The road to hell

[bcholmes]

Even as rescuers are digging victims out of the rubble in Haiti, policymakers in Washington and around the world are grappling with how a destitute, corrupt and now ruined country might be transformed into a self-sustaining nation.

Development efforts have failed there, decade after decade, leaving Haitians with a dysfunctional government, high crime and incomes averaging a dollar a day. But the leveled capital of Port-au-Prince must be rebuilt, promising one of the largest economic development efforts ever undertaken in the hemisphere. And those who will help oversee it are thinking hard about how to use that money and attention to change the country forever.

"It's terrible to look at it this way, but out of crisis often comes real change," said Ross Anthony, the Rand Corporation's global health director. "The people and the institutions take on the crisis and bring forth things they weren't able to do in the past."

— From Haiti's ruins, a chance to rebuild a nation", Washington Post

It's not only a terrible way to look at it, but it's an ill-informed way to look at it. Haiti has been subjected to two decades of destabilization efforts. There are clear reasons why development efforts have failed: because they've been designed to fail.

The country has been destabilized by two coups -- backed, funded and planned by governments like Canada and the U.S. We allowed absolutely brutal regimes -- such as the Raoul Cédras and Gérard Latortue regimes -- to engage in horrific human rights abuses. Hell, we installed Latortue.

When the Haitian people get to elect their governments fairly, they consistently want to vote for people whose primary platforms include providing services to the poor. And when that happens, countries like Canada and the U.S. cut aid to Haiti, and start funnelling money into projects like funding the opposition parties. The latest trick is to rig the elections process so that the parties that the poor majority like aren't allowed to run.

The Post article does acknowledge that U.S. foreign policy toward Haiti has contributed to the problems, there. Especially with regards to policies on rice imports. But it's also careful to frame that dilemma with phrases like, "No one is expecting controversial trade policies to be taken up overnight."

Even since 2004, Haiti has seen three major disasters. The 2004 Hurricane that destroyed Gonayiv, the two hurricanes and two tropical storms that hit the island in September, 2008 (that, again, devastated Gonayiv, among other areas) and now the 2010 earthquake. You'd think that after the first two disasters, we'd make it a priority to help build up infrastructure: roads, hospitals, emergency response teams, etc. But no. Canada has focused an inordinate amount of "aid" on elections, political reform, police and soldiers. I've sat in both the Canadian and the U.S. embassy in Haiti and listened to officials tell me that security must be the first priority because security is a necessary prerequisite to encouraging business interests. If you wanted security, maybe you shouldn't have overthrown the government in the first place!

For my part, I don't think that real change is possible in Haiti unless we are willing to discuss what's really responsible for the failures, there. And, frankly, the failures have almost everything to do with the international community's "good intentions" for Haiti.