Book Review… The Caribbean: New Challenges in a changing global landscape

May 13, 2018 Book Review…, Features / Columnists

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Book: Caribbean Realities and Endogenous Sustainability

Editors: Debbie A. Mohammed and Nikolaos Karagiannis

Critic: Glenville Ashby, PhD

Caribbean Realities and Endogenous Sustainability delivers a panoramic analysis of a region glued by historical, social and political forces. Editors Debbie A. Mohammed and Nikolaos Karagiannis present a slew of academicians with complementary views on policy approaches toward sustainability and effective governance. Their work is detailed and incisive, and speaks to societies struggling for relevance in an ever changing, competitive world.

Caribbean dynamics must be understood through historical lens. Slavery, indentureship, creolization, identity and nationalism are addressed; but so too are more recent developments, such as, terrorism and geoeconomics.

The Caribbean, like never before, is inextricably bound to the global marketplace through memoranda of understanding and treatises. Its economic viability is tied to a global financial apparatus.
Still, it’s the region’s endogenous challenges that threaten to stultify authentic growth.
Multiculturalism and racial pluralism have polarized these island states, some, more than others. The two-party system, rooted in the region’s body politic has steadily created political tribes and competing self-interests. Corruption, graft and nepotism have arisen from this political cauldron.
Still, the region’s multi-dimensionality, if properly construed and harnessed, can be resourcefully employed. Marshall and Foote advance this position in their essay, Identity Formation in the English-Speaking Caribbean: Toward a Sociodynamic Perspective. They write, “Our ‘identity’ lies in our indigeneity, which consists of those things that we have created for ourselves within the region – how we speak, work, make music, dance, worship and celebrate….Such multiculturally manifested creativity will remain the major resource that will always be required for simultaneously debunking our colonial legacy, continuing our identity formation and heralding and crystallizing hitherto untapped dimensions of regional integration.”

Caribbean plurality, while unique and advantageous on many levels, can be exploited to advance self-serving interest. The global fight against terrorism has spread to the idyllic shores of the Caribbean. Post 9/11 concerns have reached the region as the ISIS juggernaut is rumored to have mushroomed on the islands with a substantive Muslim demographic. In addition to perennial challenges, such as, drug trafficking, political turmoil and border disputes, national and regional security agencies are now charged with stemming the religious radicalization of disaffected young men.

Jacqueline A. Braveboy-Wagner addresses this subject in Caribbean Foreign Policies in the Twenty First Century: From Activism to Improvisation in Diplomacy. She writes, “In [the] national security sphere, foreign policy personnel have specific roles. Foreign ministries and ministers have had to do damage control to the images of their countries. They have had to assure their larger partners that robust counterterrorism measures are being adopted. Still, Wagner identifies the successes that regional bodies have had in the second decades of the 2000s, identifying the hosting of the Cricket World Cup in 2007, and the 2009 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Trinidad.

She later calls for a supportive political environment to facilitate diplomatic endeavours.

“Overall,” she concludes that “the aim of governments should be to convert what may be seen as an unpredictable external environment into a somewhat predictable one, one in which developmental public policies, including foreign politics, can be sustained over the medium and longer term.”

In The Post Independence Performance of Caribbean Economies: The Centrality of Economic Policy Choices, Dave Seerattan writes that global competitiveness requires an open market that facilitates the growth of companies. The region, he argues, has been hamstrung by small market size, low investment in research and development, and bureaucratic and infrastructural shortcomings.
“The key to success,” according to Seerattan, “is to be competitive in the production of goods and services for the home and export markets.” He emphasizes the importance of well managed and structured companies in this process, while acknowledging the equal relevance of government as it “provides a better environment where business can strive.”
He continues, “Size is important, since only when a large critical mass is achieved do firms have the requisite human, financial and technological resources to compete effectively outside of the home markets.”

In Corporate Governance in the Caribbean: Failures, Impact and the Way Forward, Ron R. Sookram addresses leadership, ethics and accountability as recurring themes that have adversely impacted financial institutions and public trust. The CLICO debacle, arguably the largest failed conglomerate, led to the Amendment of the 2009 Insurance Act and the enactment of the New Securities Act of 2012.

Sookram emphasizes responsible leadership. Citing (Stahl and de Luque 2014), he writes, “[Responsible leadership] can be considered to include intentional actions taken by leaders to benefit the stakeholders of a company and actions taken to avoid harmful consequences for corporate stakeholders and the larger society.”

According to Sookram, probity, integrity and honesty must define sound leadership.

He adds that while profit is essential to corporate viability, “the way in which it is derived becomes the key challenges with the new demands and changes in business context.”
Caribbean Realities and Endogenous Sustainability is an invaluable resource that effectively addresses financial largesse, economic ineptitude and political myopia, while identifying the region’s unique heterogeneity, strengths, resources and potential. Its relevance cannot be overemphasized.

Feedback: [email protected] or follow him on Twitter@glenvilleashby
Publisher: The University of the West Indies Press
ISBN: 978-976-640-642-4
Available at Amazon and UWI Press, Jamaica
Ratings: Essential

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