Friday, April 14, 2023, noon
Presenters: Dr. Christopher Davis, UNCG History and Zachary Moore, Deputy Managing Editor, Americas at ICIS
“Haiti in Crisis: Roots of the Current Upheaval and the Historical Complexity of Intervention”
Over the past few years, Haiti has appeared more and more in the headline news and, sadly, not for positive reasons. Since the assassination of Haitian President Jovenel Moise on July 7, 2021, Haiti has descended into one of the greatest humanitarian crises of its long and troubled history. Already facing the question of political legitimacy prior to Moise’s death, the Haitian government has seen its authority diminish while various gangs at present control 60% of the capital of Port-au-Prince. A nation whose dependence on foreign aid had gained it the nickname “the republic of NGOs” has recently seen this replaced with the even more unenviable title of “the mafia state”. The resulting chaos, in which Haitian citizens are increasingly cut off from food, fuel and medicine and are at the mercy of the gangs, has even resulted in an appeal from the Haitian government for foreign military intervention. So how did things get to this point? With an expert on petrochemical markets in the Caribbean and Latin America region, and a scholar of Haitian history, the presenters for this discussion will explore how Venezuelan oil diplomacy and political corruption in Port-au-Prince led to the current crisis. Furthermore, as the U.S. and other nations consider Port-au-Prince’s request for military intervention, this discussion will also explore how the history of interventions in Haiti explain U.S. reluctance to do so again.
