What Is this Place?

No one talks about Haiti unless talking about Haiti.  Think about it, that’s odd. It is as though Haiti were unrelated to anything else. Imagine talking about the US only when talking about the US; that would be odd. What kind of place would that make America? And what kind of place does that make Haiti?!


At one point, Haiti seemed to touch everyone. As the French colony Saint-Domingue, it supplied enough of Europe’s consumption of sugar, coffee, cacao and indigo dyestuff to sustain many European fortunes. In contrast, on a cost/benefit basis, Voltaire considered Canada as “a few acres of snow” not worth the fight.


This was a widely shared view so, as part of the Treaty of Paris (1763) to end the Seven Years War, France gave up most of its North American possessions to the English but kept its richer sugar islands.


So Haiti mattered because it made individuals, cities and empires rich.


It also mattered because it presented a special problem. The Enlightenment ideas that fuelled the American and French revolutions made much of freedom as a basic human right. Yet, some had the leisure to write some things precisely and directly because of the wealth extracted from slave labour.


So why does no one talk about Haiti except when taking about Haiti? Because it makes too few people rich, no longer weighs on the conscience, both, something else?


What do you think? As a Builder of Haiti you should have an informed opinion on this.