Haiti Justice Blog

New Administration, New Haiti Policy?

By Caroline Stauffer

President of The Haitian League Bernier Lauredan, Sr., M.D., believes that Haitian Americans, 2 million strong, should advise the incoming U.S. Administration on Haiti policy.  Speaking with the IJDH over the phone after the League-sponsored first annual National Congress and Convention of Haitian-Americans, Lauredan said a Haitian-American advisory council should be formed to consult with the new Government on Haiti policy.  “Nothing like that exists,” said Lauredan. “It is imperative that they talk to the Diaspora, which has Haiti at heart.”    

“For the past eight years we have tried to have meetings with the Bush administration,” said Marlene Bastien, executive director of Haitian Women of Miami, on the eve of the election.  “We have not once been able to and we pray for a new administration with an open door policy.” 

While Haitian-Americans see an opportunity to secure a more just policy towards Haiti from the Barack Obama administration, some believe lack of unity and divergence of opinion in the community will impede policy change.

Change That Haiti Can Believe in, Part III

Numerous delegations of Haitian, Haitian-American, and other ethnicities - - civil, religious, professional, artistic, social, educational and political - - met on October 10th to the 12th, 2008, for the 2008 National Congress and Convention of Haitian-Americans at the Sheraton Newark Airport Hotel in Newark, New Jersey, USA.  The purpose of the 2008 NCCHA was to obtain a comprehensive and authoritative view of the 2 million plus Haitian-Americans living in the United States, and to identify and help capitalize the vast Haitian-American resources to aid Haitians in Haiti and the United States. 

IJDH did not participate in the National Congress, but we are passing on the Congress' resolutions to continue the discussions about advocacy for Haiti under a new U.S. Administration and Congress. 

Change That Haiti Can Believe In, Part II: Haitian Diaspora Considers Immigration Policy in Storms’ Wake

The Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) and Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) are collaborating on a series of articles on Haitian-Americans' priorities for a United States policy towards Haiti under a new administration. The series' first article, on immigration, is below. SIPA's Caroline Stauffer is conducting the interviews and writing the articles. The opinions in the articles are those of the interviewees, not necessarily of IJDH or SIPA. To join the discussion, post a comment!

By Caroline Stauffer

As a humanitarian gesture, the U.S. government should stop deporting Haitians to the country devastated by a series of hurricanes in August and September, activists told the IJDH.

Change That Haiti Can Believe In, Part I

With the U.S. elections just six weeks away, and the Presidential candidates vying over the "change" mantle, this is a good time to discuss how U.S. policy towards Haiti can be improved under a new Administration and Congress. To encourage that discussion, we'll post a series of analyses on the HaitiJustice blog, starting with an article from today's Indianapolis Star, Changes in U.S. policies would calm Haiti's storm.

We hope this series helps generate ideas and consensus on how the U.S. can help Haiti develop into a country in which the full spectrum of human rights- economic, social, cultural, civil and and political- are respected. Please join in the conversation, by commenting on the posted articles or adding your own suggestions. If you have a longer piece you would like to submit as a stand-alone article, email it to brian@ijdh.org.

Thanks, Brian

*As a 501(c)(3) charity, IJDH cannot endorse any candidate. This does not prevent balanced discussions of candidates' policies, nor does it limit blog comments.

The First Annual Haiti and the Red Sox-Win-The-World-Series Column

Boston Haitian Reporter

November, 2007

When I emailed last May’s column in to the Boston Haitian Reporter, I added: “my November column is going to be on the World Series victory, so please put me down for the BHR's spot in the media seats at Fenway. I checked the mail faithfully, but despite the six months’ notice, the tickets never arrived. But I’ll keep my promise about the November column.

The challenge is finding connections between the Red Sox and Haiti.

Deye Mon Gen Mon: Fighting for Justice in Haiti and Mississippi

Boston Haitian Reporter, July 2007

The recent developments in the Emmanuel Constant prosecution are a victory, but a sad one because they demonstrate how far Haiti is away from the justice system that its people deserve. But recent "victories" for justice in the U.S. show that Haiti is not alone, and provide some lessons for pursuing justice in a hostile system.

 

Paul Wolfowitz and Haiti

The controversy over World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz and the payraise (to $193,590/year) to his Bank colleague and domestic partner, Shaha Riza, has focussed on the propriety of Mr. Wolfowitz' involvement in the promotion and raise, and the apparent hypocrisy of Mr. Wolfowitz lecturing against corruption in World Bank borrower countries while engaging in questionable practices at the Bank (see a good article in the Washington Post by William Easterly). But there has been very little discussion about the propriety of an institution whose mission is to fight poverty to be paying anyone that much money, and the hypocrisy of the Bank in general telling poor countries to cut salaries for nurses and teachers while it paid such high staff salaries.

The absence of these issues from the debates may be explained by the absence of the voices of the Bank's supposed constituents- the poor of Haiti and countries like it. The debates have been exclusively framed by relatively wealthy journalists, officials and policy makers living in relatively wealthy countries, with no input from the poor the Bank is supposed to be helping.

Raising the Alarm on Haiti?

Evaluating the performance of Haiti's President Preval is a difficult task. There is, of course, much work undone in implementing the progressive platform he was elected on a year ago. But there are also many limitations on President Preval's powers. Even the idea of an evaluation can be tricky- some in Haiti's grassroots movement fear that any critiques provide ammunition for those seeking to shorten President Preval's term or further limit his powers.

The current issue of Interconnect, a newsletter for the U.S. Latin American Solidarity movement,
looks at "leftist" Presidents across Latin America, including a piece I wrote on President Preval. That article is below, )to receive the full newsletter email interconnect_mott@frontiernet.net).

Let us know what you think. Are the critiques justified? Are they insufficient? How do we go about critiquing the government's policies without undermining its legitimacy?

Response to Brennan re: Evaluating Information from Haiti

Brennan raised some excellent questions in his comment to our last post about The New York Times and Cite Soleil.  I'll take a crack at responding below, but I hope that others who struggle with these issues will pitch in with their thoughts.

Brennan is off to a good start, doing the two best things to understand Haiti short of going there: looking at a variety of sources, and critically analyzing all of them (including IJDH's analyses). In Haiti, as in anywhere else, people's opinions are greatly shaped by their perspective (the guys eating lunch down at the Cheyenne Cafe in my rural town think President Bush is doing a great job). The different perspectives are not necessarily wrong, but many are necessarily unrepresentative.

Haiti Legislative Priority Part 2: Immigration Reform

The U.S. Congress has an historic opportunity to chart a new course in our relations with Haiti, one that respects Haitian sovereignty, promotes sustainable economic development, and advances the U.S.’ long term interest in stability in the region.

This is Part 2 of a 4 part series of discussion papers on legislative priorities, covering immigration reform. Please help us develop our positions, by letting us know what you think, at any level: global strategy, details, priorities, tactics, etc.

Advocates for fair Haitian immigration have identified two priorities for the new Congress: a) granting Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haiti, which would temporarily suspend deportations of unlawful immigrants to Haiti and grant them work permits and permission to travel, and b) making improvements to HRIFA (the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 1998), to correct technical flaws in HRIFA that excluded a few thousand deserving HRIFA applicants from becoming U.S. citizens.