Shifting Contours of the Outlaw in Urban Haiti

Abstract

In what follows, I discuss some initial empirical findings and theoretical insights from my recent work on transnational resettlement of crime-based deportees from the US to Haiti. Haitian baz, or street organizations, are increasingly taking on the trappings of the urban gang to maintain relevance and control of their zones. Simultaneously, gangs are deploying the dressings of the baz to attain authority throughout neighborhoods in Haiti. The increasing presence of criminal deportees in Haiti has complicated the political landscape to blend local and foreign categorizations of the criminal, potentially foreshadowing the end of the Haitian baz as a coherent political formation. The impact of these dynamics is discussed in the context of recent work in post-human scholarship and criminal deportation.