13124: Anonymous comments on Elite (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

PLEASE POST ANONYMOUSLY



A list member wrote:

>Perhaps, one of the major problems is that we are too focused on
>the wrong terms: Elites, Masses and Leaders. Please allow me to
>introduce a new one: citizen... Indulge me a bit.


Please allow me to introduce another new term which seems to have eluded
this discussion thus far. OLIGARCHY.

Instead of focusing on socio-cultural aspects of a given class, perhaps it
would serve us better to understand them in terms of their economic position
in society. If you do not believe that a few families control the majority
of the wealth in Haiti then you do not understand Haiti or have another
agenda other then the truth. Certainly the lesson has not been lost upon the
peasants of Jan Rabel or Piatre nor those who suffered at the hands of the
military during the period of the Cedras/Francois dictatorship. (By the way,
it was a majority opinion in the world that Cedras and Francois ran a bloody
dictatorship and much documentation has since corroborated that fact. Some
of the arguments dangled about here, concerning a description of the
"regime", reminds me of Jeanne Kirkpatrick's attempts to portray military
dictatorships, during her tenure, as merely "moderately repressive". We all
know how many lives that particular policy cost in El Salvador.)

Back to the elites, a list of said families was published in the New York
Times shortly after the dictatorship made it clear it had no intention of
implementing the Governor's Island Accord. I believe it was published in
September 1993 and included a rough accounting of family fortunes and the
industries they controlled in Haiti. In the meantime, I know there are
several list members who have knowledge of Haiti's oligarchy and can share
it with us anonymously if they wish. Let's get down to a real discussion of
the class which does not tolerate competition and has traditionally bought
and controlled Haiti's political landscape.