Economic Strategy and Growth in Barbados: From Colonial Times to the Year 2000

• Author: Courtney Blackman
• Pages: 373-384

ECONOMIC STRATEGY AND GROWTH IN BARBADOS

373

Pre-colonial experience

This paper reviews critically the economic strategies pursued

by successive Barbadian administrations and their outcomes, dating

back to colonial times. Until 1937, the year of the riots, the goal

of the Colonial Office was the promotion of conditions conducive

to the orderly cultivation of sugar cane. This entailed upkeep of a

minimal infrastructure, such as a safe water supply, passable roads,

public health, fairly widespread access to primary, but limited

access to secondary, education. Above all, there was a determined

maintenance of law and order.

The issue of economic development did not arise. The colonies

were seen as sources of raw material, exclusive markets for UK

exports, and lucrative job opportunities for colonial civil servants

and adventurous young Englishmen. At any rate, the prevailing

economic theory of ‘laissez-faire’ did not condone government

intervention into the market; it was assumed that if profitable

investment opportunities arose, entrepreneurs were sure to

recognize and exploit them.

In response to the abominable colonial conditions that caused

riots throughout the West Indies in the late 1930s, and no doubt

as a public relations measure to promote support of the war effort,

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ECONOMIC STRATEGY AND

GROWTH IN BARBADOS

FROM C OLONIAL T IMES TO THE YEAR 2000