Beverly Bell first went to Haiti as a teenager. Since then she has dedicated most of her life to working for democracy, women’s rights, and economic justice in that country. She founded or co-founded six organizations and networks dedicated exclusively to supporting the Haitian people, including the Lambi Fund of Haiti. She worked for both presidents Jean-Bertrand Aristide and Rene Preval and wrote Walking on Fire: Haitian Women’s Stories of Survival and Resistance (Cornell University Press, 2001). Today she is associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and runs the economic justice group Other Worlds.
Alexis Erkert and Deepa Panchang are co-coordinators of Other Worlds' Another Haiti is Possible program. You can access all of Other Worlds’ past articles regarding post-earthquake Haiti here.
Haitian Sweatship Workers Speak: Subpoverty Wages and Sexual Coercion
Written by Beverly BellBelow, Haitian women workers tell of their experiences in sweatshops. These interviews, gathered over the past two years, are among many dozens that this writer has collected from Haitian sweatshop workers since the early 1980s. Not one has ever diverged from the narrative of miserable working conditions ...
A Tale of Two NGOs: In Haiti, Disaster Aid or Aid Disaster?
This review of Killing With Kindness was written by Other Worlds' founder and coordinator Beverly BellThree years after the deadly earthquake in Haiti, what has become of the commitments made on Red Cross billboards, the promises from telethon hosts, the moving declarations of Presidents Obama and Clinton? What has happened ...
Interview with Larry Cohen, President of the Communications Workers of America
Interview by Beverly BellGiven the path we’ve been on in this country, the American dream is in tatters. Whether it’s a voice on the job or our standard of living or health care or education, all are being destroyed on our watch. But we can stand up and fight back. ...
Haitian activist tours U.S. demanding housing rights for the country’s 400,000 displaced
Housing activist Reyneld Sanon is beginning a tour to key cities in the United States. The tour will raise awareness about Under Tents, the international campaign for housing rights in Haiti. The campaign is a joint initiative of Haitian grassroots groups and more than 30 international organizations that are ...
The Creole Connection: New Orleans, Haiti, and Catastrophe
By Beverly BellAugust 28, 2012 As a native and resident of New Orleans who has spent three decades in and out of Haiti, and as director of an organization with offices in both places, this has been a harrowing week. The two locales sit squarely in Hurricane Isaac’s path. We ...
“Under Tents”: International Campaign Launch for Housing in Haiti
"The quantity of people who are homeless in Port-au-Prince today is not acceptable. We need the support of other governments, like the US, to demand that the Haitian Government create a social housing plan. We are looking for allies to help our advocacy. We are asking simply for quality homes ...
By Alexis Erkert When police and the landowner commanded Michelène Pierre to vacate her tent on a Sunday afternoon so that they could light it on fire, she responded: “If you want to light me on fire along with this entire camp, go ahead. I’m not leaving.” The police bypassed ...
"When it rains, we will grow again": Haitian women observe International Women's Day
By Alexis Erkert, Another Haiti is Possible Coordinator, Other Worlds "As activists, we commemorate this as a day of struggle, a day to make our voices heard until someone pays attention and helps provide solutions to our problems." Facing the Haitian parliament with a throng of banner-waving and singing women ...
Business as government: Capitalizing on disaster in post-earthquake Haiti
by Deepa Panchang and Beverly Bell“I am optimistic that in 18 months, yes, we will be autonomous in our decisions. But right now I have to assume... that we are not.”[i] With these words, Haiti’s Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive watched a swath of his government’s decision-making power shift into foreign ...
“The Super Bowl of Disasters”: Profiting from crisis in post-earthquake Haiti
By Deepa Panchang, Beverly Bell, and Tory FieldAs Americans were gearing up for last week’s Super Bowl championship, Haiti’s president Michel Martelly was on a plane to the World Economic Forum to recruit players interested in what one businessman dubbed “the Super Bowl of Disasters” – Haiti’s devastating 2010 earthquake.[1] ...
"Best practices" and "exemplar communities": Ivory tower housing solutions for Haiti
In a 2011 Forum on the Crisis of Housing in Haiti, a group of camp residents and advocates asked “grassroots organizations and all other movements to mobilize with us on the housing issue so that we can achieve this dream of justice and liberty.” Today, with more than 500,000 people ...
Two Years after the Earthquake in Haiti: "Housing is Our Battle"
By Alexis Erkert January 19, 2012 Remember, you are marching today for those who couldn’t be here, To say to them, “We haven’t forgotten. We’ll never forget.” And to say to those that are still here, We will take a stand for the rebuilding of Haiti. - Right to Housing ...
Home: From Displacement Camps to Community in Haiti
Written by Alexis Erkert and Beverly Bell As 2012 begins, a growing movement of displaced people and their allies in Haiti is actively claiming the right to housing, which is recognized by both the Haitian constitution and international treaties to which Haiti is signatory. Haitians displaced by the earthquake two ...
"Haitian Peasant Women as Poto Mitan, Central Pillar": An interview with Iderle Brénus Gerbier
Interview by Alexis Erkert, Other WorldsDecember 20, 2011Iderle Brénus Gerbier has worked with many peasant organizations in support of women's rights and food sovereignty. She is a member of the Haitian National Network for Food Security and Sovereignty (RENHASSA), campaign coordinator for Food Sovereignty in Haiti, advisor of the National ...
“MINUSTAH: Keeping the peace, or conspiring against it?”
By Deepa Panchang, Another Haiti Is Possible Co-Coordinator, Other Worlds Nou dwe sèl mèt bout tè sa a: We should be the only owners of this land. This was Haitian protesters’ message at a demonstration last month against the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti, known by its French acronym, MINUSTAH. ...
"We are Tired of Living under Tents"
By Alexis Erkert, Another Haiti is Possible Co-Coordinator, Other Worlds On Monday morning, October 3, ten women stood across the street from the Ministry of Social Affairs, waving their arms, wailing and chanting. They were calling on Osany, of the pantheon of vodou lwa, or spirits, for assistance. The lyrics ...
Take Action to Support Haitians Facing Forced Evictions from Tent Camps
For a year and a half, Haitians, under the scarce protection of makeshift plastic shelter, have battled storms and sun, physical assault and food insecurity. Moreover, they’ve had to fight for their shelter itself – for the right to remain in the camps they’ve been obliged to call home. People ...
"Until the Day I Die": Gerta Louisama on Haitian Women Winning Their Rights
Gerta Louisama is a member of the Executive Committee and the National Women’s Committee of Tèt Kole Ti Peyizan Ayisyen, Heads Together Small Producers of Haiti, Haiti’s largest and oldest peasant group. She is also head of the local Tèt Kole Women’s Committee in her village of Savanette. Here she ...
By Beverly Bell, based on reporting from Haiti-based Haiti Grassroots Watch and AlterPresse HINCHE, Haiti, June 27 – Last week, thousands of farmers and supporters of Haitian peasant agriculture marched for hours under the hot Caribbean sun to call for more government support for locally grown seeds and agriculture. The ...
“Internationalism between Peoples”: Learning and Constructing with Haitians
Jose Luis Patrola is a history professor, farmer, and member of the Brazilian land reform group, the Rural Landless Workers’ Movement, or MST. He has lived in Haiti for three years. There, he coordinates the MST’s program, an exchange of agricultural and technical cooperation between Haitians and Brazilians. In a ...
In Haiti, "Homes and Land are the Source of Life": International Forum on the Crisis of Housing
May 31, 2011 Below are excerpts from the International Forum on the Crisis of Housing, held in Port-au-Prince May 19-21, 2011. During the forum, hundreds of Haitians, plus allies from around the Americas, developed strategies to force a solution to Haiti’s greatest crisis: homelessness. Almost 17 months after the earthquake, ...
Haitian Mayor's Office Vows to Destroy All Refugee Camps, Launches Violent Campaign
On May 23 and 25, police in the Delmas district of Port-au-Prince destroyed camps which sheltered people who were otherwise homeless since the earthquake. Police and other municipal workers beat and arrested residents, and physically threatened the lives of a human rights lawyer and an advocate who had come to ...
Haiti: Just When You Think It Can't Get Worse
We may soon look back on this period in Haiti with greater appreciation. Amidst the world-historic levels of death and suffering from last January’s earthquake, citizens have at least been spared the scale of government violence that has marked much of their nation’s past (notwithstanding attacks against internally displaced persons ...
March 17, 2011 We put this question to numerous Haitians. Below are some responses. Konpè Filo has been one of Haiti’s most popular journalists since 1974. Arrested, tortured, and exiled by Duvalier in 1980, Konpè lived in numerous countries until he could return home when the dictatorship fell in 1986. ...
In Haiti, Land Reform as a Pillar of Reconstruction
Ronel Thelusmond is the director of the technical division of the National Institute for the Application of Agrarian Reform (INARA), which is part of the Haitian Ministry of Agriculture. Extreme concentration of land, giving little to no access to the 60-80% of the population who are farmers, is one of ...
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May 9th, 2013
Haitian Sweatship Workers Speak: Subpoverty Wages and Sexual Coercion
Written by Beverly BellBelow, Haitian women workers tell of their experiences in sweatshops. These interviews, gathered over the past two years, are among many dozens ...
March 5th, 2013
A Tale of Two NGOs: In Haiti, Disaster Aid or Aid Disaster?
This review of Killing With Kindness was written by Other Worlds' founder and coordinator Beverly BellThree years after the deadly earthquake in Haiti, what has ...
December 11th, 2012
Interview with Larry Cohen, President of the Communications Workers of America
Interview by Beverly BellGiven the path we’ve been on in this country, the American dream is in tatters. Whether it’s a voice on the job ...
September 11th, 2012
Haitian activist tours U.S. demanding housing rights for the country’s 400,000 displaced
Housing activist Reyneld Sanon is beginning a tour to key cities in the United States. The tour will raise awareness about Under Tents, the ...
August 29th, 2012
The Creole Connection: New Orleans, Haiti, and Catastrophe
By Beverly BellAugust 28, 2012 As a native and resident of New Orleans who has spent three decades in and out of Haiti, and as ...
July 2nd, 2012
“Under Tents”: International Campaign Launch for Housing in Haiti
"The quantity of people who are homeless in Port-au-Prince today is not acceptable. We need the support of other governments, like the US, to demand ...
March 28th, 2012
By Alexis Erkert When police and the landowner commanded Michelène Pierre to vacate her tent on a Sunday afternoon so that they could light it ...
June 28th, 2011
By Beverly Bell, based on reporting from Haiti-based Haiti Grassroots Watch and AlterPresse HINCHE, Haiti, June 27 – Last week, thousands of farmers and supporters ...
May 5th, 2011
Haiti: Just When You Think It Can't Get Worse
We may soon look back on this period in Haiti with greater appreciation. Amidst the world-historic levels of death and suffering from last January’s earthquake, ...
September 16th, 2010
"Help Us Produce, Don't Give Us Food": Food Sovereignty in Haiti (Part IV)
Jonas Deronzil is a farmer from the village of Mogé in Haiti’s fertile Artibonite Valley, and one of about 2,000 members of a production and ...
October 21st, 2010
Haiti is a reminder of a lesson we in New Orleans got after Hurricane Katrina and the broken levees: the capacity of humanity to survive, ...
May 27th, 2011
Haitian Mayor's Office Vows to Destroy All Refugee Camps, Launches Violent Campaign
On May 23 and 25, police in the Delmas district of Port-au-Prince destroyed camps which sheltered people who were otherwise homeless since the earthquake. Police ...
March 5th, 2013
A Tale of Two NGOs: In Haiti, Disaster Aid or Aid Disaster?
This review of Killing With Kindness was written by Other Worlds' founder and coordinator Beverly BellThree years after the deadly earthquake in Haiti, what has ...
October 7th, 2010
Haitian Farmers: Growing Strength to Grow Food
Rony Charles, a rice grower and member of the Agricultural Producer Cooperative of Verrettes, said, “Instead of foreigners sending us food, they should give us ...
'The East'
Why have you started a comedy festival in northern Michigan in the middle of winter?
Because if you were here in the dead of winter in the middle of nowhere (which is actually somewhere to us), you'd need a few laughs too ... Continue Reading
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