The Pacific-driven Time-Space Theorist, Professor Hufanga Dr. 'Okusitino Mahina and his view of Gross National Generosity (GNG)

The Dignified Pacific Initiative wish to thank Nepituno Tonga Online News for sharing the original article published by the Vanuatu Daily Post on their website on February 10th, 2018. This post led to the comment below left by Professor Hufanga Dr. 'Okusitino Mahina and his view of GNG. For further comments, please use this page. 

Thank you for the the knowledge you shared Professor. We are inspired and empowered at the same time knowing that the spirit of mediation you shared and the heart of generosity comes from the same source. We hope to collaborate and contribute to your work and your network in the future. 

Posted by: Professor Hufanga ('Okusitino Mahina), February 11th 2018. 

One of the pitfalls of the so-called economic development as a post-WW11 UN-led and Western-driven capitalist doctrine is undoubtedly the failure to "take culture seriously" -- not to mention the adoption of a "partial" rather than a "total" approach across the material-individual, intellectual-spiritual and social-cultural realms and not just the material-individual over the intellectual-spiritual and social-cultural domains. 

It is therefore truly refreshing to reflectively take note of the great call by Dr Kaitu'u Funaki for "doing development in the Pacific way(s)," both immediately on face value and ultimately in terms of his proposed theory of "generosity.".

By "doing development in the Pacific way(s)," reference is made, so I think, to not only the integration of the "Pacific ways of doing things" -- as opposed to the "other ways of doing things," notably the "Western ways of doing things" -- but also the utilisation of refined "knowledge (and skills)" theoretically-practically, critically-functionally acquired in ancient ha'a professional class-based education -- which are constituted or composed in "culture" as a human receptacle and transmitted or communicated in "language" as a social vehicle. 

Moreover, knowledge (and skills), culture and language as inseparable intersecting or connecting and separating temporal-formal, spatial-substantial (and functional-practical) entities in reality as in nature, mind and society are constantly mediated through sustained symmetry and harmony to create beauty, in and over both time and space. 

On the other hand, the same applies to the so-called political governance (that is, both good governance and good leadership) as a Post-Cold War World Bank-sanctioned, Western-pushed democratic doctrine -- underlined by transparency, accountability, equality (or more befittingly equity), and justice -- all informed by the so-called "rule of law."

Is not "generosity" a two-way transaction going on between entities, identities or tendencies involved in the natural, intellectual and social processes -- as in the tavaist, realist view, that all things in reality, as in nature, mind and society, stand in eternal relations of exchange, giving rise to order and conflict (that is, intersection or connection and separation); that order and conflict (that is connection and separation) are of the same logical status, in that order (or connection) is a form of conflict (or separation); and that conflict (or separation) -- that is, a condition of crisis -- is transformed to order (or connection) -- that is, a state of stasis -- by way of mediation through sustained symmetry and harmony to create beauty?

It quite simply follows that the crisis at the intersection or connection and separation between Moana Oceania (Pacific) and Western cultures (and knowledge [and skills] and languages) -- in view of the fact that we are hard put to get rid of the Moana Oceania (Pacific) cultural "roots" and, at the same timespace, to stop incoming powerful waves of Western influences generally -- as in the specific case of both economic development and political governance as respective capitalist and democratic doctrines -- where they are mediated through sustained symmetry and harmony to produce beauty.

In effect, this transformation is one of changing the current modus operandi of things from a condition of "imposition" to a state of "mediation" -- that is -- a change in the current state of the art from the rule of "autocracy" to the reign of "generosity." It is only by means of both "mediation" and "generosity" -- in contrast to both "imposition" and "autocracy" -- that both "doing economic development and political governance in the Moana Oceania (Pacific) ways" can be made viable, sustainable and understandable in meaningful ways.