The 1400

Renaissance – Trinidad and Tobago
The 1400’s ushered out the dark ages and brought a period of art, culture, revitialism, shifting
paradigms, thinkers with a deep appreciation for humanity and the humanities in western
culture. We, here in Trinidad and Tobago have been in our dark ages for the longest time and
have been crying to enter an era of renaissance. Any society that is to be civilized, progressive
and sustainable must discover and infuse its people with the arts. We pride ourselves on
movement towards a knowledge based economy, when what we need is a value based society,
not of economic value based on industries and intellectual capital, rather value in the form of
knowing how to live, life skills, value for life, and respect for law, history the environment and
humanity. Too often we transfer models in their entirety from developed nations into our own,
not considering the hundreds of years those societies took to develop and to produce those
civic minded well cultured citizens that make the system work.
My hope is not to soften the industriousness and aspirations of our people by romanticizing on
what we ought to be, but it must be admitted that our institutions have failed us, so too have
our leaders and our people have therefore developed a culture of lawlessness which, if left to
continue shall suppress the growth we have achieved thus far. The Marxist perspective on
education alludes to schools reinforcing class distinctions and encourages children to passively
accept a pre-determined or expected future for themselves. Sounds familiar? Unfortunately
ours and many other education systems place more value on achieving economic prosperity
than on molding socially acceptable, adaptable and civilized minds. But we are a small nation
and should be able to put in place the machinery to enforce change, this is a fact. A society
sees its crescendo when the arts, cultural diversity, innovation, philosophy, agriculture and like
elements flows through its veins. Akin to this school of thought is the Islamic Golden age, the
Scottish Enlightment, Italy’s Renaissance which subsequently permeated the rest of Europe.
The evidence is there to see and history does indeed repeat itself.
In order to allow social change (which we are desperately in need of) to occur, we need to
superimpose social constructs that allows the norms to skew in a positive direction thereby
avoiding deviance. Once we allow the norms, those unwritten rules, the interaction, to be
counterproductive we proliferate another generation of vipers.
The social programmes meant to offset social ills in our society leaves much to be desired, they
are nothing more than an easy way out of one’s immediate situation, and does not contain that
sustainability factor that adds real value, conversely they encourage dependency on the state
with only a handful emerging with some entrepreneurial streak and work ethic. The U.K. has an
excellent programme called ‘County Community Project’ where they provide a range of
services, such as intervention for persons on or coming off drug use, educational services by
way of personal advisors that coach and builds self esteem and confidence in students with
little prospects at school on a one to one basis. The program has an aspect of volunteerism and
attacks a problem by approaching it as opposed to having the problems approach the
programme. Dealing with the issues at this micro level, within homes are key to successful
intervention, and it is here my mind drifts back to the community police and how effective that
tool could have become in our box of solutions.
The dictionary of Public Health defines a failed state as ‘a nation or comparable administrative
jurisdiction in which essential infrastructure, including health services, law enforcement, and
other necessities for collective and personal health and safety, has broken down because of
lawlessness and anarchy’. While there is good sense in the ranks, it’s time to re-discover, re-
think, re-tool and re-brand ourselves before we become a Zimbabwe, Guinea or Somalia.
E. Rampaul
Princes Town

The 1400

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Renaissance – Trinidad and Tobago

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