Can Pasifika Theologians Convert Neoliberal Cannibals?

Abstract

This article reinterprets the colonial trope of the “South Seas cannibal” to critique the dynamics of
contemporary neoliberal capitalism. Nineteenth-century European explorers, missionaries, and travel
writers frequently portrayed Pacific Islanders as “savage cannibals,” a colonial discourse that
anthropologist Gananath Obeyesekere calls “cannibal talk.” Such representations functioned
ideologically to justify colonial expansion under the banner of the three Cs: Christianity, Commerce, and
Civilisation. Drawing on historical and anthropological scholarship, the article argues that what has been
described as “ritualised anthropophagy” in Pasifika societies was neither indiscriminate nor without limit
but embedded within complex cosmological frameworks governed by concepts such as mana and tapu,
where ritual consumption symbolised the regulated transfer of power and the restoration of relational
balance.
The article then reverses the mission by applying the metaphor of cannibalism to modern economic
systems. Drawing on theorists such as John Elkington, David Harvey, and Nancy Fraser, neoliberalism is
described as a form of “cannibal capitalism” that consumes, without limit, its own social, ecological, and
political foundations. This extractive logic is further analysed through Nikotemo Sopepa’s critique of
necropolitics in the Pacific context. In response, the article highlights emerging Pasifika theological and
ecological frameworks, including Reweaving the Ecological Mat and Sopepa’s “mana ethic,” which
propose relational, land-centred alternatives grounded in reciprocity, limit, and the flourishing of life.