Book Review…Revisiting the Revolution

Jan 10, 2016 Book Review…, Features / Columnists

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Book: Grenada: Revolution and Invasion
Edited by Patsy Lewis, Gary Williams, and Peter Clegg
Reviewer: Dr Glenville Ashby

The bloodless 1979 coup d’état that pushed a small, obscure state unto a global geopolitical stage was affectionately called ‘The Revo.’
Reeling from the excesses of autocratic regimes, left-leaning activists challenged the

status quo. The Zeitgeist revolution of 1970s powered Grenadian intellectuals to the levers of power and the stage was set for a social, political and economic experiment that stirred the imagination of the marginalized, but incurred the suspicion and wrath of the United States and it’s right-leaning friends.
At the outset, a prodigious, insightful agenda proved transformational, impacting the lives of the disenfranchised. Economic empowerment, infrastructural development, a thrust in education, and teacher training programmes in a society with an unforgiving literacy rate were clear indicators that ‘The Revo’ was attuned to the pulse of the people.
But its abrupt implosion and subsequent invasion by US troops at the invitation of a handful of Caribbean countries, sent shockwaves to every corner of the globe, raising the $64,000 question: What went wrong?
‘Grenada: Revolution and Invasion’ is a timely oeuvre that ably responds to a series of unanswered questions. Well-edited, rigorous, almost clinical, it employs several multidisciplinary tools to grasp the unconscious factors that sparked this tragedy. ‘Grenada’ offers as a stark, pulsating, and evocative account of the build-up to the murder of Maurice Bishop and the US assault on the Caribbean nation. Every essay is revealing. Every writer is profoundly resourceful, offering a unique perspective on the rise and fall of the People’s Revolutionary Government.ý
This is an undertaking that goes beyond the draw of political and military intrigue. It delves into history, human rights, feminism and Jungian psychology. It invites students of political science to revisit the applicability of political theories. Many will realize that the human psyche – a product of forces, known and obscure – is the only barometer of success or failure. Throughout, there is an appeal to Kantian views of bioethics and morals. Indeed, there are universal principles that transcend political prescriptions. Sexism, narcissism and arrogance displayed by some party members eroded popular support. And the inability to implement basic policies to fully empower women left some pondering that a revolution within the revolution was needed. Further, the obsession to establish a Marxist-Leninist vanguard in a former black British colony by Bernard Coard and his supporters threatened party unity.
Notably, the writers are measured, never by swayed by romanticism or apologism, albeit there is a spattering of emotions bleeding through some of the presentations.
British attorney, Richard Hart, in ‘The Grenada Diaries,’ recalls brimming emotions during his evacuation: “It was very sad to see Queens Park, the scene of so many rallies…swarming with American soldiers …I was sitting next to Shahiba and could see her tears and my own eyes were quite moist..”
Patsy Lewis’s “A Response to Edward Seaga’s Grenada Intervention,” is detailed in her rejection of the former Prime Minister’s claim that the US intervention was legitimate and legal. She also adds that Seaga’s defence of the invasion presented in his book, “The Grenada Intervention: The Inside Story,” – is anachronistic, loaded with Cold War rhetoric, and fails “to better understand the time, developmental concerns and challenges facing small states, or to reflect on alternative responses to the crisis”.
Robert J. Beck takes this discourse a step further in “The Grenada Invasion, International Law and the Scoon Invitation”. He acknowledges Governor General Scoon’s request for external assistance as authentic, but adds another layer to this legal imbroglio by examining the intervention in Lebanon and Sri Lanka during the Cold War. He concurs with G. Nolte’s thesis in “Intervention by Invitation,” that “international recognition of the internal character of a conflict and the legitimacy of a government played an important role…in the acceptance by other States of interventions at the invitation of a government.”
Writers speak to the collective conscience of Grenada, its cultural archetype and foreboding psychic traumas that it suffers in silence. The pain is hidden, secretly nursed, only to surface with injurious effect.
State terror precipitated the sheer horror of the US invasion, leaving deep, psychic scars. Grenadians are yet to heal. Memories of boys trained to handle guns to defend the revolution are not easily erasable.
In ‘Women in the Grenada Revolution, 1979-1983,’ one soldier’s words tell the psychological static of a people primed for violence: “As a soldier, one learned who the enemy is and they become not a person who has ideas and thoughts that could reason….I wanted so much to kill a Yankee soldier, to slit his throat and feel the knife cutting into his flesh…”
When this rhetoric seeps into the wider society through mass mobilization of militias, battle lines are drawn and a pervasive sense of distrust is created. The murder of Bishop sparked social and psychological schisms. Confusion, acrimony and angst overwhelmed a people. The unimaginable irony of the invasion – the US assuming the rule as savior, split the psyche on a personal and national level.
The trauma of the 1983 October events is buried, too frightening to unearth. But, as Collins argues in “What Happened,” a nation must heal, restore it dissociative parts to realize its fullest potential.
“Narrative, “he pens, “is a powerful source for examining not just personalities but also complex experiences of trauma…” He later asks, “Somewhere in Grenada’s history, had there developed a personality cult that made politicians of any ilk inclined to promote their ideas and personalities even when a majority of the populace seemed not inclined to support them? He later responds to his own enquiry: “Grenada’s political culture was historically very authoritarian, elitist, focused on the ‘maximum leader.’”
It is this unconscious force that shaped the tortuous outcome of the revolution. Yes, the party misfired, forcibly hoisting a political system through autocratic, if not violent means. Ironically, it resorted to the very tactics that shaped the nation’s history.
And a fitting corollary to the traumatic events of October 1983 is offered in Jermaine O. McCalpin’s, “Written to Amnesia?” Here, the writer emphasises that reconciliation is illusory without justice. Of the effectiveness of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, it argues that “given its poor diet and poor eyesight, it ended up cataloguing the pain of the past without providing a basis on which Grenada could move forward. In the end, the report has helped to write the past into amnesia, and Grenadians …are keeping silent, almost as a solemn vow.”
Despite its deficits and tragic denouement, the revolution triumphed on multiple levels. In the end, though, ’Grenada’ stretches the imagination, clamoring for long term reflection and study. Indeed, that a movement, so spirited, authentic, and organic, buckled under ideology and the frailties of human nature is a damning statement on the fate of societies.

Feedback: glenvilleashby@gmail.com or follow him @glenvilleashby
Grenada: Revolution and Invasion
ISBN: 978-976-640-555-7
Publisher: The University of the West Indies Press 2015
Rating: Essential
Available: Amazon

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