Samoan Fono, 2011

Committee Profile

The Samoan Fono, known officially as the Legislative Assembly of Samoa, is the core lawmaking unit of the government of the Independent State of Samoa. 

This committee takes place in May 2011 and emulates the 15th Samoan Fono, the iteration of the parliament that made the historical decision to swap sides across the International Date Line. 

When this committee takes place, Samoa’s time zone is aligned with that of American Samoa, and by extension, that of the United States—putting Samoa “one day behind” its Pacific neighbors like Australia and New Zealand. However, Samoa—despite its relative geographical isolation in the Pacific Ocean—has by no means been left out from the world’s rapid economic growth and globalization. With increased economic and geopolitical ties to its Pacific neighbors, Samoans must consider: must they switch their time zone and move “ahead” one day, in order to be on the same calendar day as their trading partners? Or should the country keep its current time zone, continuing efforts to preserve cultural ties with the politically separate American Samoa?

This committee addresses the nuance behind time zone geopolitics: crucially, debate here puts a lens on how time zone choices affect pan-Pacific culture, how trade integration goes hand in hand with time system synchrony, and how something as simple as a nation’s place on a map can define its productivity and identity.

Chair Letter

Dear delegates,

Welcome to BruinMUN! My name is Aneesh Ratnala, and I’m thrilled to serve as your chair for the Samoan Fono at BruinMUN XXXIII. I’m originally from Andover, Massachusetts, and I’m a second-year computer science major at UCLA. Outside of Model UN, I help organize UCLA’s hackathon, enjoy learning languages, and like to play pickleball.

I began my Model UN journey in 2020, when I was a freshman in high school and when all of life was over Zoom. My first in-person committee, a World Health Organization general assembly at Tufts University, was the first time I saw how satisfying it could be to trade ideas in real time, giving speeches impromptu, writing solutions on the fly, and meeting people who were just as curious as I was. I hope that, in the Samoan Fono, you’ll ultimately feel that way, too.

The Samoan Fono is an exciting committee, and I’m beyond eager to bring it to you. Simulating the main legislative assembly of the Pacific island nation of Samoa, this committee is all about the geopolitics behind time zones—where most world maps are covered in bold black lines demarcating international borders, the temporal borders this committee examines are far subtler. Samoa’s 2011 leap across the International Date Line presents a unique analysis of modern time zones, where an entire nation skipped a calendar day to adapt to changing markets, economies, and lifestyles.

Whether this is your first Model UN conference or one of your last, I want you to feel intellectually challenged when you debate in the Samoan Fono. Most importantly, I hope you’ll enjoy your time in committee and leave UCLA having met new people and discussed new ideas.

See you in November!

Aneesh Ratnala

Chair, Samoan Fono, 2011

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