The lost Haitian revival

As Mark Goldberg writes for the Daily Beast, Haiti just can’t catch a break. The country, which has been through years of war and upheaval, and remains woefully poor, yesterday was hit with a massive earthquake which has caused critical damage to its major city and capital, Port-au-Prince. Casualties are expected to be massive, and ...

574527_Haiti2.jpg
574527_Haiti2.jpg

As Mark Goldberg writes for the Daily Beast, Haiti just can't catch a break. The country, which has been through years of war and upheaval, and remains woefully poor, yesterday was hit with a massive earthquake which has caused critical damage to its major city and capital, Port-au-Prince. Casualties are expected to be massive, and as many as 3 of the country's 9 million citizens are without basic services. What makes it all sadder is that things had, just recently, seemed to be looking up.

As Mark Goldberg writes for the Daily Beast, Haiti just can’t catch a break. The country, which has been through years of war and upheaval, and remains woefully poor, yesterday was hit with a massive earthquake which has caused critical damage to its major city and capital, Port-au-Prince. Casualties are expected to be massive, and as many as 3 of the country’s 9 million citizens are without basic services. What makes it all sadder is that things had, just recently, seemed to be looking up.

Around 800,000 tourists traveled to Haiti last year — a sizeable number for a small nation.  But 500,000 of them never ventured further than Royal Caribbean Cruise Line’s heavily guarded man-made enclave on the northern shore of the island; therefore, they did little good for Haiti’s economy. (Royal Caribbean apparently installs most of its own staff in Labadee, seen above, meaning fewer Haitians hired.)

Haitians as well as U.N. staff on the island were battling the country’s image as a failing state, a murder and kidnapping capital. Its safety statistics are in fact in line with or lower than those in other Caribbean nations, after spiking in 2004 during the Aristide crisis. 

Just last week, Comfort Inn announced it was planning on building a small hotel on the island. It would have been the only major international chain to have an outpost on Haiti. Additionally, via Tyler Cowen, Haiti was just one of two Caribbean countries expected to have GDP growth in 2010, of around 2.5 percent.

Image via RobinH00d on Flickr

Annie Lowrey is assistant editor at FP.

More from Foreign Policy

A photo collage illustration shows U.S. political figures plotted on a foreign-policy spectrum from most assertive to least. From left: Dick Cheney, Nikki Haley, Joe Biden, George H.W. Bush, Ron Desantis, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy, and Bernie Sanders.
A photo collage illustration shows U.S. political figures plotted on a foreign-policy spectrum from most assertive to least. From left: Dick Cheney, Nikki Haley, Joe Biden, George H.W. Bush, Ron Desantis, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Vivek Ramaswamy, and Bernie Sanders.

The Scrambled Spectrum of U.S. Foreign-Policy Thinking

Presidents, officials, and candidates tend to fall into six camps that don’t follow party lines.

A girl touches a photograph of her relative on the Memory Wall of Fallen Defenders of Ukraine in the Russian-Ukrainian war in Kyiv.
A girl touches a photograph of her relative on the Memory Wall of Fallen Defenders of Ukraine in the Russian-Ukrainian war in Kyiv.

What Does Victory Look Like in Ukraine?

Ukrainians differ on what would keep their nation safe from Russia.

A man is seen in profile standing several yards away from a prison.
A man is seen in profile standing several yards away from a prison.

The Biden Administration Is Dangerously Downplaying the Global Terrorism Threat

Today, there are more terror groups in existence, in more countries around the world, and with more territory under their control than ever before.

Then-Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez arrives for a closed-door briefing by intelligence officials at the U.S. Capitol in Washington.
Then-Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez arrives for a closed-door briefing by intelligence officials at the U.S. Capitol in Washington.

Blue Hawk Down

Sen. Bob Menendez’s indictment will shape the future of Congress’s foreign policy.