Introduction

According to Girvan, the Caribbean is a socio-historical category, commonly referring to a

cultural zone charaterised by the legacy of slavery and the plantation system. The Caribbean is
made up of many islands that were captured by many peoples speaking different languages and
believing in different things at different times in its history. As a result the Caribbean has a long
history of slavery and colonization and these shared events are what make the Caribbean unique
and has influenced our political culture. According to Almond and Verber, political culture is the
system of empirical beliefs expressive symbols and values which define the situation in which
political culture takes place. Caribbean political culture has been defined by our history of
slavery and then colonization.

Political culture

Throughout history the political culture of any nation is shaped by the historical events that

Political culture refers to the collective opinions, attitudes and values of individuals
about POLITICS.

Politics in the Caribbean is not consumed by race. Yet, race is somewhere among the factors
considered by voters and, under certain circumstance, it comes more clearly to the fore. It is fair
to say that the race factor between the descendants of African and Indians in Guyana, Trinidad
and Suriname remains a major consideration in political life.

Our attitudes towards politics or the direct result of our upbringing this account for our behaviour

Any nation political culture is shaped by events that took place in its history. The Caribbean as a
region is no exception. It is shared history of colonization and slavery, but how has this impacted
the political culture in the Caribbean today?

Creole Society

According to Nigel Bolland Creole refers to locally born persons of non-native origin, which, in
the Americas, generally means people of either African or European ancestry, or both. However
in the common usage, Creole refers to a local product which is the result of a mixture or blending
of various ingredients that originated in the old world.
Creoles are natives of the Caribbean. The Creole complex has its historical base in slavery,
plantation systems, and colonialism. Its cultural composition mirrors its racial mixture.
Europeans and African elements predominate in fairly standards combinations and relationships.
Perhaps this combination of European and African traditions is the most important feature of
Creole life.

According to Bolland the concept of Creolisation, then refers to those processes of cultural
change that give rise to such distinctiveness.

The purpose of this paper is to show how the Creole Model has impacted the Caribbean Political
Culture today. According to Brathwaite

According to Bolland the concept of Creole society, as it has been used in the Caribbean, stresses
the active role of the Caribbean peoples and the importance of African cultural traditions. In
many ways it is the antithesis of the old imperialist viewpoint that denies the “natives” a history
of their own and asserts that nothing of any cultural values was ever produced in the Caribbean.

The Creolization theory was proposed by Edward Brathwaite. Brathwaite proposed that the
principles of cultural distinction and unitary origin through which societies were typically
analyzed and categorized need to be abandoned in the case of the Caribbean. He recognized
instead, that the intrinsic ethnic and cultural pluralism of the islands were fundamental to an
understanding of the culture (http://science.jrank.org).

Creolization, then, was a cultural process that took place within a Creole society, that is, within a
tropical colonial plantation polity based on the British raj for its economic well-being, its
protection and (from the point of view of the whites), its cultural models.

Edward Brathwaite adds a different perspective on Caribbean societies. Rather than conceiving
of any dichotomy between European and African cultures, he sees in their mixed and combined
form. It is this mixture that he calls the Creole culture. Creole culture is the adaptation of foreign
culture to local origins. The Caribbean is a product of two main cultures having to adopt
themselves to a new environment and to each other. Creole culture is creative, a fact that is often
overlooked given stress and focus on the imitativeness of some culture practices.
Caribbean culture is not to be seen as a function of the hegemonic power of the metropole or as
European or African, but as Caribbean.

For hundreds of years the Caribbean islands were inhabited by three main indigenous tribes - the
Arawaks, the Ciboney and the tribe that gave the island its name: the Caribs. When Christopher
Columbus became the first European to land on these shores, the history of the Caribbean took a
dramatic turn.

Plantation Society

The plantation society theory was proposed by R.T smith who used
Guyana as a model for the Caribbean. Smith focused society during
slavery as well as post emancipation and World War II on the Caribbean.
Smith noted that the absence of central state systems allowed plantation
owners to run their plantations as they wished. For the enslaved this
meant that the plantation was a total institution where the lives of the
slaves were determined by the plantation owners this is one reason for
the diversity of the Caribbean culture. The dominant groups within the
slave society assumed an even greater importance after slavery. His
model was adopted by George Beckford whose analysis sought to show
that the culture of the Caribbean is a reflection of the social structure.
This social structure has been determined by the Plantation society and
by the fact the plantation was a total institution.

According to George Beckford: the plantation was the chief instrument of European colonization
and exploitation in the Caribbean, the U.s. South, the Guianas, and Northeast Brazil an area
described by Wagley as Plantation America; in certain islands of the Indian and Pacific Oceans;
and in Ceylon, Malaya, Indonesia and the Phillippines. In all these places the structural
characteristic of the plantation system have persisted and they define a particular social
framework. Plantation economy and society is an appropriate general description of the social
framework.
Elements of the Caribbean political culture

General belief in democracy- most Caribbean felt this is the best from of government, higher level of
voter turn out, 1995 – 2001 voter turn out significantly higher

General belief in mass political parties – arranges from the struggle of workers rights. Political parties
formed 2 parties system strong competitive

In the Creole and plantation society black people were at the lowest ground on the
social ladder. They did not play any part in political affairs has they couldn’t
participate in the political process. Even after the emancipation they couldn’t vote.
So the political arena was controlled by: the planter class and a few white creoles.
People of Africans descents then were not educated in politics and didn’t have any
political leader to look up to because the few that were aspired to be leaders the
system had them assassinated, so they came to see politics as the Whiteman affair
in which they could not aspire the Whiteman’s affair and they themselves could not
aspire to become political leaders thus the common perceptions that black people
could not lead themselves so they continue to look to the white persons to lead
them.

Even after emancipation in countries like Barbados any strong black national leader
that emerge were seen has a threat and sent to prison were deported like Marcus
Garvey from Jamaica and this prevail until independence where this were replaced
now by the Caribbean white. They believe because of their skin colour the former
colonial masters treat them favorably thus acting as intermediary for the black.
Thus in the Caribbean after most island gained independence they elected so call
white leaders to represent them. Race has always played a part in Caribbean
politics as most of the leaders are consider white. This is a direct legacy of the
Creole and plantation societies were the slave were thought that they could not
represent themselves. However as early as the nineteen seventies the Caribbean
discovered their Caribbean’s and nationalism was born. As a result the face of our
politicians changes from social white to that of the brown man in representation.
This is still symbolic of black people being told that they are unable to represent
themselves, thus electing person of lighter huge to represent them. It could be that
black persons were not offering themselves for leadership because they were told
that they could not be leaders. However the region started to accepts its. African
identity and saw a change where the so call white no longer needed to represent
the people because we want leaders representation from among ourselves. Many
black leaders were emerging from this. The black cloud of leaders still lingers. As a
case in point in the 1992 general election where the PNP won the election because
Jamaican think its time for a black man to be in the parliament and even in Trinidad
where the Indian and the African community wanted representation from among
their own.

Another element

However the slaves saw how the planter class uses their political power to get
certain privilege to get what they want from the metropole and also how they use
the legislation to keep the slave subservient, so the slave think that white persons
would make better leaders
With the beginning of colonization, many more peoples speaking different languages and believing in
different things claimed ownership over certain islands (in many cases nowhere near each other
geographically). Under new "ownerships", the islands became involved in slave-trading. Each different
colonizer of the islands chose to take slaves from different areas of western Africa, depending on where
their "mother country’s" other colonies were located in Africa. This resulted in the arrival and mixing of
new groups of different peoples speaking different languages and believing in different things.
Consequently, the Caribbean is an extremely diverse region of the world. To study either its history or
what it is today, is not an easy task, and to try and define its people is nearly impossible.

Many people will think of Caribbean Islands as a nice place for a getaway vacation. But historical
background of Caribbean is somewhat different. Caribbean has a long history of colonization and slavery
for many generations. As new colonization was established, new cultures and languages were
introduced.

The role of the plantation was a prominent issue brought up by all the authors. The plantation played an
imperative role in Caribbean society from colonialism to contemporary society.

Nowadays, many of the islands have either won their independence or are part of their invading countries in name
only. Some the islands have become commonwealths of the United States. Others like Jamaica, Cuba and Haiti are
entirely self-sufficient. This has splintered the culture of Caribbean people even further, as many of the islands
continue to stake out new identities as they forge past their imperial pasts and into the future.