Crisis cannot fail to ignite new
HAM from colonial times. Today it is cause and consequence of a situation of poverty and of permanent precariousness. Small peasants super-exploit what land they can get, and cannot afford to give a thought for the future. Charcoal is the only source of energy. And selling charcoal is often the only means to get explosions the cash to buy necessities and pay taxes. This is why it is impossible to solve so urgent a problem as land erosion without a profound transformation of the social structure and the system
PUSHED BACK onto unfertile land that they usually do not own, Haiti's small peasants are condemned to constant insecurity. They have to live from hand to mouth, and never have the means to improve their equipment. Often they have to take short-term leases for the land.
They are bled from every side, by the state and its pyramiding taxes, by food speculators, by Tontons
Macoutes and similar groups of thugs, by big landowners, money lenders, surveyors, notaries and other parasites.
FILIP MARTENS
A
FTER HANDING over the better part of their harvest to the big landowners, small-scale coffee producers receive only
40% of the price paid for the coffee by foreign firms, while their counterparts in Central America who are not
- overflowing with riches - receive
75%! The remainder goes to the state and to middle-men, notably the big wholesalers at the ports.
The state has never used its tax income to really make investments in the countryside and help small peasants to produce. For its part, the bourgeoisie who essentially deof the big towns, vote themselves to foreign trade, have never invested in the modernization of the country. They consume the profits with every rainfall, the thin soil washes down in sheets in the torrents. Sediments are deposited further degrading what fertile lands may be found there, and making irrigation systems unusable.
This situation is essentially due to the intensity of deforestation. It is estimated that 50 million trees are cut down each year. In the 1930s, forests covered 23% of the territory. This had fallen to 7% on 1974 and can be no more than 1.5% today! Consequently, when it rains, less water soaks into the sub-soil leading to the drying up of springs; and correspondingly more water runs off, leading to floods that are disastrous for agriculture.
The massive deforestation originates of land tenure.
Forcing people into abject poverty
Duvalierism was not an accident, but rather the fruit of a long history. According to the Haitian writer MichelRolph Trouillot, the nineteenth century already set the stage for three future days of reckoning. The first would be when the governments, merchants and foreigners "had so bled this peasantry that there was no longer anything they could grab without forcing the people into the most abject poverty".
The second was when "the role of the leech" played by the "urban parasites" employed by the state would "largely exceed the partial and unequal distribution that they had carried out"
The third would be when "the pretenders to the remnants of the throne became so numerous as to overwhelm the throne itself", and "where any political faction that stayed in power could only do so at the expense of asserting this power daily by violence...It was the day of reckoning in blood, that would congeal the exceeding of all these limits." 1
The North American occupation 1. Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Les racines historiques de l'Etat duvalérien, Editions Deschamps, Port-au-Prince, or send them abroad.
At the bottom of the heap, obliged to sell their labour by migrating periodi-
IV 128: A SPECIAL FEATURE ON cally during the year, the poor and
THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE landless peasants have always carried the Haitian nation on their backs. The
RUSSIAN REVOLUTION origins of the Haitian crisis go way back. It is rooted in strongly hierarchical social relations and the submission to foreign powers. It has been marked for a long time by a prevailing trend of economic stagnation.
Land erosion is one of the most dramatic aspects of this crisis today, and ultimately threatens the very existence of the country. Although the population's growth rate is not extremely high (mainly because of the high mortality rate), the peasants are more and more numerous, and have less and less land. Two-thirds of the cultivated surface is in the mountainous zone and
The USSR today
* Reform and revolution
Economic reform and democratization
The debate on the rehabilitation of victims of the Stalinist purges
* A hundred flowers?
The appearance of independent reform clubs and committees
ORDER YOUR EXTRA
COPIES NOW!
October 12, 1987 • International Viewpoint
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5
HAM (1915-34) removed the obstacles that had held back these occurrences. It increased the exploitation of the peasantry and the country's dependence, forged an army designed for internal repression
Haiti at below world market prices. It is very possible, moreover, that its price will climb once it has supplanted all the local products. Those organizing the smuggling - the military, some big merchants and hauland centralized Haiti completely around Port-auPrince. The days of reckoning arrived Duvalier has left but the Tontons Macoutes remain (DR) in the 1950s. A political and economic crisis led to François Duvalier seizing power in September 1957.
Thirty years later, Haiti is in the grip of paralysis, a generalized crisis similar to the 1950s. The economic crisis ripened in the 1970s, during which there was a constant deterioration of agriculture. This accelerated abruptly from 1981 onwards.
In 1982, the slaughter of pig stocks had catastrophic consequences. This the result of pressure from the United States, and was done with its collaboration. Repeating economist Jean-Jacques Honorat, it could be said that this operation broke the "underpinning of the Haitian nation", represented by the peasant subsistence economy?
This corresponded perfectly to the US project: to considerably reduce that section of the Haitian economy devoted to feeding the country, to better integrate Haiti in "its" international division of labour. Haiti underwent a remodelling of agrarian structures and an unbridled penetration of capital into the countryside. The US tried to put such a project into operation during their occupation, but could not bring it to fruition.
The other side of the US plan is the transformation of Haiti into a free-zone", according to the formula of present economy minister Leslie Delatour, who shares this objective. With his agreement, the subsistence my has been - since Duvalier's departure - subjected to new hammer blows. The National Government (CNG) has lifted most protectionist barriers and allowed the market to be inundated by products that one hardly dares call "contraband" because the trade is
Each day boats coming in from Miami discharge tons of merchandise, food products and producers' goods in provincial ports that had been shut down for decades. The first victims of this traffic were rice producers. Because of the differences in productivity and the numerous financial demands on the Haihigher price than the American product. tian peasants, local rice sold at a much International Viewpoint • October 12, 1987
The American rice is much more highly regarded than Haitian rice. It is hardly any dearer than corn, which has led to a drop in com prices. Whether they grow rice, corn or beans, Haitian peasants can no longer sell their produce and find themselves being strangled.
The medium and rich peasants sometimes manage to invest elsewhere. On the other hand, landless peasants no longer have work and are left without resources.
Tens of thousands thrown out of work
The disaster does not stop there. The food-processing machinery is outdated, cannot meet competition from foreign products. Cooking oil and tomato paste factories have had to shut their doors. That will soon be the fate of the flour mills Still more serious, the sugar factories, have generally worked months a year, have had to close after just three months because of competition from Dominican sugar. Thousands of workers have been made redundant, depriving tens of thousands of people of resources - for domestic employees of these workers. At the same time, tens of thousands of peasants who cultivate sugar cane can find outlets for their har-
Smuggling has increased the divisions between town and country. Consumers, for their part, are seeing a big drop in food prices. Smuggling has created thousands of extremely precarious jobs in the port towns, and has given impetus to the "informal sector" in the big towns.
Although under Duvalier American
— the "mangé sinistre" — had already begun to be rejected, contraband today is a form of imposed food aid", which is bringing closer closer the ruin of whole sections of the economy and dragging Haiti in the tow
Miami rice is being sold today in
Wage contractors -will then be making new profits while the Haitian masses will see their buying power plunge once again.
The loss of industrial jobs, caused by the borders beginning to open up, has not been counter-balanced by the development of an assembly industry. According to the economic plan that the US has drawn up for the country, Haiti should take advantage of "the comparative advantage" represented by an abundant workforce, made still less demanding by an influx of destitute peasants in the reserve army of the unemployed.
In fact, for some years in Haiti there was an impetuous growth of assembly plants in the Port-au-Prince industrial zone. Up to 45,000 people were employed in these factories. At one time, Haiti figured as the "leader" of the Caribbean in this field. But now it has to trim its sails. Haiti no longer enjoys the "stability" that the American employers so appreciated under Duvalier. Since this type of industry did not require them to make investments, a lot of these employers packed their bags
Above all, perhaps, the industrialists realized that the Dominican Republic offered more advantages. Since the devaluation of the peso, the minimum wages of the two countries have been very similar. Particularly, the wages of skilled workers — who represent half of the waged workers in this type of industry in Haiti - are 50% less in the Dominican Republic. At the beginning of 1987 there were 50,000 jobs in the Dominican Republic's assembly plants, and like Haiti some years ago, the factories already set up there attracted
The crisis in Haiti is currently having some contradictory effects. It is accentuating relations of dependence, and making it difficult to build autonomous organizations. But, at the same time, it is creating some explosive situations and giving rise to a growing radicalization of the oppressed layers.
The extreme destitution of large sec2. Jean-Jaques Honorat, La peste porcine en Haiti: de l'éradication d'une épizootie au grand projet d' antidéveloppement national, Collectif Paroles, Montréal, 1983.
tions of the population is a major obstacle to the construction and stabilization of mass organizations. Most of the neighbourhood committees that sprang up in Port-au-Prince after February 7, 1986, have disappeared, or been taken over again by the city government. Some were diverted from their goals by individuals who saw them as a way of making a living. In the coun tryside, it is not difficult for people with a lot of money to recruit unscrupulous marginal elements.
The deepening of the crisis exacerbates the tensions that may exist between some oppressed sections of the population. And the absence of strongly implanted organizations able to unite all these layers is being felt sorely. For their part, the ex-Tontons Macoutes are very adept at stirring up and exploiting problems that can divide communities.
Problems of independent organization
In Haiti's present economic situation, the churches' "development" projects sprinkled across the country give these religious institutions a considerable role in the economy of some areas, one that they generally exploit for their own ends. Since the most dynamic elements are dependent on the churches, it becomes very difficult for the peasants to organize independently from them.
Despite these obstacles, the explo sion that caused Duvalier to flee has not stopped there. It was the product of a groundswell that shook up all of society. Since then, there have been a number of waves of mobilization that partially paralyzed the country, interspersed with calm spells that sometimes long but deceptive.
The movement is very different from that of 1956, when massive crowds came into the streets, manipulated by some demagogues. Today, the situation is reversed. The politicians try to regain control of a movement whose initiatives continually take them by surprise. The population's distrust of presidential candidates (who mostly served Duvalier at one time or another) is particularly illuminating. The United States, in thinking that it could quickly manufacture a "national saviour", was
In spite of the problems, organizations and some multiform networks have developed and shown themselves capable, in certain cases, of coordination between towns. This is no longer a privilege solely of the youth movements created under the aegis of the Church, as was the case during the mobilizations against Jean-Claude
It was the mass organizations, notably of youth in the shanty towns, students and the transport union, that were the driving force of the mobilizations this summer. The "Group of 57", who proclaimed themselves the "strike coordination committee", and were pushed to the fore by the press, have often been reduced to short-circuiting the initiatives of the mass organizations. It is the latter that have been the spearhead of the anti-imperialism that is one of the striking features of the current situation.
The attitude to communism has also changed a lot among poor people in the towns, reflecting a growing radicalization. In the countryside, on the other hand, anti-communism is at fever pitch, whipped up by propaganda from various churches. But, in many zones, the average level of consciousness of the peasants is higher than it has ever been.
The Catholic Church, which remains the only big "mass party" in Haiti, has been hit head-on by the effects of this radicalization and, since February 1986, has continually wavered in its attitude to the CNG. It has just condemned the positions of its own radical minority, which calls for a "people's Church". Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide's sermons about self-defence and socialism corresponded too closely to the needs of the hour! [See interview.]
The National Government Council has no confidence in the bourgeois leaders' ability to put an end to the social crisis. For them the only defences are the army and the para-military groups. Coming out of 30 years of Duvalierism, the men of the CNG know what they are talking about. The CNG is not, strictly speaking, a pure and simple instrument of Duvalierist sectors. It has its own interests, including economic ones in smuggling. But it has rapidly understood that the Duvalierists and the ex-Tontons Macoutes' well-implanted networks in the coun tryside - where three-quarters of the population live - are indispensable for quelling the growing discontent, and that it is vital to ally itself with
It has often been said that the CNG has failed. Rather, it is the antiDuvalierist bourgeoisie that has failed. Perhaps two-thirds of its members carry a North American passport. That is enough to explain why, in spite of the nashing of teeth in some sectors that have suffered from foreign competition, this fundamentally parasitic social class has supported the politics of Leslie Delatour. It no more has a political alternative to offer to the CNG than
Indeed, what is there to say about the presidential candidates supported by the anti-Duvalierist bourgeoisie, except that in all the political crises Haiti has
HAM gone through since Duvalier fled they have proved incapable of making the slightest impact? The anti-Duvalierist bourgeoisie has dragged petty bourgeois organizations such as the Parti nationaliste progressiste haïtien (PANPRA) and the Congrès des mouvements démocratiques (CONACOM) down with it. The project of these groups is to establish a democratic parliamentary-type regime. How could "democratic" government, limiting itself to reforms, confront an economic and social crisis as deep-going as that in Haiti? By what means could it reform an army that developed out of the American occupation and Duvalierism? They refuse to face these questions.
At the beginning of the summer, when they had to come down off their cloud and propose a governmental alternative, they could not find anything better to do than include in it "an officer ranking just after generals Henry Namphy and Williams Regala". This only confirmed that, in Haiti's situation, the choice was between the revolutionary road and an alliance with the army (and, beyond that, with the US).
A party acceptable to the bourgeoisie
The policy followed by these organizations this summer is the same as the one that prevailed when CONACOM was formed. The official line then was to coordinate the mass organizations for the struggle, but in reality to control them. Its initiators wanted to create for themselves a political base for building a party acceptable to the bourgeoisie, the Church and foreign powers. And they were already getting support from Latin American currents in the Socialist International, and from "liberal American circles". 4
The crisis in Haiti is so profound that it cannot fail to ignite new explosions. But today the petty bourgeois organizations hold the upper hand, and there is apparently no well-rooted revolutionary vanguard capable of offering perspectives to the mass movement, of helping it to coordinate and to successfully confront the Tontons Macoutes and the army. This is a serious deficiency and it threatens to lead to a wearing out of vital energies. This would facilitate the installation of a new dictatorship — perhaps even more savage than the previous one - the only response that the dominant classes and imperialism have to the Haitian crisis. * 3. PANPRA, Haitian Nationalist Progressive Party, a split from IFOPADA; it is led by Serge Gilles and supported by the French Socialist Party. CONACOM, Congress of Democratic Movements, a formation created in January 1987, led by Victor Benoit and Serge Bajeux. 4. Caribbean Contact, April 1987.
October 12, 1987 • International Viewpoint
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Religious and framework of the National Government
Council (CNG) and of the corrupt capitalist system that keeps it going.
Afterwards, we can see by what name to call the Haiti that toimperialism day true patriots are calling by names that express their desires: a system that can guarantee honest work, justice, liberty and respect to everyone.
ON THURSDAY August 14, hundreds of young people occupied Port-au-Prince cathedral, and seven of them began a hunger-strike. They were protesting against the transfer of Father Jean-Bertrand Aristide to a remote suburb of the capital, and demanded that the bishops speak out clearly on the Jean-Rabel massacre. [See /V 125,
September 14, 1987.]