AnnouncementRemembering Zion (continued)
The Caribbean Contrast.
Against this varying background of experiences, what has been the Caribbean reality? The predominant racial and ethnic group of the islands are residents by reason of a forced relocation. This was a transplantation complemented by a deliberate policy of weakening the cultural fabric of the slaves through a "resettlement" so vile that even the basic concept of family among the slaves was repudiated by the slavers. Tribal linkages and lineages were discarded, ethnic practices and languages were prohibited, all in oreder to effect an absolute break with the ancestral home, Africa, and to deny any sense of community, cooperation, group identification among the slaves themselves. Being subject to arbitrary relocation through re-sales or loans, the slaves' sense of affinity for an area or landscape was diminished. Unlike the Jews, there was no promise of a return from exile, and all the legends, observances, myths and beliefs were destroyed. Unlike the Irish, several generations of slavery were to pass before an opportunity to accumulate resources and assets could be realized. Even so, that opportunity was not one of a wide open frontier as in North America which greeted the Irish, but a continuing relegation to the sidelines of social, economic and political activity. Like the ethnic Indians, many of the Caribbean peoples have determined that opportunities exist outside the colonial setting to which they had been removed. Unlike the Indians, such re-migrations to England, Canada and the United States occurred initially as individuals, in anonymity and by and large to dispersed areas without support of "the ties that bind" of language, religion, culture etc.
The inhabitants of the Caribbean area are a migrant people. Whether located by force or induced by promises of wealth or established by privilege or attracted by lifestyle or victims of circumstance, we have arrived on these shores and here we have created a unique and in some ways enviable society. Considering the short period since abolition and the continuance of the critical factors of economic growth in alien hands, communities of understanding and tolerance with creditable achievement in education, the arts, health care have still emerged across the archipelago. It is unfortunate that in the fields of science and technology, business and production so much still remains to be done. To a large extent, significant private investment in much of the local economies have been the results of remittances from nationals resident abroad. Early out-migration, too, has acted as a release valve for the pressures of unemployment and underemployment which have been built up over the years. In the apologetic words of the poet…..
"True patriots all,
For be it understood,
We left our country
For our country's good."
However, in many instances, the islands have lost some of their best and brightest, some of their most skilled and ambitious, some of their most adventuresome and innovative to metropolitan countries. The vacuum created by these outflows is palpable in even the most cursory examination of current development challenges in the islands. But this may only be a temporary setback with potential beneficial results if the islands are able to draw from these migrants and their equally skilled and motivated children (second and third generation diaspora) the necessary human resources to address the challenges of a global economy and society (reverse brain drain).
Historically, in a succession of periodic emigrations, Caribbean islanders have toiled in the canefields of the Dominican Republic. They have dared the hazards and heartbreaks of the Demerara goldfields. They have sweltered in the back-breaking work of building the Panama Canal. They have endured the social isolation of the oil refineries of Curacoa and Aruba. They have entered the large metropolitan centres of the United States and Canada. They swelled the working populations of industrial Britain. With each wave, they made their contributions to their new homes and continued to support, contribute to and promote private and community projects and ventures in the lands they left behind. Now, they and their progeny can be found in the boardrooms of large transnational corporations, on the faculty of distinguished academic institutions, on the staff of groundbreaking laboratories. They are in government and politics, determining and affecting national policies. They are at the forefront of the learned professions, and are spearheading the scientific and technological revolution. They are consultants of every sort, engineers, accountants, in advertising and promotion, in the leisure, hospitality and entertainment industry and holding their own as competent equals in the competitive global economy. They are qualified teachers, nurses, skilled tradesmen, independent business owners. They man law-enforcement agencies and help fill the ranks of the military.
The existence of this remarkable resource has not gone unnoticed. Already, the Government of Jamaica in a series of remarkable and ground-breaking initiatives has established arrangements and relationships to enlist Jamaicans abroad in the national development effort. The government is purposefully embarked on programs of trying to identify their nationals abroad; of providing information and support services favorable to their investment at home; of facilitating return of non-resident nationals desiring to do so; of accommodating individuals and groups wishing to donate to institutions and communities at home; and in energizing nationals abroad in promoting the national interest in their various countries. This is only a beginning, and the scope for a mutually rewarding relationship in the long term is immense. Other Caribbean leaders, particularly Dr. Gonsalves of the Organization of the Eastern Caribbean States (and Prime Minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines) have expressed interest in these policy directions and in adopting them as deemed appropriate in their individual jurisdictions. Whatever the success achieved on an individual island basis, the benefits multiply more than proportionately if the Caribbean nations combine and integrate their efforts in this regard.