Amid Rubble and Ruin, Our Duty to Haiti Remains
Words are especially difficult to come by in a state of numbness. My response to the outpouring of calls and emails from concerned friends had become something of a mantra. No, still no news yet. We have not been able to make contact with anyone. To stay sane, I resigned myself to accepting that my immediate family would not come out of this without loss. And even if we had, the lives of the already departed and sheer magnitude of the devastation were enough to keep me catatonic.
You see, I was just in Haiti the week before Christmas. I went to the Ghetto Biennale of the Grand Rue artists. I returned from what I boasted was my best trip ever, full of hope about the future. The reason for my optimism was encounters with people from Cité Soleil. Through INURED, a research institute, I met ten students who received scholarships to study in Brazil and members of a community forum that has been actively engaged in dialogue in attempts to build broader coalition beyond politics. Their work renewed my dedication to participate in building the country again. I made a commitment to raise funds to make sure both of these efforts are successful.
Hope is not something that one often associates with Haiti. An anthropologist and critic of representations of the island, I have often questioned narratives that reduce Haiti to simple categories and in the process dehumanize Haitians. Yes, we may be the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, but there is life there, love and an undeniable and unbeatable spirit of creative survivalism.
I have heard cries of “why Haiti?” and “why now?” or “this could have been avoided.” Narratives of blame may be explanatory but at this time they are not constructive. Since our inception as a sovereign state early in the 19th century, we have faced obstacles. We have had to build and rebuild before. I am worried about Haiti’s future. In the immediate moment we need help, rescue missions of all kinds. I am already concerned about weeks from now when we are no longer front-page news. Without long-term efforts, we will simply not be able to rebuild. What will happen then?
My first response to seeing post-quake pictures of the capital was to ask how they will build factories with this devastation. In the last year, the UN and Special Envoy Bill Clinton’s plans to help develop the country’s economy have virtually ignored dissent on the ground that called for a more humane approach that would not recreate the same exploitative labor relations that continue to serve the wealthy. Haiti’s government, with its absence of structure, cannot be ignored as it is in desperate need of reinforcement and civil space needs to be nurtured.
The folks I met last month had one response when I asked why, despite their personal hardships, they chose to engage in community building. In Kreyol or in French, they replied: “C’est mon Devoir” (it is my duty). I was charmed by the phrase, its elegance and matter-of-factness. On this side of the water, I hold onto their words today as a sign that there is will in Haiti. When long-term efforts are on the way, the international community, too, must see it as their duty to not recreate the mistakes of the past.
Haiti Will Never Be the Same
It is still difficult to absorb the images. Though I have now heard from family members, I experience symptoms of trauma, mainly dissociation—my mind seeks sporadic distances from my body as this is simply too much for my psyche to bear. Unlike those glued to their screens, I turned off the television. I have that luxury. Yet, I keep thinking of those who cannot. If, with over 1600 miles between us, this is my reaction, then what must it be like for people who are in the thick of it in Haiti?
Since its inception as a free black state in 1804, Haiti has been fragile. If the earthquake that devastated the capital last week has revealed anything else, it is that the country has a weak and barely functioning state and virtually no infrastructure. Of course, that is not news to those who know Haiti: it has always been the case. How it got that way tells us why efforts to rebuild Haiti must take a different course. And this simply cannot be understood without some references to the island’s history.
Since independence, most politicians have followed a simple rule: build coalition to oust the enemy, then disband as they had done with the French. Freedom came at a price. The young Republic’s sovereignty was compromised in critical ways that continue to affect it today. Early on, it was crippled by debt — an indemnity payment demanded by France of 150 million francs (borrowed from European banks) for their loss of property, and the island’s economy never quite recovered. Haiti was also isolated by an international community- still trafficking in slavery for 60 years after its successful revolution. The brutal U.S. military occupation in the early twentieth century furthered Haiti’s centralization in the capital, weakening regional institutions and economies. Moreover, ruler after ruler chose to concentrate power and develop the capital at the expense of the nation. In that vein, the birth certificates of those not born in the capital, until very recently, were actually labeled “moun andeyo”, people born on the outside.
As a result, the escalated internal migration over the years that overpopulated Port-au-Prince was fueled by the search for jobs, education and other opportunities due to the absence of government presence in rural areas. Thus, it is not surprising that rescue efforts and resources are unable to be delivered. Leoganne, Petit Goave, and Jacmel, for example, are still out of reach to rescue workers. Historically, the extractive state has opposed its nation and only served a select few.
Recently, I spoke with a friend who was there during the earthquake. He sounded fully present. He politely asked how I was.
“You just lived through an earthquake, how are you?” I replied.
His words were a staccato of observations: “You can’t imagine how terrible it is… I have taken lots of pictures…videos…this must be documented. Bodies everywhere. The smell. People need to know what is really going on there. A friend of mine has 400 people in her yard. Her house collapsed. Everyone is outside. Some are dead. We need water. Medical assistance. Food. There is no state. No ministry in operation. No communication. Nothing. There is nothing. Haiti, I tell you, will never be the same.”
Haiti better not be the same!
The earthquake has indiscriminately shifted some of the class boundaries in Haiti, forcing everyone out in the streets due to fear of frequent aftershocks. This disaster, with all of its horror and tragedies, actually represents an opportunity when the time arrives to rebuild a different Haiti — one with a government with a national agenda, not self-interest, one that recognizes its duty to its citizens. Haiti could be a country with industries and labor relations that cease to exploit its workers and stops reinforcing the extreme gap between the rich and the poor.
This prospective Haiti could promote expansion of civil space that fosters both acknowledgement of dissent and genuinely supports democratic engagement. This new Haiti can be a place where education is not privatized and centralized in the capital, but available to everyone in all nine departments. And finally, it can be an island that embraces its social and cultural plurality in its myriad forms without debasing its black masses. That simply cannot occur without the constructive will of all Haitians and the international community, especially the United States and global aid agencies, because they have historically undermined local politics.
So when rebuilding is underway, we need to remain just as engaged. We are obliged to become vigilant observers and volunteers who question, watch and participate in reconstruction efforts on the ground to make certain that Haiti, which is so close and yet so far away, will never be the same. And must not be the same.
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