Nor can it be attributed to some inherent shortcoming on the part of Haitians. The book is not so much about the earthquake as it is about the centuries of internal and external obstacles to autonomy and freedom of Haitian people from the time of the Haitian Revolution.Īs the author states, the true causes of Haiti’s poverty and instability are not mysterious-the result of some secret pact with the Devil as televangelist Pat Robertson argued or the “influences of the voodoo religion” as journalist David Brooks proposed. Unlike Haiti Rising: Haitian History, Culture and the Earthquake of 2010 (2010) edited by Martin Munro, who one reviewer has argued is already out of date, Dubois’s work will stand the test of time in offering a critical lens into the Haiti that the world watched crumble on that fateful afternoon and the human disaster that followed. Yet as Dubois demonstrates, the Haitian people have never given up on their struggle for true democracy, creating a powerful culture insistent on autonomy and equality for all.Revealing what lies behind the familiar moniker of "e the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere,"e this indispensable book illuminates the foundations on which a new Haiti might yet emerge.Historian Laurent Dubois’s Haiti: The Aftershocks of History (2012) is an important intervention on the discourses surrounding Haiti following the earthquake of 2010 and an overview of history in general. At the same time, Dubois shows, the internal debates about what Haiti should do with its hard-won liberty alienated the nation's leaders from the broader population, setting the stage for enduring political conflict. He details how the crushing indemnity imposed by the former French rulers initiated a devastating cycle of debt, while frequent interventions by the United States-including a twenty-year military occupation-further undermined Haiti's independence. The country's difficulties are inextricably rooted in its founding revolution-the only successful slave revolt in the history of the world the hostility that this rebellion generated among the colonial powers surrounding the island nation and the intense struggle within Haiti itself to define its newfound freedom and realize its promise.Dubois vividly depicts the isolation and impoverishment that followed the 1804 uprising. But as acclaimed historian Laurent Dubois makes clear, Haiti's troubled present can only be understood by examining its complex past. Maligned and misunderstood, the nation has long been blamed by many for its own wretchedness.
A passionate and insightful account by a leading historian of Haiti that traces the sources of the country's devastating present back to its turbulent and traumatic historyEven before the 2010 earthquake destroyed much of the country, Haiti was known as a benighted place of poverty and corruption.
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