Alan Taylor: belief

Transcript context

…The Dominican Republic has done relatively well. Do you view that as an issue of deep roots or just a series of later, different, accidental forces from a historical point of view? In the 19th century you would not have said that the Dominican Republic was doing well. It reverts back to Spanish control during the American Civil War. What I would say is that the Dominican Republic never has this extractive financial commitment that turns out to be so burdensome on Haiti. At that time, the country was called Santo Domingo, meaning the Dominican Republic. If you were in the 1870s, you would be hard pressed to say, which of these two countries is going to have the better economic future? If you look really close and you think this debt burden that Haiti is carrying is probably going to be the difference in the longer run, and it is one of the factors that has led Haiti to lag behind the Dominican Republic. Do you think there are deep roots to the now long-standing Cuban communist rule period, or is that, again, just something that happened later?…

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