tag:theconversation.com,2011:/fr/topics/trinidad-and-tobago-32991/articlesTrinidad and Tobago – The Conversation2020-01-17T13:54:57Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1255472020-01-17T13:54:57Z2020-01-17T13:54:57ZThe first step in managing plastic waste is measuring it – here’s how we did it for one Caribbean country<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/308854/original/file-20200107-123399-1v4zqz7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3872%2C2562&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Plastic waste that started as packaging clogs tropical landfills. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/tropical-landfill-royalty-free-image/172785721?adppopup=true">apomares/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Countries around the world throw away millions of tons of plastic trash every year. Finding ways to manage plastic waste is daunting <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-more-developing-countries-reject-plastic-waste-exports-wealthy-nations-seek-solutions-at-home-117163">even for wealthy nations</a>, but for smaller and less-developed countries it can be overwhelming. </p>
<p>We recently carried out a study for the Caribbean island nation of Trinidad and Tobago that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2019.104436">applied economic principles</a> to its plastics management challenge. Some of what we did can be used anywhere. </p>
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<span class="caption">Trinidad and Tobago is a nation of two islands off the coast of Venezuela.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/td.html">CIA World Factbook</a></span>
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<p>Our backgrounds are in <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=CsMBTsMAAAAJ&hl=en">business management</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=A9RAOJEAAAAJ&hl=en">sustainability</a>. Although Trinidad and Tobago is a tiny country whose economy is based on beach tourism and the petroleum industry, and we had relatively little data on plastic production, use and disposal available, we see this as a useful case study. Trinidad and Tobago is not the only place where data is limited or expensive.</p>
<p>Because Trinidad and Tobago’s population is <a href="https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/td.html">just 1.2 million</a>, we were able to look at its complete economy. It belongs to <a href="https://caricom.org/about-caricom/who-we-are">Caricom, the Caribbean Community</a>, a regional organization that includes 16 million people, giving it access to larger markets. And it struggles with the same problems many large countries face: lack of landfill space. The disposal problem is urgent. </p>
<h2>Plastic arrives as packaging</h2>
<p>The first step to solving any problem is to measure it. This is often challenging for plastics, due to lack of data on <a href="https://theconversation.com/tons-of-plastic-trash-enter-the-great-lakes-every-year-where-does-it-go-100423">where they come from and end up</a>. A major part of our analysis was repurposing trade statistics to make up for limited data. </p>
<p>Material flow analysis helps quantify the flow of products and wastes. This process was developed in the late 1990s by <a href="https://www.pearson.com/us/higher-education/program/Graedel-Industrial-Ecology-and-Sustainable-Engineering/PGM121237.html">industrial ecologists</a> for waste management. They have applied it to track materials like metals and products like <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2012.07.008">computers</a> at national and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0040-1625(02)00201-9">international</a> scales.</p>
<p>The analysis combines different kinds of data. It tracks imported or newly manufactured products entering economies to their use and reuse, including recycling, export or disposal in landfills. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-7610-3_7">Academics and government agencies</a> conduct material flow analysis to inform environmental management. </p>
<p>The most surprising finding from our study was that most of the plastic entering the country’s landfills – a total of 49,000 tons per year – was not produced or imported. Rather, it entered the country as packaging around imported products. In other words, the largest amount of landfilled plastic “came along for the ride” with other things.</p>
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<h2>Recycle, burn or ban</h2>
<p>Much plastic waste ends up in landfills (or the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-03104-3">ocean</a>), but there are better solutions. One is recycling. </p>
<p>One promising finding from our study is that people in Trinidad and Tobago throw away 26,000 tons of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/polyethylene-terephthalate">PET plastic bottles</a> every year – enough to make building a domestic recycling facility economically efficient. There is also enough domestic demand for PET bottles to use the plastic that would come from a recycling facility to make more bottles.</p>
<p>A second solution is finding an alternative use for plastic waste. Plastic can be burned for energy, with proper scrubbing and cleaning, as is done in Sweden, where <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/21/climate/sweden-garbage-used-for-fuel.html">about half of all garbage is burned for energy</a>. </p>
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<span class="caption">One solution is banning certain plastics like single-use bags.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/disposable-plastic-bag-waste-recycling-environmental-1421745995">From www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
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<p>Some companies elsewhere, such as Lehigh Northeast Cement Co. in Glens Falls, New York, are starting to burn plastic as a <a href="https://poststar.com/news/local/lehigh-cement-gets-state-ok-to-burn-paper-and-plastic/article_a6b97aeb-3a4e-58c4-a789-6188b82e13ae.html">fuel in cement plants</a>. Cement production is energy intensive, and plastic can substitute for a large portion of the fossil fuels used. Trinidad and Tobago has a cement plant of sufficient size to burn around 29,000 tons of plastic waste. </p>
<p>Whether this option would work depends on whether there are other uses for the plastic and <a href="https://www.stalberttoday.ca/local-news/landfill-mulls-cement-solution-for-plastic-waste-1300974">how much plastic the cement plant there would take</a>. There are economic motivations to find out: Using waste plastic can increase profits at cement plants while reducing the amount of plastic going into landfills by roughly 30%. </p>
<p>A third solution is banning some plastic items. We determined that a ban on ubiquitous polystyrene shopping bags could reduce plastic waste in Trinidad and Tobago by 2,000 tons per year. Along with several other Caricom countries, Trinidad and Tobago has <a href="https://www.theyucatantimes.com/2019/12/caribbean-countries-that-will-ban-the-use-of-plastics-in-the-year-2020/">banned the use of these bags and other single-use plastics</a> starting Jan. 1, 2020. </p>
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<h2>Measuring the flow of plastic: A universal solution</h2>
<p>While these results are specific to Trinidad and Tobago, material flow analysis can be used in any country. This approach clarifies the real outcome of efforts to manage plastic. For example, it showed us that banning single-use plastic bags and plastic straws could be worthwhile, but should be part of a larger strategy that identifies and manages larger sources of waste plastic. </p>
<p>This kind of analysis does not have to be be expensive. Our study was based on publicly available data on imports and exports, manufacturing, and waste flows into landfills. Our results, although incomplete, were sufficient to spotlight workable solutions. </p>
<p>The main barriers to using material flow analysis are awareness and expertise. The method is not yet widely known, and relatively few people have been trained to do it. But in a globalized world, where huge quantities of goods and materials are constantly moving across borders, it is a valuable tool for tackling urgent waste management challenges.</p>
<p><em>Sherwyn Millette, a Ph.D. graduate from Rochester Institute of Technology and current sustainability consultant to Trinidad and Tobago’s College of Science, Technology and Applied Arts, was a coauthor of the study described in this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/125547/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Eric Williams receives funding from the U.S. National Science Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clyde Eiríkur Hull does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>To manage plastic wastes, nations first need to know what they have and where it’s coming from. A case study from Trinidad and Tobago shows how this approach can help identify solutions.Clyde Eiríkur Hull, Professor of Management, Rochester Institute of TechnologyEric Williams, Professor of Sustainability, Rochester Institute of TechnologyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1244492019-10-16T16:27:46Z2019-10-16T16:27:46ZWhy Canada should embrace a coalition-style ‘fellowship of parties’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/297370/original/file-20191016-98640-wpwcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C8%2C5960%2C2782&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-Francois Blanchet, Green Party Leader Elizabeth May and Jagmeet Singh of the NDP could all play roles if Canada opts for a coalition government.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham Hughes/Chris Wattie/Nathan Denette</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh broke a cardinal rule of Canadian politics recently when he dropped the “c” word — <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/trudeau-coalition-ndp-windsor-1.5320394">coalition</a>. Although coalitions are healthy, democratic and quite common around the world, Canada’s two biggest political parties use it as a blunt object to scare voters. </p>
<p>Canada has been governed by Liberals or Conservatives for its entire <a href="https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&dir=his&document=chap2&lang=e">152-year history</a>, and in all that time, neither party has seriously delivered changes to the electoral system that would reflect what voters ask for at the ballot box. </p>
<p>It’s difficult to let go of power, especially when you allow yourself to believe you’re revered. That’s the stuff of dictatorships, though, and it should have no role in a democracy. </p>
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<span class="caption">Trudeau and Singh chat following a recent leaders’ debate.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS</span></span>
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<p>The promise was clear in the <a href="https://www.macleans.ca/macleans-annotates-the-2015-speech-from-the-throne/">2015 Speech from the Throne</a> — first-past-the-post elections were toast and Canada’s antiquated electoral system would finally see the overhaul we so desperately need. First-past-the-post means that in every riding, the candidate who wins the most votes wins. The winner doesn’t need an absolute majority, or more than 50 per cent of the votes.</p>
<p>But the allure of <a href="https://theconversation.com/lessons-for-canada-in-new-zealands-indigenous-friendly-electoral-system-83768">total power</a> that first-past-the-post offers to political parties earning less than 40 per cent of the popular vote is apparently too seductive. So here we are again.</p>
<p>We’re stuck with first-past-the-post in Canada, but that doesn’t mean we have to return to the time-honoured tradition of using our vote as nothing more than a veto of the worst possible option. That’s how Justin Trudeau and Andrew Scheer want us to understand minority parliaments, because they both thirst for inflated majorities. </p>
<p>We can work creatively to bring about democratic renewal, but doing so requires a firm commitment from key opposition parties like the NDP, Greens and even the Bloc Québécois. </p>
<h2>Look to Trinidad & Tobago</h2>
<p>My proposal is simple — do what Trinidad and Tobago did in their 2010 election. Faced with a mighty incumbent party and a desire to change their first-past-the-post system into something that better translated votes into seats, opposition parties formed the <a href="https://jyoticommunication.blogspot.com/2010/05/column-test-begins-for-kamlas.html">People’s Partnership</a> in which each member maintained their party’s distinctiveness, but came together on several overlapping interests. </p>
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<span class="caption">Trinidad & Tobago Prime Minister-elect Kamla Persad-Bissessar waves to supporters at her party headquarters on the night of the general election in 2010 after her five-party coalition won the vote.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo)</span></span>
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<p>This was not a traditional coalition government. That’s because unlike coalition governments that are cobbled together when a single party fails to win a majority of seats, such an arrangement is carefully negotiated ahead of the election and delivered to citizens so they have a real choice ahead of the election. </p>
<p>Candidates would run in the election under their party’s banner — be it Green, NDP, BQ or as an Independent — with the clear understanding that they intend to work with fellow parties as promised ahead of the vote. </p>
<p>This would lead to far more seats for all these parties. And it puts voters in charge of essentially hiring a government for four years, rather than leaving them to the whim of partisan horse-trading that follows a minority election.</p>
<p>Even if we had a <a href="https://www.fairvote.ca/proportional-representation/">proportional representation</a> system, the best we could hope for is a small party acting as a king- or queen-maker. That lets the small party veto policy, but only if they are willing to fight an election.</p>
<p>This is better, sure, but we should be dispensing with royalty, not trying to exercise just a little more control over it.</p>
<p>You might be thinking: What makes this proposal different from just forming a new party? </p>
<h2>Party loyalty demanded</h2>
<p>A fellowship of parties maintains party distinctiveness, and establishes a temporary basis of unity until the goals are achieved. Forming a new party or switching our electoral model won’t remedy the <a href="https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/february-2019/proportional-representation-wont-fix-canadas-accountability-problem/">fundamental democratic failings of our system and its related political culture</a>, in particular how it demands party loyalty. </p>
<p>Jody Wilson-Raybould, former Liberal justice minister and attorney general, recently told <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-september-25-2019-1.5295787/jody-wilson-raybould-wants-a-minority-government-and-is-willing-to-work-with-whomever-is-in-power-1.5295789"><em>The Current</em></a> that the confines of party whips and political agenda are harming the ability of members of Parliament to do what is right, which shaped her decision to run as an Independent.</p>
<p>If the NDP, Greens, BQ and influential Independents like Wilson-Raybould and Jane Philpott formed a limited partnership — a one-term government collaborating on areas of overlapping interest — they could win the election or, at a minimum, offer a powerful and constructive perspective on critical issues facing the next Parliament. </p>
<p>Such a fellowship would negotiate who would represent the group, and by extension, an actual majority of voters. This person would be both the leader of their individual party and the leader of the one-term fellowship. </p>
<p>Ultimately, their priorities would be up to them to determine, but in my reading of the non-contentious points of agreement in Canada based on what parties have been talking about publicly, it would include:</p>
<p>1) Committing to be a one-term government, with no ambition of seeking re-election. This will protect whoever leads the fellowship from falling victim to the allure of power that contaminated Justin Trudeau and <a href="http://www.guardian.co.tt/news/msj-rejects-kamlas-unity-call-6.2.908614.a92abf41fc">former Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissesser</a>, who both got cold feet when it came time to deliver on electoral reform. It cost Persad-Bissesser her job, and Trinidad & Tobago their chance at democratic renewal. </p>
<p>The People’s Partnership in Trinidad accomplished lots in its tenure in office, but failed to overcome the hubris of majority power. They had no one-term commitment, and sought to preserve their own majority status in subsequent elections, which they lost. We must learn from that mistake in Canada — a one-term commitment solidifies a serious promise to Canadian voters. </p>
<p>2) Working toward democratic renewal, including lowering the voting age from 18 to 16. Much has been done by all parties on this in the last Parliament, and it should be resumed. <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/5962709/montreal-climate-strike-photographs/">Teenagers are more politically engaged</a> than ever, and if <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-oct-3-2019-1.5306425/thursday-october-3-2019-full-episode-transcript-1.5307937">16-year-olds</a> can drive, carry a gun in the Canadian Army Reserves and give sexual consent, they should be able to vote.</p>
<p>3) Addressing the <a href="https://thetyee.ca/News/2019/09/24/Takeaways-Canada-UN-Climate-Emergency-Meeting-New-York/">climate emergency</a> and its broad implications, including Indigenous sovereignty and provincial jurisdiction.</p>
<p>4) Expanding national <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/5882960/what-is-pharmacare-canada/">pharmacare</a> and <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/5951503/election-2019-toronto-child-care/">daycare</a></p>
<p>5) Marginally increasing taxes on the <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/5981369/canada-election-2019-tax-cuts-hikes/">wealthiest</a>. </p>
<p>6) Building nation-to-nation relationships with Indigenous Peoples across the country instead of reducing their concerns <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/unreserved/unreserved-heads-to-the-polls-1.5314954/we-seem-to-have-completely-fallen-off-the-radar-an-indigenous-take-on-the-2019-election-1.5315050">to pipelines</a>. This includes enshrining the principles <a href="https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/declaration-on-the-rights-of-indigenous-peoples.html">of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP)</a> into Canadian law.</p>
<p>It ain’t perfect, but it’s a concrete start.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ajay Parasram is affiliated with The MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance as well as the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, NS Office. </span></em></p>We’re stuck with first-past-the-post electoral system in Canada, but that doesn’t mean we have to use our vote as nothing more than a veto of the worst possible option.Ajay Parasram, Assistant Professor and Founding Fellow, MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance, Dalhousie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1016532018-08-28T10:38:19Z2018-08-28T10:38:19ZTeaching V.S. Naipaul in the Caribbean<p>Like everyone else in the world, people on the twin-island Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago learned on Aug. 11 that Trinidad-born Sir Vidia Naipaul – better known as V.S. Naipaul – had died. </p>
<p>While newspapers in the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/12/books/vs-naipaul-appraisal.html">U.S.</a> and <a href="https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1002344/VS-Naipaul-dead-nobel-prize-literature-author-dies-tributes-how-did-he-die">Britain</a> ran tributes to this titan of English-language literature, reactions in the Caribbean have been more <a href="http://www.indiawest.com/letters_to_editor/naipaul-s-multi-racial-school-friends-in-trinidad/article_e56f1b50-a7e4-11e8-9267-7f4383e1dd5e.html">complex</a>.</p>
<p>Naipaul is perhaps Trinidad’s most famous offspring. But many here consider the 85-year old writer a <a href="https://www.spectator.co.uk/2018/08/why-has-v-s-naipaul-rejected-the-trinidad-of-his-birth/">prodigal son</a>, because he often disavowed his origins. </p>
<p>After receiving the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2001, Naipaul <a href="https://www.caribbean-beat.com/issue-53/guerilla-vs-naipaul#axzz5OvfrEZfP">claimed</a> England as his “home” and India as the country of his ancestors. He neglected to mention his birthplace and the setting for so much of his work: Trinidad and Tobago.</p>
<p>But Naipaul remains a celebrated part of the Caribbean canon, one of just three Nobel Laureates from the region. In 2007 he even participated in many events at the University of the West Indies, the Caribbean’s premiere public university, when it celebrated what it called <a href="https://sta.uwi.edu/news/releases/release.asp?id=21828">The Year of Sir Vidia Naipaul</a>. </p>
<p>As a <a href="https://sta.uwi.edu/fhe/dlcc/VMaharaj.asp">lecturer in literature at the university’s St. Augustine campus</a>, it’s my job to help students appreciate his conflicted literary legacy. </p>
<h2>Naipaul the decolonizer</h2>
<p>Naipaul’s family, like nearly <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/17/nyregion/indian-twice-removed.html">half of Trinidad’s population</a>, had Indian roots. Though his early novels were often comedies set in the Caribbean, the author left home to study in England. His later works – bleak reflections on India, Africa and the Muslim world – reflected Naipaul’s global outlook. </p>
<p>Caribbean schoolchildren first meet Naipaul as teenagers. One of his books is usually included in the <a href="https://www.cxc.org/">public secondary school curriculum</a>, which is specifically designed to make education a part of the region’s decolonization. Currently it is “A House for Mr. Biswas.”</p>
<p>Fifty-six years after independence from the United Kingdom, the Caribbean is still sloughing off a legacy of colonial rule: the perception that Caribbean culture is less rich, relevant and important than other cultures. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233678/original/file-20180827-75981-bhxcxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Naipaul, a complex literary titan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Chris Ison/PA via AP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“Silence in our school curriculum on the subject of Caribbean writers raised additional doubts about the literary merit of such works as well as the moral standing of their authors,” wrote the literary critic <a href="http://scholarlyrepository.miami.edu/anthurium/vol5/iss2/5">Rhonda Cobham-Sander</a> in 2007. “[S]o we tended to talk about them, like the uncle who had fled to Venezuela … in the past tense, or the subjunctive.”</p>
<p>Today’s Caribbean curriculum, in contrast, teaches young people to embrace aspects of the local culture once considered embarrassing. </p>
<p>Naipaul, who was born under British colonial rule but came of age writing about the region’s drive for sovereignty, is seen as part of this post-colonial project. </p>
<p>The namesake of Naipaul’s picaresque <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/feb/12/teju-cole-vs-naipaul-a-house-for-mr-biswas-trinidad-novel">“A House for Mr. Biswas,”</a> for example, is bent on escape from living with his in-laws, the Tulsis. Even as his lot in life improves with residence in each of the Tulsis’ new homes, Biswas is never satisfied.</p>
<p>As Naipaul’s prologue makes clear, his protagonist is like the Caribbean in that way: He pursues sovereignty and personal freedom at the price of security. </p>
<h2>Naipaul in the university</h2>
<p>Over the course of their three-year undergraduate education, literature students at the University of the West Indies-St. Augustine may read Naipaul up to six times. Each course puts Naipaul to a different use as it aims to provide students with a different set of skills and competencies.</p>
<p>“A House for Mr. Biswas” again often appears on their first-year “Introduction to Prose Fiction” syllabus. </p>
<p>The short stories from <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49741.Miguel_Street?from_search=true">“Miguel Street”</a> may be included in their “West Indian narratives” coursework, and Naipaul’s <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Way-World-V-S-Naipaul/dp/0679761667">“A Way in the World”</a> is generally a key text for teaching postmodern literary theory. Advanced literature students may read <a href="https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/v-s-naipaul/the-indian-trilogy">Naipaul’s Indian trilogy</a> in a third-year class called “Indian Diaspora Literature.” </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/233679/original/file-20180827-75978-1hvbxd0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">For Caribbean readers, Naipaul’s characters — and the humor he derives from them — are immediately recognizable.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/91/MiguelStreet.jpg/220px-MiguelStreet.jpg">Wikipedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In my experience, students – especially those from Trinidad and Tobago, who form the majority of St. Augustine’s student body – generally connect immediately and powerfully with Naipaul’s work.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49741.Miguel_Street?from_search=true">“Miguel Street</a>,” for example, often evokes raucous laughter because its characters and events are so instantly recognizable to Caribbean readers. </p>
<p>In recounting her early readings of the book, <a href="https://www.amherst.edu/people/facstaff/ccobhamsande">Cobham-Sander</a>, recalls “laughing till I cried at Man Man … and screaming with delight at the idea of his dog leaving symmetrical piles of droppings on the stools in the Café at the corner of Alberto Street where we regularly stopped for sweet drinks.”</p>
<p>Cobham-Sander was also certain that Naipaul’s protagonist Man Man was modeled on a real person – an eccentric neighbor of hers – demonstrating the author’s talent for capturing local daily life. </p>
<h2>Naipaul the pop culture creator</h2>
<p>As <a href="https://scholarlyrepository.miami.edu/anthurium/vol3/iss2/?utm_source=scholarlyrepository.miami.edu%2Fanthurium%2Fvol3%2Fiss2%2F10&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages">many scholars</a> have asserted, Naipaul’s writing style shares a great deal in common with that most Trinidadian of persons, the calypsonian. </p>
<p>“It is only in the calypso that the Trinidadian touches reality,” Naipaul writes in his long travel essay, <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/trauma-and-literature/middle-passage-and-racebased-trauma/87BC19724E6D42FA63309FF8065DF5B8">“The Middle Passage</a>.” “The calypso deals with local incidents, local attitudes, and it does so in a local language. The pure calypso, the best calypso, is incomprehensible to the outsider.” </p>
<p>But, like the traditional “calypsonian,” whose aggressive <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40653156?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">lyrics often offend</a>, Naipaul’s work can raise a reader’s hackles.</p>
<p>This is particularly true of the author’s many nonfictional texts. </p>
<p>In last semester’s advanced seminar in West Indian Literature, I taught “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Middle-Passage-Caribbean-Revisited/dp/0375708340">The Middle Passage</a>” – Naipaul’s 1962 attempt to unveil the long-lasting aftereffects of slavery on the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iku9TS-3rk4">the Caribbean</a>. </p>
<p>It is Naipaul’s very first travelogue, when he cut his teeth on the form, and it was a government commission. Trinidad’s first-ever prime minister, Eric Eustace Williams, asked the young writer to explore the post-colonial Caribbean and write a critique that would lay a basis for nation-building. </p>
<p>Instead, the <a href="https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=2148&context=clcweb">devastating tome</a> may well have severed his relationship with the region – and with generations of Caribbean readers to come. </p>
<h2>Naipaul’s critics</h2>
<p>Among other <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/books/review/Shaftel-t.html">controversial</a> takes on Caribbean history, “The Middle Passage” includes such indictments as “History is built around achievement and creation; and nothing was created in the West Indies” – this in newly independent region in the midst of rewriting its history. </p>
<p>For my students, the book’s reputation as a national betrayal was a real obstacle. Most told me they disliked the text. Some said it was offensive to West Indians. </p>
<p>And that was before they had even read it.</p>
<p>These same students had enthusiastically engaged with similarly difficult questions of slavery, race and Caribbean history in the work of cultural theorist Stuart Hall. His BBC video series “<a href="http://bufvc.ac.uk/dvdfind/index.php/title/18006">Redemption Song</a>” asserts that whites and blacks lived together on plantations in “a mixture of cruelty and intimacy.”</p>
<p>But, with Naipaul, the students were less amenable to such ideas.</p>
<h2>Reconciling Naipaul</h2>
<p>The criticism that <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/02/a-terrifying-honesty/302426/">followed that book</a> is one of the greatest difficulties professors face in teaching Naipaul. </p>
<p>How can we help students see Naipaul’s value as a post-colonial prophet when he so famously spurned the region during its quest to forge an indigenous identity? </p>
<p>How do students reconcile the Caribbean decolonizer they first meet in high school with the Caribbean skeptic they’ll debate as more mature readers? </p>
<p>Naipaul wrote for 60 years. He was <a href="https://literature.britishcouncil.org/writer/v-s-naipaul">knighted</a>. He authored novels, essays and travelogues. He won <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/dec/21/lookingbackatthebookervs">every literary prize imaginable</a>. </p>
<p>He was pandit, calypsonian and knight – a provocateur of different cultural persuasions and a defender of what he believed to be right – sometimes simultaneously, often contradictorily.</p>
<p>To paraphrase the author himself, Naipaul was <a href="https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/editorial/a-complicated-man/article24672195.ece">a complicated man</a> bearing all the complicated strands of his own complicated pasts. </p>
<p>In the Caribbean, accepting this V.S. Naipaul is a task indeed, for teacher and student alike.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/101653/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>J. Vijay Maharaj is affiliated with Friends of Mr Biswas, an NGO formed to provide support for young and/or upcoming writers and readers and to maintain the Naipaul house in Trinidad for this purpose, among others. </span></em></p>Author V.S. Naipaul, who died on Aug. 11, both scorned and mirrored his Caribbean origins. At the University of the West Indies, students must reconcile this conflicted titan’s literary legacy.J. Vijay Maharaj, Lecturer, The University of the West Indies: St. Augustine CampusLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/738972017-03-16T07:32:32Z2017-03-16T07:32:32ZIn Trinidad and Tobago, Carnival goes feminist (bikinis and feathers included)<p>Trinidad and Tobago’s Carnival, which recently ended its 2017 rendition, is an event as contradictory as it is extraordinary. </p>
<p>No mere mimicry of other such celebrations in Rio de Janeiro or New Orleans, Carnival on this Caribbean island of 1.4 million people – primarily descended from <a href="http://www.trinicenter.com/kwame/2002/Nov/252002.htm">enslaved Africans and Indian indentured labourers</a> – combines African traditions with European pre-Lent festivities and Indian musical rhythms. </p>
<p>Given this <a href="https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-1-4614-6086-2_679">syncretism</a>, it’s perhaps unsurprising that, over the past 200 years, Carnival has been not just two days of normal order turned upside down but also an annual expression of female political resistance. </p>
<h2>Beads and glitter and ‘bikini mas’</h2>
<p>Caribbean women’s takeover of Carnival is most evident during “bikini mas”. Each year, tens of thousands of women participate in this Carnival mas(querade), “playing mas” in Rio-style sequined bikinis, feathered headpieces and beads. </p>
<p>Because playing bikini mas has come to replace traditional costumes portraying other periods, places and cultures (as well as some fantastical imagined characters), <a href="http://2017.blisscarnival.com/ny-times-carnivals-louder-commercial-beat-adds-dissonance/">some fear</a> that Trinidad and Tobago’s historic tradition is dying. New, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.tt/carnival/2012-02-13/changing-face-carnival">imported masquerade styles</a>, say traditional mas makers, do not make political statements or show off local artistry.</p>
<p>But bikini mas is a complex phenomenon. Its <a href="http://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/full/10.1108/S1529-212620160000021011">rise is directly linked</a> to women’s increasing earnings and economic independence; disposable income and the desire for well-earned fun support the demand for such costumes. It also reflects black and brown women’s wish to be affirmed as <a href="https://books.google.tt/books?hl=en&lr=&id=dGSnsW6rA6EC&oi=fnd&pg=PA25&dq=pamela+franco+carnival&ots=cHwBWyEnyg&sig=juWro71HAdrjOaCGSRgZGZaQw_M&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=pamela%20franco%20carnival&f=false">beautiful and sexy</a>, not only seen as successful and serious students and workers. </p>
<p>As feminist scholar and mas player Dr Sue Ann Barratt told me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>A big part of it for some women is … to show they have been working out and qualify as gorgeous, for affirmation as a woman and to send a message that you can be watched, but not touched.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In short, bikini mas authorises women to push back against the strict moral controls that religion and society place on them (while allowing men more sexual freedom). </p>
<p>Take, for example, these lyrics from Soca music star Destra Garcia’s 2016 hit, Lucy: “I grew up as ah real good girl, always home, don’t go nowhere. As soon as I was introduced to Carnival, they say I loose”. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, singer Orlando Octave observed in one 2017 tune, “Plenty girl have [a] man and [yet] acting like they single, wining like she single, feting like she single”. </p>
<p>This contradiction – which Trinidadian women live every day – has helped spur bikini mas to become a ritual for an entire <a href="http://wlrn.org/post/carnival-made-china-trinidads-annual-festival-faces-generational-divide">generation of young women</a>: a women’s movement given cultural expression. </p>
<h2>The original anti-slut shaming</h2>
<p>These revellers are continuing the nation’s long-standing tradition of female self-affirmation, resistance to subordination, and renegotiation of the rules governing public space. </p>
<p>Caribbean women have always been at the forefront of rebellions, from rising up against slavery in the <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01440398408574875?journalCode=fsla20">1500s</a> to leading the <a href="http://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/36917286/Water__Women_and_Community.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAIWOWYYGZ2Y53UL3A&Expires=1489587018&Signature=KqDI69VPeYcUbYpPjHYByTy%2FSVw%3D&response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DWater_women_and_community_in_Trinidad_We.pdf">1903 riots</a> over access to water. </p>
<p>Well before slavery was abolished in 1838, Trinidadian women played in Carnival bands. Sometimes they covered themselves in mud, expressing a sexuality even then decried as indecent. Alongside them would march women who fought in stickfights (public duelling competitions), a stereotypically “masculine” activity. </p>
<p>By the 1800s, such women had come to be known as “<a href="http://caribbean-beat.com/issue-77/wining-words#axzz4awn4APtH">Jamettes</a>”, from the French <em>diametre</em>, which referred to those considered to exist below the line of respectability. </p>
<p>After abolition these working-class, African-descended women continued the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7p0fRafo0Q">Jamette</a> tradition. They often cooked, washed clothes and socialised in shared urban backyards, and worked in a wide range of trades, from washerwomen or market vendors to sex workers.</p>
<p>With its fearless and unapologetic combination of sexual, reproductive and economic issues with insistence on justice, equality and freedom from violence, Jamette politics has come to influence Trinidad and Tobago’s modern Carnival – and Caribbean feminism – in ways that <a href="https://sta.uwi.edu/crgs/december2012/journals/Editorial.pdf">cross class, colour, religion and race</a>. </p>
<p>Predating by decades the “<a href="http://amberroseslutwalk.com/">slut walks</a>” of Canada and the United States, bikini mas has helped cultivate contemporary women’s opposition to rape culture in Trinidad and Tobago, where male domination and sexual harassment of women is seen as natural and normal. Indeed, the <a href="https://redforgender.wordpress.com/2016/11/27/lifeinleggings-call-for-feminist-solidarity/">Caribbean region</a> has <a href="http://www.stabroeknews.com/2012/news/stories/02/28/sexual-violence-rates-in-the-caribbean-highest-in-the-world-report/">disproportionately high rates of sexual violence</a>. </p>
<p>Last year, a Japanese steelpan player, Asami Nagakiya, was murdered during Carnival in Port of Spain. After the city’s mayor suggested that that women’s dress and behaviour at this annual event invited abuse, <a href="https://globalvoices.org/2016/02/15/citizens-protest-against-trinidad-mayors-vulgar-victim-blaming-statements/">feminist groups</a> called for his <a href="https://grrlscene.wordpress.com/?s=carnival&submit=Search">resignation</a> and young women came out in their bikini mas costumes to protest the victim-blaming. </p>
<p>Over the next months, <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/notaskingforit?lang=en">#NotAskingForIt</a> campaign, featuring female students, workers, family members and bikini mas players, circulated social media across the entire Caribbean region. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rKXE6GfvrIo?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">‘Just because I look glamorous in a tight dress’ doesn’t mean I’m ‘asking for it’.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Classist and sexist or empowering?</h2>
<p>Bikini mas is not without its contradictions. The cost of participation in a “band” of mas costume players can be up to US$1,000 per person. Though all classes of women find the money to pay for an outfit, economics shapes access to these moments of female freedom. </p>
<p><a href="http://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4955&context=etd">Classism features</a>, too, in the way that many women who play in bikini mas bands are contained on either side by ropes and security personnel. This reproduces historical ways that white upper classes used to cut themselves off from others while taking over the streets. </p>
<p>But such cordoning also signals a harsh modern reality of violence against women: the ropes are meant to protect women of all classes and races from sexual harassment. Still, this policing of women’s bodies complicates the radical potential of bikini mas. </p>
<p>Young feminist are finding ways to connect Trinidad’s centuries-old Carnival to a new generation of political resistance. This year, the prominent <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/leave-me-alone-trinidads-women-find-a-rallying-cry-for-this-years-carnival/2017/02/26/3888f116-f9e6-11e6-aa1e-5f735ee31334_story.html?utm_term=.c14d73564033">“Leave me alone, Leave she alone” campaign</a> teamed up with singer Calypso Rose to embolden women against sexual violence and encourage men to help create a Carnival – and by extension society – in which women are safe and free. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"839799446170927104"}"></div></p>
<p>In Trinidad and Tobago, Carnival is where thousands of women express their aspirations for freedom and equality. Look beneath stock images of pretty glitter and beads, and you’ll find just such feminist ideals.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73897/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gabrielle Hosein receives funding from the International Development Research Council (2010-2014) and the European Union (present).</span></em></p>Some deride a Carnival trend in which women revel in the streets wearing swimsuits and feather boas. But to feminists, ‘bikini mas’ is a highly political act.Gabrielle Hosein, Lecturer and Head of Gender Studies Department, The University of the West Indies: St. Augustine CampusLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/681112016-11-07T20:13:49Z2016-11-07T20:13:49ZBeyond the ICC crisis: is there an alternative path for Africa?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/144807/original/image-20161107-4704-kgzh33.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Former Chadian leader Hissene Habre being escorted in to stand trial at the Palais de Justice in Dakar, Senegal in 2015. He was found guilty and sentenced to life in prison in 2016 by judges of the Extraordinary African Chambers for crimes against humanity, rape, sexual slavery. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Stringer</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Much has been said about <a href="https://theconversation.com/withdrawal-from-the-icc-a-sad-day-for-south-africa-and-africa-67489">South Africa’s withdrawal</a> from the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the risks of a “domino effect” or “mass exodus”. At least two other African countries – <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-burundi-icc-idUSKCN12Q287">Burundi</a> and <a href="http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2016-10-26-gambia-the-icc-and-the-african-domino-effect/#.WBs_CNy3eC4">The Gambia</a> – have also announced their withdrawals.</p>
<p>Experts have shed light on the complex <a href="http://www.ejiltalk.org/international-and-domestic-implications-of-south-africas-withdrawal-from-the-icc/">legal implications</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/south-africas-reasons-for-leaving-the-icc-dont-quite-add-up-67481">political motives</a> and consequences on the ICC’s <a href="https://www.issafrica.org/iss-today/think-again-where-does-the-icc-go-from-here">future</a>. </p>
<p>One problematic aspect of this debate is that it is highly emotional as the tone of many comments shows. There is widespread fear this might be the beginning of the end of the ICC and by extension the end of international criminal justice in Africa. </p>
<p>But a broader legal perspective is needed.</p>
<p>First, a little-known fact. Courts dealing with other aspects of international law have faced and handled temporary and permanent withdrawals. The <a href="http://www.icj-cij.org/homepage/index.php?lang=en">International Court of Justice</a>, which solves disputes between states, was little affected by the United States withdrawing to escape responsibility in a <a href="http://www.cfr.org/courts-and-tribunals/united-states-icj/p26905">specific case</a> against Nicaragua in the 1980s. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.corteidh.or.cr/index.php/en">Inter-American Court of Human Rights</a> continues to produce pioneer case-law. This is despite the fact that it has experienced withdrawals from two states frustrated by the court’s decisions against them – <a href="http://www2.amnesty.se/uaonnet.nsf/dfab8d7f58eec102c1257011006466e1/d961c1610dc0b483c125677c003512dc?OpenDocument">Trinidad and Tobago</a> and <a href="http://www.ijrcenter.org/2012/09/19/venezuela-denounces-american-convention-on-human-rights-as-iachr-faces-reform/">Venezuela</a> – numerous threats of withdrawals, and constant political difficulties. </p>
<p>To a certain extent comparisons with the ICC’s current challenges could be made.</p>
<h2>The role of the ICC in context</h2>
<p>It is important to recall that it is a court of <a href="http://guardian.ng/opinion/international-criminal-court-of-last-resort/">last resort</a>. It is the tip of the iceberg of international criminal justice that relies firstly on national jurisdictions. </p>
<p>States themselves have the priority to prosecute and judge individuals for the most serious crimes – especially war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. The ICC’s role is therefore only <a href="https://www.ictj.org/complementarity-icc/">“complementary”</a>. Basically it intervenes only if national courts are unable or unwilling to do so.</p>
<p>In addition, at an intermediate level between national courts and the ICC, there are also the less known hybrid courts combining national and international features to address specific situations.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=676&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=676&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/144598/original/image-20161104-27914-1n3fb9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=676&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Former Liberian President Charles Taylor, left, on trial at the Special Court for Sierra Leone in The Hague.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Koen van Wee</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>For example the <a href="https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en">Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia</a> focuses on atrocities committed by the leaders of the <a href="http://www.genocidewatch.org/images/Why_the_Khmer_Rouge_Murdered_Two_Million_People_by_Gregory_Stanton.pdf">Khmer Rouge</a>. And the <a href="http://www.rscsl.org/">Special Court for Sierra Leonne</a> sentenced Charles Taylor, former president of Liberia, for various counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. </p>
<p>Another example is the current project of the <a href="https://justiceinconflict.org/2015/05/14/why-central-african-republics-hybrid-tribunal-could-be-a-game-changer/">Special Criminal Court</a> for the Central African Republic. The plan is to divide cases collaboratively between local courts, the hybrid court and the ICC. They all have a part to play as intertwined layers of international criminal justice. The more the merrier to fight impunity.</p>
<p>In this context, the ICC crisis is still deeply problematic as it is the symbolic compass of the fight against impunity. But this does not have to be the twilight of international criminal justice in Africa. To draw a full picture, the current debate must consider the potential for strengthening regional alternatives in addition to national responses.</p>
<h2>What are the African alternatives?</h2>
<p>National responses can be improved by adopting appropriate laws where needed or creating specialised prosecution units. The financial and political challenges are always underlying issues, but there have been recent achievements at the national level.</p>
<p>For instance, South African courts proved very responsive in the <a href="http://opiniojuris.org/2014/10/30/huge-win-zimbabwe-torture-docket-case/">“Zimbabwe Torture Docket” case</a>. Even if the crimes were committed beyond the national territory and without the involvement of nationals, their seriousness justified the South African courts exercising a form of <a href="http://www.ejiltalk.org/universal-jurisdiction-in-south-africa/">universal jurisdiction</a>, which is a powerful tool for states willing to engage in the fight against impunity.</p>
<p>Hybrid courts can also be successfully developed in Africa. These courts have traditionally been backed up by the United Nations around the world. But there is currently a unique experiment happening in Africa: the <a href="http://www.chambresafricaines.org/">Extraordinary African Chambers</a>. </p>
<p>This is the first example in the world of a hybrid court being supported by a regional organisation instead of the United Nations. The African Union is playing a pioneer role, proving that it can efficiently get involved in setting up such a court. Overcoming numerous <a href="https://www.ijmonitor.org/2015/12/a-long-walk-to-justice-the-trial-of-hissene-habre/">challenges</a> the court was set up in Senegal in 2012 to judge Hissène Habré, former president of Chad, for international crimes.</p>
<p>Observers have concluded that the court has proved its capacity to ensure a trial respecting <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/30/hissene-habre-trial-provides-model-for-international-justice">international standards of justice</a>. <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/hissene-habre-victims-justice_us_5751acb1e4b0ed593f142f77?jzv8gibp3apz4zpvi">Victims</a> have also praised this long-awaited court finally offering a response to the crimes they suffered. In May 2016 the Court sentenced Hissène Habré to life in prison and the case is now at the appeal stage.</p>
<p>The creation of an African Criminal Court could also be seriously envisioned. This is the project of the 2014 Malabo <a href="http://www.au.int/en/treaties/protocol-amendments-protocol-statute-african-court-justice-and-human-rights">Protocol</a>. Since 2008 there has been a <a href="http://www.au.int/en/treaties/protocol-statute-african-court-justice-and-human-rights">plan to transform</a> the <a href="http://en.african-court.org/">African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights</a>, which has <a href="http://www.au.int/en/sites/default/files/treaties/7778-sl-protocol_to_the_african_charter_on_human_and_peoplesrights_on_the_establishment_of_an_african_court_on_human_and_peoples_rights_17.pdf">30 Member States</a>, into the African Court of Justice and Human Rights. </p>
<p>The Malabo Protocol would extend the jurisdiction of this yet to be established court in order to include international crimes. It would be the first unified international court competent to judge general matters, violations of human rights (state responsibility) and international crimes (individual responsibility).</p>
<p>This protocol presents various legal weaknesses, the main one being the granting of <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/11/13/statement-regarding-immunity-sitting-officials-expanded-african-court-justice-and">immunity</a> to sitting heads of state and senior state officials. </p>
<p>In practice this project also faces the common financial and political challenges of other international courts. So far the protocol has <a href="http://www.au.int/en/sites/default/files/treaties/7804-sl-protocol_on_amendments_to_the_protocol_on_the_statute_of_the_african_court_of_justice_and_human_rights_19.pdf">not been ratified</a>. It is still unclear if the ICC withdrawals will translate into a revival of this alternative project. </p>
<h2>Looking to the future</h2>
<p>Finally, let’s not forget the <a href="http://www.ejiltalk.org/take-the-long-view-of-international-justice/#more-14700">long-term</a> perspective. International criminal justice is a very recent field. It originated in the aftermath of the <a href="http://www.globalization101.org/courts-and-justice-in-international-law-the-post-world-war-ii-military-tribunals/">Second World War</a> and came to the fore in the 1990s when the UN set up tribunals for the <a href="http://www.icty.org/">former Yugoslavia</a> and <a href="http://unictr.unmict.org/">Rwanda</a>. </p>
<p>The ICC itself is not even <a href="https://www.icc-cpi.int/about">15 years old</a>. It is too early to know if the current crisis will be remembered as an earthquake, a critical turn or a hiccup in the history of the field. </p>
<p>It is unsure how many of the current <a href="https://asp.icc-cpi.int/en_menus/asp/states%20parties/pages/the%20states%20parties%20to%20the%20rome%20statute.aspx">34 African States Parties</a> of the ICC will actually withdraw as they hold very <a href="http://www.africa-confidential.com/article/id/11818/More_talk_talk_than_walk_walk">different views</a>. Even the formal notices of withdrawal might be <a href="http://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2016-10-24-op-ed-there-is-another-way-out-of-south-africas-icc-dilemma/#.WBs_rdy3eC4">reconsidered</a> or later reversed if this crisis becomes an opportunity for opposing African states to get their concerns addressed from inside the <a href="https://asp.icc-cpi.int/en_menus/asp/assembly/Pages/assembly.aspx">Assembly of States Parties</a> to the Rome Statute.</p>
<p>Otherwise, from a legal perspective, it is preferable that discontented states use their legal option to withdraw instead of staying while violating their obligations to cooperate. And not all international obligations would vanish as all are members of the United Nations. Even states that are not party to the ICC have certain obligations to cooperate, especially in situations referred to the Court by the <a href="https://theconversation.com/leaving-the-icc-wont-absolve-south-africa-of-its-legal-obligations-50558">UN Security Council </a>. </p>
<p>The African Union has been vocal against the ICC. At the moment 54 of the continent’s <a href="https://africacheck.org/reports/how-many-countries-in-africa-how-hard-can-the-question-be/">55 states</a> are part of the AU. It will soon be 55 when Morocco <a href="http://www.au.int/en/pressreleases/31421/morocco-officially-requests-join-african-union">rejoins</a> after a 32-year absence. Now the AU has to prove it could lead a credible African alternative. There are legal options to explore if there is a genuine political will to do so. </p>
<p>In any scenario, African leaders carry the responsibility to define the future of international criminal justice in Africa. African <a href="https://juta.co.za/products/civil-society-and-international-criminal-justice-in-africa-challenges-and-opportunities">civil society</a> also has a major role to play in taking ownership of this debate and keeping its leaders accountable.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/68111/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amanda Cabrejo le Roux does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There are fears that the withdrawal of countries from the ICC would mark the end of international criminal justice in Africa. This need not be the case.Amanda Cabrejo le Roux, PhD Candidate in Law, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-SorbonneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.