David Robie


David Robie is a New Zealand author, journalist and media educator who has covered the Asia-Pacific region for international media for more than two decades. He became an associate professor in Auckland University of Technology School of Communication Studies in 2005 and a professor in 2011. In 1985, Dr Robie sailed on board the Greenpeace eco-navy flagship Rainbow Warrior for 10 weeks until it was bombed by French secret agents in New Zealand’s Auckland harbour. He is the author of a book about the ill-fated voyage, Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior. An updated memorial edition of Eyes of Fire was published in July 2005 and a 30th anniversary edition in July 2015.
In 1993-1997, Robie headed the University of Papua New Guinea journalism programme and in 1998-2002 became coordinator of the University of the South Pacific journalism school where his students covered the 2000 George Speight coup d'état in Fiji. According to the NZ Listener, an assistant minister in Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka's government in 1998 threatened to close Robie's media and politics website - Café Pacific - and revoke his work permit as a media educator in "what was seen as the first test of the 1997 Constitution's freedom of expression clause". In 1999, Robie became the annual Australian Press Council Fellow and is an advocate of Pacific media freedom. He is founding editor of Pacific Journalism Review, which was launched at the University of Papua New Guinea in 1994. In 2005, he won the PIMA Pacific Media Freedom Award. He specialises in Asia-Pacific issues and is now director of the Pacific Media Centre. Robie is author of several books on South Pacific media and politics.

Books by David Robie