On November 30th, Barbados celebrated its independence. Not from a dictatorial governmental unit, but rather, from the monarchy. After 400 years of being under English rule, Barbados is now a free state. It was finally able to elect a president instead of having the Queen as their head of state, making Barbados a republic of its own. These actions are incredibly similar to the United States in 1776, but with less bloodshed. However, this sparks an intriguing question: why did it take so long for Barbados to get its independence?
The first piece of history we need to note is that there were a lot of people who were enslaved and taken from Barbados. These people were forcibly ripped away from their environments to work in the cotton industry, or served as servants and maids all without pay. They were all treated as work animals. These injustices plagued the population of Barbados for years, meaning the country’s population was greatly reduced. The more people involved in something, the bigger change you are able to make. This is the first deciding factor of why it took longer for them to gain independence.
The second factor is what we’ve been discussing throughout “The Tempest”. The idea of colonialism through two lenses. The first being about the people. We dehumanize the people who are native in order to look superior or feel superior to the residents of the land that we are not a part of. This “us vs them” mentality often forces us into actively trying to colonize and convert these states. The second lens being how we value land in terms of power. The bigger and more impactful your area of rule is, the more powerful you are. When the British were doing their conquests to the New World right before they massacred the people there, they were looking for power. The wealth that came from beyond was what fueled their economy for decades. The fact that Barbados was aggressively colonized for these factors is the second reason they weren’t able to gain independence until now.
The island’s relationship with monarchy to this point had been about slavery. It was the relationship between the oppressed and the oppressor. When the citizens of Barbados were celebrating, and Prince Charles made an appearance, there were major calls for him to be uninvited because of what the royal family had done. This highlights a major part of colonization, the urge to continue to be nice to the oppressor. This is nothing short of Stockholm Syndrome on a higher skill. These smaller nations were forced to be nice to Britain for the last 400 years, and they actively can’t stray from that model because they don’t know how. Pleasing Britain was a major part of their society, and they continue to perpetuate that in their norms.
This reveals something major: the effects of colonization last longer than just the period of colonization. The fear of British rule continues to exist in Barbados, the fear of the government continues to exist between the Indigenous people and Canada’s government. The role of the oppressor versus the oppressed will always continue to be a relationship in which the oppressor benefits because of the deep rooted effects of colonization.
When speaking about my own opinion, I strongly believe Barbados needs to take a harder stance against the monarchy for the time being. Even if they continue to be in the commonwealth, they need to distance themselves from the royal family to try and repair the relationship between the government and its citizens after years of abuse. The harder the stance, the more that Barbados is able to show that it no longer tolerates the monarchy.
