Haiti On My Mind

As Haiti and its allies search for lasting solutions to the current violence-driven insecurity inflicted by criminal gangs, a multitude of passionate debates take place around the world in search of best ways forward. This is an opportune time to also address the vexing issue of past American policies that deeply harmed Haiti, and the necessity to prevent this from happening again.      

The proximity of our two countries makes close relationships unavoidable and, indeed, desirable. But, the U.S. is the most advanced and richest country in the world with a population of 342 million, while Haiti is one of the smallest and poorest countries in the world with a population of eleven million. This imbalance puts the burden on the U.S. to ensure our policies result in positive outcomes for Haitians. Unfortunately and repeatedly, too many of our actions have left a trail of serious damage.

Here are four examples, out of many, of harmful U.S. policies:

• When Haiti’s enslaved men and women won – against all odds – their independence from France (1804), the U.S sided with France when the latter forced the former slaves to pay “reparations” (a ransom) to their former French slave owners. It took Haitians more than a century to pay that forcibly imposed debt, assessed by some at $122 billion in today’s currency (NYT). Siding with France meant participating in the devastating economic blockade of the newly formed republic.
• For nineteen years (1915-1934) the U.S. occupied Haiti. Among the most egregious actions during that time were forcing rural Haitians to work for free, called ‘corvée’, chillingly echoing slavery, emptying the country central bank’s coffers including its gold bars, and killing an estimated 15,000 Haitians (Trouillot).  
• In early 1990s, the Clinton Administration forced Haiti to lower its rice import tax to barely 3%. In his 2010 public apology, President Clinton explained that he thought Haitians should be freed from the burden of growing food, and instead work in the industrial sector. This defies logic since Haiti has always been an agriculture-based economy as food production is vital for its survival, and an industrial sector that could employ millions did not exist.
  
  The end result is that the U.S. killed Haiti’s rice production, irreparably intensifying hunger and pushing smallholder farming families deeper into poverty.
  
  But this policy had one big winner: Riceland, the U.S largest rice company, located, as it happens, in Arkansas. While in the early 1990s Haitians grew enough rice to feed themselves, by 2022, Riceland’s exports of U.S. heavily subsidized rice supplied 80% of Haiti’s rice consumption (USDA).
• Most recently, on July 7th, 2021, Haiti’s president, Jovenel Moise, was assassinated. Many assumed that the U.S. – a constitutional federal republic – would support Haitians in following their constitution. But we didn’t. Instead, together with the Core Group, U.S. declared Dr. Ariel Henry the de facto country’s provisional head. Granted, Moise did express his wish to nominate Henry as his prime minister. But the president was dead; and Haiti’s constitution is clear on what steps to follow when a president becomes incapacitated (articles 149 and 149.1).
  
  A similar situation occurred in 2004 when a coup forced President Jean-Bertrand Aristide into exile. Haitians named Boniface Alexandre, the country’s senior judge, as the head of the provisional government which served for the prescribed twenty-four months. And, as mandated, it organized elections to choose the licit government. Haitians followed their constitution to the letter – and it worked.
  
  By imposing Henry, the U.S. deprived the Haitian people of their self-determination.

During Henry’s governance that lasted thirty three instead of the prescribed twenty four months, gang’s extreme and ruinous violence escalated considerably. Using insecurity as an excuse, Henry declared that elections could not be organized as planned – de facto extending his own mandate for an unlimited duration. The population revolted, the U.S. finally withdrew its support, and he was forced to resign.

The most dispiriting part of this is that following Henry’s resignation, Haitians found themselves in exactly the same position had they been empowered to follow their constitution thirty-three months earlier. Today, a temporary presidential council has been set-up, it has designated the provisional government’s prime minister, Garry Conille, who  named his provisional government, which was approved and is functioning.

Meanwhile, the heavy toll of violence during the past thirty five months looms large: roughly 5,000 Haitians killed, thousands of women and girls raped, 400,000 internally displaced, and more than 300,000 fled the country, resulting in a staggering loss of life, talent, and brain power.  

We will never know if a constitutionally formed provisional government could have prevented the gangs’ onslaught on the capital and surrounding areas. But experience indicates that most Haitians would have considered such a government legitimate, and themselves as empowered.

This recurring pattern of U.S. harmful policies toward Haiti during the last two hundred years demonstrates that guardrails must be put in place to stop enacting harmful policies.            

Every few years, members of Congress call for a hearing to better understand Haiti’s current situation. This helps them evaluate proposed U.S. policies regarding Haiti. Within that framework, the Congress could order a study to analyze all past U.S. policies, describe the outcomes, draw lessons learned, and propose solutions to build the necessary safeguards.  

Undergirding any solution must be the iron-clad determination that our deeply rooted principles and values will not stop at the water’s edge. And, that leaders within Haiti and the diaspora will be included in articulating the way forward.  

Such a collaborative solution will provide crucial guidance, reinforce mutual trust and lead to a stronger, more transparent, and powerful bi-lateral cooperation. Critically, it will ensure an end to misguided U.S. policies whose nefarious impacts have been afflicting Haiti’s most vulnerable populations then and now.

Creating a protective safety net, however,  does not release us from the obligation to repair the harm we have already caused. Haitians need it to significantly improve their lives, and we need it to maintain our vital moral fortitude.

NYT: The New York Times, “The Root of Haiti’s Misery” , May 27th, 2022;
Trouillot: Michel Ralph Trouillot, as cited by Wikipedia: ”United States’ Occupation of Haiti”.
USDA: United States Department of Agriculture “Haiti’s US Rice Imports”.

Henryka Manès is the Founder and Executive Director of Ecoworks International. She has been working with developing and emerging economy countries for the past 35 years. Haiti is her 25th country. EWI was established in 2009 to work in Haiti as a way to paying it forward and thank Haiti for issuing visas and passports in 1937 to families fleeing Nazi persecutions.

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