Extend Haiti's TPS designation

I am a co-signer of this open letter calling for the U.S. government to extend Haiti's TPS (temporary protected status) designation. As the letter states: failure to extend TPS "would be disastrous for families here and there and destabilizing, adding a significant burden to a nation already saddled with overwhelming challenges, increasing desperation..."

New article published in the peer reviewed journal Caribbean Studies

Click here for a PDF of my new article published in the scholarly journal Caribbean Studies.  This is an altered version of one chapter in my recently completed Ph.D. dissertation: The Caribbean and Global Capitalism.  The article is titled: "From International to Transnational Mining: The Industry's Shifting Political Economy and the Caribbean". The English, Spanish, and French versions of the abstract are below. Click here for a URL link to the journal.

A Review of Leo Panitch & Sam Gindin's book on the Political Economy of U.S. Empire

See here for a new piece that I have published in the journal Critical Sociology reviewing Leo Panitch and Sam Gindin's book The Making of Global Capitalism:  The Political Economy of American Empire (2012, Verso).

Paramilitarism in Haiti: A Photographic History

     Below are photos to accompany my book Paramilitarism and the Assault on Democracy in Haiti (Monthly Review Press, 2012). These photos were either: (a) provided to me with permission to use by the photographer, (b) photos that I took, or (c) they have been posted through Creative Commons (CC) which was especially necessary with the older historical periods covered.
     These images focus our attention on paramilitary organizations and their facilitators: various state, military, and intelligence apparatuses, officials, and elite networks. As paramilitary groups and their backers have gained impunity time and again, it is necessary to document all of this for the historical record, which I have tried to do in my recently published book. Through these photos, we are forced to recognize that the victims of paramilitary violence in Haiti are overwhelmingly from the country's lower-income communities and grassroots pro-democracy movement.
     In addition to these photographs, I suggest looking over the many excellent documentaries, books, and other sources that provide a compelling record of contemporary paramilitary violence in Haiti and the region. 

     I have put these photos together from a powerpoint that I used a few months back during various presentations I gave on the book. I hope readers of the book will find this useful, as well as the university classes that I know have been assigned to read it. This photo collection is a work in progress. [NOTE: As of 2019 I am continuing to update this page, and I will continue into the foreseeable future. Also, in 2018 I published an article providing a condensed overview of my 2012 book and with a better grounding in  sociological/political economic theory.]

OpEd in Miami Herald

I have a new article published here in the Miami Herald. It is titled "Reviving Haiti’s army would harm democracy". Click here to read.

WBAI Interview

Interviewed on the radio station WBAI, New York (99.5 FM) on US/UN supervision of ex-army paramilitary integration into Haiti's police force: begins at 15mins & 30secs.
http://archive.wbai.org/files/mp3/wbai_110811_210038thurs9pm10pm.mp3

WikiLeaks Reveal: U.S. and UN Officials Oversaw Integration of Ex-Army Paramilitaries into Haiti’s Police Force

by Jeb Sprague

[This article will appear this week in the newspaper Haiti Liberté]

Throughout 2004 and 2005, Haiti’s unelected de facto authorities, working alongside foreign officials, integrated at least 400 ex-army paramilitaries into the country’s police force, secret U.S. Embassy cables reveal.

            For a year and a half following the ouster of Haiti’s elected government on Feb. 29, 2004, UN, OAS, and U.S. officials, in conjunction with post-coup Haitian authorities, vetted the country’s police force – officer by officer – integrating paramilitaries with the goal of both strengthening the force and providing an alternative “career path” for paramilitaries.

End Forced Exile

See here for a petition that was published today in the Miami Herald calling for the Haitian government, the United States, France, Canada, and the United Nations to stop blocking the return of Haiti's first democratically elected president.

Stealth Duvalierism

Haiti, Michel Martelly, and the Presidential Selection of 2010
Znet and Haiti Liberte

December 20, 2010
By Jeb Sprague

In the media coverage of Haiti's ongoing electoral crisis, presidential candidate Michel "Sweet Micky" Martelly, whom ruling Unity party candidate Jude Célestin edged out of Haiti's Jan. 16 run-off by less than 1%, has been portrayed as the victim of voting fraud and the leader of a populist upsurge against Haiti’s crooked Provisional Electoral Council (CEP).

Some have questioned his presidential suitability by pointing to his vulgar antics as a konpa musician over the last two decades, where he often made demeaning comments about women and periodically dropped his trousers to bare his backside.

The real problem with Martelly, however, is not his perceived immorality, but his heinous political history and close affi liation with the reactionary “forces of darkness," as they are called in Haiti, which have snuffed out each genuine attempt Haitians have made over the past 20 years to elect a democratic government. Far from a champion of democracy, Martelly has been a cheerleader for, and perhaps even a participant in, bloody coups d'état and military rule.

Migrants Risk Everything in Arizona Desert Crossing

By Jeb Sprague
INTER PRESS SERVICE (IPS)

Photo of: Border leading into the desert at the Mariposa port-of-entry.

NOGALES, Mexico, Apr 17, 2010 (IPS) - As he drops his last purification tablet into a pail of swirling, murky water, Sergio, 26, stares out toward the desert. Recently deported from Arizona, where he has a young child and where he has lived for the majority of his life, he explains, "I have to return, it's my home."

Lacking official U.S. documentation, Sergio, like other undocumented migrants is unable to get a driver's license. Using a fake ID, he was originally deported to Mexico after being pulled over in a routine traffic stop and jailed for four months.