, which fosters collaborative relationships between educational institutions in the Pacific and Caribbean. In March 2007 he co-convened a conference called China in Oceania: Towards a New Regional Order? at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University, Beppu, Japan. In 2003, Dr Wesley-Smith was awarded the UH Board of Regents Medal for Excellence in Teaching.

Selected publications

2007	Altered States: Regional Intervention and the Politics of State Failure in Oceania. In Intervention and State-Building in the Pacific: The Political Legitimacy of 'Co-operative Intervention', edited by Greg Fry and Tarcisius Kabutaulaka, Manchester University Press.
2007	Self-Determination in Oceania: New Roles for US, Japanese and Asian Powers? Japan Focus: An Asia Pacific E-Journal. Posted 7 February. http://www.japanfocus.org
2007	Self-Determination in Oceania. Race and Class 48(3): 29-46
2006	The Limits of Self-Determination in Oceania. Social and Economic Studies. 55 (4).
2006	There Goes the Neighborhood: The Politics of Failed States and Regional Intervention in the Pacific. In Redefining the Pacific? Regionalism, Past, Present and Future, edited by Jenny Bryant-Tokalau and Ian Frazer, 121-126. Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing Limited
2004	The Ocean in Me. In Pacific Places, Pacific History, edited by Brij V Lal, 70–86. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.
2004	The Politics of State Failure and Regional Intervention in the Pacific. Concept paper for “Regional Forum on Reinventing Government in the Pacific Islands,” Apia, Sāmoa, 4–6 October.
2003	Back to the Future: Decolonizing Pacific Studies, edited by Vilsoni Hereniko and Terence Wesley-Smith. Papers from the Twenty-fifth Annual Pacific Islands Studies Conference, “Pacific Studies 2000: Honoring the Past, Creating the Future.” Special issue of The Contemporary Pacific 15 (1).
2003	Net Gains? Pacific Studies in Cyberspace. The Contemporary Pacific 15:117–136.
2001	Coups, Conflicts, and Crises: The New Pacific Way? (with Gerard A Finin). Race and Class 42 (2): 1–16. Originally published as an East-West Center Working Paper, Pacific Islands Development Series 13. Honolulu: East-West Center (2000). Working paper available online at: http://www.eastwestcenter.org/stored/pdfs/PIDPwp013.pdf.
2000	Asia in the Pacific: Migrant Labor and Tourism in the Republic of Palau. Special issue of The Contemporary Pacific 12 (2).
2000	Historiography of the Pacific: The Case of The Cambridge History. Review essay. Race and Class 41 (4): 101–119.
1999	Changing Patterns of Power. In The Pacific Islands: Environment and Society, edited by Moshe Rapaport, 144–155. Honolulu: Bess Press.
1997	A New Era for Japan and the Pacific Islands: The Tokyo Summit (with Gerard A Finin). AsiaPacific Issues 32. Honolulu: East-West Center.
1995	Rethinking Pacific Islands Studies. Pacific Studies 18 (2): 115–137.

Terence Wesley-Smith, with former student Isebong Asang (left) and colleague Katerina Teaiwa (right) at the UH Faculty Convocation in September 2003.

Terence Wesley-Smith with Vince Diaz, University of Michigan, at the Approaches to Interdisciplinary Pacific Studies workshop, University of California at Santa Cruz, May 2004.

Terence Wesley-Smith and participants at the China in Oceania conference, Beppu, Japan, March 2007