Book Review: Aid State

Jake Johnston, Aid State: Elite Panic, Disaster Capitalism, and the Battle to Control Haiti. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2024.  ISBN: 9781250284679.

Genre: current affairs, Haiti

Subgenre: history, politics, international affairs

Format: hardcover

Source: Eastside Branch, Lexington (KY) Public Library 

This is a good book to help readers understand the Haitian collapse recently and the history that led to this point. The book mainly covers from the 2010 earthquake to the assassination of the most recent president, at the time, President Jovenel Moïse. The book features extensive research. The author draws on extensive interviews with politicians, NGO officials, and Haitians. He also adds from his extensive journalistic experience covering Haiti, and he even provides materials from sources obtained via FOIA requests, request that the U.S. Government was often reluctant to provide. 

Soon we learn that it is not so much that Haiti is a "failed" state. It is more that it was a state that never had a fair chance to succeed. From the French imposing onerous reparations after Haiti became independent to American interventions to foreign interventions, Haiti never really had a chance to chart and make its own destiny. Local elites, corrupt local officials, NGO's, and foreign governments all colluded at various times to promote their own interests at the expense of the Haitian people and country. This is a book where very few come out looking well. For the most part, foreign nations, business interests, and NGO's are basically running, or trying to run, Haiti to further their own agendas. A particularly nefarious way they do so is through money and aid, making Haiti into an "Aid State" dependent on aid funding. This also means at times that if Haiti does not fall in line, funding can be cut. If you've ever donated money to a Haitian relief effort, you may want to consider who you are giving the money to; some of these relief organizations may not be as virtuous as you think. 

The book is well researched with extensive notes for documentation. However, it is a dense book at times, and it can be heavy reading. The narrative is full of details and a lot of minutiae at times. It may not always be easy to keep track of what happens when and who does what. Yet the book exposes an extreme neocolonialism strangling a small nation where people still struggle and hope for the best. 

At this time, this book is a pretty good overview of what is happening in Haiti and how it got there. It also exposes the role of the United States, its government, private enterprise, and NGO's, such as the Clinton Foundation,  in trying to mold Haiti to their wishes. Add in other international players, and it is a neocolonial game all over again. Want to learn more about U.S. foreign policy? This book shows you how the U.S. applies it to Haiti, which can serve as an example of what they do elsewhere. As the author writes, learning about U.S. foreign policy is a way of "confronting the hypocrisy at the core of our own origin story" (9).

I recommend the book for public and academic libraries. Readers of current events may be interested in this one. Book may also be of interest for readers in political science, current affairs, and Latin American and Caribbean history. As I said, it is not an easy read, upsetting at times, but worth it to learn more. 

3 out of 5 stars.

Book qualifies for the following 2024 Reading Challenge: