Accounting for economic development in the context of post- colonial stress syndrome: the Fijian experience

This paper presents a study of the operations and accounting practices within the Fijian Development Bank. These practices cannot be understood outside the complex tensions and contradictions in Fijian society. Such tensions and antagonisms are a legacy of what has been called in other places 'post-colonial stress syndrome'. The Bank is faced with the (impossible) task of reconciling a history of colonisation and racial discrimination with the forces of globalisation and drive for economic development. How can the Bank help to preserve the Fijian agrarian way and quality of life and promote economic development of Fiji? The establishment of profit-centres at Branch level and insistence of profit-driven, commercialised loan and repayment policies contrast with the culture of its indigenous people. The tensions outside the Bank are evident within. The analysis attempts to make explicit the socio-historic specificity of the contradictions and raises questions about the meaning of development and the nature of development banks.