Why is Haiti the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere?
In this follow-up episode, we'll explore the challenges that post-revolutionary Haiti has faced, and learn how and why it has never managed to escape its past.
[00:00:05] Hello, hello hello, and welcome to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:00:11] The show where you can listen to fascinating stories, and learn weird and wonderful things about the world at the same time as improving your English.
[00:00:20] I'm Alastair Budge, and today we are going to be talking about Haiti.
[00:00:25] Specifically, we will be discussing the question of why Haiti wins the unfortunate prize of the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.
[00:00:35] I should say that this is a follow-up episode, a part two, of the last episode on the Haitian Revolution, so if you haven’t listened to that one yet, I would strongly recommend that you do so first, as there is a lot of background information there, and this episode will make a lot more sense if you’ve listened to that one first.
[00:00:56] OK then, let’s get started and talk about Haiti.
[00:01:02] The search engine “Google” is a great way of getting an insight into what people all over the world are curious about.
[00:01:10] Just start typing into the search bar, and Google will present you with the most frequently asked queries.
[00:01:18] If you start typing “best recipes for”, Google might suggest “dinner”, or “healthy meals”, or “toddlers”.
[00:01:28] I’m in Sweden at the moment, and if I start typing “why is Sweden”, I’m presented with options like “so good at music”, “so happy”, “so expensive”, and a question that I’ve been asking myself recently, “so cloudy”.
[00:01:45] All valid questions, and clearly a lot of people are looking for the answers.
[00:01:53] If you start typing “why is Haiti”, however, you are presented with a very different set of suggestions, a set of questions that present not quite such a rosy picture.
[00:02:06] Why is Haiti so dangerous?
[00:02:08] Why is Haiti so unstable?
[00:02:10] Why is Haiti so violent?
[00:02:13] Why is Haiti so poor?
[00:02:17] These are all very valid questions. Haiti has been overrun by gangs, there is no government, the former US ambassador to Haiti said it's not going to be a failed state, it is a failed state.
[00:02:32] So…why?
[00:02:35] Well, you will remember the story of the Haitian Revolution from the last episode.
[00:02:40] As a brief reminder, the second-largest island in the Caribbean is called Hispaniola.
[00:02:47] In 1492 it was “discovered” by Christopher Columbus, who claimed it for the Spanish.
[00:02:55] Spanish interest in the island waned, and in 1697 the western half was handed over to France.
[00:03:04] The French called it Saint-Domingue and turned it into a slave colony of grotesque proportions. It became the most profitable slave colony in the world, at one point producing half of all of the coffee in Europe.
[00:03:20] Fast forward to 1791, and the slaves of Saint-Domingue rose up. It was a long, complicated and extremely violent uprising–as we heard in the last episode–but in January of 1804 they finally emerged victorious, and a new state was declared: the country of Haiti.
[00:03:43] Finally, there was peace, the nation could get on with the business of nation-building, and its citizens would enjoy the wealth and prosperity that the island’s natural resources had afforded its white residents.
[00:03:59] Unfortunately, this has never happened.
[00:04:02] Haiti is the only country in the Western Hemisphere that is classified as a “Least developed country”.
[00:04:09] Its GDP per capita is $1,700, and Haitians have a life expectancy at birth of a measly 64 years.
[00:04:20] And this pill is even more bitter to swallow when you consider the situation on the eastern half of the island, the country previously called Santo Domingo, now the Dominican Republic.
[00:04:34] Now, to reiterate, Haiti and the Dominican Republic are on the same island.
[00:04:40] The climate is the same, the terrain is the same, the two nations even have practically the same population.
[00:04:48] But everything else is very different.
[00:04:51] The GDP per capita of The Dominican Republic today is six times larger than that of Haiti, life expectancy is a full 10 years more, the average person in Haiti is nearly 10 times poorer than their Dominican neighbour.
[00:05:09] There are plenty of reasons for this, stretching the entirety of Haiti’s history as an independent country.
[00:05:17] And in fact the first, very possibly the most important, goes right back to the start.
[00:05:24] So it is January 1804 and Jean-Jacques Dessalines has declared the nation of Haiti, with himself as an emperor.
[00:05:35] One of his first acts was what can only be described as the genocide of the remaining white population, and the remaining 5,000 or so white plantation owners and workers were slaughtered, often publicly and in truly terrible ways.
[00:05:52] Dessalines was, in his own words, avenging the century of mistreatment and cruelty by the whites towards their slaves, and cleansing the country of the dangerous whites.
[00:06:05] You might well say that he had every right to do it, but it did little to cement his power or put the country back on its feet.
[00:06:15] Its economy was in tatters after the primary means of production, the plantations, had been destroyed during the revolution.
[00:06:24] And with the massacre of the remaining white population, this essentially eliminated most of the people who had the expertise and understanding of how to manage and run the plantations.
[00:06:38] Dessalines tried to reintroduce the plantation system, even using forced labour not so dissimilar to the slavery he had fought tooth and nail to abolish, but it was not enough.
[00:06:51] Within three years, he would be assassinated by political rivals, and Haiti would be split up into separate parts, the Kingdom of Haiti in the north and the Republic of Haiti in the south.
[00:07:05] But the most important development would come in 1825, when the French king Charles X, Charles the Tenth of France, sent a fleet of 14 warships, complete with 528 cannons, to Haiti.
[00:07:22] This was not a declaration of war, or an attempt to recolonise Haiti, but a request for compensation. Well, not really a request, it was a demand.
[00:07:35] The French presented an ordinance from the king, a series of demands to the nation of Haiti.
[00:07:43] Specifically, France wanted 150 million francs to compensate for its loss. And by loss, this referred to the loss of the slave-powered colony.
[00:07:57] In exchange, France would not only leave Haiti in peace, but it would recognise Haiti as an independent country and treat it as an equal, on diplomatic terms at least.
[00:08:11] The then-ruler of Haiti, President Jean-Pierre Boyer, clearly felt he had little option but to agree, and accepted the French demands.
[00:08:22] The problem was that 150 million francs was a vast amount of money, equivalent to 300% of Haiti’s GDP, 3 times the entire revenues generated by the country every year.
[00:08:38] Haiti simply didn’t have the money, and it was forced to borrow money from French banks at high rates of interest in order to pay back the French state.
[00:08:50] This created a so-called “double debt” - the debt repayment to the French state and the interest payments to the French banks who loaned Haiti the money.
[00:09:01] In the interest of balance, the debt was reduced to 90 million francs, but this debt would be a yoke around the neck of every Haitian for over a hundred years.
[00:09:13] Haiti was already a poor country, and by the late 19th century 4 out of every 5 tax dollars its government was collecting were going to pay this debt.
[00:09:27] It was completely unsustainable, and meant that Haiti was unable to do anything other than pay the debt.
[00:09:35] Haiti defaulted on its debt multiple times, but each time was forced to take on more debt, with more interest, to repay the original debt.
[00:09:47] And this debt was no longer just to France.
[00:09:50] Haiti had also taken loans from American banks to pay back the French, so you had this unusual and deeply unfair situation where the country was crippled by foreign debt from the very start.
[00:10:06] What’s more, it wasn’t recognised as a country, at least by some key countries from which it sought recognition: the United States and Britain.
[00:10:16] Both countries still allowed slavery, and were fearful of acknowledging a country created after a slave rebellion.
[00:10:24] Just to the west of Haiti was the British colony Jamaica, home to hundreds of thousands of black slaves.
[00:10:31] And just a thousand kilometres north of Haiti was the United States, a relatively freshly independent country itself, but still home to millions of slaves.
[00:10:43] Recognising Haiti as a legitimate country might give slaves in the United States and in British colonies the idea that they too could be free, and that was not something the Americans or the British were too keen on.
[00:10:58] The UK and the United States did eventually recognise Haiti, in 1833 and 1862 respectively, but these years of non-recognition made it very hard for Haiti to trade, to seek diplomatic relations, to do what it needed to do to grow itself out of the mountain of French debt.
[00:11:20] And domestically, as you might imagine, Haiti was not a stable place.
[00:11:26] There were continuing disputes with neighbouring Saint-Domingo, which was annexed by Haiti and then gained independence in 1844.
[00:11:34] There were coups, assassinations and short-lived presidencies.
[00:11:40] And in 1915, faced with the prospect of an anti-American politician seizing power, the United States invaded and occupied Haiti. It was an occupation that would last 19 years, only ending in 1934.
[00:11:58] Now, speaking in purely economic terms, and when compared to some of the other woeful periods of Haitian history, the American occupation was not a terrible thing for the country.
[00:12:11] There were infrastructural improvements, the stabilisation of the country’s financial system, and some improvements in the day-to-day life of the average Haitian.
[00:12:23] But these infrastructural developments were enabled by forced labour, by Americans forcing Haitians from their homes to work building bridges or roads.
[00:12:35] And Haiti was occupied and controlled by another, more powerful country, Haitians were taking orders from white masters, it was not so different from the colonial days.
[00:12:48] This, understandably led to resentment on the part of the Haitian people towards their American occupiers.
[00:12:56] And it hampered the potential for Haiti to stand on its own two feet, politically, institutionally and diplomatically.
[00:13:05] It also started a long tradition of the United States supporting political candidates that would be sympathetic to American interests, and suppressing up-and-coming Haitians who weren’t.
[00:13:18] Now, the Americans left in 1934, and the people of Haiti discovered that there was a more dangerous enemy even closer to home.
[00:13:29] On the eastern side of the island, the leader of the Dominican Republic, Rafael Trujillo, decided to seize the opportunity to commit what must be one of the greatest atrocities to have taken place on the island of Hispaniola.
[00:13:43] And for that ugly prize, there is some competition…
[00:13:48] He had risen to power on the back of anti-Haitian sentiment, and had publicly stated that he was going to “solve” the problem of Haitians in the Dominican Republic.
[00:14:00] In October of 1937, he ordered Dominican soldiers to kill every Haitian living in the border region of the Dominican Republic.
[00:14:10] It was a slaughter of monumental proportions.
[00:14:14] Soldiers started to murder Haitian men, women and children with knives and machetes.
[00:14:21] As the Haitian population tried to flee, they were cut down in their tracks, turning the rivers red with blood. And those that fled towards the ocean were captured, their hands tied, and thrown into the sea to be eaten by sharks.
[00:14:38] It was truly awful, and is estimated to have cost the lives of up to 35,000 Haitians.
[00:14:46] So, more than 100 years after it declared its independence, Haiti was still experiencing political turmoil, aggression and prejudice from its Dominican neighbours, and it was still repaying its debt to Charles X, the king of France.
[00:15:03] And the 100 years after that, so the second half of the 20th century through to the present day, have not been filled with much good news for the people of Haiti either.
[00:15:16] For a 14-year period from 1957 to 1971 the country was ruled by the infamous Francois Duvalier, otherwise known as Papa Doc. His regime was autocratic and characterised by violence and intimidation towards his opponents.
[00:15:35] And after his death and the passing of the presidency to his son, Jean-Claude Duvalier, or Baby Doc, things did not get much better.
[00:15:47] Now, up until now, we've been talking about political and social events, problems caused by people.
[00:15:54] But we must now talk about problems caused by nature.
[00:15:59] Haiti in an area of the Caribbean that experiences frequent hurricanes and tropical storms.
[00:16:06] Not much fun, and every year people would be killed, but this wasn’t unique to Haiti; it's something that most Caribbean islands have to deal with.
[00:16:17] But in 2010 Mother Nature enacted upon Haiti the most monumental stroke of bad luck, in the form of a devastating earthquake.
[00:16:28] Now, the earthquake itself wasn’t that incredibly strong. It was 7 on the Richter scale, so it wasn’t even in the top 10 biggest earthquakes measured that year.
[00:16:41] But it was the most devastating, by a long margin, costing anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 lives, and causing billions of dollars worth of infrastructural damage.
[00:16:55] And ever since, Haiti has been trying to rebuild itself.
[00:16:59] It has received billions of dollars in aid, tens of thousands of aid workers have flocked there in a bid to help the country and its citizens get back on their feet.
[00:17:11] But, has it worked?
[00:17:14] By pretty much any metric you could look at, it has not.
[00:17:18] As of the time of recording this episode, Haiti meets every criterion for a “failed state”.
[00:17:25] The president has fled, there is no government, the streets are ruled by a series of military leaders, crime rates are at an all-time high, many major NGOs have pulled out because it is too dangerous.
[00:17:41] So, what comes next for Haiti?
[00:17:44] There are calls for foreign troops to be sent into the country to maintain some stability, but perfectly understandably, there are just as many voices within Haiti who reject this.
[00:17:56] After all, the history of Haiti is full of foreigners coming to the country and promising peace and prosperity, and well, none coming, and the country being left in a worse state afterwards.
[00:18:11] To wrap things up, Haiti must be one of the most unfortunate places in the world.
[00:18:17] Blessed by beautiful scenery, wonderful mountains, sandy beaches and crystal clear waters. And with a clear example of what life could have been like to the east, in the form of the Dominican Republic.
[00:18:32] But cursed by years of foreign occupation, slavery, war, prejudice, extreme violence, and political instability.
[00:18:42] So, as to the question of Why Haiti Is So Poor, well, the answer is that there are some very good reasons.
[00:18:52] OK then, that is it for today's episode on post-revolutionary Haiti, and the end of this two-part mini-series on Haiti.
[00:19:00] I hope it's been an interesting one, and that you've learnt something new about this fascinating but perpetually unlucky country.
[00:19:08] As always, I would love to know what you thought of this episode.
[00:19:11] Have you been to Haiti? Do you have any Haitian friends? If you do, have you talked much about the history of Haiti?
[00:19:18] I would love to know, so let’s get this discussion started.
[00:19:22] You can head right into our community forum, which is at community.leonardoenglish.com and get chatting away to other curious minds.
[00:19:30] You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:19:35] I'm Alastair Budge, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
[00:00:05] Hello, hello hello, and welcome to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:00:11] The show where you can listen to fascinating stories, and learn weird and wonderful things about the world at the same time as improving your English.
[00:00:20] I'm Alastair Budge, and today we are going to be talking about Haiti.
[00:00:25] Specifically, we will be discussing the question of why Haiti wins the unfortunate prize of the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.
[00:00:35] I should say that this is a follow-up episode, a part two, of the last episode on the Haitian Revolution, so if you haven’t listened to that one yet, I would strongly recommend that you do so first, as there is a lot of background information there, and this episode will make a lot more sense if you’ve listened to that one first.
[00:00:56] OK then, let’s get started and talk about Haiti.
[00:01:02] The search engine “Google” is a great way of getting an insight into what people all over the world are curious about.
[00:01:10] Just start typing into the search bar, and Google will present you with the most frequently asked queries.
[00:01:18] If you start typing “best recipes for”, Google might suggest “dinner”, or “healthy meals”, or “toddlers”.
[00:01:28] I’m in Sweden at the moment, and if I start typing “why is Sweden”, I’m presented with options like “so good at music”, “so happy”, “so expensive”, and a question that I’ve been asking myself recently, “so cloudy”.
[00:01:45] All valid questions, and clearly a lot of people are looking for the answers.
[00:01:53] If you start typing “why is Haiti”, however, you are presented with a very different set of suggestions, a set of questions that present not quite such a rosy picture.
[00:02:06] Why is Haiti so dangerous?
[00:02:08] Why is Haiti so unstable?
[00:02:10] Why is Haiti so violent?
[00:02:13] Why is Haiti so poor?
[00:02:17] These are all very valid questions. Haiti has been overrun by gangs, there is no government, the former US ambassador to Haiti said it's not going to be a failed state, it is a failed state.
[00:02:32] So…why?
[00:02:35] Well, you will remember the story of the Haitian Revolution from the last episode.
[00:02:40] As a brief reminder, the second-largest island in the Caribbean is called Hispaniola.
[00:02:47] In 1492 it was “discovered” by Christopher Columbus, who claimed it for the Spanish.
[00:02:55] Spanish interest in the island waned, and in 1697 the western half was handed over to France.
[00:03:04] The French called it Saint-Domingue and turned it into a slave colony of grotesque proportions. It became the most profitable slave colony in the world, at one point producing half of all of the coffee in Europe.
[00:03:20] Fast forward to 1791, and the slaves of Saint-Domingue rose up. It was a long, complicated and extremely violent uprising–as we heard in the last episode–but in January of 1804 they finally emerged victorious, and a new state was declared: the country of Haiti.
[00:03:43] Finally, there was peace, the nation could get on with the business of nation-building, and its citizens would enjoy the wealth and prosperity that the island’s natural resources had afforded its white residents.
[00:03:59] Unfortunately, this has never happened.
[00:04:02] Haiti is the only country in the Western Hemisphere that is classified as a “Least developed country”.
[00:04:09] Its GDP per capita is $1,700, and Haitians have a life expectancy at birth of a measly 64 years.
[00:04:20] And this pill is even more bitter to swallow when you consider the situation on the eastern half of the island, the country previously called Santo Domingo, now the Dominican Republic.
[00:04:34] Now, to reiterate, Haiti and the Dominican Republic are on the same island.
[00:04:40] The climate is the same, the terrain is the same, the two nations even have practically the same population.
[00:04:48] But everything else is very different.
[00:04:51] The GDP per capita of The Dominican Republic today is six times larger than that of Haiti, life expectancy is a full 10 years more, the average person in Haiti is nearly 10 times poorer than their Dominican neighbour.
[00:05:09] There are plenty of reasons for this, stretching the entirety of Haiti’s history as an independent country.
[00:05:17] And in fact the first, very possibly the most important, goes right back to the start.
[00:05:24] So it is January 1804 and Jean-Jacques Dessalines has declared the nation of Haiti, with himself as an emperor.
[00:05:35] One of his first acts was what can only be described as the genocide of the remaining white population, and the remaining 5,000 or so white plantation owners and workers were slaughtered, often publicly and in truly terrible ways.
[00:05:52] Dessalines was, in his own words, avenging the century of mistreatment and cruelty by the whites towards their slaves, and cleansing the country of the dangerous whites.
[00:06:05] You might well say that he had every right to do it, but it did little to cement his power or put the country back on its feet.
[00:06:15] Its economy was in tatters after the primary means of production, the plantations, had been destroyed during the revolution.
[00:06:24] And with the massacre of the remaining white population, this essentially eliminated most of the people who had the expertise and understanding of how to manage and run the plantations.
[00:06:38] Dessalines tried to reintroduce the plantation system, even using forced labour not so dissimilar to the slavery he had fought tooth and nail to abolish, but it was not enough.
[00:06:51] Within three years, he would be assassinated by political rivals, and Haiti would be split up into separate parts, the Kingdom of Haiti in the north and the Republic of Haiti in the south.
[00:07:05] But the most important development would come in 1825, when the French king Charles X, Charles the Tenth of France, sent a fleet of 14 warships, complete with 528 cannons, to Haiti.
[00:07:22] This was not a declaration of war, or an attempt to recolonise Haiti, but a request for compensation. Well, not really a request, it was a demand.
[00:07:35] The French presented an ordinance from the king, a series of demands to the nation of Haiti.
[00:07:43] Specifically, France wanted 150 million francs to compensate for its loss. And by loss, this referred to the loss of the slave-powered colony.
[00:07:57] In exchange, France would not only leave Haiti in peace, but it would recognise Haiti as an independent country and treat it as an equal, on diplomatic terms at least.
[00:08:11] The then-ruler of Haiti, President Jean-Pierre Boyer, clearly felt he had little option but to agree, and accepted the French demands.
[00:08:22] The problem was that 150 million francs was a vast amount of money, equivalent to 300% of Haiti’s GDP, 3 times the entire revenues generated by the country every year.
[00:08:38] Haiti simply didn’t have the money, and it was forced to borrow money from French banks at high rates of interest in order to pay back the French state.
[00:08:50] This created a so-called “double debt” - the debt repayment to the French state and the interest payments to the French banks who loaned Haiti the money.
[00:09:01] In the interest of balance, the debt was reduced to 90 million francs, but this debt would be a yoke around the neck of every Haitian for over a hundred years.
[00:09:13] Haiti was already a poor country, and by the late 19th century 4 out of every 5 tax dollars its government was collecting were going to pay this debt.
[00:09:27] It was completely unsustainable, and meant that Haiti was unable to do anything other than pay the debt.
[00:09:35] Haiti defaulted on its debt multiple times, but each time was forced to take on more debt, with more interest, to repay the original debt.
[00:09:47] And this debt was no longer just to France.
[00:09:50] Haiti had also taken loans from American banks to pay back the French, so you had this unusual and deeply unfair situation where the country was crippled by foreign debt from the very start.
[00:10:06] What’s more, it wasn’t recognised as a country, at least by some key countries from which it sought recognition: the United States and Britain.
[00:10:16] Both countries still allowed slavery, and were fearful of acknowledging a country created after a slave rebellion.
[00:10:24] Just to the west of Haiti was the British colony Jamaica, home to hundreds of thousands of black slaves.
[00:10:31] And just a thousand kilometres north of Haiti was the United States, a relatively freshly independent country itself, but still home to millions of slaves.
[00:10:43] Recognising Haiti as a legitimate country might give slaves in the United States and in British colonies the idea that they too could be free, and that was not something the Americans or the British were too keen on.
[00:10:58] The UK and the United States did eventually recognise Haiti, in 1833 and 1862 respectively, but these years of non-recognition made it very hard for Haiti to trade, to seek diplomatic relations, to do what it needed to do to grow itself out of the mountain of French debt.
[00:11:20] And domestically, as you might imagine, Haiti was not a stable place.
[00:11:26] There were continuing disputes with neighbouring Saint-Domingo, which was annexed by Haiti and then gained independence in 1844.
[00:11:34] There were coups, assassinations and short-lived presidencies.
[00:11:40] And in 1915, faced with the prospect of an anti-American politician seizing power, the United States invaded and occupied Haiti. It was an occupation that would last 19 years, only ending in 1934.
[00:11:58] Now, speaking in purely economic terms, and when compared to some of the other woeful periods of Haitian history, the American occupation was not a terrible thing for the country.
[00:12:11] There were infrastructural improvements, the stabilisation of the country’s financial system, and some improvements in the day-to-day life of the average Haitian.
[00:12:23] But these infrastructural developments were enabled by forced labour, by Americans forcing Haitians from their homes to work building bridges or roads.
[00:12:35] And Haiti was occupied and controlled by another, more powerful country, Haitians were taking orders from white masters, it was not so different from the colonial days.
[00:12:48] This, understandably led to resentment on the part of the Haitian people towards their American occupiers.
[00:12:56] And it hampered the potential for Haiti to stand on its own two feet, politically, institutionally and diplomatically.
[00:13:05] It also started a long tradition of the United States supporting political candidates that would be sympathetic to American interests, and suppressing up-and-coming Haitians who weren’t.
[00:13:18] Now, the Americans left in 1934, and the people of Haiti discovered that there was a more dangerous enemy even closer to home.
[00:13:29] On the eastern side of the island, the leader of the Dominican Republic, Rafael Trujillo, decided to seize the opportunity to commit what must be one of the greatest atrocities to have taken place on the island of Hispaniola.
[00:13:43] And for that ugly prize, there is some competition…
[00:13:48] He had risen to power on the back of anti-Haitian sentiment, and had publicly stated that he was going to “solve” the problem of Haitians in the Dominican Republic.
[00:14:00] In October of 1937, he ordered Dominican soldiers to kill every Haitian living in the border region of the Dominican Republic.
[00:14:10] It was a slaughter of monumental proportions.
[00:14:14] Soldiers started to murder Haitian men, women and children with knives and machetes.
[00:14:21] As the Haitian population tried to flee, they were cut down in their tracks, turning the rivers red with blood. And those that fled towards the ocean were captured, their hands tied, and thrown into the sea to be eaten by sharks.
[00:14:38] It was truly awful, and is estimated to have cost the lives of up to 35,000 Haitians.
[00:14:46] So, more than 100 years after it declared its independence, Haiti was still experiencing political turmoil, aggression and prejudice from its Dominican neighbours, and it was still repaying its debt to Charles X, the king of France.
[00:15:03] And the 100 years after that, so the second half of the 20th century through to the present day, have not been filled with much good news for the people of Haiti either.
[00:15:16] For a 14-year period from 1957 to 1971 the country was ruled by the infamous Francois Duvalier, otherwise known as Papa Doc. His regime was autocratic and characterised by violence and intimidation towards his opponents.
[00:15:35] And after his death and the passing of the presidency to his son, Jean-Claude Duvalier, or Baby Doc, things did not get much better.
[00:15:47] Now, up until now, we've been talking about political and social events, problems caused by people.
[00:15:54] But we must now talk about problems caused by nature.
[00:15:59] Haiti in an area of the Caribbean that experiences frequent hurricanes and tropical storms.
[00:16:06] Not much fun, and every year people would be killed, but this wasn’t unique to Haiti; it's something that most Caribbean islands have to deal with.
[00:16:17] But in 2010 Mother Nature enacted upon Haiti the most monumental stroke of bad luck, in the form of a devastating earthquake.
[00:16:28] Now, the earthquake itself wasn’t that incredibly strong. It was 7 on the Richter scale, so it wasn’t even in the top 10 biggest earthquakes measured that year.
[00:16:41] But it was the most devastating, by a long margin, costing anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 lives, and causing billions of dollars worth of infrastructural damage.
[00:16:55] And ever since, Haiti has been trying to rebuild itself.
[00:16:59] It has received billions of dollars in aid, tens of thousands of aid workers have flocked there in a bid to help the country and its citizens get back on their feet.
[00:17:11] But, has it worked?
[00:17:14] By pretty much any metric you could look at, it has not.
[00:17:18] As of the time of recording this episode, Haiti meets every criterion for a “failed state”.
[00:17:25] The president has fled, there is no government, the streets are ruled by a series of military leaders, crime rates are at an all-time high, many major NGOs have pulled out because it is too dangerous.
[00:17:41] So, what comes next for Haiti?
[00:17:44] There are calls for foreign troops to be sent into the country to maintain some stability, but perfectly understandably, there are just as many voices within Haiti who reject this.
[00:17:56] After all, the history of Haiti is full of foreigners coming to the country and promising peace and prosperity, and well, none coming, and the country being left in a worse state afterwards.
[00:18:11] To wrap things up, Haiti must be one of the most unfortunate places in the world.
[00:18:17] Blessed by beautiful scenery, wonderful mountains, sandy beaches and crystal clear waters. And with a clear example of what life could have been like to the east, in the form of the Dominican Republic.
[00:18:32] But cursed by years of foreign occupation, slavery, war, prejudice, extreme violence, and political instability.
[00:18:42] So, as to the question of Why Haiti Is So Poor, well, the answer is that there are some very good reasons.
[00:18:52] OK then, that is it for today's episode on post-revolutionary Haiti, and the end of this two-part mini-series on Haiti.
[00:19:00] I hope it's been an interesting one, and that you've learnt something new about this fascinating but perpetually unlucky country.
[00:19:08] As always, I would love to know what you thought of this episode.
[00:19:11] Have you been to Haiti? Do you have any Haitian friends? If you do, have you talked much about the history of Haiti?
[00:19:18] I would love to know, so let’s get this discussion started.
[00:19:22] You can head right into our community forum, which is at community.leonardoenglish.com and get chatting away to other curious minds.
[00:19:30] You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:19:35] I'm Alastair Budge, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
[00:00:05] Hello, hello hello, and welcome to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:00:11] The show where you can listen to fascinating stories, and learn weird and wonderful things about the world at the same time as improving your English.
[00:00:20] I'm Alastair Budge, and today we are going to be talking about Haiti.
[00:00:25] Specifically, we will be discussing the question of why Haiti wins the unfortunate prize of the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere.
[00:00:35] I should say that this is a follow-up episode, a part two, of the last episode on the Haitian Revolution, so if you haven’t listened to that one yet, I would strongly recommend that you do so first, as there is a lot of background information there, and this episode will make a lot more sense if you’ve listened to that one first.
[00:00:56] OK then, let’s get started and talk about Haiti.
[00:01:02] The search engine “Google” is a great way of getting an insight into what people all over the world are curious about.
[00:01:10] Just start typing into the search bar, and Google will present you with the most frequently asked queries.
[00:01:18] If you start typing “best recipes for”, Google might suggest “dinner”, or “healthy meals”, or “toddlers”.
[00:01:28] I’m in Sweden at the moment, and if I start typing “why is Sweden”, I’m presented with options like “so good at music”, “so happy”, “so expensive”, and a question that I’ve been asking myself recently, “so cloudy”.
[00:01:45] All valid questions, and clearly a lot of people are looking for the answers.
[00:01:53] If you start typing “why is Haiti”, however, you are presented with a very different set of suggestions, a set of questions that present not quite such a rosy picture.
[00:02:06] Why is Haiti so dangerous?
[00:02:08] Why is Haiti so unstable?
[00:02:10] Why is Haiti so violent?
[00:02:13] Why is Haiti so poor?
[00:02:17] These are all very valid questions. Haiti has been overrun by gangs, there is no government, the former US ambassador to Haiti said it's not going to be a failed state, it is a failed state.
[00:02:32] So…why?
[00:02:35] Well, you will remember the story of the Haitian Revolution from the last episode.
[00:02:40] As a brief reminder, the second-largest island in the Caribbean is called Hispaniola.
[00:02:47] In 1492 it was “discovered” by Christopher Columbus, who claimed it for the Spanish.
[00:02:55] Spanish interest in the island waned, and in 1697 the western half was handed over to France.
[00:03:04] The French called it Saint-Domingue and turned it into a slave colony of grotesque proportions. It became the most profitable slave colony in the world, at one point producing half of all of the coffee in Europe.
[00:03:20] Fast forward to 1791, and the slaves of Saint-Domingue rose up. It was a long, complicated and extremely violent uprising–as we heard in the last episode–but in January of 1804 they finally emerged victorious, and a new state was declared: the country of Haiti.
[00:03:43] Finally, there was peace, the nation could get on with the business of nation-building, and its citizens would enjoy the wealth and prosperity that the island’s natural resources had afforded its white residents.
[00:03:59] Unfortunately, this has never happened.
[00:04:02] Haiti is the only country in the Western Hemisphere that is classified as a “Least developed country”.
[00:04:09] Its GDP per capita is $1,700, and Haitians have a life expectancy at birth of a measly 64 years.
[00:04:20] And this pill is even more bitter to swallow when you consider the situation on the eastern half of the island, the country previously called Santo Domingo, now the Dominican Republic.
[00:04:34] Now, to reiterate, Haiti and the Dominican Republic are on the same island.
[00:04:40] The climate is the same, the terrain is the same, the two nations even have practically the same population.
[00:04:48] But everything else is very different.
[00:04:51] The GDP per capita of The Dominican Republic today is six times larger than that of Haiti, life expectancy is a full 10 years more, the average person in Haiti is nearly 10 times poorer than their Dominican neighbour.
[00:05:09] There are plenty of reasons for this, stretching the entirety of Haiti’s history as an independent country.
[00:05:17] And in fact the first, very possibly the most important, goes right back to the start.
[00:05:24] So it is January 1804 and Jean-Jacques Dessalines has declared the nation of Haiti, with himself as an emperor.
[00:05:35] One of his first acts was what can only be described as the genocide of the remaining white population, and the remaining 5,000 or so white plantation owners and workers were slaughtered, often publicly and in truly terrible ways.
[00:05:52] Dessalines was, in his own words, avenging the century of mistreatment and cruelty by the whites towards their slaves, and cleansing the country of the dangerous whites.
[00:06:05] You might well say that he had every right to do it, but it did little to cement his power or put the country back on its feet.
[00:06:15] Its economy was in tatters after the primary means of production, the plantations, had been destroyed during the revolution.
[00:06:24] And with the massacre of the remaining white population, this essentially eliminated most of the people who had the expertise and understanding of how to manage and run the plantations.
[00:06:38] Dessalines tried to reintroduce the plantation system, even using forced labour not so dissimilar to the slavery he had fought tooth and nail to abolish, but it was not enough.
[00:06:51] Within three years, he would be assassinated by political rivals, and Haiti would be split up into separate parts, the Kingdom of Haiti in the north and the Republic of Haiti in the south.
[00:07:05] But the most important development would come in 1825, when the French king Charles X, Charles the Tenth of France, sent a fleet of 14 warships, complete with 528 cannons, to Haiti.
[00:07:22] This was not a declaration of war, or an attempt to recolonise Haiti, but a request for compensation. Well, not really a request, it was a demand.
[00:07:35] The French presented an ordinance from the king, a series of demands to the nation of Haiti.
[00:07:43] Specifically, France wanted 150 million francs to compensate for its loss. And by loss, this referred to the loss of the slave-powered colony.
[00:07:57] In exchange, France would not only leave Haiti in peace, but it would recognise Haiti as an independent country and treat it as an equal, on diplomatic terms at least.
[00:08:11] The then-ruler of Haiti, President Jean-Pierre Boyer, clearly felt he had little option but to agree, and accepted the French demands.
[00:08:22] The problem was that 150 million francs was a vast amount of money, equivalent to 300% of Haiti’s GDP, 3 times the entire revenues generated by the country every year.
[00:08:38] Haiti simply didn’t have the money, and it was forced to borrow money from French banks at high rates of interest in order to pay back the French state.
[00:08:50] This created a so-called “double debt” - the debt repayment to the French state and the interest payments to the French banks who loaned Haiti the money.
[00:09:01] In the interest of balance, the debt was reduced to 90 million francs, but this debt would be a yoke around the neck of every Haitian for over a hundred years.
[00:09:13] Haiti was already a poor country, and by the late 19th century 4 out of every 5 tax dollars its government was collecting were going to pay this debt.
[00:09:27] It was completely unsustainable, and meant that Haiti was unable to do anything other than pay the debt.
[00:09:35] Haiti defaulted on its debt multiple times, but each time was forced to take on more debt, with more interest, to repay the original debt.
[00:09:47] And this debt was no longer just to France.
[00:09:50] Haiti had also taken loans from American banks to pay back the French, so you had this unusual and deeply unfair situation where the country was crippled by foreign debt from the very start.
[00:10:06] What’s more, it wasn’t recognised as a country, at least by some key countries from which it sought recognition: the United States and Britain.
[00:10:16] Both countries still allowed slavery, and were fearful of acknowledging a country created after a slave rebellion.
[00:10:24] Just to the west of Haiti was the British colony Jamaica, home to hundreds of thousands of black slaves.
[00:10:31] And just a thousand kilometres north of Haiti was the United States, a relatively freshly independent country itself, but still home to millions of slaves.
[00:10:43] Recognising Haiti as a legitimate country might give slaves in the United States and in British colonies the idea that they too could be free, and that was not something the Americans or the British were too keen on.
[00:10:58] The UK and the United States did eventually recognise Haiti, in 1833 and 1862 respectively, but these years of non-recognition made it very hard for Haiti to trade, to seek diplomatic relations, to do what it needed to do to grow itself out of the mountain of French debt.
[00:11:20] And domestically, as you might imagine, Haiti was not a stable place.
[00:11:26] There were continuing disputes with neighbouring Saint-Domingo, which was annexed by Haiti and then gained independence in 1844.
[00:11:34] There were coups, assassinations and short-lived presidencies.
[00:11:40] And in 1915, faced with the prospect of an anti-American politician seizing power, the United States invaded and occupied Haiti. It was an occupation that would last 19 years, only ending in 1934.
[00:11:58] Now, speaking in purely economic terms, and when compared to some of the other woeful periods of Haitian history, the American occupation was not a terrible thing for the country.
[00:12:11] There were infrastructural improvements, the stabilisation of the country’s financial system, and some improvements in the day-to-day life of the average Haitian.
[00:12:23] But these infrastructural developments were enabled by forced labour, by Americans forcing Haitians from their homes to work building bridges or roads.
[00:12:35] And Haiti was occupied and controlled by another, more powerful country, Haitians were taking orders from white masters, it was not so different from the colonial days.
[00:12:48] This, understandably led to resentment on the part of the Haitian people towards their American occupiers.
[00:12:56] And it hampered the potential for Haiti to stand on its own two feet, politically, institutionally and diplomatically.
[00:13:05] It also started a long tradition of the United States supporting political candidates that would be sympathetic to American interests, and suppressing up-and-coming Haitians who weren’t.
[00:13:18] Now, the Americans left in 1934, and the people of Haiti discovered that there was a more dangerous enemy even closer to home.
[00:13:29] On the eastern side of the island, the leader of the Dominican Republic, Rafael Trujillo, decided to seize the opportunity to commit what must be one of the greatest atrocities to have taken place on the island of Hispaniola.
[00:13:43] And for that ugly prize, there is some competition…
[00:13:48] He had risen to power on the back of anti-Haitian sentiment, and had publicly stated that he was going to “solve” the problem of Haitians in the Dominican Republic.
[00:14:00] In October of 1937, he ordered Dominican soldiers to kill every Haitian living in the border region of the Dominican Republic.
[00:14:10] It was a slaughter of monumental proportions.
[00:14:14] Soldiers started to murder Haitian men, women and children with knives and machetes.
[00:14:21] As the Haitian population tried to flee, they were cut down in their tracks, turning the rivers red with blood. And those that fled towards the ocean were captured, their hands tied, and thrown into the sea to be eaten by sharks.
[00:14:38] It was truly awful, and is estimated to have cost the lives of up to 35,000 Haitians.
[00:14:46] So, more than 100 years after it declared its independence, Haiti was still experiencing political turmoil, aggression and prejudice from its Dominican neighbours, and it was still repaying its debt to Charles X, the king of France.
[00:15:03] And the 100 years after that, so the second half of the 20th century through to the present day, have not been filled with much good news for the people of Haiti either.
[00:15:16] For a 14-year period from 1957 to 1971 the country was ruled by the infamous Francois Duvalier, otherwise known as Papa Doc. His regime was autocratic and characterised by violence and intimidation towards his opponents.
[00:15:35] And after his death and the passing of the presidency to his son, Jean-Claude Duvalier, or Baby Doc, things did not get much better.
[00:15:47] Now, up until now, we've been talking about political and social events, problems caused by people.
[00:15:54] But we must now talk about problems caused by nature.
[00:15:59] Haiti in an area of the Caribbean that experiences frequent hurricanes and tropical storms.
[00:16:06] Not much fun, and every year people would be killed, but this wasn’t unique to Haiti; it's something that most Caribbean islands have to deal with.
[00:16:17] But in 2010 Mother Nature enacted upon Haiti the most monumental stroke of bad luck, in the form of a devastating earthquake.
[00:16:28] Now, the earthquake itself wasn’t that incredibly strong. It was 7 on the Richter scale, so it wasn’t even in the top 10 biggest earthquakes measured that year.
[00:16:41] But it was the most devastating, by a long margin, costing anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 lives, and causing billions of dollars worth of infrastructural damage.
[00:16:55] And ever since, Haiti has been trying to rebuild itself.
[00:16:59] It has received billions of dollars in aid, tens of thousands of aid workers have flocked there in a bid to help the country and its citizens get back on their feet.
[00:17:11] But, has it worked?
[00:17:14] By pretty much any metric you could look at, it has not.
[00:17:18] As of the time of recording this episode, Haiti meets every criterion for a “failed state”.
[00:17:25] The president has fled, there is no government, the streets are ruled by a series of military leaders, crime rates are at an all-time high, many major NGOs have pulled out because it is too dangerous.
[00:17:41] So, what comes next for Haiti?
[00:17:44] There are calls for foreign troops to be sent into the country to maintain some stability, but perfectly understandably, there are just as many voices within Haiti who reject this.
[00:17:56] After all, the history of Haiti is full of foreigners coming to the country and promising peace and prosperity, and well, none coming, and the country being left in a worse state afterwards.
[00:18:11] To wrap things up, Haiti must be one of the most unfortunate places in the world.
[00:18:17] Blessed by beautiful scenery, wonderful mountains, sandy beaches and crystal clear waters. And with a clear example of what life could have been like to the east, in the form of the Dominican Republic.
[00:18:32] But cursed by years of foreign occupation, slavery, war, prejudice, extreme violence, and political instability.
[00:18:42] So, as to the question of Why Haiti Is So Poor, well, the answer is that there are some very good reasons.
[00:18:52] OK then, that is it for today's episode on post-revolutionary Haiti, and the end of this two-part mini-series on Haiti.
[00:19:00] I hope it's been an interesting one, and that you've learnt something new about this fascinating but perpetually unlucky country.
[00:19:08] As always, I would love to know what you thought of this episode.
[00:19:11] Have you been to Haiti? Do you have any Haitian friends? If you do, have you talked much about the history of Haiti?
[00:19:18] I would love to know, so let’s get this discussion started.
[00:19:22] You can head right into our community forum, which is at community.leonardoenglish.com and get chatting away to other curious minds.
[00:19:30] You've been listening to English Learning for Curious Minds, by Leonardo English.
[00:19:35] I'm Alastair Budge, you stay safe, and I'll catch you in the next episode.
