by Larry Smith
As Franklyn Wilson noted, the country's overall approach to immigration was settled as far back as the early 1970s, and yet we can still waste time over it today. The issue was put to rest by the implementation of a strict Bahamianisation policy by the new PLP government, accompanied by a massive investment in education.
These two policy shifts reversed a trend towards the wholesale recruitment of expatriates, and broadened educational opportunities for Bahamians who could then expand the nation's middle class.
As the late Dr Keva Bethel described the period immediately following the Second World War: "The highest forms of employment to which the majority of Bahamians were likely to be able to aspire...were posts in the civil service, teaching, nursing, or the church. Moreover, only a proportionately modest number actually achieved those positions."
But in the first years after majority rule in 1967, the government spent as much as 19 per cent of the annual budget on education, building new schools throughout the country to provide better education for all Bahamian children.
Continue reading "Immigration Policy and Political Propaganda in the Bahamas" »

The History of Migration to the Bahamas
by Larry Smith
A new book by former Antiquities, Monuments & Museums Corporation chief Keith Tinker collates everything we need to know about regional migration to the Bahamas - from prehistoric times to the present.
Tinker, 57, is a historian who led the AMMC from its inception in 1998 until last year. Before that he was a civil servant in the Ministry of Finance and the Department of Co-operatives, also teaching part-time at the College of the Bahamas. He holds degrees in history from West Indies College in Jamaica, Florida Atlantic University, and Florida State University.
The Migration of Peoples from the Caribbean to the Bahamas was published last year by University Press of Florida. Unfortunately, although it is only 200 pages with no photographs, the hardback edition is expensive - over $70 retail - which will limit its accessibility.
Tinker describes migration to the Bahamas from English-speaking countries in the West Indies since Emancipation. His interest was sparked by the relatively large West Indian presence here - Trinidadian prison overseers, Barbadian policemen, Haitian tailors, Jamaican teachers, Guyanese surveyors - and the lack of scholarship on the subject.
Continue reading "The History of Migration to the Bahamas" »
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