This chapter aims to analyse the roots and dynamics of the sexual politics and argues that such a counter-power is part of the strategy of resistance/survival, yet it also embodies empowerment. The material basis of male dominance and of the gender hierarchy generally resides in men’s control over women’s labour. This control is exercised by excluding women from access to essential productive resources and by restricting their sexuality. In Haiti, however, patriarchy as a specific form of the sex/gender system is very complex.

This article examines both the national context and the development of Haitian women’s organizations and struggles in the diaspora over the last forty years. It looks at their interconnectedness and their relations to structures of power at the level of the state and civil society. Three main sources of data inform the argument: secondary ethnographic and sociohistorical analyses, participant observation in Haiti and Haitian communities in North America, as well as informal group and individual interviews with Haitian women.

The emergence of the women's movement in the 1960, the adoption by the United Nation of the Decade for Women (1975-85) prompted the development of research on gender issues. Action research is a methodology that puts women at the center of the analysis. This paper identifies the emergence of action research in the Caribbean. It argues that in the case of Haiti gender and feminist action research has not fully developed. In fact, gender issues is still not a field of inquiry.

The twentieth century saw a wide range of struggles for women’s empowerment and equality in Haiti. In this excerpt, Carolle Charles focuses on the politicization and the consequent victimization of Haitian women under Duvalier. Exploring the phenomena of indiscriminate violence and repression as generative of political being, Charles unpacks the means by which the Duvalierist state ironically transformed women into more politicized, albeit more vulnerable, citizens.

Tous droits réservés. Republié avec l'autorisation du·de la détenteur·rice du droit, Linden Lewis.

This text reflects on the state of post-disaster Haiti and the current feminist movement through the voices of prominent feminist leaders, mainly that of Myriam Merlet, Charles and the discussion she had with Myriam Merlet in 2009 on the issue of Haitian women as both commodities and seller of these commodities (Machan ak Machandiz). Her focus on Merlet and their discussions of women unveils nuanced commentaries on their positionalities within Haitian culture looking at how colour, class, sexualiy and the urban/rural divide shape them.