In 1947, Australia helped establish the South Pacific Commission (SPC, now the Pacific Community) to promote cooperation and improve the welfare of Pacific peoples. Based in Noumea, it was the first body to bring together colonial powers and later, Pacific Islander voices, yet its history is little known in Australia. 

Dr Bergantz's research draws on the archives of diplomat William Douglass Forsyth, a founding figure of the SPC, to uncover the political and personal struggles involving Australia, France, and Indigenous leaders that shaped the organisation and contemporary vision of today’s Blue Pacific.

About Dr Alexis Bergantz

Dr Alexis Bergantz is a Senior Lecturer in Global & Language Studies at RMIT University in Melbourne. He is a historian of Australia’s entanglements with France and the French Pacific, and his first book, French Connection: Australia’s Cosmopolitan Ambitions (NewSouth), won the 2022 New South Wales Premier’s Australian History Award. His current research examines Australia’s relationship with the French Pacific in the 20th century.

He completed his PhD in History at ANU, receiving the J. G. Crawford Prize for Academic Excellence and the John Molony Prize for best thesis in History.

Dr Bergantz advances the study of French-Australian relations through a range of roles, including co-chair of the Research Committee of the Institute for the Study of French-Australian Relations (ISFAR), General Editor of the French-Australian Dictionary of Biography, and Secretary of the Australian Society for French Studies.

Dr Bergantz is a 2025 National Library of Australia Fellow.