"Jamaicans are so ignorant and uneducated they will vote for anyone who gives them a handout. So our leaders and the entire political system are completely corrupt. Democracy can never work in a country like this."

“Does life get any better than this?” Australian fan at Queen’s Park Oval 2003.
“The fans love West Indies cricket. They love the West Indies way of life. They see on television how West Indians enjoy themselves and they will be coming to be part of it.” Chris Dehring, CEO Cricket World Cup 2007

Louise “Miss Lou” Bennett is undisputedly the most universally loved personality this nation has ever produced. For over 50 years as poet, broadcaster, actress, television personality and stage performer she tirelessly championed Jamaican folk customs. Yet Miss Lou was more than a brilliant entertainer, she is in all likelihood the greatest poet this country has produced. Certainly she is the only Jamaican poet whose works are continuously in print and she still outsells all the others put together.

Last week I came across an article entitled “Growth May Be Good for the Poor - But are IMF and World Bank Policies Good for Growth?”. The answer as usual is, it depends who you ask. However the following chart surprised me.

“Knowledge” said Francis Bacon “is power”. And the more knowledgeable an electorate the more powerful a democracy is in terms of carrying out the true will of the people. With this goal of empowering the electorate through information in mind, the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC) intends to organize both national and constituency debates in the forthcoming general elections.

A few years ago I had a contentious discussion with some NDMers about constitutional reform. I argued that political formats similar to Jamaica’s had worked very well in countries like Australia, Barbados and Canada, so it didn’t make sense to blame all our problems on a faulty governmental system. They however maintained that Westminster was an outdated colonial relic and only with a modern separation of powers model could Jamaica make the adjustments necessary to compete in the modern globalized economy. The future, they claimed, lay in places like Argentina.

Our next general election might be the closest since independence. And given the quirks of Westminster and our “garrison” constituency phenomenon, all sorts of scenarios are possible. Here for instance the most recent Stone and Anderson polls are extrapolated over the 1997 constituency results.

As a shopkeeper my job is to make readily available to customers whatever they want. Still, I never cease to be amazed at how many seemingly unnecessary things people not only desire but apparently can’t do without. But then I’m a man, and apart from pharmaceuticals probably 90% of the stuff in my stores is either bought by or for women. It’s incredible really how different male and female needs seem to be. Left to our own inclinations all most men really require is enough food, shelter from the rain, and occasional sex. Which is why bachelor homes usually resemble bear caves with furniture.

Every August we hear dewy-eyed imperialists nostalgically lamenting how much better off we were under the Union Jack. And the recent Stone poll showing that 53% of Jamaicans feel we would have been better off if we had remained a British colony was certainly food for thought. Yet suppose a referendum had been held in 1962 and a majority of Jamaicans had voted against independence. Would Britain have continued to support us as a colony?

“Liberal political and economic institutions depend on a healthy and dynamic civil society for their vitality” wrote Francis Fukuyama in his book “Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity”. If a society has a culture of trust and particularly if its members have the capacity to trust people outside their families, it generates “social capital” which is “critical to prosperity and to what has come to be called competitiveness”. In short, Mr. Fukuyama argues, countries where people trust each other tend to be richer than countries where they do not.