AS midnight strikes tonight, we shall be saying goodbye not just to a year but to a decade, the first of the century.

It is a good time to reflect on how those ten years have treated Jersey and what has changed since the celebrations ushering in a new millennium were staged.

In part, the conclusion must be that for Jersey, as for the rest of the western world, more or less everything has changed. Old certainties about governmental, financial and religious institutions, about internal security, economic development and personal prosperity, and about the environment we inhabit have all been swept away, one by one.

More specifically in terms of this small Island, the dramatic decade now drawing to a close was one which raised important questions, still to be fully answered, about Jersey’s sense of identity and its place in a changing world.

For too much of that period, we have approached those questions in a defensive, deferential posture. Now, as a new decade begins, it is time to move on to the front foot and present a more confident and unapologetic face.

Whether through envy, ignorance or both, an unpleasant attitude of knee-jerk hostility towards Jersey has been too often in evidence. There is a sad tendency, encouraged by lazy national media stereotyping, to believe that any small and successful island community must by definition be backward, secretive and up to something dubious.

When that place is one which was once occupied by the Nazis and now makes its living by providing offshore financial services, it is irresistibly tempting for its detractors to sprinkle in suggestions of widespread collaboration and tax-dodging. Their gleeful malice reached fever pitch, of course, with the lurid fantasies woven around the Haut de la Garenne investigation over the past two years.

The real Jersey is a very different place from the one so carelessly and hurtfully stigmatised in this way. Those who live here know that, but we cannot assume that everyone else does, or that anyone else is going to do the job for us of ensuring that a truer image is projected around the world.

Our collective new year (or, indeed, new decade) resolution should be to stand up for Jersey more positively and more often. This is a place with much to be proud about and every right, both by constitution and by custom, to determine its own destiny and act independently in the interests of its citizens.

What we need now is an assertive campaign to spread understanding of the Island’s status as a Crown Dependency, functioning happily outside the United Kingdom; to promote much more widely the rich heritage which underpins that under-appreciated legal status; and to trumpet the standards of excellence demonstrably attained in innovative industries from farming to finance.

Circumstances dictate that in the decade to come, Jersey will be required both to stand on its own feet more and to pursue new international relationships. Fortunately, history and geography have given us a sound basis for doing so. It remains to be seen whether those responsible can muster the necessary will, wisdom and imagination to fly the Jersey flag to full effect.

Meanwhile, in a slightly tentative spirit of hope and expectation after the problems experienced by so many this year, we wish all our readers a happy and secure 2010.