REVIEW: Noted: Democracy and the price of silence

Abstract

Review of: Shoot the messenger: The report on the Nuku'alofa reconstruction project and why the government of Tonga dumped it, By Teena Brown Pulu. Auckland and Nuku'alofa: Taimi Publishers.

Investigative journalism is critical to good governance in evolving South Pacific democracies, particularly the youngest, Tonga, which embarked on the biggest democratic reforms in a century in 2010. This is the view of Auckland Tongan anthropologist, social commentator and now author of a suppressed-then-exposed report about post-riots urban development.