Dominican Republic and Haiti: Country Studies

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Haiti: Government and Politics
not to attempt to extend his term in office by three years to
make up for the time lost in exile, but rather stood down and
transferred power peacefully to Rene Preval, he established a
positive precedent for his successors. In a country, however,
where a well-known proverb reminds all that "Laws are made of
paper, bayonets are made of steel," it was the dismantling of the
army, not the constitution by itself, that enabled such a prescribed
transition to occur. Unless this now-obsolete proverb
can find its way back into Haiti's political lexicon, the maintenance
and extension of the personal power of a president, if
now achieved, must take place by a combination of nonconsecutive
terms and a political proxy, and under the watchful eyes
of a parliament that may not be prone to making such a
maneuver easy.
The Presidency and Political Culture
Although hundreds of positions were open in the 1990 elections,
it was only one—the presidency—that seemed to matter.
In 1994 the restoration to power of one person, President Aristide,
overshadowed all other issues linked to Haiti's three-year,
post-coup crisis. Underscored by this attention to one office or
to one person was a deeply ingrained Haitian political reality:
the focus has always been on the presidency, the crown jewel
some might say the only jewel—in Haitian politics. For generations,
the aspiration of Haitian political leaders has been to
achieve the all-powerful position of the presidency. Haitian
writers have often described in pathological terms the obsession
of Haiti and its political leaders with the presidency. Prior
to becoming president, Francois Duvalier wrote about the historical
"mania for the presidency" as the disease of "presidentitis."
State and nation merged in the person of the president, an
often godlike figure with life-and-death power over the citizenry.
Presidents rarely represented a coalition of interest
groups; instead they usually headed a faction or political movement
that seized control of the state by any means possible,
with the support, or at least the tolerance, of the army.
These perceptions, and the reality of weakly developed political
institutions and separation of powers, have reflected the
disproportionate power of the country's chief executive and
the existence in Haiti of a political culture based on who would
be the president. Political parties or movements organized
around a charismatic or powerful leader who could ascend
directly to the position. Legislative bodies and elections, which
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