"DE COUNTRY GONE THROUGH":Trinidad East Indian `Refugees' to Canada.
(A development of a paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association,
November 19th 1989, Washington DC.)
Niels M. SampathInstitute of Social Anthropology
University of Oxford
Abstract
In [late 1980s] Trinidad, an economic recession and a(re)alienation from government power have created socialanxieties manifested in a cluster of mass emigration.Colloquialisms compare the country's condition withconceptions of madness and an incapacity to rehabilitate.These factors encouraged the use/misuse of `loopholes' inCanadian `refugee' status laws. This paper examinesthe motivations and perspectives of one social network of East Indians, in Trinidad and in Canada, suggesting that `refugee' psycho/sociological concepts of (inter)national identity can reflect a bounded variety of ethnocentric values.
print/amendment date: April 7, 2023
Speculating about this, he reviewed his situation. He was the father of four children, and his position was as it had been when he was seventeen, unmarried and ignorant of the Tulsis. He had no vocation, no reliable means of earning a living.........he would have to make a decision. Yet he felt no anxiety. The second to second agony and despair of those days at Green Vale had given him an experience of unhappiness against which everything had now to be measured. He was more fortunate than most people. His children would never starve; they would always be sheltered and clothed. It didn't matter if he were at Green Vale or Arwacas, if he were alive or dead.
-from V.S. Naipaul's A House for Mr. Biswas (1985 [1961]: 303-304).
Introduction:
In July/August of 1990, a black Islamic sect attempted and failed a coup
d'etat on the West Indian island of Trinidad. For both numerical and
cultural reasons, the Muslimeen, as the sect is known locally, can be
considered well on the fringe of what is locally thought to be `normal'
Trinidadian society. However, Trinidad suffers from what has been
termed `the absence of an image of the people at large' (Segal 1987:
173) and so one can suggest that the coup attempt partly reflected a
common Trinidadian alienation from general nationalist objectives and
power structures and that different ethnic groups will respond to this
alienation in different ways.
By far the most notable recent example of this alienation includes
those East Indians who, in 1988, chose to leave material possessions and,
in many cases, immediate families, by applying for so-called `refugee
status' in Canada. Much of the impetus for this action was motivated by
the impending closure of Canadian immigration/refugee law `loopholes'.
But it is the combination of these `loopholes' with factors inherant in the
general Trinidad East Indian situation that provides an interesting insight
into the potential difficulties of both refugee definition and East Indian
diaspora conceptions of (inter)national identity.
In late 1988, in order to collect additional anthropological data for a
dissertation on masculine values, I returned to a village in southern
Trinidad called Indian Wood (pseudonym). The village and the
surrounding area are inhabited entirely by people of Hindu East Indian
descent who depend largely on rice and vegetable farming, as well as
sugar cane cultivation on an adjoining government-owned plantation.
Many of the people are also employed in nearby towns.
Upon my return, I discovered that 20% of the 150 households in the
village had family members who had recently departed for Canada. Most
of these people had, as the villagers said, `gone refugee'. According to
the Trinidad press at the time (Dec. 1988), national emigration of this
sort was on the order of some 3,000 to 4,000 from a total population of
1.3 million. This was not a statistically significant number, but it had a
growing profile in the media and in local conversation (by March of 1990
some press estimates had raised the refugee figure to 15,000). There
was a running debate as to whether these people were victims of
circumstance or traitors giving the country a bad name. The situation
was made immediately apparent by the friend and informant who met
me at the airport upon my return. `Look', he said. `Plenty people
travelling, but notice is mostly Indians leaving.' And so the question
arose: Why were these people leaving?
Although the Trinidad/Canada case can be considered a mass
migration only in a very local and clustered context, it did exhibit the
classic dual forces of emigration pressure, i.e. a push away from the
indigenous country, and a pull towards the receiving country. It was the
peculiarities of the combined forces which determined the scope of the
migration.
The `push' factor and the roots of alienation:
Trinidad and Tobago is a twin-island republic and former British colony off
the coast of Venezuela's Orinoco basin. It has a multi-ethnic population.
In the 1980 Trinidad and Tobago census figures (Ministry of Finance
1987), East Indians were the second largest ethnic group with 40.7% of
the population, just behind those of African descent who made up 40.8%.
The other groups include, with 16.3%, a `mixed' category (largely
African/European Creoles); whites with 0.9%, and a Chinese population of
0.5%. If birthrates (Harewood 1978:65) are maintained, one can project
that the 1990 census, unless distorted for political reasons, will show East
Indians as the largest ethnic groupi.
A variety of historical influences have gone into importing and then
transmuting the constituents of the post-colonial cosmopolitan society
which exists today. The chief effects came from the sugar industry and
its demand for cheap labour. The abolition of slavery in 1834, and a
relative lack of success at recruiting/retaining the freed African slaves,
resulted in a search for a replacement plantation work-force. Eventually,
following the importation of free American and Caribbean Negroes, as
well as Chinese and (Madeiran) Portuguese, the indentureship of Indian
labourers, primarily from the Uttar Pradesh and southern or `Madrassi'
regions, proved the most successful alternative to slavery. The Indian
indentured migration to Trinidad continued until 1917.
Descendants of the original labourers from the sub-continent often
appear as Indian in their cultural traits today, as one might imagine the
first labourers in their plantation settlements must have appeared.
Perhaps, because most Indians continue to live in rural areas (Malik
1971:12), such first impressions are deceptive. Instead of a superficial
rural representation, recent studies have focused on the way in which the
plural natures of both East Indian society (with regards to caste,
language background, religious tradition, etc.) and Trinidadianii society as
a whole, have contributed to a perceived emergence (Nevadomsky 1982)
or transformation (Vertovec 1987) of many elements of Trinidad Indian
ethnic identity. This is in contrast to the museum-like transference and
retention of Indian culture, as was previously suggested in ethnographic
literature (e.g. Klass 1961, Niehoff and Niehoff 1960)iii.
Following the national mottos, `Together we aspire, together we
achieve' and `For every creed and race: an equal place' in a literal sense,
Trinidad has no permanent official race relations committee or any such
equivalent. This is in spite of complex local hierarchies of racial
terminology and prejudicial attitudes which continue to confuse attempts
to tackle the country's social, political, and economic problems. Studies
by Trinidad's academics into social issues involving race are often
lambasted by some local media commentators as attempts to keep the
country divided from `the national interest' (i.e. see mottos above).
To many East Indians, `the national interest' has always been interpreted
as the interests of the Creole (or, formerly, white) e'lite and of their urban
African power/employment base.
In general, it is the visible social features of a particular situation
which are important to Trinidadians. However, depending on one's
perspective, this situation fluctuates between conditions of apparent
cultural pluralism, a situation whereby political domination by one ethnic
group is maintained in equilibrium by an institutional division (of labour
etc.) among ethnic groups (Charlotte-Smith 1986:225), and a situation of
cultural heterogeneity, meaning that institutions can function as
integrating influences (following Despres 1967). With respect to the
Indian population, this situation allows a tourist guidebook to
simultaneously describe them as having farming as their `chief
occupation' and that `small and medium businesses' are `owned mainly
by Indians' (Hodge 1987:69).
Deep-rooted attitudes based on race and ethnicity can either
diverge from (i.e. ignore) or, depending on the circumstances, combine
with (i.e. utilize), separate economic factors and class interests. `Group'
consensuses do result and support for them is attributed to either class,
race, or both, depending, once again, on the circumstances. This
situational flexibility with regards to race relations may be the reason
why two writers have, albeit at different times, reached apparently
opposite conclusions. V.S. Naipaul has written that `Trinidad in fact
teeters on the brink of a racial war' (1985[1962]:86), while Selwyn Ryan
writes that `The odds that there can be a racial war in Trinidad and
Tobago are slight indeed' (Trinidad Sunday Express, April 8th, 1990, p.3).
While it would be too presumptuous to point out and tie together
the relative optimism and racial backgrounds of Ryan and Naipaul
themselves, it is fair to point out that such expressions of optimism, or
lack of thereof, can be linked to the degree of conviction or alienation,
respectively, an individual feels for a given society. In Trinidad, because
social change has come to reflect the residual effects of managing a
series of sugar, cocoa, and oil-based boom and bust cycles, politics has
proven to be the most salient arena for expressing such alienated or
nationalistic feelings. For when times are bad, both the relatively isolated
country farmers, and the `wheeling and dealing' small businessmen
realize (or imagine) their potential political power and act accordingly.
For example, any proposals or grievances brought about by
organizations or institutions with an observably (ethnically)
homogeneous membership (e.g. an Indian village council) are often
viewed as serving purely marginal and/or minority interests even if the
issue is utilitarian or mundane in nature and is otherwise `in the national
interest` (e.g. street-lighting to deter crime). Three factors have gone
into creating a situation whereby political views have synthesized
elements of national conviction and/or alienation, packaged them into
development policy, and then, in trying to justify this national
construction, reinforced the original patterns of alienation and conviction.
Firstly, the political parties in Trinidad, overtly or covertly, have
seen any social group or definable socio-geographic area as potential
sources of both patronage and antagonism. Secondly, the population en
masse, as in many other countries, consistently sees the political process
as an inter-group competition with elections judged more as the finishing-
line for ambitions, i.e. an end-result, rather than the start, or
continuation, of social development. Finally, for whatever group of
individuals is attempting to influence developments, the reactions of the
rest of society following the above tendencies regularly reinforces the
sense of alienation, and so the members of the group themselves
contribute to these tendencies when given the chance, and a perceived
need, to do so.
Integration of Trinidad ethnic group participation in local
institutions does not occur spontaneously but is, following Despres (op.
cit.), brokered as each situation demands it. Importantly, in the light of
Trinidad attempting to proceed with stable political development on the
Western model (a process which is thought by the Trinidadian elite to
reduce alienation and conflict), the conceptions of cultural pluralism and
heterogeneity remain the foundations of government ideology with the
important elements of basic democracy, such as free and active debate
and participation, continue to exist. Yet, according to Despres, these
conceptions are inadequate `for an assessment of sociocultural change
or for predictive purposes' (1967: 27).
The socio-economic framework in Trinidad has, until recently at
least, been well-suited to the fluctuating tendencies described above.
Trinidad's internal economy is based heavily on oil revenue and
government expenditure (Auty and Gelb 1986, Mulcharsingh 1971, Black
et al. 1976) with the former having declined dramatically in the past
decade while the latter had, until 1987, been steadily increasing. The
wealth created by oil production has been the pre-dominant factor
influencing society in Trinidad in the last fifteen years, following the world
oil crises of the early 1970s. Despite corruption and misspending, much
of the wealth managed to trickle down to the lowest social strata which,
in the case of Indian Wood, meant a transformation from a case of classic
peasantry, to virtual middle-class economics and entrepreneurship.
The younger generations, in particular, began to describe
themselves as having `the same life-style as what they have in America,
Canada, England and them places'. Superficially at least, this is a fairly
accurate comment. The amount of money in circulation provided much of
the population with the feeling that they were masters of their own
destiny, and that the government existed only to rake in their own share
for ambitous and corruption-riddled construction projects. The former
prime minister, Eric Williams, made his famous comment that, `Money is
no problem!' One Indian Wood villager recalls further that `Nobody could
say nothing against you. All you have to do is reach in your pocket and
take out your stack of hundred blue notes [i.e. 1000 dollars]. And in them
days it was nearly one-to-one exchange [against the U.S. dollar] you
know!' Through their wealth, Indians happily continued to be alienated
from government.
Unfortunately, the truth was that the government effectively relied
on the trickle-down effect to keep the population dependent on its
patronage, rather than trying to resolve the problems of development
with any long-term strategy. When the price of oil on the world markets
fell in the mid-1980's, the country rapidly became short of cash, and the
lower and new middle classes soon began to suffer financially.
Additionally, the wealth disparity within the oil boom and bust cycle was
far greater and more widespread than what had previously been
experienced with the sugar and cocoa industries.
General elections were held in December of 1986iv. With the
economic let-down, Indian support for the government was non-existant.
Faced with the added burden of corruption charges so widespread that it
cost them the support of their usual African middle and lower class
power-base, the African-dominated government party, the People's
National Movement (or PNM), which had held office since independence
in 1962, lost by a 33 to 3 parliamentary seat landslide. A large number of
the voters had known no other government, so there was simply no
emotional experience or practical cynicism which could handle a
complete change in government at the national level. People's
expectations were extremely high, and the results produced widespread
euphoria. For example, on the night of the election, when the television
and radio commentators announced that the government had, for all
intents and purposes, fallen, the people in Indian Wood, ran out into the
street, started banging on garbage can lids, set off firecrackers left over
from Divaliv celebrations the month before, and generally started making
as much noise as possible. The political alienation which had been felt for
years seemed to have been vanquished at last. Over and over again, the
phrase `Is we government now, yes?' was heard. This soon proved to be
wishful thinking.
Economic recession and the re-alienation process:
The winning coalition, running under the guise of a united party banner
called the National Alliance for Reconstruction (or NAR), was made up of
long-disaffected PNM members, largely Afro-Trinidadian, and the long-
standing group of Tobago, rural Indian, and middle-class (or suburban)
based parties which had been in opposition all along.
The coalition soon began to fall apart. Following a series of cabinet
shuffles, which resulted in exclusion from many of the important
ministries, most of the Indian members in the coalition re-grouped to
form a political clique which they called the `Committee for Love, Unity,
and Brotherhood, 1988', or CLUB-88vi. At the same time, inheriting what
they claimed was a surprisingly empty treasury, the new NAR
government was perceived as being unable to fulfill some of its most
basic manifesto promises of infrastructure development in the previously
deprived rural, i.e. Indian, areas. In the end, it was forced to arrange
financing with the International Monetary Fund, and by 1988 the IMF's
budgeting dictations had resulted in wage reductions and a virtual
doubling of unemployment to top 20%, all in the face of a matching (20%
+) inflation rate due to a series of currency devaluations. Trinidad was,
and still is, in a severe economic recession.
Throughout 1987 and 1988, the people in Indian Wood were
becoming more and more bewildered. Politically, they felt they had done
everything correctly, including continuing support of the NAR party in the
1987 county council elections. Nevertheless, job losses accelerated, as
did the prices of basic commodities. Without too many people admitting
it directly, the people of Indian Wood had looked forward to government
patronage of the same style that the lower-class African PNM supporters
had enjoyed in the form of `make-work' programs, etc. Although they
knew in advance that their Indian political party leader would be
occupying a deputy position, they had put aside some of their prejudices
and voted for a coalition. But the African prime minister, A.N.R. Robinson,
managed to displace calls for many of the political patronage programs in
favour of austerity budgeting. It was not the implementation of austerity
throughout the society which led to near-total Indian political alienation
from the new government. Rather, it was the interpretation of it by
Indians as a continuation of the neglect they had faced as long as they
could remember, that increased their frustration.
As unemployment grew, crime rates began to soar, and the people
in the country areas such as Indian Wood who, for so long, had felt no
need to bar their doors and windows the way the people in the towns did,
became the victims of armed robberies. With suggestions of racial
discrimination, the government was blamed for the decline in law and
order. The print media began to voice objections to the government's
complaints over news coverage. In the summer of 1988, one of the
leaders of CLUB '88 suggested, in a characteristically animated speech in
parliament, that the government would soon have some Trinidadians
becoming refugees, implying a parallel with the Ugandan Indians under
Idi Amin's dictatorship.
Basically, there was a complete loss of confidence in the ability of
the government, the traditional benefactor, to rehabilitate the country
and so, ironically, people throughout Trinidad blamed the new
government for all of the trouble. National opinion was reinforcing Indian
alienation. It seemed to be the PNM style of government all over again
with the added touch of a sense of betrayal. As one young man told me:
`You know how they say, "there is no hope in dope"? Well, there is no
hope in dopes either.'vii
People could not understand how their living standards had eroded
so quickly. Despite patience and an adaptation of traditional religion and
culture towards social and economic changes (Vertovec 1987), in the
minds of rural East Indians Trinidadian nationalism had become an even
more ambiguous construct than what it was before (see Segal op. cit.).
Their ideal construct of nationhood which, in a complicated fashion,
incorporated prejudices of their own racial superiority into espoused
official egalitarian values, had been shattered. The situation became
curiously analogous to Naipaul's (1985[1961]) famous Mr. Biswas
character, abandoning one home and embarking on the acquisition of
another. With a weary shrug of the shoulders, people began to say; `De
country gone through'.
There is an anthropomorphism to this comment which is also highly
revealing. When a man is `gone through', it usually means that he has
suffered what we might call a `nervous breakdown'. In my field
experience, it was most often used to describe a young man's condition
after his first attempt at courtship was rejected. Appearing to be unable
to recover, such a person would soon become the butt of black humour
and would be told; `Keep away from the gramazone'. Ingesting the
defoliant gramazone (known elsewhere as paraquat) is the favoured
method of suicide among rural East Indiansviii. So if Trinidad was
consistently and seriously being described as being `gone through', one
can expect that, in the absence of some form of national suicide, the
serious Indian social malaise (in terms of ruling party/nationalist
enthusiasm) which had made itself known in similiar economic conditions
prior to the Black Power revolt of 1970 was re-emerging in force.
In fact, national suicide in the form of Indian civil unrest was, once
againix, out of the question since, apart from the impracticality of
organization and a lack of available weapons, it was enthusiasm for any
form of Trinidadian nationalism that had been destroyed. As one person
told me; `There would never be a civil war in Trinidad because no
Trinidadian would ever fight for his country. They would have to be
mad!'x
Although the economic process of wealth distribution was now in
reverse and becoming one of poverty entrapment, the malaise and the
rapidity with which the economic downturn had taken hold, following a
decade of increasing prosperity, was in part belied by the infrastructure
and general business activity which remained outwardly the same.
Therefore, one might assume that, in a country which had recently
undergone a peaceful and democratic change of government, it might
have been premature to expect any analytically-inclined Canadian
diplomatic staff in Trinidad at the time to note any connection between
economic hardship and political/ethnic persecution (whether real or
imagined), in the same manner as the Trinidadians who sought refugee
status. Despite the latter's Canadian-based immigration lawyers stressing
the word `persecution', in late 1988 a Canadian High Commission official
announced on Trinidadian television and in newspaper statementsxi that
the people under discussion were to be categorized as `economic
migrants, not refugees'.
`O Canada': the `pull' factor
Part of the reasoning behind a developed countries immigration/refugee-
host policy is its own ethnocentric conception of its appeal both at home
and to those in undeveloped countries. Faced with the political pressures
of Canada's adhering to an untried `Multiculturalism Policy' (Berry 1984),
managing fluctuating unemployment figures, and supposedly dealing
with the lingerings of entrenched racism, it might seem to be
advantageous to create as much distinction as possible between what is
considered `regular immigration' on the one hand, and `refugee
acceptence' on the other. But, as this section will show, this objective
cannot be met without problems and, in this particular case, it
heightened the importance of the `pull' factors that made Trinidad
Indians aware of Canada as a viable alternative to the alienating
conditions at `home'.
The first of these `pull' factors is the one that many people were
exposed to in childhood. Much of the rural East Indian population has,
directly or indirectly, experienced an education based on the work and
textbooks of the Canadian Presbyterian Missionxii. Thus, even the
youngest children will often be as knowledgeable of the ten Canadian
provinces as they are of the rest of their own Caribbean region. The
important factor to remember in this case, is that the influencing images
of `Canada as benefactor' came directly through the high status persona
of the Canadian or, as is more likely for recent generations, Canadian-
trained, school master, teacher, church minister, or successful friend or
relative who had done well by them. Related to this `schoolmaster factor'
is also the important introductory element of Canada being seen as an
origin of social, moral, and personal discipline.
Secondly, in examining the refugee case, it is important to note
that there is a long history of regular emigration to Canada. Canada is
one of the first countries one will hear mentioned as being prosperous,
often ranking ahead of the United States. This is no surprise considering
the large extent of Canada's involvement in both Trinidadian and
Caribbean development (Chodos 1977). In fact, in the period 1971-1975,
at the start of the oil boom, Trinidadians came 10th on the list of
`business immigrants' to Canada with 20,000 individuals and/or
familiesxiii. Some of these well-to-do immigrants were later to prove a
mixed-blessing to their refugee cousins by acting as self-proclaimed
`immigration consultants' and running illegal-immigrant employment
agencies, raking in high fees and commissions, respectively.
The prosperity of the oil boom in the 1970s and early 1980s also
meant that many people, even the traditionally poorer rural villagers,
could travel and see for themselves how their relatives had fared.
Generally, despite some disparaging comments, these Trinidadian
visitors were impressed by their cousins success as `Canadians' yet
flattered by the their retention of `Trini' values in `multicultural' Canada.
One older lady in Trinidad told me that she was very impressed with her
visit to Toronto because you `could cook anything there just like in the
country in Trinidad' and that `Canada [sic] such a rich city that it have
white people to pick up garbage!'
This also introduces a more sinister contrast between the perceived
images of Canada with Trinidad. Trinidad is considered as a former white
colony `ruined by Creoles'. Canada is perceived of as being white and
successful. Among rural Trinidad East Indians, especially among those
who grew up in the officially hierarchical colonial atmosphere, and who
would be the family heads making the decisions to emigrate as refugees,
racial prejudice and colonial bias of this sort cannot be ruled out as a
motivating factor. It surfaced dramatically in the Trinidad press when
rumours were flying that Indians were on Canadian television saying that
they were refugees because their daughters, wives, and mothers were
`being raped by black men`.
However, the final and deciding impetus in the case of the Trinidad
refugees and the `loophole' factor mentioned in the introduction to this
paper, was the announcement, at that time (1987-88), of the forthcoming
Canadian legislation; Bills C-55 and C-84. Briefly put, Bill C-55 would
streamline the process of determining genuine refugees from those
deemed to be `bogus', while Bill C-84 would basically `encourage'
refugee claimants to obtain this status before arriving in Canada
(Documentation 1987; Grey 1989; Naidoo 1989). Ironically, the way this
legislation was formulated proved to be the source of a new flow of
refugees from countries from which there had been no previous claims
for refugee status.
The legislation was held up for two years as the Canadian
government sought, unsuccessfully as it turned out, to include a
provision to prevent potential refugees from using the United States as a
so-called `Safe Third Country' point-of-entry. This delay allowed the word
to spread that in order to enter Canada, one had to be fairly quick or else
the so-called `loophole' of entering the country posing as a tourist,
declaring refugee status at the end of the time limit stamped on the
passport, and then having a long wait for a hearing, would be sealed.
This systematic use of loopholes was presenting formidable
problems for the Canadian government. The sense of urgency for the
potential refugees was heightened by rampant rumours which suggested
that a general amnesty would be declared for all those arriving in Canada
before the new legislation became law in January of 1989. Needless to
say, this only increased the flow of people. In other words, one can
conclude that the majority of the Trinidadians involved definitely did not
constitute the initial wave of refugee-immigrants, but did react to the
amnesty possibilities opened up by a steadily increasing number of
asylum seekers.
At this point, it is necessary to illustrate, from the point of view of
Trinidadians planning to leave for Canada, the logic that went into sorting
out the confusion of immigration terminology. Officially, Canada did/does
not want any `illegal immigrants'. It was understood that those who had
legally immigrated in previous years, known as `landed immigrants' in
Canada, were either sponsored by close relatives or had secured a job
prior to departure. The rumour of an eventual amnesty was considered
applicable only to those who had declared themselves to be `refugees'.
Since the possibility of legal immigration was open only to a few
families, it made sense to maneuver one's way into the refugee system,
and then to mimic the actions of legal immigrants, i.e. via self-sufficiency,
in the hope of gaining sympathy from a hearing judge. One must note
that this description does not imply a cold calculating move, directly
insensitive to the needs of so-called `genuine refugees'. It was simply felt
that Trinidad had run out of possibilities, and that if Canada was to be an
alternative, this was the time for action.
A bonus of this method was that even if the hearing was
unfavourable, there would probably be a healthy savings of `foreign
exchange', i.e. Canadian dollars, to bring back home. It was generally
known that by the summer of 1988, there was a large backlog of people
awaiting hearings, with waits of up to two years.
It was deemed risky to declare refugee status upon arrival at the
airport. If the screening interview went badly, the individuals ran the risk
of being sent back to the country from which they had arrived. Therefore,
one loophole which was exploited was to destroy all of one's documents
on the plane, or upon arrival at the airport, such that there was no proof
as to which country one had arrived from. This would also ensure a
lengthy hearing process rather than a quick deportation. Most people,
and in particular those who had `landed immigrant' relatives in Canada,
preferred to enter as visitors. This was especially true in the weeks
before Christmas in 1988, or at least until December 10th of that year
(see below) when tourist and relative visitations seemed, to the potential
refugees at least, to be believable alibis. But the numbers were already
large enough that the immigration people were suspicious and not
everyone succeeded.
Those who succeeded and were not sent back on the next flight
usually organized themselves with employment and housing in the
Toronto suburban area before venturing to the downtown immigration
office, when their tourist time-limit ran out, to declare themselves as
refugees. This action often carried the hope that should an amnesty
come, preference might be given to those who could prove that they
could fend for themselves. In either case, `genuine' refugees in most
countries can be presumed to prefer self-sufficiency over all-
encompassing patronage by the host country. This paradox of declaring
oneself as a refugee, which carries the stereotype of comparative
helplessness, while trying to prove self-sufficiency, illustrates the
confusion that existed and probably still exists for the `bogus' refugees. It
was this confusion that left people open to exploitation by immigration
middle-men.
For example, one group from Indian Wood, some of which were
already employed in Canada, were advised by a man they called a
`Guyanese immigration consultant', who charged them four figure sums
($TT)xiv. He had them arrive in Canada from Trinidad posing as visitors,
and then chartered a bus to take them to the U.S. border at Niagara Falls
where, not having a visa, they were, as expected, refused official entry
into the U.S. They then returned to the Canadian border post and
declared themselves to be refugees. Technically, they could not be sent
back to the country from which they had come from, in this case the U.S.,
because they had been refused entry there. In fact, some of the group
spoke of having spent the day walking through nearby downtown Buffalo,
New York although they had no idea how this was arranged.
Refugees from all over the world were arriving at Toronto airport in
such large numbers that neighbouring hotels were full of people, largely
those who had no travel documents, in so-called `detention', awaiting
further screening and more permanent accommodation. The Canadian
immigration officers were so overtaxed with work that they protested
with a `work-to-rule' action. This was the political pressure the
government required in order to impose a visa restriction on a number of
countries which had suddenly increased the numbers of refugee landings.
These countries included (Naidoo op. cit.: 8) Portugal, Turkey, Nicaragua
and, of course, Trinidad.
For the purposes of motivation analysis, the Trinidad refugee
phenomenon more or less ended on the 10th of December 1988, when
the Canadian government imposed, overnight, a visa restriction. There
were many stories of people who had travelled to and from Canada
during the year posing as tourists while secretly establishing themselves
there. When the visa restriction was suddenly imposed, some of these
people were stranded in Trinidad without their families. For in order to
obtain a visitor's visa to Canada, without which the airlines would not
grant a seat on the aircraft, one needed a bank statement, a letter from
a recognised Trinidadian employer, and a return ticket. Some people, and
not just those who were stranded, immediately began alternately pooling
their bank accounts, forging job letters, and getting friendly travel agents
to write supporting letters. Although a few of these attempts succeeded,
this is the point at which the refugee flow from Trinidad effectively
ceased.
The Trinidad media then began to concentrate on publicity about
supposedly bona fide visitors being denied visas. The relatively small
Canadian High Commission in Port of Spain became swamped with
applicants, and their treatment intensified public debate on the rights
and wrongs of what had happened. A focal point was the demeaning
nature of `decent and ordinary' Trinidadians having to line up for a
visitors visa and then being refused one, when Canadians, in order to
encourage their tourist dollars, technically didn't even need a passport to
visit Trinidad. Trinidad's self-image, so often dependent on what it either
perceived or touted itself to be on the world stage, had been shakenxv.
During one visit to the Canadian High Commission, I observed a
frustrated young Afro-Trinidadian woman, unsuccessful in charming her
way past the security guards to the head of the long and crowded line of
visa applicants, shouting angrily, `This would never be allowed if the PNM
was in power.!' As is usual in Trinidad, a reactionary calypso, sung by
`Trinidad-White' Denise Plummer, provided a popular catharsis to this
sort of emotion. Its main chant, after extolling the many virtues of `sweet
Trinidad' was: `Where you going? Nowhere! Where you staying? Right
here! ... My home is right here in Trinidad. For me to leave here I must be
mad!'
For those from Indian Wood who were in Canada and awaiting their
hearings, living in shared housing, and either working at manual labour
or as casual help, there was very little communication with the people
back in the village. They received hardly any phone calls from home, with
the people in the village deciding that if there was work in Canada the
refugees could afford to call home. This raises the issue of saving face.
The villagers decided that those who did phone back had found the
best jobs. In fact, these callers were often the most homesick and worst
off, but felt obliged to maintain an image of well-being and prosperity.
The effect of this was to reinforce the underlying alienation, both of
Trinidadians at home from their own country's nationalism, and of those
in Canada who could receive little comfort from home except for reports
about how things were getting worse. The entire issue, as far as
perceptions of success in the refugee venture by the people themselves
was concerned, was beginning to revolve around the type of job attained
in Canada.
The majority of the villagers who had left Trinidad had still been
employed or were financially viable up to the time of departure. This was,
ironically, something of a prerequisite in order to be able to afford the
cost of travelling and maintenance upon arrival as a `visitor'. However, in
economic terms they felt certain that staying in Trinidad would mean
being laid off in the near future and then facing financial commitments
which were already becoming increasingly difficult to manage. The idea
of going to Canada to get a job and earn money was, from the start,
never hidden or denied except at the behest of certain immigration
lawyers or consultants. As one person put it; `I don't know about being an
economic refugee. All I know is that I can't remain in Trinidad. Maybe if I
was a Creole in Port of Spain they would give me work, but [the
government] don't care about we Indians in South at all. We only getting
retrenchment and crime in our tails.'
In other words, there was never any shame in being a refugee and
`abusing the refugee system' did not enter into their minds. They were
there to earn money and to take jobs which, apparently, Canadians did
not want. Indeed, a walk through downtown Toronto in 1988 would have
revealed dozens of `help wanted' notices in retail and restaurant outlets.
This suited the young and/or single refugees, but families with several
school-age children faced a more difficult task finding adequate
employment. When this did not always transpire there were, of course,
regrets.
I visited one such family in May of 1989, living in a subsidized
apartment at the top of a 14 story building in suburban Scarborough,
east of Toronto. The father, a former truck driver for a soft drink
company in southern Trinidad, had expected to simply sign up with a
long-haul truck company and drive large tractor-trailers across Canada.
He was shocked to find that he would have to do another driving test for
a particular licence, and that simply to rent a truck for the test would,
with the insurance involved, cost a prohibitive $2000 (CDN) dollars. He
planned to stay in Canada, living on the welfare payments provided by
the Ontario government, saying that he was only doing so because he
felt one of his daughters was getting a better education than `at home'.
The younger generation had less of a problem fitting in, even when
they could not, or would not, find a job. In some cases getting welfare
payments only confirmed to them what a great place Canada was. As
recognised refugees and as Ontario welfare recipients, even a bottle of
aspirin came free of charge on prescription from a friendly Canadian (ex-
Trinidadian) doctor. Any hostility from local Euro-Canadians seemed to
have been drowned out through fraternization with the rest of the
immigrant community, or through receptive church and community
youth groups. Those who preferred to maintain traditional Hindu ties
could gain access to the Hindu social networks in Toronto, some of them
predominantly Indo-Caribbean although, as Paranjpe (1986: 87) has
observed, even this sort of activity can be seen as a potential agent of
`Canadianization'.
Given the choice, younger people preferred to stay in Canada saying,
within the first few months of their arrival at least, that the place was just
like what they had expected from looking at television, though perhaps a
bit dirtier. One young man had told me in Trinidad in 1987 that if he
didn't get out of Trinidad he would `probably commit suicide'. In Canada
in 1989 he said that if he had to go back to Trinidad he would `definitely
commit suicide'.
Most of the refugees had resigned themselves to the fact that they
might well be sent back in the next year or two, following their
hearingsxvi. There never was any announcement of a general amnesty for
refugee claimants. Only one man has returned to Indian Wood, and this
was just to attend the funeral of his wife who had died suddenly.
Ironically, the Canadian authorities demanded that his sister in Montreal
had to place a bond ensuring that he would return to Canada to resume
his refugee hearings. He returned in three days.
Trinidad Indians as marginal refugees
The Trinidadians described in this paper, have been pragmatic in the
interim period, saving `foreign exchange', and planning for an eventual
return to Trinidad following an unsuccessful hearing. This is the reluctant
decision of most of the people involved, although later correspondence
indicates that many who had previously considered the whole venture
temporary, do wish to stay permanently if given the chance. An example
from the wife in one family:
I feel that if we get a good hearing we should stay. Is true some things here worse than in Trinidad. R------ not free to move and lime in the area how he does back home. But if I get on the subway, in half an hour I get to Toronto and there is plenty things to see. I ain't have no trouble moving from one job to another. Right now I working in a car plant kitchen. Things kind of easier in a way. Different worries but less worries. I find it strange that with all the bad talk about Canada at home about how white children does run wild, I find the children does stay in the house and just watch TV, more here than back home. You can control them more easier [sic].
The above account compares well with Ramcharan's (1983:61)
figures for Indo-Caribbean immigrants to Canada and their positive
attitudes towards remaining there. Initially only 45% felt this way versus
80% `after a period of years'. It also corroborates with Gosh (1983) who
noticed that, once in Canada, Indian women (in this case direct from the
sub-continent) may prove more sentimental about `home' than the men,
but that their implicit role as `custodians of religious and cultural
convictions' allows them an adaptability or, more accurately perhaps, a
tolerance (through a maintainable social distance) towards their new
(and often working) environment. This is probably truer for younger
rather than for older women, but no older Trinidad Indians went alone to
Canada as refugees.
The men from Trinidad, such as R------ mentioned by his wife
above, must, in contrast to the women, shift their gender identities
towards new, and usually more subservient, power relationships at work
and while initially liming (the Trinidadian term for informal socializing). In
this respect, that group of people which has come to be known as
`overseas Indians' (Kurian and Srivastava 1983: passim) who, as in this
case, have made a second migration, may have some advantages over
those who migrate straight from the sub-continent, when faced with the
all-encompassing and racist `Paki' labelling applied by many Euro-
Canadians. Fijian Indians in Vancouver, for example, tend to be highly
optimistic about their prospects and positive in their outlook on
[Euro-]Canadians, in extreme contrast with Sikhs direct from the Punjab
(Buchignani 1983:87).
Despite problems with assimilating family values, many overseas
Indians see themselves, and perceive of being seen as, meeting
Canadians half-way in terms of culture. That is to say, they share
materialistic ambitions and have the capability to act towards those
ambitions largely within the rules of Canadian society (ibid.). Most
migrating Trinidadians firmly believe, for example, that the `civilized'
aspects of Trinidad have prepared them handily for life abroad.
Importantly, however, the reverse is not so true. During the oil
boom, Trinidad communities began to receive so-called `freshwater
Yankees' and other returnees, but many were never re-accepted socially,
became unhappy, and returned to North America, even before the
Trinidad economy turned for the worse. One man from Indian Wood has
spent the last 20 years living for a few years at a time in both Canada
and Trinidad, superficially happy, yet perceptably uncomfortable in both
locales.
Therefore, it would probably be too optimistic, not to mention
ironically ethnocentric, to suggest that the Canadian experience may
have adapted the Indian Wood refugees to a better future in a
modernizing, capitalistic Trinidad, should they have to return. As recently
suggested by Brown (1987) and Drew (1987), the Indian diaspora
consistently display elements of social marginality (as opposed to
marginality on a more personal, individual, or aggregate level). This
consistency is in turn held (ibid.) to disprove theories similiar to the
evolutionary model of a serial pattern of contact, conflict, accomodation
and assimilation (Park 1950). Furthermore, the degree to which Indians
find themselves in an `ethnic quandry' (Vertovec 1990), is, once again,
strongly affected by the vagaries of the particular social situation and
environment. Thus, it is possible that individual Trinidad Indians can feel
less `harrassed' and less `under pressure' in Canada (or Britain, or the
United States) than `at home', i.e. in Trinidad. McLuhan and Powers have
recently described the mixed blessings of `"the missing face" of Canadian
culture' (1989: 147 ff.) in what they call the `global village'. In light of
this, there may well be an argument that it is better to be marginal in an
essentially `de-nationalizing' Canada given the stress of fluctuating
alienation and conflict that goes with being marginal in a stridently
`nationalizing' Trinidad.
Clearly, Trinidad's colonial-induced cultural plurality has failed to
satisfy the successful expression of many East Indian, and Creole,
nationalist aspirations, most of which, as characterized by Naipaul (e.g.
1987 [1967]; 1985 [1962]), include patterns of Western modernization
and `lifestyle'. Despite oil boom financing, attempts at mimicked
modernization remained superficial. Instead, more viable and successful
Trinidadian national expression, or `true-true Trini-styles' as they are
somewhat ironically described, such as carnival, calypso, steelband, and
also the Trinidad Indian festivals such as divali and phagwa, have
developed their characteristics precisely because of their quasi-
spontaneous atmosphere and `marginal', i.e. ethnic, roots. Yet
Trinidadians always consider it a `good thing' when different types of
people are seen participating (or just as usually, observing) these events.
Bluntly put, satisfaction with Trinidad nationalism can only be
partial through these efforts so long as mimicry remains part of people's
aspirations. The alternative cannot, therefore, be something inherently
Trinidadian. Hence the link between nationalism and ethnic identity. This
is not an ethnocentric statement in so far as Trinidad's nationalistic
constructions are not unique in being mytholigized and egalitarian in
nature (Segal 1987: 176).
Conclusion
Compared with recent Asian, African, and European events, with their
cases of visible destitution, violence, and loss of life, the Trinidad/Canada
refugee case may have been a small phenomenon; a blip on the
statistical charts. Nevertheless, it can be seen to illustrate and highlight
two important general points.
First of all it highlights the continuing crisis of defining exactly what a
`refugee' is. This crisis is not merely one of pure definition but of whether
a definition can be either useful or just in the changing international
conditions. Refugees/migrants from a particular country may be `merely'
seeking economic improvements in one month, and the next month they
may be fleeing for their lives, or vice versa. As Appe (1989) points out,
further burocratic definitions may only serve to confuse the governments
which are attempting to draft permanent legislation and policies to deal
with individuals from a hundred or more countries, each with varying
situations.
Although the positive approach would be to constantly modify
policy (Nettleton 1989), it will no doubt continue to be the case that some
refugees are accepted while others are rejected as `(economic)
migrants'. So what will the rejected ones do?
Secondly, once people believe their own country is `gone through' and,
for whatever reason, the belief exists that there is another place
temporarily available, the attraction for an escape can incorporate itself
into any local cycle of social anxiety, reaction, and reinforcing alienation
from formerly acquiescent national allegiances.
It has been beyond the scope of this paper to examine in detail
many of the related issues of racism, ethnicity, nationalism, or whether
one can compare this refugee episode with the original departure of
indentured Indians from India. Nevertheless, it is clear that in the light of
recent events in Trinidad, in Eastern Europe, and elsewhere, it is not
advisable to dismiss cases of `economic migrants' in an offhand manner.
Further analysis is necessary. As local constructs of national identities
selectively incorporate and/or reject the values and symbols of a more
global mass consumption (Miller 1987, 1990) the production of refugees
of alienation will increase.
--------------
Notes:
i.For religious statistics the 1980 census (op. cit.) showed Roman Catholics making up 33.6% of the population and Anglicans having 15.0% (both largely African and 'mixed'). Hindus have 25.0% (the second largest figure overall), Muslims 5.9%, and Presbyterians 3.9% (all three largely East Indian). An ambiguous 'other' category with 16.6% is made up of American evangelical and local cult/sectarian groups. Importantly, this is the only group figure to have grown appreciably (from 11.1%) since the 1970 census, indicating, in the case of evangelical movements, the strength of outside evangelical influences on Trinidad.
ii. Since this paper does not deal with Tobago, Trinidad's sister island with a minuscule Indian population, I shall be referring to the island of Trinidad as if it were the entire country.
iii. This division of attitudes towards Indian identity, as such, also exists in the historical literature on Indian plantation life in the Caribbean (Haraksingh 1985).
iv. For a more detailed summary of the political events leading up to the 1986 General election, see Yelvington 1987.
v. Divali, the Hindu Festival of Light, takes place in late October/early November of each year.
vi. In April 1989, CLUB '88 became the basis of a new political party, the UNC, or United National Congress.
vii. In the past few years, there has also been a dramatic increase in drug use, particularly involving 'crack' cocaine. As a result, there has also been a wholesale importation of North American anti-drug propaganda.
viii. The statistical suicide rate in Trinidad, in which adolescent East Indians figure prominently, amounts to one of the highest in the Western Hemisphere (Ministry of Health 1984: 23-24).
ix. see Ryan 1972; Nicholls 1971; Gosine 1987. The latter paper in particular reflects the sort of Indian intellectual pro-family/anti-Black prejudices which have contributed to an overall Indian alienation.
x. The events of July/August 1990 do not render this statement invalid. Trinidad Indians (of varying backgrounds and locales) I contacted during the abortive coup were indifferent to both the NAR government and the Muslimeem, and merely deplored the fact that the dispute would do nothing to improve the overall situation.
xi. e.g. Trinidad Guardian, Dec. 2nd 1988, p.1
xii. While there was a social revolt of sorts against the mission's work earlier in the century (Samaroo 1975, Campbell 1985), the Canadian influence had grown irreversibly.
xiii. Canada Today Magazine 22 (April 1989) Canadian High Commission, Trafalgar House, London.
xiv. This occurred despite frequent Trinidad press warnings of bogus immigration consultants (c.f. Sandesh Aug.7, 1987). It was often claimed that such persons had not managed to secure legal immigrant status even for themselves. The Guyanese reference reflects a general Trinidadian prejudice against Guyana (I am grateful to Kevin Yelvington and Brackette Williams for reminding me of this).
xv. This effect continued into 1990 ( for example see Trinidad Sunday Guardian 11/03/90 p.11), with the acceptence by the Canadian Immigration Refugee Board of the case of a 41-year old woman who claimed she had been harrassed by criminal activity in Trinidad but was refused police protection. It remains to be seen what effect this case, and the recent attempted coup, will have on the cases of other claimants.
xvi. Most of the 26 Trinidadians (Refuge 8(4), 1989:2) who had received an initial hearing, up to May 1989, had been sent back. This is from the (1988) press-estimated total of 3,000 to 4,000 who had made their way to Canada and who could expect a hearing.
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