MOREAU INTEGRATION TWO
-LUC ROBERT GELIN

What am I made of? To answer this question, I feel that I should focus on my life story and where I come from. I was born in Brooklyn to a Haitian mother on October 26, 2002. I go back to the first families of the first generation of the "Republic of Haiti". Indeed, I am a descendant of the first Haitian head of state, Jean Jacques Dessalines, on the maternal side. The latter had fought against the French army, to create the first black republic in 1804. The only black man present on the famous “Titanic”, Joseph Philippe Lemercier Laroche was one of his grandsons, which makes me think therefore links to the latter from a family point of view. My ancestors mostly lived in the north of the island. Sure enough, my mom and dad are both from the north although they raised me in the Western Department.
I grew up in a context where Haitian society has always been sick. I personally think that I am made of all those events
Stuck in a chronic crisis against the backdrop of corruption, Haiti has been, since the founding of the First Republic in the early 19th century, gripped by violence and held hostage by a faction of society, a small group of oligarchs, greedy for power and more and more carried by the search for rent or by the lure of profit. Going back as far as the day after independence, we can retrace the historical course of a series of practices that would be at the origin of the current Haitian crisis, showing how corruption could not only be a handicap to cohesion social, but also a brake on the economic development of the country. It has made it possible to squander public funds and further widen the existing gap between Blacks and Métis, between the urban world and the rural world. At the heart of corrupt practices and manipulative strategies, the Haitian Senate (and later Parliament), as the main generator of conflict, pulls the strings in the interests of its members.
Formerly perceived by black peoples and by the oppressed around the world, as a model, a beacon of freedom, Haiti, the rebel, is today decried, singled out and perceived by many, especially the Caribbean neighbors, as the example not to be followed. How is it possible? How could a country, which has helped so many peoples or countries, including Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Guinea, Israel and even Greece, pass from the inspiring status of megaphone of the “black world” to that also denigrating of the foil? Difficult to find an objective explanation. Some observers even find it very curious that in such a small country, whose territory is barely larger than the state of Maryland (the equivalent of Brittany), we cannot put an end to poverty, as billions of dollars have been poured into it in recent decades.

Haiti is, in fact, a land of paradoxes where the best, as well as the worst, are possible, and it would undoubtedly have known a better fate if the donations which are, in principle, intended for it were not dispersed, diverted and often shared upstream between donors and contractual companies, via a vast opaque or even mafia international network, organized by some of the supposed donors themselves. Needless to say, by acting in this way, these pseudo-donors are only depriving the country of some of its faculties, including that of facilitating its economic development. Suffice to say that there are serious doubts about the motivation of the international community which generally presents itself as the benefactor of Haitians, the one who would like to help put an end to this recurring crisis which has shaken the country so much and which continues to disrupt the Haitian society. In the meantime, this endemic crisis situation has, paradoxically, already enabled many Western charlatans to invent themselves as experts on the “Haitian problem” which they, like arsonist firefighters, themselves created through this same network of corruption.

In Haiti, in fact, the economy joins forces with politics to give a strong impedance to the traditional elites who gradually exclude from the political equation and from the “imaginary” democratic game, the people (the mass) who have seen their status reduced. to that of the simple spectator. His vote having been rendered useless or ineffective, in particular because of the numerous and recurring manipulations of the ballot, the results of which are often known in advance. Studies on Haitian systemic crises attempt to place in their context some of these practices that have shaped the Haitian system. This work revolves around three main axes which are all themes addressed: the practices of the elites, the socioeconomic consequences for the rest of the population (in particular the most disadvantaged), and also the involvement or the impact of certain old practices on the current situation. Combining empirical and analytical methods from various fields or fields of the humanities and social sciences, including history and sociology, it offers a vision of reality based on historical facts and events. The objective being not only to find correlations, interweaving and possible tensions between the past and the present, but also to show how the current crisis is it the consequence of certain inconsistencies of the traditional Haitian elite or rather of 'a bourgeois or gentrified oligarchy.

There is also a strong problem with regard to the environment in which young people evolve.
In Haiti, the integration of young people into society and into the labor market is a critical issue for the maintenance of social order. In this country which remains the poorest on the American continent and one of the most unequal in the world, activities have been paralyzed for almost a week in the capital and the main provincial towns. The demonstrators demand in particular the judgment of the possible corrupt, a real access to social services, but also work for the young people.
In this fragile country characterized by chronic political instability, those under 21 represent more than half of the population. These young people are one of the most vulnerable groups and the one whose situation has deteriorated the most following the earthquake. In this context, understanding the aspirations, expectations and issues facing Haitian youth has never been so crucial.

“Young people today are tyrants. They contradict their parents, devour their food and disrespect their teachers.” This sentence, wrongly attributed to Socrates, reflects a contemporary reality, to say the least: members of one generation often find it incomprehensible how the next generation behaved. In a hyper-connected world, dominated by social networks, all this incomprehension manifests itself in the Internet window. One need only look at the suggestions for a quick Google search to realize this.


The iniquitous fate that awaits Haitian youth today must be corrected urgently. Beyond a question of social justice, it is the future of the country which is at stake. Indeed, the sacrifice of a rising generation risks to maintain an intergenerational vicious circle, guaranteeing the economic growth in the long term.
In the current context of a profoundly changing labor market, in Haiti as elsewhere, better understanding these young people allows the promotion of interventions more suited to the challenges they face in order to develop their potential.
This is all who I am, this is what I am made of. I also believe it is my duty to devote my life to changing this situation. So, this is also what I’m made for