Internationally acclaimed Economic Historian, Social Justice and Minority Empowerment Activist, Professor Sir Hilary Beckles, has launched his latest publication. The new book, How Britain Underdeveloped the Caribbean: A Reparation Response to Europe’s Legacy of Plunder and Poverty, explores how successive governments have systematically suppressed economic development in their former colonies and have refused to accept responsibility for the debt and development support they owe the Caribbean.Published by The UWI Press, the book, is a continuation of the ground-breaking work Sir Hilary began in Britain’s Black Debt: Reparations for Caribbean Slavery and Native Genocide.Strategically timed, it is launched in celebration of the 50th anniversary of two of the Caribbean’s foremost works on economic history; Sir Walter Rodney’s ‘How Europe Underdeveloped Africa’ and George Beckford’s ‘Persistent Poverty: Underdevelopment in Plantation Economies of the Third World’. In addition, it fits within the context of the 60th year of Independence of Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago.
