NPR

Over a million people have participated in protests this month.  The Carnival in Port au Prince was cancelled.  Instability strains access to heath care and other basic services.  Haitians are tired of unchecked corruption when life remains a daily struggle for many.  Whether this government remains or is replaced, Haiti's future depends upon improving its institutions and improving accountability.  As Athena Kolbe and Robert Mugga points out, it is difficult to imagine this happening without increasing the participation of women in local, regional, and national politics.  It is women, after all, who are holding the country together.  A new way of governing also depends upon involving youth and other civic groups to hold their government accountable, partner with it whenever possible, and to organise when it is not.  The full article which appeared in NPR is linked and below. 

Haiti has long had a sanitation problem, being one of a very small number of countries where sanitation worsened over the last twenty five years.  Port au Prince, its largest city, has no central sewage system and is unlikely to ever have one.  There are other models for sewage management but implementing them without good governance, the rule of law, and a well-informed public is, as with anything else, challenging.  However, there are champions for improving sanitation both within and outside the Haitian government. The full NPR article by Rebecca Hersher follows. 

For me, Haiti will always conjure up sounds of rara music. Rara is Haitian street music, often celebrated during Catholic and Vodoun holidays, with a rhythm that is almost hypnotic.  Rara can be both celebration and resistance. NPR recently reviewed RAM - a Haitian band that has long combined elements of rock and rara.  Listen to the review here or read the transcript below. Better yet, go see them perform at the Hotel Oloffson in Port au Prince.