MIAMI – To a packed audience of more than 200, the Prime Minister of Saint Lucia, Hon. Kenny Anthony, delivered the thought-provoking 16th Annual Eric E. Williams Memorial Lecture at Florida International University on October 17, 2014.
“Reparations and 21st Century Development: The Silence Is Broken and We Speak to the World” ably addressed CARICOM’S political stance on slave trade reparations, made possible by Eric Williams’ 1944 groundbreaking study on the abolition and emancipation of British West Indian slavery, Capitalism and Slavery. The book re-framed the historiography of the British trans-Atlantic slave trade and its concomitant European incarnations. Popularly referred to as The Williams Thesis, this landmark text – translated into eight languages including Russian, Chinese, Japanese, Turkish and this year, Korean – established the contribution of Caribbean slavery to the development of both Britain and America. It continues to inform today’s ongoing debate and remains “years ahead of its time…this profound critique is still the foundation for studies of imperialism and economic development,” according to the New York Times.
In a determined and measured fashion, entirely consistent with his legal background, Prime Minister Anthony discussed recent precedents of reparatory justice made by Great Britain to the Mau Mau freedom fighters of Kenya – to the tune of 20 million pounds sterling; and the payment of some 455 million dollars to an indigenous community in the US. The most well known case of compensation for historical wrongs, of course, remains that of the Jewish Holocaust for which, as late as 2013, Germany had agreed to pay survivors almost 800 million euros. “These awards suggest,” stated the Prime Minister, “that the world has begun to understand and accept the idea of compensation…[for the] ‘value extraction’ … wealth, labour, liberty, dignity, and everything else [wrested by] one section of the community, the free section …from the enslaved community.” The most egregious example of reverse reparatory justice can be found in Haiti, which won a war of national liberation and was declared a free nation in 1804. In its independence constitution of 1805, the world’s first black republic promptly abolished slavery and slave trading and declared them crimes. In 1825, after 21 years of nationhood, Haiti was forced by the French led pro-slavery international community, to agree to pay reparations of 150 million gold francs (later reduced to 90 million) to former slavers in France – for the loss of their ‘property.’ Haiti’s ‘debt’ was not satisfied until 1947, almost a century and a half later, leaving the small island nation seemingly intractably impoverished and the national psyche irreparably wounded.
Established in 1999, FIU’s annual Eric Williams Lecture honors the distinguished Caribbean statesman, consummate academic and historian, and author of several other books. Eric E. Williams was also the first Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago and Head of Government for a quarter of a century until his death in 1981. He led the country to Independence from Britain in 1962 and onto Republicanism in 1976.
Among prior Eric Williams Memorial Lecture speakers have been: the late John Hope Franklin, one of America’s premier historians of the African-American experience; Kenneth Kaunda, former President of the Republic of Zambia; Cynthia Pratt, Deputy Prime Minister of the Bahamas; Mia Mottley, Attorney General of Barbados; Beverly Anderson-Manley, former First Lady of Jamaica; Portia Simpson Miller, now Prime Minister of Jamaica; the celebrated civil rights activist Angela Davis; and prize-winning Haitian author Edwige Danticat.
The Lecture, FIU’s first named and longest running, seeks to provide an intellectual forum for the examination of pertinent issues in Caribbean and African Diaspora history and politics. It is co-sponsored by FIU’s: Department of English, Latin American and Caribbean Center, AADS Graduate Students Association, Caribbean Students Association, Council of Student Organizations; Milton Adams/Karen M. Linger; Lenor Ancilla Armstrong; Reginald Barker; Elliot & Sandra Bastien; Bilmor With Advertising Specialties, Inc.; Rendell Brewster; Dr. & Mrs. Bradford Brown; Anthony Bryan; Leslye Danglade; Hayden Davis; Dr. & Mrs. Dennis Dove; EC Worldwide Travel; Edwards & Partners; Leon & Eunice Francis; Diane Galloway’s Herbal Gardens, Inc.; Lew E. & Jill Garland; Joan Hinkson; Hometrust Mortgage Co.; Rev. Canon & Mrs. Winston Joseph; Joy’s Roti Delight; Leroy & Anne Lashley; Miami Dade College; Neki Mohan; Ronnie & Sumin Quan-Vie; Keith & June Richards; Lenny & Gemme Roach; Royal Funeral Service; Mervyn Solomon; Split N’s Salon; T&T Community at Christ the King; Radcliff Thomas; Trinidad and Tobago Independence Ball Committee, Inc.; Welch, Morris & Associates.
The Lecture is also supported by The Eric Williams Memorial Collection Research Library, Archives and Museum at the University of the West Indies (Trinidad and Tobago campus), which was inaugurated by former U.S. Secretary of State, Colin L. Powell in 1998. It was named to UNESCO’s prestigious Memory of the World Register in 1999.
