TT needs resurrecting, too

Easter is of course the celebration of Christ’s resurrection following his crucifixion on “Good Friday.” Much can be said about this, the most important of Christian commemorations, but I simply wish to point out that on this Easter morn there is much that needs “resurrecting” in Trinidad and Tobago” and indeed, throughout the world.

Underpinning much of what is wrong is, in my view, the absence of social justice and equity as the philosophy that should underpin and guide policies by the economic and political decision-makers in the world. Regrettably, beginning with the decade in which Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher took power in the US and Britain respectively, there has been an open shift away from any pretence that social justice and equity should guide decision-making. In the past 20 odd years the focus has been on individual satisfaction regardless of the cost that this approach may have amounted to. We thus have been driven by the neo-liberal policies where the so-called “market-place” must be dominant over all else.

In reality this has meant that labour has had its share of national income reduced relative to that of capital, while countries of the “third world” have had their share of international wealth, decreased relative to those of the “industrialised north.” The measure of this is worsening income distribution between the rich and poor, within countries as well as between countries. Put another way, the rich are getting richer and the poor, poorer. But this is “development” according to the model of Reagan, Thatcher and the multinational corporations that they effectively represented.

For them, development means that the consumer economy is thriving. And so we have the malls, any number of stores selling products that we don’t make ourselves, supermarkets that offer choices to the consumers at the expense of local farmers and manufacturers, restaurants that range from the expensive “haute cuisine” to the expensive fast foods, chain operators from Price Smart to Long John Silver that give the pretence of being in Miami, and cars by Porsche, BMW and other luxury marques. What we are seeing in Trinidad and Tobago is a pattern of “development” all over the world. We are now buying “brands” not a product even, so we look not for a cup of coffee but Starbucks, not a pair of sneakers but Nike, not a sandwich but a Subway.

At the same time shop fronts are remodeled to have the right “look” and entire communities in downtown areas are redeveloped to make them acceptable to the middle-income professionals that need housing close to where they work. Thus in upper Manhattan — in Harlem, for example, people are turfed out and the buildings gutted or torn down in order that fancy apartments can be sold or rented on the upper floors while the ground floor becomes the Starbucks or whatever else “the market” requires.

In this process nobody is really concerned about the people who lived there. That they are mostly poorer and depending on the city — black or coloured — is not a matter for the planners and the developers. After all, money will be made by the real estate operators, some building contractors and no doubt some corrupt public officials, the location will become accessible (read acceptable) to the decision makers and those who count, and the problems of crime and violence solved — or at least swept under the carpet or shifted away from sight. This process — the Americans dubbed it “gentrification” has been taking place all over North America and in many parts of Europe.

It is a policy approach totally bereft of social justice and equity and it is now very much in the driver’s seat here in Trinidad and Tobago. This is very obvious if we examine the proposed development of Port-of-Spain, both west and east.

The working class communities of east Port-of-Spain are to be relocated and when the new high rise buildings are completed the population of the city is meant to be doubled. All one has to do is ask — will this doubling come from the former residents? Will it come from Laventille or Morvant where there is an acute shortage of suitable housing? Or will it come from outside of these communities? And will the income category remain the same or will we see a shift towards the middle and upper-middle groups? In west Port-of-Spain the government claims that it is primarily building new office accommodation for Ministries. This is only partially so as the waterfront is being turned into a convention centre with two 26 storey buildings inclusive of a five star hotel, convention centre and offices for the non-existent FTAA headquarters. The waterfront, once the realm of dockworkers from behind the bridge will now be the locale for foreign and local power-brokers, political and economic. Even the rebuilt Breakfast Shed has changed in character as it is now just another food court and not the place where patrons and the cooks interacted in an intimate and interactive way.

“Developed country status” has clearly meant different things to different people. Some of us wish to see development being about people, counted in the actual improvement in the well-being and daily lives of ordinary citizens, while others count it in terms of projects completed and buildings constructed. The sad thing is that we have had no national debate on the pros and cons of each approach. This is still urgently needed.

There are many other implications of the neo-liberal model of development. For example, we need to know precisely how the large expenditures will result in sustainable development such that today’s income levels will not fall precipitously as they did when the oil boom of the 1970’s came to an end.

We also need to examine what is happening to the labour market where on the one hand some are unable to access jobs given their low level of educational attainment or lack of skills or are only able to find low paid jobs in the service sector, while on the other hand, a relatively few are earning very substantial sums. In this very unequal labour market there is also a shortage of labour and this gap is increasingly filled by non-nationals.

This has happened all over the world and is in part the basis of protests by immigrants and/or their children in the US today and in France last year. It has now been followed by mass protests by unions and students on the issue of a labour law in France that would have resulted in the loss of workers rights, a protest so sharp that it forced the government to withdraw the legislation.

This is evidence of social movements that have been born out of resistance to the policies of the last two decades, policies that reject the notion of social justice and equity. This rebirth of social movements at a time when the owners and managers of capital thought that their agenda had won out for all time (remember their glee at the collapse of the Soviet Union), has also seen Latin America’s political map being redrawn with Chavez, Morales and Lula, amongst others now in office. And there have been massive protests against the war in Iraq, the WTO and globalisation, and the attitude of the Bush administration to Katrina. Trinidad and Tobago’s social movement may also be resurrecting in opposition to a development model that is unacceptable to many because it is not based on the principles of social justice, equity, peace and sustainable communities and development.