Haitian poet Suze Baron, who immigrated to the US to work in nursing, expressed her concern about the state of her home country in They Say:
They say
human blood
enriches the soil
If it were so
if it were so
my friends
rice millet and corn
would be plenty
in Haiti.
Indeed, the Caribbean nation is on the precipice of anarchy, and little grows there.
Once a Spanish colony, Haiti was ceded to France in 1697. Due to a smallpox epidemic brought by European colonizers, the indigenous inhabitants were wiped out. France imported a large number of slaves from Africa who became the main population of the island.
After a slave uprising, Haiti became the first country in the region with a majority black population of former slaves to declare independence.
Compared with the neighboring Dominican Republic, Haiti seems to be politically and economically unstable. It has failed to establish an effective democratic system, and has been plagued by disasters.
During the Age of Sail, European empires expanded their colonies. After the US declared independence, other colonies of the British Empire followed, most of which became democratic countries.
The advancement of democracy in former Spanish, Portuguese and French colonies in the Americas was less successful.
Looking at the democratization of former colonies, the British Empire’s legacy of the rule of law seems to have had a great effect.
This can be seen in former British colonies such as India, Singapore and Hong Kong, which outshine other post-colonial nations and territories that had made a similar transition.
The instability caused by dictatorships often harms the value of independence even more than colonization. In many of the revolutions labeled as “liberation,” the desire for power by ambitious revolutionaries has led to another kind of disaster.
Political instability in turn affects economic development, and the vicious circle continues.
In nations where people have grown used to being colonized, the meaning of “liberation” often becomes politically arbitrary in the struggle for power.
Some newly independent countries have become their own masters, but they do not yet look like it.
Taiwan was ceded to Japan by the Manchu Qing Dynasty. After 50 years of confusion about its own motherland, it became a part of the Republic of China (ROC) in 1945.
The ROC was the first democratic republic in Asia, but after its establishment in 1912, it was never stable. From 1928 to 1949, when it was replaced by the People’s Republic of China, there were only 21 years of real unification.
The ROC did not truly stabilize until after its exile to Taiwan. After the Martial Law era under the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) long-term “party-state” rule, the country gradually transformed into the “ROC in Taiwan” through a quiet revolution since its first transfer of power at the beginning of the new century.
However, the new ROC has yet to be normalized in the face of the Chinese threat externally, and the abandonment of an exilic mentality. Today, chaotic politics inhibits national development. For those who live in Taiwan and are on the path of democracy, look at China and the world. There are lessons to be learned.
Lee Min-yung is a poet.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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