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.
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my
.
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CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE
=
OF
TECHNOLOGY
PABADENA. CALIFORNIA 911090
+
OIA SF THE HUMANITIES
* ANS SOCIAL SCIENCES
~
.
.
October 29,
Mr. Theodore R. Mitchell
Executive Director
Micronesian Legal Services Corporation
P.O. Bor 826
Saipan, Mariana Islands
96950
197
.
Dear Ted,
.
.
wee
t
oY
*
I have now read through the three volumes of the Draft Envircnmental
Impact Statement dealing with the Clean Up, Rehabilitation,
Resettlement of Enewetak Atoll-Marshall Islands. One thing that you
have going for you is that the peopleof Enewetak wish to return home,
and have been pressing for this return for years. Many of the stresses
associated with the type of compulsory relocation that I have studied
inclucing the undermining of local leadershiv, are simply not present
although I would suspect a carry-over from the past.
Another favorable factor has been the willingness of everyone involved
to date (a) to listen to the local people (at least through their council
of 12) and (b) to take into consideration their wishes in planning their
return. On the other hand, any kind of settlement scheme involves
stress to the settlers and as you note in your letter of October 11,
little attention has been paid to the potential impacts of this stress.
we
Because my predictive theory deais primarily with compulsory
.
;
oe
oe
.
relocation at the time of forced removal, rather than 28 years later!,
I will have to cast the net wider (which of course is a much more risky
business) and deal with settlement schemes in general, compulsory
resettlement being an extreme example of this more general category.
As lam sure you are well aware, the historv of settlement schemes
throughout the world is a grim one -- with probably over 90%being
unsuccessful from the point of view of both settlers and settlement
authorities, It is hard to imagine a more difficult task that creatine
Jr,
from scratch new communities, which are bcth socially mAS
sly
econornically viable, Though.the situation is more favorable/tren thes
on
people are willing participants, in'the Encwetak case no sett(ted cL acat A ~.
selection is possible since everyone who wishes to return {— ‘oun
and old, conservative and progressive, -hard working and lead, must
.
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