Hard to see how this could be solved, outside of Haiti being "lucky" enough to get one gang leader who defeats the others and tries to establish a stable government.<p>A serious international intervention is basically a non-starter. Rich countries would be accused of colonialism and sharply criticized for any mistake, other countries in the region don't have the money or force capability, and nobody has a real motivation to pursue such a thankless task. If I remember right, Haitians themselves are pretty iffy on even wanting security provided by foreigners (due to history).
To me the core lesson here is the incredible value of stable political and economic institutions.<p>(even after adjusting for the incredible injustice of all the external actors, and nature itself).<p>If you are lucky enough to get such a stable system, it's a high priority to defend it. Don't weaken it for marginal improvements for your cause.
There are uncomfortable truths in the world, and Haiti's story is one of them.<p>After the slaves revolted and gained independence in 1804, the state was embargoed. Haiti's first president, Alexandre Pétion, offered paying the value of the lost <i>land</i> to the French government.<p>Simultaneously, they reached out to the British and offered favorable trade terms to them. But a slave revolt was seen as untenable at the time and the British agreed to allow France to pursue "whatever means possible, including that of arms, to recover Saint-Domingue and to subdue the inhabitants of that colony."<p>Around the same time, Haiti tried to ally itself with the US, offering its ports + favorable trade. The US also sided with the French against the former slave colony.<p>Facing military invasion, in 1825, they agreed to pay indemnity for the value of the slaves lost by the French government for a total of 150 million francs. As they couldn't pay the amount in lump sum, Haiti was forced to enter into unfavorable loans with the United States and France to pay the slavery debt. Around 80%+ of GDP was used to pay foreign debt<p><pre><code> By the late 1800s, eighty percent of Haiti's wealth was being used to pay foreign debt; France was the highest collector, followed by the German Empire and the United States
</code></pre>
Non-payment wasn't an option. In 1903, Haiti accused the capital institutions France had set up for debt extraction within Haiti of fraud. That threat led a coalition of private entities who owned the bonds, working with the US State Department, to use the US military to invade the former state. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Haiti" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_occupation_of_Ha...</a><p>Haiti didn't pay off its debts until 1947. For reference, Joe Biden was 5 years old when Haiti finally paid off this slavery debt.<p>As the overwhelming majority of the state's economic output was sapped by this debt, Haiti lacked the ability to invest in itself until the end of WW2.<p>Post-WW2, Haiti went through decades of political turmoil and never achieved political stability.<p>Haiti's present cannot be judged without the weight of this past. And it's future cannot be charted without accounting for it.<p>Of course, the place that was invaded at the drop of a hat and deprived of resources never learned to build civil institutions and non-corrupt governance. Fixing this probably requires a lot of close study to develop very specific interventions to change Haiti's culture and help it prosper.
I follow this guy <a href="https://www.instagram.com/sean_haiti" rel="nofollow">https://www.instagram.com/sean_haiti</a><p>I'm in the DR right now and some locals are worried about the violence in Constanza spreading but most are just going about their lives. The DR is the least stressful country int he world after all.