Haïti | EPFL Graph Search

Haïti, en forme longue république d’Haïti (Ayiti, en forme longue Repiblik d Ayiti ou Repiblik Ayiti), est un État des Grandes Antilles, occupant le tiers occidental de l’île d'Hispaniola (soit environ), les deux tiers orientaux étant occupés par la République dominicaine. Sa capitale est Port-au-Prince et son point culminant est le pic la Selle ( d’altitude). La défaite de l'armée française au cours de l'expédition de Saint-Domingue, au terme de la révolution haïtienne, est à l’origine de la création de la république d’Haïti, qui devient en 1804 la première république noire, le premier État noir des Temps modernes et le deuxième État indépendant d'Amérique (après les États-Unis). Haïti est aussi le seul territoire francophone indépendant des Caraïbes, dont il est également le pays le plus peuplé. Après avoir été une des premières destinations des Caraïbes dans les années 1950 à 1970 et avoir manqué la transition démocratique après la chute des Duvalier (François Duvalier, dit « Pa

From innovation in the construction sector in Haiti to social impact on Haitian society: Digital Norms by Assimilation DNA

Abigaïl-Laure Sarah Irène Kern

The impact of the earthquake of 2010 was aggravated by the precarious housindg of the vulnerable Haitian population. Although disaster risk reduction and building sector regulations are today national priorities, Haiti lacks adequate training entities. The Rustic Superior foundation is experienced in training young Haitians to become construction workers with an essential extra skill: how to integrate seismic and anti-hurricane standards into their constructions. Haiti is now an increasingly connected country with 3G available nationwide: a large majority of the population owns a cellphone or internet devices. Thus, Rustic Superior decided to launch a new concept in the construction sector: Digital Norms by Assimilation DNA (Apprentissage par dispositif numérique ADN). The DNA approach will be the 1st entirely on-line vocational training scheme in Haiti. First applied to the construction sector, DNA can be replicated to other priority areas such as tourism or DDR, and also to larger geographical areas.

2016

Crise et gouvernance

Abigaïl-Laure Sarah Irène Kern

On January 12 2010, Haiti was hit by an earthquake of 7.2 on the Richter scale. Close to 220,000 persons died, more than 300,000 were wounded and almost two other million were displaced. The earthquake¿s epicenter was actually several kilometers away the capital, in the city of Léogâne, approximately 80% of which was destroyed. Three other medium-sized cities ¿ Grand-Goâve, Petit-Goâve and Jacmel - were also deeply affected by the earthquake. These four cities were the field of study for this thesis, which argues that this type of event, a natural disaster, triggers a crisis. The main hypothesis is that the crisis catalyzes tensions, reveals structures and can be a factor of transformation in the governance of medium-sized cities, which has long been ignored by both academia and government. Approaching the crisis in terms of crisologie (Morin, 1976), proved to be the best way of identifying January 12th as an event and the starting point of a crisis, of distinguishing its causes from its consequences and of understanding the processes at work. Urban governance in Haiti was analyzed at three specific levels (systemic, cybernetic and neguentropic). Antagonisms characteristic of crises appeared at each level. Then, considering the city as ¿ordinary¿ refocus the debate on small and medium-sized cities of the South and was a way to use intermediation as an analytical tool to reveal the structures of urban governance. Eight intermediation dimensions were created for and applied to each of the cities studied. This tool both reveals a spatial typology of these cities (influenced, satellite or remote from a metropolis) and serves as a basis for the surveys on representations that were conducted among local stakeholders. These surveys help link intermediation with the ¿shared urbanity¿ of these cities, indicating how urbanity, autochthony and the reputation given to each city from outside function as elements that force inhabitants to position themselves on the national urban scene. Several important findings emerged through the study of governance in times of emergency and of reconstruction, both at the national and local levels, and through urban development projects in the cities being studied, highlighting their governance trajectories. The urban functions of the cities revealed that their spatial typology combined with their shared urbanity influence the intervention of international actors in their territories and impacts on the governance mechanisms between local, national and international stakeholders.This research highlighted also the importance of political factors which create confusion between political boundaries, resulting in an absence of differentiation between local and national powers within Haitian society. The particularities of the local contexts show too that society¿s participation strongly depends on local urban governance. Initiated only by international actors, it can lead to relative inefficiency, or even counter-productivity, if it is not socially engineered to the technicality of the projects. Finally, this work allowed to discuss the pertinence of two normative prerequisites that guide international community¿s intervention in developing countries: the criteria of good governance and the concept of fragile, bankrupt, failing or collapsed State, both centrals nowadays in the attribution of public development aid.

EPFL2017

Crise et gouvernance

Abigaïl-Laure Sarah Irène Kern

EPFL2017