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Between the devil and the deep blue sea: mercantilism and free trade

department of the University of Pittsburgh

Taking the work of radical dependency theorist Clive Thomas as its starting point, this article examines the structural effects on Caribbean economies of capitalist globalisation, neoliberal `adjustment' programmes and the imposition of `free market' rules of trade. It looks at the interplay between the powerful corporations and nation states and asks whether the region's `underdevelopment' is a product of its comparatively small size or of its colonial history. Arguing that the latter was the principal factor, it analyses both the sugar and the banana industries in terms of their forced accommodation to the dictates of imperialism, to provide lessons for the present.

Key Words: bananas • Barbados • Caribbean economy • Clive Thomas • dependency theory • imperialism • neocolonialism • sugar • Windward Islands

References

• Clive Y. Thomas, `The inversion of meaning: trade policy and the Caribbean sugar industry ', paper presented to the Policy History Conference, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio, 1—3 June 2000, pp. 21—2.
• Lloyd Best, `Size and survival', in Readings in Political Economy in the Caribbean (Kingston, Jamaica, New World Associates, 1971); William Demas, The Economics of Development in Small Countries with Special Reference to the Caribbean (Montreal, McGill University Press, 1965).
• Clive Y. Thomas, Dependence and Transformation: the economics of the transition to socialism (New York, Monthly Review Press, 1974).
• Roving neocon ambassador for the Reagan and George W. Bush regimes, Abrams is currently deputy national security adviser for `global democracy' strategy. In `The shiprider solution: policing the Caribbean', The National Interest (Spring 1996), pp. 86—92, Abrams wrote, in reference to the small states of the Caribbean, that, `IN AN INCREASINGLY TROUBLED REGION, RELIANCE ON A FOREIGN POWER FOR SECURITY AND PROSPERITY MAY BE THE MOST SENSIBLE FORM OF NATIONALISM. And the only available foreign power is the United States.' Capitalisation in original. `It is time to ask, out loud', he continued, `whether the decision made by Puerto Ricans decades ago when they voted for commonwealth status, and by Bermudans in a 1995 plebiscite that rejected independence from Britain, was not the wiser course: continuing dependency on a larger, richer, stronger nation.'
• Clive Y. Thomas, Making Global Trade Work for People: the concerns of small states (UNDP Capacity 2015 Resilience Series, Vol. 62004, 2004), p. 5.
• Ibid., p. 27.
• Anthony McGrew, `Globalisation: conceptualising a moving target', in John Eatwell (ed.), Understanding Globalisation: the nation-state, democracy and economic policies (Stockholm, Almqvist & Wiksell International, 1998), pp. 16—17.
• Bernard Semmel, The Rise of Free Trade Imperialism (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1970) and The Liberal Ideal and the Demons of Empire (Baltimore and London, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993).
• West India Royal Commission (1897): appendix C — part III, Barbados, p. 209.
• Ibid., p. 218.
• Ibid., pp. 218—9.
• Recently acquired by the Icelandic Bakkavor Group.
• Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Peasants and Capital: Dominica in the world economy (Baltimore and London, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988).
• Brent Borrell, Bananas: straightening out bent ideas on trade as aid (Canberra and Sydney, Centre for International Economics, 1999), p. 3.
• Donald L. Bartlett and James B. Steele, `How to become a top banana', Time (Vol. 155, no. 5, 7 February 2000).
• Winston Anderson, `Forum non conveniens strikes again: American court closes its door to eastern Caribbean litigants', Journal of Eastern Caribbean Studies (Vol. 23, no. 3, September 1998), p. 81.
• Ibid., p. 79.
• Ibid., p. 78.
• Ibid., p. 87.
• Thomas, Dependence and Transformation, op. cit, p. 87.
• Clive Y. Thomas, The Rise of the Authoritarian State in Peripheral Societies (New York, Monthly Review Press, 1984).
• This was glaringly obvious, for example, in the otherwise hard-hitting documentary `Life and Debt' (Tuff Gong Pictures, 2001, Director Stephanie Black).

Race & Class, Vol. 49, No. 2, 41-56 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/0306396807082857


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This Article Abstract Free Full Text (Free PDF) Free Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Green, C. A. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?