Contemporary Haitian Politics (Part II)
By Hyppolite Pierre
For perhaps a better understanding of Haiti's Civil Society, one perhaps needs to look again at politics and the economy. The issues are with presidential leadership, Parliament and the development of new legislation, and the rule of law. One also needs to even succinctly consider the impact of the American occupation on Haiti between 1915 and 1934.
Presidential leadership
A president of Haiti is someone who must obey, and encourage all citizens at large to obey the laws of the country. S/he must work towards progress for the country by bringing in or encouraging more and better ideas to take roots in society as s/he uses effectively the State's administrative machines. S/he must also have the confidence of society at large in his or her functions as a leader, on the basis of his or her work.
Haiti's current president has a major social impediment. Haiti is so stratified as a society that many citizens mostly from the elite, look at one's collar first, before they will accept or refuse a leader's governance rather than that leader's qualifications and potential. Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the current president, is from modest origin. He was in the priesthood and benefited largely from that experience to earn his undergraduate and graduate degrees free of charges, in Haiti and abroad. As an adept to the theology of liberation, he used in the 1980's fiery languages to describe the economic elite which he and many others considered exploitative. He uses such colorful languages, so well understood by his constituents the poor, that many of his detractors justify their resentment toward him on that basis. They claim that he was and is not fit for the presidency because he was (and to some still is) divisive. Although now quite comfortable, he is still the private joke of those who resent his phenomenal personal success.
He is in that sense albeit involuntarily, one of the causes of all the present difficulties in Haitian society. He is because he represents what many others especially from the elite despise. He stands at least publicly for the poor and is truly still loved by a good many of them. He uses the Haitian language more so than the elite would have preferred a president to. He walks around crowds of people who still venerate him, people who speak no French, do not or barely know how to read and write, and who are very poor.
The traditional political class or political elite from the left or the right that has compacted onto the Convergence opposition, think of him as vile, someone who should have been an afterthought but yet, is a major player on the political chessboard.
With all these impediments, the power of the president to accomplish what he was elected to do is diminished. It is so mainly because he needs the collaboration of the elite or at least a wide segment of it, to be effective. That has yet to happen, even though many think it is already happening. In the short and long run therefore, Civil Society suffers. What is truly left for the president in terms of favorable and trustworthy partisans or sympathizers are the Diaspora.
The Diaspora as members of Haiti's Civil Society
Since many of them live in places like North America and Western Europe, they have grown accustomed to the idea that one can rise from poverty and reach any level of success that his or her good fortunes render possible. Thus, while in exile, Aristide's largest and most effective constituents were a large segment of that Diaspora, eventually characterized in French as "diplomates du béton", or the asphalt diplomats.
They were then called the asphalt diplomats because, while Aristide and his closest partisans and diplomats were negotiating in private over his political faith and that of the elected government, people from the Diaspora would constantly wage demonstrations in the United States and Canada, from Miami through New York and Boston, to Montreal and even Ottawa, in Canada.
Despite the tremendous success of the Diaspora in terms of assuring the return of Aristide to power in 1994, the perception was and still is for the longest period of time, that the party in power cares very little about these not-so-foreign constituents. That explains why, much was not done to satisfy these "constituents until very recently, when the Haitian Parliament voted a law that gives certain legal benefits to Haitians who have become foreign citizens and their children born on foreign soil.
As we discussed the economic influence of the Diaspora on the country's economy, we can also consider that group as part of Haiti's Civil Society. They travel often to Haiti on vacation or for personal affairs like businesses, funerals, or as tourists during the carnival period, etc. When they go to Haiti and depending on where they are from, they bring in new trends which the local population mimics.
Even from a distant perspective, it is clear that the Diaspora has an impact that is felt throughout society at large. It is indeed thanks to their constant complaint via private and even public channels, that finally in May 2002, the Haitian Parliament had passed that major piece of legislation related to the matter of their rights and duties as foreign citizens from national origin.
Previously, even the idea of double citizenship was not foreign but rejected by virtually all segments of society. Nowadays, many Haitians especially from the business community, keep residence in two places like Miami and Port-au-Prince. The Diaspora has truly become an integral part of society at large.
The effect of legislation on Civil Society
Haiti's legislative chambers tend to work slowly, impeding upon potential for improvements in Civil Society. This is apparently due to the lack of an effective and brilliant leadership in Parliament, and other effective legislators who can introduce bills that stir up debates before they are either rejected or passed into law.
According to news reports, quite often, with the previous 46th, and the current 47th legislatures, members of Parliament and at times even the president himself or his direct aides have to make phone calls to encourage these elected members of Parliament who are on the State payroll, to come to the Chambers so they can discuss bills that have already been, or which they would like to introduce in Parliament.
This problem has been particularly acute recently, with the President of the Parliament Mr. Fourel Célestin, a Senator, sometimes expressing publicly his dismay and frustration over the absence of a majority of legislators, deputies and senators, making it impossible to even have a quorum and debate on legislative issues.
One such bill was about children's rights. In Haiti, those from modest, middle, and upper income usually borrow the service of poor children from rural areas, and abuse them eventually, coerce them into doing all sorts of work in a household oftentimes without ever sending them to school, or even giving them free time for themselves.
Those children are referred to in the Haitian language as restavèk, which means "staying with", a derivative of the French "rester" which means "stay", and "avec" which means "with".
It was thanks to pressure from groups and Haitian associations mostly abroad that the government of President Aristide, himself an advocate for children, pushed through a bill in Parliament which had finally become law.
Legislators must first understand their impact on Civil Society. More importantly, political parties must continue on choosing the best potential legislators as candidates, to help Haiti's Civil Society become more rational and attractive. Equally important, legislators must also devise ways to render new laws passed effective. For instance, even though the new laws about children's rights have passed, it is not clear how these laws will be implemented, who will enforce those laws.
The rule of law and Civil Society
It is one thing to debate an issue in Parliament as important as the issue of children used as servants in others' homes, and adopt new legislations on that basis. It is quite another to hire regulation enforcers who can and will do their job effectively. Haiti first of all needs the economic means to make that possible.
The country also needs the collaboration in most cases, of those upon whom those laws will be enforced so the meaning of these laws can be valuable.
As the economy is in the negative, it is hard for government to even enforce certain laws that will make Civil Society more rational and attractive. Can one force or oblige someone else to do what's right and not mistreat a child, when the parents of that child has no means to visit his or her child regularly, and thus find out about the child's real conditions, as opposed to what the parents were promised? Is there a necessary channel of communication, built into this new law, between the child and the parent, which makes it possible for the child's parent to know the real conditions in which his or her child is living say, in a middle class suburban home in Port-au-Prince?
After all, those who have the most to lose in a child-servant relationship are the parents of that child. Are the parents of that child who live in a rural community even aware of the existence of this new law? If and when they do, how often can they visit such a child at his or her new home per year according to that new law? Does that new law passed by Parliament and signed by the Executive Branch, consider the matter of when or if the child can go and spend some time with his or her mother and father?
This is only one in hundreds of laws which, to those who live in a developed society and understand the meaning of law enforcement, mean not much. In a country like Haiti where mechanisms for law enforcement are either too cumbersome or unrealistic, or simply inexistent, such laws may not even be worth more than the paper they're written on? How thus can Civil Society become confident, in this newly emerging system that most are striving to craft into a democracy?
These are some of the troubling questions that Civil Society has to contend with. They sometimes make thoughtful individuals even more cynical and less trustworthy of government. Gaining the confidence of Civil Society requires that all these intricacies, and the necessary mechanisms be put in place so people can gradually trust the State in its judgments and decisions.
The American occupation and its long-term effect on Haiti's Civil Society
It was first and always the Catholic Church and France which had the greatest influence on Haiti and its elite. Catholic priests and nuns trained the elite in the areas of education, religion, intellectual beliefs and biases and acuteness, societal norms.
That began to change in 1915, when the United States invaded Haiti and occupied that country for the next 19 years. Since then, and especially since the temporary disagreements between the high clergy of the Catholic Church and François Duvalier in the 1960's, the Protestant Church had begun to take roots in Haiti. The American ways of doing things had also begun to influence the Haitian culture. Businesses slowly but surely, had gained worthiness in terms of manners in which one acquires wealth, rather than through crooked politics.
The United States which at the time of its occupation of Haiti, favored the traditional light-skinned elite, had also created opportunities for a rising Black middle class. That newly emerging middle class group eventually became more assertive, self-confident, and began to require and acquire greater political rights and power.
Also, if previously French was the only and most important language of the elite, English had evolved as a result of this occupation and have become by the early 1980's, a crucial language for not only business people, but also for those in politics, or those who wish to move around in "high society".
Although this wasn't noticed for long, even in he early 1960's, some fathers with financial means were already sending their wives to the United States to give birth to their children. It is a practice that is continuing to this day. After the American occupation in 1934, and already during the 1940's, many tourists travel to Haiti from the United States, and began to enjoy the country's flora and pleasant breezes either in the capital or in other cities. They also began to enforce the notion of America, and even reinforce the presence of the English language into the Haitian culture.
The Haitian Diaspora nowadays consists mostly of individuals who live in the United States. They are the most assertive of the country's Diaspora, borrowing a page from the American culture. Many of their business leaders buy products in the US and bring them to Haiti.
The American influence on Haiti is only growing and will only continue to grow. The music from Hip-Hop to Rock N' Roll to Jazz, Rap, and all the rest, has impregnated the Haitian psyche, so much so that some very popular Haitian bands and musicians color Haiti's traditional music style, the meringue, with the brushes of Americana. Haitian politics is so impregnated by the American influence that virtually all politicians try to get into the good grace of either some powerful legislator from the United States, or some powerful think-tank.
It is quite common nowadays to hear of such Haitian politician visiting Capitol Hill, in the hopes to meet with people as far left of the political spectrum as Senator Kennedy from Massachusetts, or Christopher Dodd from Connecticut, and as far right as Senator Jesse Helms from North Carolina. Lobbying is even a common term in our Haitian and French speaking ways. Haiti's Civil Society is now truly in the cultural crossroads between the United States, France, its Dominican brothers on the East side of the island, and its deeply entrenched African roots.
Civil Society has yet to emerge from all these currents.
Politics, economy, class consciousness, and the obsession with righteousness are all parts of contemporary Haiti. Marked by its African roots, its European heritage, its Latin influence, and its Anglo-Saxon neighbors in Miami, Fl, or New York, or even California, Haiti is moving.
Sometimes or perhaps too often, the move is backward. But overall, hope remains that leaping towards the future is still part of the country's agenda.
It is the fight for democracy that has prolonged so much which creates both the lack of confidence, and yet the hopes that someday Haiti will begin driving on the road of development.
It is the Diaspora composed of elements from this so stratified society, which brings the American flashiness as opposed to the European subtleties, into the fabric of that culture. All those elements have an undeniable impact on the country's contemporary politics.
