Understanding Haiti’s contemporary “crisis” and solidarity politics

See Roundtable Video (English)

Co-sponsored by North American Congress on Latin America, Ayibopost, and  LACC’s US Department of Education Title VI Grant. 

• Saturday, March 20, 2021
• 4-6 p.m. EDT

Roundtable moderated by Mamyrah Dougé-Prosper and Mark Schuller

Participants:

• Mehdi Chalmers, Trois-Cent-Soixante
• Dr. James Darbouze, ALASO and FSPVA
• Guerline Jozef, director, Haitian Bridge Alliance
• Dr. Sabine Lamour, sociologist and director, SOFA
• Samuel Nesner, former coordinator with KJM (Mining Justice Collective)
• Dr. Djems Olivier, geographer
• Ninaj Raoul, coordinator, Haitian Women for Haitian Refugees

This event will be held in Haitian Kreyòl and simultaneously interpreted in English and Spanish.

Haiti has garnered front-page attention since February 7, when President Jovenel Moïse’s term expired. Rather than signal support for democracy in its oldest neighbor, newly inaugurated President Biden’s first words and actions continued U.S. support for Moïse. The Biden administration also deported almost as many Haitians in one month as Trump did all last year.

What’s happening on the ground in Haiti? How can people – in the Diaspora and our friends in countries around the world – engage in effective solidarity action?

This launch of the latest issue of the NACLA Report offers a series of grounded perspectives to not only reflect on Haiti’s contemporary situation as it unfolds, but also hopefully to inspire a more principled, informed, and engaged solidarity politics. Linked by history and the global racial economy, struggles in Haiti and in the United States are manifestations of an Empire grasping for new strategies as the extractivist paradigm is reaching its natural limit. The current moment requires more active engagement, and for us to see how we are not only connected by particular issues, but also connected to communities that are differently situated along global capitalism’s process of accumulation by appropriation.