The Eastern Caribbean Subculture of Governance
| Author | Terri-Ann Gilbert-Roberts |
| Profession | Research Fellow of the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies (SALISES) University of the West Indies Mona |
| Pages | 196-225 |
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The Eastern Caribbean
Subculture of Governance
The conception of sovereignty, which became entrenched in the
post-1962 independence era, has constrained the evolution of an
appropriate regional governance framework. Notwithstanding, the
evolution of relatively more progressive regional institutions in the
Eastern Commonwealth Caribbean suggests that the prevailing
tradition of sovereignty need not have precluded the development of
supranational modes of governance in the wider region. It is in that
context that the features of a subculture of regional governance which
evolved between 1962 and 2009, both parallel to and within the broader
CARICOM framework of national sovereignty are now explored. The
emergence of the institutional foundations of the subculture – vis-à-vis
the West Indian Associated States (WISA) framework and the Eastern
Caribbean Common Market (ECCM) is reviewed. The consolidation of
those institutions in 1981 into a centralised Organisation of Eastern
Caribbean States (OECS) designed to strengthen the position of the
sub-region within CARICOM is then examined. Thirdly, this chapter
legislative executive capacity in an OECS Economic Union and in a
Trinidad and Tobago-East Caribbean Integration Initiative. Finally,
the chapter concludes with a brief discussion of the relevance of the
Eastern Caribbean experience to the process of rethinking and perhaps
restructuring CARICOM governance.
The Subregional Foundations of CARICOM
Governance
in the context of a Demasian paradox of sovereignty, has been most
evident in the seven less developed countries (LDCs) of CARICOM:
The Eastern Caribbean Subculture of Governance 197
Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Lucia, St Kitts and Nevis,
St Vincent and the Grenadines and Montserrat.1
limitations of human and natural development resources inherent in
small size, these countries shared a long history of federal administration
among the Windward Islands (1833–42) and among the Leeward Islands
(1674–1798 and 1871–1958) that preceded the establishment of the West
Indies Federation (WIF).2
context of Eastern Caribbean political advocacy towards the creation of
the WIF and the attempts to reinstate federal governance in the subregion,
immediately following the collapse of the WIF in 1962. Arthur Lewis’s
account of the negotiations for a ‘Federation of Eight’, including Barbados,
government administration.3 Lewis argued that the risk of corruption
and abuse of power in such small territories in which citizens held close
island independence a realistic goal. The fact that four of the governments
that observation.4 The interdependent federal framework was, therefore,
expected to promote political accountability as well as economies of scale
for development.
Barbados’ involvement in the negotiations was rather curious given its
eligibility for independent statehood based on a relatively better economic
argued that Barbados’ participation had been secured primarily through
the strength of the friendship between newly-elected Premier Errol Barrow
and Antiguan Premier Vere Bird – a friendship which had also facilitated
the emergence of the Dickenson Bay Agreement in 1965 – it is perhaps
WIF negotiations, retained an ideological commitment to West Indian
Nationalism and an idealistic view of leading Barbados into an alternative
states included a level of dependence on more developed countries,
Barbados’ involvement was expected to accord the Federation greater
economic viability and political legitimacy.
Ultimately, however, despite the enthusiasm of all the parties and the
Eastern Caribbean predisposition to regional governance, the negotiations
for a ‘Federation of Eight’ stalled under circumstances similar to the WIF
experience, given a certain commonality of political culture across the
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