Labour relations in Papua New Guinea : a historical review of literature, 1920-2006

Literature reviews attempted on aspects pertaining to most developing countries are not often smooth and sometimes a daunting task to analyse in any logical manner. It is basically because of the conduct of labour (industrial) relations that seems to have little resemblance to the models and descriptions familiar in the developed countries. Therefore, any attempt to review existing literature on Papua New Guinea (PNG) labour relations is going to be not straight forward but challenging. This is partly because most of the works done on PNG labour relations are descriptive, fragmented and lack the attention to theory displayed in industrial relations commentary developed and applied in the West. In part this is not the fault of the commentators on developing countries in general and PNG in particular. Rather it may be seen as a product of the complexity of the country lacking a homogenous economic, social and political environment.