2018 New Caledonian independence referendum
New Caledonia was formally annexed by France in 1853, and Europeans and Polynesians, as well as other settlers, have since made the indigenous Kanaks a minority (27%, 11% and 39% respectively in the 2014 census). The territory was used as a penal colony from 1864 to 1897, and the Kanaks were "excluded from the French economy and from mining work, and ultimately confined to reservations". Between 1976 and 1988, conflicts between the French government and the independence movement saw periods of serious violence and disorder (culminating in the Ouvéa cave hostage taking in 1988), with the emerging Kanak independence movement gaining support from many Kanaks frustrated with their lower socio-economic status and lack of involvement in the economy, seen as problems caused by the French "exploitation". Though GDP per capita (nominal) is high at $38,921 and though New Caledonia is a major producer of nickel, there is significant inequality in income distribution, with many claiming that the mining revenue benefits people outside the territory and its (declining) mining communities.
Japanese settlement in New Caledonia
Official statistics showed some 6,880 Japanese miners that landed in New Caledonia between 1892 and 1919. The Japanese community had almost 3,000 individuals in 1922, and many left New Caledonia in the 1920s and 1930s as ethnic suspicion against ethnic Japanese intensified. Within the Japanese community, Okinawans consisted a sizeable minority, and a 1905 census recorded some 387 Okinawans in New Caledonia. In all official census until the 1940s, Japanese were classified as "Europeans" and enjoyed similar rights with other European settlers. Inter-ethnic unions between Japanese men and women were frequentplace, although some Japanese settlers married Japanese women. A 1940 report showed some 36 men that married Japanese women, while another 20 married French women. Another 107 married or cohabited with Kanak, Vietnamese or Javanese women. In the same year, there were some 200 second-generation Japanese settlers, of which three quarters were born to one non-Japanese parent, while the remainder were of pure Japanese descent.