The Society of Notables

In Haiti, the emergence of the notables goes hand in hand with the establishment of a type of society characterised by notabilitarian values. A society, in the sense that it produces its own structure: 'learning, habitus, representations of the world, of itself and of its own labour; in short, culture. In doing so, it produces history.' This type of society constitutes a phalanstery of domination over which the notables reign. They generally cement the foundations of their domination over the rest of society through economic accumulation-often based on landholdings-social prestige and political power. From this relationship crystallises a compartmentalised social bond that places the notables at the apex of the social pyramid, wielding a power of domination that enables them to triumph over the rest of the population, who are unable to achieve any social mobility. For the mechanisms that reproduce this bond offer no glimmer of participation that might serve as a pathway to the exercise of any form of citizenship. In this sense, a society of notables cannot be a democratic society; its very structure is antithetical to democracy.