Damming the Flood ─ Haiti and the Politics of Containment

Formerly the most lucrative European colony in the Caribbean, Haiti has long beenone of the most divided and impoverished countries in the world—a fact made clearby the disastrous effects of the earthquake in January 2010, which triggered anotherUS military operation. Damming the Flood analyzes the American and French role inthe violent overthrow of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004. The suppression ofthe remarkable popular mobilization known as Lavalas, or “the flood,” was perhaps themost successful act of imperial sabotage since the end of the Cold War. Updated with anew afterword that covers the international response to the earthquake, Damming theFlood is both an invaluable history of Haiti and a crucial account of America’s twenty-first-century imperialism.

Peter Hallward is Professor of Modern European Philosophy at Kingston University, London. He is the author of several books, including Out of This World: Deleuze and the Philosophy of Creation (2006), Badiou: A Subject of Truth (2003) and Absolutely Postcolonial (2001).