Haiti is the Caribbean's oldest independent state and, in Lewis's account, one of its most awkwardly placed members. Admired for the revolution that founded it and kept at arm's length for the political turmoil that followed, the country was the last to enter CARICOM, joining only in 1997.

That double attitude, Lewis argues, has produced regional policy toward Haiti that pulls in two directions at once. The clearest case is CARICOM's handling of the February 2004 coup against Jean-Bertrand Aristide and the period that followed.

The paper asks why the relationship stays so unsettled despite Haiti's weight in the region. It works through the historical roots of Haiti's ties to CARICOM and through the ways member governments have responded to successive Haitian crises, with particular attention to the post-Aristide years. Lewis concludes that goodwill has existed on both sides, but that much of what regional cooperation with Haiti promised has not been delivered.