Paradise Destroyed: Catastrophe and Citizenship in the French Caribbean by Christopher M. Church (review)

Church looks at the close correlation between natural and man-made disasters, as well as socioeconomic politics in France's oldest colonies of Martinique and Guadeloupe. Church demonstrates that, from 1870 to 1902, the Third Republic's responses to cataclysmic natural calamities, man-made catastrophes, and subsequent civil unrests led to the reshaping of its political and economic relationship with these islands that were already on the brink of economic disaster due to a failing sugar industry. The debate over France's relationship with these islands triggered another debate that put to the test the French nation's imperialist vision and self-image as a leading civilization and a fierce defender of the Jacobin ideals of liberty, equality, and fraternity. As documented by Church, each time disasters took place—such as the fires that destroyed Fort-de-France and Pointe-à-Pitre in 1890 or the eruption of Mont Pelé in 1902—they triggered fallouts that exposed France's double bind when it came to its Caribbean colonies. A consistent theme throughout the book is the metropole's inclusive and exclusive practices and attitude toward its Antillean citizens who, although granted the rights conferred by full citizenship (political participation, representation in the French Assembly, etc.), were still not treated as fairly as their metropolitan counterparts. These inclusive practices are best demonstrated in the discourses on shared citizenship or cultural affiliation that put forth the exceptional nature of the two islands and their populations—especially the pro-assimilation mulattoes who composed their middle class. As "Tropical Frenchmen," they were the epitome of a successful civilizing mission. It was therefore on the basis of compatriotism that the French government and society came to help these distant brothers during times of hardship. Such discourses were part of a bigger narrative that served to show the superiority of French civilization and ultimately changed the image of the French Antilles in the French collective imagination—from colonies of exploitation to colonies of settlement. Nevertheless, based on racial and cultural intermixing, this vision was not commonly shared. Church underscores how conservatives, from the colonial administration and from the plutocracy that ruled the islands—the white planters known as Békés—were quick to point out the subservient and predominantly economic nature of the relationship between the metropole and its colonies. Moreover, popular uprisings (such as the 1900 general strike in Martinique) and cataclysmic events further contributed, in the Hexagone, to the depiction of the islands as socially and environmentally dangerous, haunted by the specter of socialism, and populated by unruly black masses. More importantly, they exposed the deeply-rooted racism and social issues that plagued these Creole societies. The emphasis on disasters' economic calculus over human needs, the unequal distribution of governmental aids—in favor of the wealthier (and) white citizens—highlighted indeed the French government's own prejudice toward those who, even today in the wake of hurricane Irma, continue to identify as its second-class citizens.