What Can Stop Haiti’s Free Fall?
A new Haitian transitional council faces serious challenges in seeking an enhanced potential for long-term stability.
By Marie Jones
A new Haitian transitional council faces serious challenges in seeking an end to violence, the establishment of a representative government and, ultimately, an enhanced potential for long-term stability, but the island nation’s civil society, its youth, and its diaspora could offer a level of hope.
Haiti is beset by widespread food insecurity, a lack of access to medical care, and armed violence that has killed or injured some 2,500 Haitians between January and March 2024, according to the United Nations. Now that embattled Prime Minister Ariel Henry has stepped aside, a 1,000-person Kenyan-led multinational security support mission force backed by the United Nations and financed largely by the United States is expected to be deployed soon to restore rule of law in Haiti.
It will be no easy task for a multinational security support mission to release the stranglehold that gangs have on Haiti, especially its capital Port-au-Prince. The U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence warned in its 2024 Annual Threat Assessment (PDF) that “gangs will be more likely to violently resist a foreign national force deployment to Haiti because they perceive it to be a shared threat to their control and operations.”
It will be no easy task for a multinational security support mission to release the stranglehold that gangs have on Haiti.
The United States and United Nations have mixed records when it comes to security operations in Haiti and skepticism abounds regarding Kenya’s ability to succeed in forging a working peace there. Still, if a level of stability can be achieved, there are some features of Haiti’s evolution that offer hope:
- Its civil society. Haiti was the world’s first Black nation to establish a free state following a successful revolution against its colonizers. It then endured a series of brutal dictatorships employing all forms of repression intended to stunt the growth of opposition thought. Perhaps because of this past, there is a resilient spirit that lives on in Haitian civil society. The transitional council includes representation from Haitian political parties, the private sector, and civil society, which is a first step in the right direction. Yet the council should remember that Haitian economic elites and state bureaucracy have tended to crowd out civil society and stifle diverse input into political arrangements over time.
- Its youth. Those under 25 make up 51.4 percent of Haiti’s general population. This is the age group deciding between working for the gangs, surviving despite the gangs, or joining government efforts to stop the gangs. Haitian leaders and international organizations should launch initiatives to strengthen youth civic engagement and political participation. In September 2023, the Observatory for Haitian Youth held a workshop to identify ways to incorporate young civic leaders into Haiti’s decisionmaking processes, for example. Not all youth groups support the new transitional council, and it will be key to figure out how to establish a productive dialogue with these potential future leaders.
- Its diaspora. The large Haitian diaspora in the United States, Canada, and elsewhere should have the human capital and willingness to partner with civil society and political leaders in Haiti to help design a path forward. The diaspora has generally achieved education rates that eclipse those in Haiti, making it a natural group to engage for philanthropy, entrepreneurship, volunteerism, and capital market investment. Indeed, both the United States Agency for International Development (PDF) and the U.N. International Organization for Migration have programs seeking to engage the diaspora for the development of Haiti. Now is the time for efforts to coalesce around creating and implementing a robust package of economic opportunities that the gangs cannot offer.
The large Haitian diaspora should have the human capital and willingness to partner with civil society and political leaders in Haiti to help design a path forward.
If a multinational force and Haitian police can reduce the influence of gangs, Haiti’s civil society, youth, and diaspora could be leveraged to organize elections, establish a representative government, and set in place an economic development plan toward stability and prosperity.
Marie Jones is a senior international and defense researcher at RAND, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research institution. This commentary is part of a RAND initiative to analyze conflict in Africa and African Diaspora countries and follows a previous post on the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
This originally appeared on The RAND Blog on May 1, 2024.
