Red and Black in Haiti: Radicalism, Conflict, and Political Change, 1934-1957

In their perspective, Haiti's predicament had little to do with the color of its rulers; instead, it was rooted in the country's exploitative capitalist structures and in the bourgeoisie's utter subservience to imperialism (p. 20). [...]neither color nor nationalism would change Haiti's class-ridden and exploitative social order; what was required was the introduction of socialism. [...]it was noirisme with the emergence of Fignolé as the charismatic leader of Port-au-Prince that triumphed in the aftermath of the political collapse of Lescot's milat regime. Not only were milats the exploitative enemy that had to be destroyed, but the black masses themselves were to be denied political autonomy; they had to follow blindly the dictates of a charismatic man of destiny. [...]noiristes came to espouse a form of political messianism grounded in the belief that black power entailed "a black leader and group leading the masses like a shepherd" (p. 109).