Haiti and the uses of America: post-U.S. occupation promises

251 Pages·2017·5.604 MB·English

by  Verna, Chantalle F

Haiti and the Uses of America

Haiti and the Uses
of America
•
Post- U.S. Occupation Promises
Chantalle F. Verna
Rutgers University Press
New Brunswick, Camden, and Newark, New Jersey, and London
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Verna, Chantalle F., 1974– author.
Title: Haiti and the uses of America : post-U.S. occupation promises /
Chantalle F. Verna.
Description: New Brunswick, New Jersey : Rutgers University Press, 2017. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016025801| ISBN 9780813585178 (hardcover : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9780813585161 (pbk. : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780813585185 (e-book (epub))
Subjects: LCSH: United States—Foreign relations—Haiti. | Haiti—Foreign
relations—United States. | BISAC: HISTORY / Caribbean & West Indies
/ G eneral. | HISTORY / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies). |
POLITICAL SCIENCE / Colonialism & Post-Colonialism. |
HISTORY / United States / 20th Century.
Classification: LCC E183.8.H2 V47 2017 | DDC 327.7307294—dc23
https://lccn.loc.gov/2016025801
LC record available at
A British Cataloging- in- Publication record for this book is available
from the British Library.
Copyright © 2017 by Chantalle F. Verna
All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, elec-
tronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without
written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University Press,
106 Somerset Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. The only exception
to this prohibition is “fair use” as defined by U.S. copyright law.
www .rutgersuniversitypress .org
Manufactured in the United States of America
With heartfelt memories of
André Elizée (January 30, 1955– January 10, 2010)
and
Eddy Jean- Baptiste (March 14, 1972– February 22, 2011)

Contents
Preface ix
Note on Terminology and Language xiii

Introduction 1
1.
The Promise and Peril of Foreign Ties, 1791– 1915 20
2.
“With the Spirit of Friendship”: U.S. Occupation,
Indigénisme, and Haitian Nationalism, 1915– 1934 42
3.
Pan- Americanism in Port- au- Prince: Historical
Memories and Urban Activities, 1934– 1945 73
4.
La Nouvelle Coopération: Cultivating Knowledge
through Haiti- U.S. Ties, 1936– 1948 98
5.
“Viva UNESCO”: A Subtle Embedding
of the United States in Haiti, 1948– 1953 122
Epilogue: Enduring Promises 148
Acknowledgments 153
Abbreviations 163
Notes 165
Note on Sources 201
Bibliography 203
Index 227
vii

Preface
We must have the dream. . . . and try to attain it at its maximum. . . .
We must continue to fight, so we can arrive at what is possible.
— Haitian scholar and activist Odette Roy Fombrun, 2002
A tremendous sense of hopefulness often accompanies moments
of transition—b eginnings and endings bring with them aspirations
and expectations of what is to come. Ideas from the past or those
newly inspired in the present can generate a sense of promising
possibility. Haiti and the Uses of America is about the promise of the
first two decades after the U.S. military occupation of Haiti, which
lasted from 1915 to 1934, and the value of paying attention to the
idyllic rhetoric during Haiti’s earliest post-U .S. occupation years.
In doing so, I offer a perspective that is often absent from com-
mon narratives which explain U.S. involvement in Haitian affairs
strictly as a product of U.S. imperialism, a function of a growing
diaspora that emerged most notably during the dictatorships of
François Duvalier (1957–1971) and his son Jean-Claude (1971–1986)
and after changes to U.S. immigration laws in 1965. Unlike those
who have taken up the task of investigating the pursuits and impli-
cations of a foreign, and particularly a U.S., presence in Haiti, I
emphasize the complexity of interests some Haitians have had in
U.S. involvement in Haiti and the consequences thereof. By impli-
cations and consequences, I do not mean specific, tangible results
that came when some Haitians reached out to individuals and
institutions from the United States. Rather, I am more concerned
ix
about understanding the roots and nature of ideas that ties to the
United States could be positively promising in Haiti, and how
those ideas began to establish themselves within various sectors
of Haitian society, beginning with Haiti’s professional and skilled
urban residents. My aim is to provide greater historical depth and
complexity to our understanding of the perspectives that inform
Haiti’s current ties to the United States.
My yearning for a more nuanced perspective came during the
1990s when I began wondering why some Haitians anticipated
that U.S. involvement in the Haitian state’s affairs could be a good
thing, especially given critiques about occupation in the past and
other forms of imperialism in the present. I had been observing
and, with my own novice hopes, experiencing the roller coaster of
expectations that came with the end of the Duvalier dictatorship
in 1986. For many in Haiti and in the diaspora, visions of cross-
class alliances in post- Duvalier Haiti held the promise of resolv-
ing many of Haiti’s challenges. Sadly, highly contested elections
and related violence thwarted that vision. Those challenges played
out vividly when Jean-B ertrand Aristide, a Catholic priest turned
populist politician, who in February 1991 had become Haiti’s first
post- dictatorship elected president, was ousted by a military coup
several months later.
With the support of some Haitian lobbyists, in Haiti and from
within many of Haiti’s U.S.-b ased diaspora communities, the U.S.
government imposed trade embargoes on Haiti and ultimately, in
1994, entered into an agreement with the military junta to secure
Aristide’s return to power. Fast-f orward two decades, in Haiti’s
bicentennial year of independence (2004), another segment of
Haiti’s U.S.- based diaspora lobbied U.S. officials again. This time,
the result was U.S. assistance for Aristide’s removal from power
during his highly contested second elected term. In 1994 and again
in 2004, the U.S. government intervened militarily in Haiti, on
both occasions under the auspices of United Nations missions.
Listening to competing views in news reports and in debates
among family members, I reflected on the critiques I had heard
when it came to previous interventions (including the one that
x Preface