The politics of building democracies: Efforts by the Organization of American States to promote democracy in Haiti (1990--1998)

This dissertation explores the phenomenon of democracy assistance by examining the democracy promotion activities of the Organization of American States (OAS), with particular emphasis on its efforts to restore and promote democracy in Haiti between 1990 and 1998. The case study reveals that marked contradictions have emerged as the Organization tries to promote democratic outcomes while both supporting and facilitating the workings of a profoundly undemocratic trading and economic system. More specifically, political and economic reforms endorsed by the OAS have served to reinforce the position of Haiti's dominant classes (especially those associated with transnational capital) while failing to improve the political and economic prospects of the majority of Haitians.; Moreover, upon examining the democracy work of the OAS, it becomes clear that the political form being promoted and defended is a variant of representative democracy able to absorb the political tensions associated with global restructuring (by limiting participation to elections) and which leaves structured relations of power deriving from socio-economic organization untouched.; The consequences of advancing this understanding of democracy over a study demonstrates. The fact that democracy was being promoted alongside the liberation of market forces deeply affected the prospects of democratic change in that country. Indeed, the scope for national decision-making was narrowly defined by international financial institutions and any prospects for political debate over alternative socio-economic visions dismissed or side-lined.; This case study suggests that OAS efforts to promote democracy in Haiti were, therefore, undermined by the Organization's tacit but firm commitment to the neo-liberal economic model that is sweeping the region, as well as its antipathy for popular notions of democracy and broader more extensive forms of social change. Only in this way can one explain why the Organization would encourage and assist electoral processes and institutions building (the markers of representative democracy), while working against the political and economic vision of its first truly democratically elected President.