Carib-being or Carib-been?

From the CTCT Secretariat

On April 21, the Conference on Theology in the Caribbean Today (CTCT) held its virtual forum entitled ‘Carib-being or Carib-been? Is there still hope for regional identity today?’

The topic was motivated by the current escalating geopolitical tensions regionally and internationally which have been calling into question the idea of a present-day regional identity.

Featured speakers were Rev Clifford Payne, retired Church of God pastor and one of the foundational members of the Caribbean Conference of Churches (CCC); and Professor Justin Robinson, Pro Vice-Chancellor and Principal of The University of the West Indies (UWI) Five Islands Campus. The proceedings were moderated by CTCT member and UWI, Mona, Professor Anna Perkins.

As both speakers explored the reality of Caribbean identity, they highlighted the threats to such, coming from external pressures and a changing geopolitical landscape presently being defined by the maxim: ‘might is right’, where a rules-based order was being rejected by larger powers.

The speakers highlighted the serious effects this had on the Caribbean through the examples of US military build-up in the Caribbean with direct consequences for both Venezuela and Cuba.

Rev Payne provided a historical look at regional identity through the lens of the CCC, a regional ecumenical body founded in 1973. Among the precursors to such a movement, he identified Vatican II which allowed for recognising a new world in which Roman Catholics would relate to other Christian bodies differently.

This had a formidable consequence for the Caribbean where Archbishops Anthony Pantin of Trinidad and Tobago and Samuel Carter of Jamaica (both deceased) were among those instrumental in the work of the CCC. In speaking of the present prospects for ecumenical work within the Caribbean, Rev Payne lamented the deteriorating interest in both regional and ecumenical movements and highlighted a lack of investment from member churches along with an insularity among individual churches.

Prof Robinson meanwhile questioned the weakening of Caribbean identity and attributed it to some factors: insular nationalism—where politics was being organised in terms of what is important to individual nations first, and the region second or optional.

Rev Payne also identified a colonial mindset which resulted in the belief that we cannot chart our own paths and we need external validation. The priority of the Privy Council over the Caribbean Court of Justice for some territories was highlighted as an instance of this validation.

The sense that “foreign is better” was also mentioned as a root cause of a weakening sense of Caribbean identity, along with the drive of political leaders to establish their own little kingdoms.

Prof Robinson however, called out the stubborn resistance to all these threats that were actually taking place—highlighting, as examples: culture, and musical fusions discernible in Afro-Reggae beats like Reggaeton and the many manifestations of Carnival in different territories that draw from one another, unity inherent in diaspora communities, sport, and civil society.

Prof Robinson pointed to the CTCT as but one example of how civil society works to foster a sense of regional identity beyond insular national politics. He further affirmed the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) as a lived example of conscious regional integration through the single currency, freedom of movement and single central bank.

The recognition that individual States cannot make it alone has helped to strengthen the sense of integration among the eastern Caribbean states. Prof Robinson asserted that regional identity was “neither safely alive nor quietly dead” and that civil society was one way of moving toward a much-needed and stronger sense of regional identity.