Abstract
Only twice in this century have events in Haiti held a high priority in Washington: in 1915, when the Haitian president’s torn body was paraded through the capital, Port-au-Prince, in the midst of chaos and prospects of European intervention; and in 1986, when the Duvalier regime fell. Following both the 1915 and 1986 crises, U.S. policy aimed at four objectives: restoring order, keeping other powers out, attending to acute problems of economic mismanagement, and planting the seeds of modern and democratic government in Haiti.
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References
Lawrence E. Harrison, Underdevelopment Is a State of Mind (Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 1985).
David Nicholls, From Dessalines to Duvalier, Race, Colour and National Independence in Haiti (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), p. 247.
Zbigniew Brzezinski, Game Plan, A Geostrategic Framework for the Conduct of the U.S.-Soviet Contest (New York: The Atlantic Monthly Press, 1986), chapter 3, pp. 76–98.
An account of this early period in U.S.-Haitian relations is provided by Rayford W. Logan, The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with Haiti, 1776–1891 (Chapel Hill, North Carolina: University of North Carolina Press, 1941).
See David Healy, Gunboat Diplomacy in the Wilson Era; The U.S. Navy in Haiti, 1915–1916 (Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin Press, 1976).
Ludwell Lee Montague, Haiti and the United States, 1714–1938 (Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1940), p. 210.
Robert Debs Heinl and Nancy Gordon Heinl, Written in Blood, the Story of the Haitian People, 1492–1971 (Boston, Mass.: Houghton Mifflin, 1978), p. 513.
As first suggested by Jeremiah O’Leary, The Washington Star, March 11, 1975. Jack Anderson has alleged that other attempts were made in 1966, The Washington Post, April 7, 1975. Secretary of State Dean Rusk noted later that “all sorts of efforts… and almost all techniques” were used to bring about change in Haiti, but that “Duvalier was extraordinarily resistant.” Heinl and Heini, Written in Blood, p. 622, drawing in part on a U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report of November 20, 1975.
Edwin M. Martin, “Haiti: A Case Study in Futility,” SAIS Review, Summer 1981.
U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 1979, p. 19.
Congressional Black Caucus Task Force on Haitian Refugees, Fact Finding Mission to Haiti, June 30, 1982.
Ernest H. Preeg, Haiti and the CBI (Washington, Overseas Development Council, 1984), pp. 54–75, which studies the 1982–83 time frame. Preeg was American ambassador to Haiti 1981–1983.
For a brief overview of the pope’s visit and the expanding role of the church, see James Ferguson, Papa Doc, Baby Doc, Haiti and the Duvaliers (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1987), pp. 75–77; Elizabeth Abbott, Haiti, the Duvaliers and Their Legacy (New York: McGraw-Hill), pp. 260–262.
The problems facing the new regime is well analyzed by Anthony P. Maingot, “Haiti: Problems of a Transition to Democracy is an Authoritarian Soft State,” Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs, Winter 1986–87, pp. 75–102.
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© 1991 Foreign Policy Research Institute
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Fauriol, G. (1991). Malign Neglect: U.S. Policy toward Haiti under the Duvaliers. In: Pipes, D., Garfinkle, A. (eds) Friendly Tyrants. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21676-5_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21676-5_9
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