On 1 November 1981, the island of Antigua gained its independence, ending almost 350 years of British rule. However, just because they had their independence it didn’t necessarily mean they were free. While in power, the British government had created the vast majority of the institutions that these people relied on to govern, and to complete their secession from Britain they attempted to reject these institutions and move further towards democracy. While the effort was admirable, the resulting government was from what the people had wanted. While it does respect civil liberties it is plagued by the issue of corruption and the resulting crimes. In fact, The World Bank’s Government Effectiveness indicator, which operates on a scale from -2.5 to 2.5, gives the government of Antigua a score of 0 and on their similar corruption index, Antigua scores a 0.2 (Bak, 1). While neither of these numbers is negative, the combined scores indicate that the government in Antigua is minimally effective and in danger of becoming severly corrupt. This corruption is extremely damaging because not only does it bring crime into the country but it also damages the public confidence in the government that they rely on every day (Bayley).
The most relevant thing from step 3 is how widespread the damage from corruption is. An idea that stuck with me from the reading I did, was that corruption was a continuation of the type of oppression the islanders faced under the British. Combining this with the fact that some members of the government don’t do much to hide crimes such as running brothels, embezzling public funds, and engaging in shady politics, the people of Antigua have more than enough reason to lose faith in their government (Kincaid). Losing faith in government, especially so soon after gaining independence and creating it, is devastating to a country. The government touches nearly every aspect of an individual’s life, and if they can’t rely on that then life becomes exponentially harder. In summation, the widespread corruption within the Antiguan government is extremely damaging to its people and serves as a warning to the rest of the world.
Bibliography
Bak, Mathias. Overview of corruption and anti-corruption in Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Guyana, Jamaica, St Lucia, and Trinidad and Tobago. Transparency International., 2019.
Bayley, David H. Western Political Quarterly, vol. 19, no. 4, 1 Dec. 1966, pp. 719–732.
Kincaid, Jamaica. A Small Place. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2000.
Thanks for giving us a little background of Antigua. This is very helpful for us to examine the reading for the week. I think you also helped by making us understand Kincaid’s experiences as well.
Very informative post. I think understanding some of the background that Kincaid does not explain in her essays really leads to a more complete understanding of Kincaid’s writing. I also found it interesting how severely the Antiguan government affected the Antiguan people, which makes me more appreciative of democracy in America.
This is a very nice background on Antigua. I think it is important that you stated although they had their independence they were not free. This is the case when many countries gain independence and it can be decades until they truly are free and develop the country how they want and remove systemic problems. I love the perspective of Kincaid losing faith in government extremely quickly due to how open the corruption is. I think this ties back into the point that they weren’t really free.
I thought your post was well thought out and clearly written. The background information really helped me to better understand Kincaid’s writing. I was aware that Argentina was a corrupt nation but I didn’t know just how much it affected the people. So the information you put in your post was beneficial to growing my understanding of the Argentinians situation. Good job!
This was incredibly informational! I do not know very much about Antigua, so this information I’d very helpful in understanding the many issues that we are reading about. I did not realize how recently the country had gained its independence or how connected that was to the corruption of their government.
Good post! I think you did a good job explaining a little bit of the history of Antigua, and how it is facing problems and corruption. It is good context and makes the Kincaid reading a lot more understandable.