Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

This study examines the exploitation of Haitian migrant workers in the Dominican Republic’s sugarcane industry, focusing on structural violence, racial discrimination, and capitalist labor extraction. Based on fieldwork in El Seibo and San Pedro de Macorís, it reveals how legal precarity, forced dependency, and spatial segregation maintain the subjugation of Haitian laborers. The Dominican state and sugar companies produce and reproduce a reserve army of labor through a mix of legal exclusion, labor subjugation, and spatial confinement. The research connects these practices to historical colonial regimes, highlighting how Haitian workers’ exploitation fuels global sugar value chains and capitalist accumulation.

Keywords

Haitian migration structural violence sugarcane industry Dominican Republic reserve army of labor capitalist extraction

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Amnesty International (2025) Dominican Republic: The Fight Against Racism Must Be Respected and Protected by the Authorities. Amnesty International. Available at: https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2025/03/republica-dominicana-la-lucha-contra-el-racismo-debe-ser-respetada-y-protegida-por-las-autoridades/ (accessed 21 March 2025).

APnews (2025) Maltratos y expulsiones de haitianos de República Dominicana. APnews. Available at: https://apnews.com/article/noticias-4997192833f6d9cf2b8923882789dd74 (accessed 14 October 2025).

Arisma

(2022) La violence haïtienne contemporaine et sa mise en discours dans la presse écrite: état, identité et representations. Doctoral Dissertation, Université Paul Valéry-Montpellier III; Université d’Etat d’Haïti.

Associated Press (2025) Dominican Republic Under Fire as Deportations of Pregnant and Breastfeeding Women to Haiti Rise. AP News. Available at: https://apnews.com (accessed 15 April 2025).

Audebert

(2020) Caribbean migration spaces and transnational networks: the case of the Haitian diaspora. In: Audebert

(ed.) Border Transgression and Reconfiguration of Caribbean Spaces. Springer, pp.71–93.

Balibar

Wallerstein

(1991) Race, Nation, Class: Ambiguous Identities ( Turner

, Trans.). Verso.

BBC Mundo (s.f.) (2025) Mi hermana está recién parida y la tienen detenida: “cruele”, redadas en Hospitales de República Dominicana en las que arrestan a embarazadas haitianas para deportarlas. Available at: https://www.bbc.com/mundo/articles/cd7vj03j9n8o (accessed 25 April 2025).

BMC Public Health (2019) Perceived discrimination in bateyes of the Dominican Republic: results from the everyday discrimination scale and implications for public health programs. BMC Public Health 19: 1519. DOI: 10.1186/s12889-019-7773-2

Boisseron

(2010) Haitians and Dominicans: the (pre)occupations of race and history. Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism 14(1): 92–104.

10.

Bouilly

Paraison

Rojas

, et al. (2020a) Perceived discrimination in bateyes of the Dominican Republic: Everyday Discrimination Scale results and public health implications. Revista Panamericana de Salud Pública 44: e104.

11.

Bouilly

, et al. (2020b) Racialized borders and gendered exclusions: Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic. Latin American Perspectives 47(2): 63–83.

12.

Bourdieu

(1977) Outline of a Theory of Practice ( Nice

, Trans.). Cambridge University Press.

13.

Bourgeois

(2023) A la sombra de los mangos: Frontera(s), raza y nación en República Dominicana. Cuadernos Inter.cambio sobre Centroamérica y el Caribe 20(2): e56252.

14.

Braun

Clarke

(2006) Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qualitative Research in Psychology 3(2): 77–101.

15.

Cabral

(1979) Unity and Struggle: Speeches and writings of Amílcar Cabral ( Wolfers

., Trans.). New York & London: Monthly Review Press.

16.

CAC (n.d.) Our Consortium (2025). Consorcio Azucarero Central. Available at: https://cac.com.do/en/nuestro-consorcio/ (accessed 9 September 2025).

17.

Castel

(2021) Trabajo, deuda y chantaje: Los braceros haitianos en los cañaverales de la República Dominicana. Latin American Research Review 56(4): 877–890.

18.

Castel

(2025) Dominican bateyes and the Haitians: new reconfigurations of a colonial legacy. Confluenze. Rivista di Studi Iberoamericani 17(1): 55–76. DOI: 10.6092/issn.2036-0967/17720.

19.

Castles

(2006) Guestworkers in Europe: a resurrection? International Migration Review 40(4): 741–766.

20.

Castor

(1988) L’occupation américaine d’Haïti. Les Classiques des Sciences Sociales.

21.

Catanese

(1999) Haitians: Migration and Diaspora. 1st ed. Routledge. DOI: 10.4324/9780429040412.

22.

Central Romana (n.d.) Corporate Structure (2025). Central Romana Corporation. Available at: https://centralromana.com.do/en/corporate-structure/agriculture/ (accessed 9 September 2025).

23.

Darder

(2012) Culture and Power in the Classroom: Educational Foundations for the Schooling of Bicultural Students. 2nd ed. Routledge.

24.

Dauvergne

(2008) Making People Illegal: What Globalization Means for Migration and Law. Cambridge University Press. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511810459

25.

De Castro

(2014) La desdemocratización de las relaciones laborales en los enclaves globales de producción agrícola. In: Pedreño Cánovas

(ed.) De cadenas, migrantes y jornaleros. Los territorios rurales en las cadenas globales agroalimentarias. Talasa, pp.59–77.

26.

De Genova

(2002) Migrant “illegality” and deportability in everyday life. Annual Review of Anthropology 31(1): 419–447. DOI: 10.1146/annurev.anthro.31.040402.085432

27.

Delba

AMB

(2018) Genocidio civil de dominicanos y dominicanas de ascendencia haitiana en la República Dominicana. Meridional. Revista Chilena de Estudios Latinoamericanos (10): 179–186.

28.

Derby

(1994) Haitians, magic, and money: Raza and society in the Haitian-Dominican borderlands, 1900–1937. Comparative Studies in Society and History 36(3): 488–526.

29.

Dery

Molinero-Gerbeau

(2024) Structural, historical, and geopolitical violence as an identity marker of Haitian nationals and migrants. National Identities 26(4): 451–468.

30.

Dery

Molinero-Gerbeau

(2025) Haitian Reserve Army of Labor: a product of geopolitical, endemic, and phenomenological violence. Journal of World-System Research. forthcoming

31.

Durkheim

(1984) The Division of Labor in Society ( Halls

W. D.

, Trans.). Free Press. (Original work published 1893.)

32.

Durkheim

(2019) The division of labor in society. In: Durkheim

(ed.) Social Stratification, Class, Race, and Gender in Sociological Perspective. 2nd ed. Routledge, pp.178–183.

33.

Engels

(2003) The condition of the working class in England. American Journal of Public Health 93(8): 1246–1249.

34.

Fanon

(1961) The Wretched of the Earth ( Farrington

, Trans.). Grove Press. (Original work published 1961.)

35.

Fanon

(2008) Black Skin, White Masks ( R.

Philcox

, Trans.). Grove Press. (Original work published 1952).

36.

Farmer

(2004) Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor. University of California Press.

37.

Ferguson

(2003) Migration in the Caribbean: Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Beyond. Minority Group Internacional.

38.

Foster

McChesney

(2018) The global reserve army of labour and the new imperialism. In: Aronowitz

Roberts

(eds) Class: The Anthology. Wiley-Blackwell, pp.485–502.

39.

Fraser

(2019) The Old Is Dying and the New Cannot Be Born: From Progressive Neoliberalism to Trump and Beyond. Verso Books.

40.

Galtung

(1969) Violence, peace, and peace research. Journal of Peace Research 6(3): 167–191.

41.

Gauthier

(2017) Les travailleurs agricoles en République Dominicaine: Une analyse de l’exploitation dans le secteur sucrier. Éditions Sociales.

42.

Howard

(2001) Coloring the Nation: Race and Ethnicity in the Dominican Republic. Signal Books.

43.

Howard

(2007) Development, racism, and discrimination in the Dominican Republic. Development in Practice 17(6): 725–738.

44.

Human Rights Watch (1990) Dominican Republic: forced recruitment and abuse of Haitian sugarcane workers. World Report 1990, Chapter on the Dominican Republic. (Discussion found in pp. 12–15.)

45.

ILO (2019) Working Conditions in the Dominican Sugar Industry: A Report on Migrant Workers. International Labour Organization.

46.

Instituto Dominicano del Azúcar (INAZÚCAR) (2025) About the Industry. Dominican Sugar Institute. Available at: https://www.dominicansugar.org/about-the-industry (accessed 9 September 2025).

47.

Instituto Azucarero Dominicano (2025) Estadísticas institucionales 2025 [Institutional Statistics 2025]. Available at: https://inazucar.gov.do/transparencia/index.php/estadisticas/category/1057-2025 (accessed 9 september 2025).

48.

Jansen

(2021) Perceptions of ethnic difference in a transnational context: a case study from the batey Alejandro Bass (Dominican Republic). In: Morales

(ed.) Topics in Spanish Linguistic Perceptions. John Benjamins, pp.141–162. DOI: 10.1075/ihll.32.06jan

49.

Kaiser , et al. (2015) Social stressors, social support, and mental health among Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic. Revista Panamericana de Salud Pública [Pan American Journal of Public Health] 38(2): 157–162.

50.

Loop Haïti (2024) Voici les chiffres du “Programme Biden” jusqu’à mi-juillet. Available at: https://haiti.loopnews.com/content/plus-de-205-mille-haitiens-approuves-dans-le-programme-biden (accessed 23 July 2024).

51.

Lugones

(2007) Heterosexualism and the colonial/modern gender system. Hypatia 22(1): 186–209. DOI: 10.1111/j.1527-2001.2007.tb01156.x

52.

Lundahl

(1983) The Haitian Economy: Man, Land and Markets. St. Martin’s Press.

53.

Madruga

, et al. (1990) El batey: Estudio socioeconómico de los bateyes del Consejo Estatal del Azúcar. CEDEE.

54.

Maldonado-Torres

(2007) On the coloniality of being: contributions to the development of a concept. Cultural Studies 21(2–3): 240–270.

55.

Martínez

(1995) Peripheral Migrants: Haitians and Dominican Sugar Plantations. University of Tennessee Press.

56.

Martínez

Wooding

(2017) El antihaitianismo en la República Dominicana: ¿un giro biopolítico? Migración y Desarrollo 15(28): 95–123.

57.

Marx

(1867) Capital: A Critique of Political Economy ( Fowkes

, Trans.). Penguin Classics. (Original work published 1867.)

58.

Mayol

(2024) Sugar annual: Dominican Republic. Report No. DR2024-0003. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agricultural Service. Available at: https://apps.fas.usda.gov/newgainapi/api/Report/DownloadReportByFileName?fileName=Sugar+Annual_Santo+Domingo_Dominican+Republic_DR2024-0003&utm_source=chatgpt.com (accessed 10 April 2024).

59.

Memmi

(1957) The Colonizer and the Colonized ( Greenfeld

, Trans.). Beacon Press.

60.

Mignolo

(2000) Local Histories/Global Designs: Coloniality, Subaltern Knowledges, and Border Thinking. Princeton University Press.

61.

Mintz

(1985) Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History. Viking.

62.

Molinero-Gerbeau

(2023) Periphery-core migrations and the global capitalist agriculture. In: Atzeni

Azzellini

Mezzadri

, et al. (eds) Handbook of Research on the Global Political Economy of Work. Edward Elgar, pp.292–301.

63.

Molinero-Gerbeau

Avallone

(2016) Producing cheap food and labour: migrations and agriculture in the capitalistic world-ecology. Social Change Review 14(2): 121–148.

64.

Moore

(2000) Sugar and the expansion of the early modern world-economy: commodity frontiers, ecological transformation, and industrialization. Review (Fernand Braudel Center) 23(3): 409–433. Available at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/i40009270

65.

Moore

(2010) The end of the road? Agricultural revolutions in the capitalist world-ecology 1450–2010. Journal of Agrarian Change 10(3): 389–413.

66.

Morice

(2001) Les politiques migratoires: Entre utilitarisme et répression. Hommes & Migrations (1230): 6–17.

67.

New York Times (2025a) U.S. blocks Dominican Republic sugar imports, citing forced labour. New York Times. 14 October 2025. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/23/business/economy/us-sugar-imports-forced-labour.html?searchResultPosition=1

68.

New York Times (2025b) Han sido apátridas en la República Dominicana durante una década. Hoy enfrentan la deportación a Haití. New York Times. 14 October 2025. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/es/2023/10/06/espanol/republica-dominicana-deportar-haiti.html

69.

Nkrumah

(1965) Neo-Colonialism: The Last Stage of Imperialism. Thomas Nelson & Sons.

70.

OEC (2025) Raw Sugar in Dominican Republic Trade. OEC – The Observatory of Economic Complexity. Available at: https://oec.world/en/profile/bilateral-product/raw-sugar/reporter/dom (accessed 9 October 2025).

71.

OIM (2025) Haiti Latin America. Available at: https://dtm.iom.int/haiti (accessed 8 november 2025).

72.

Patten

Arboleda-Flórez

(2004) Epidemic theory and group violence. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology 39: 853–856.

73.

Patton

(2015) Qualitative Research & Evaluation Methods. Sage.

74.

Quijano

(2000) Coloniality of Power, Eurocentrism, and Latin America. Nepantla: Views from South 1(3): 533–580.

75.

Reyes

(2020) The Exploitation of Haitian Agricultural Workers: Dynamics of Migration and Precarity. Ocean Atlantic University Press.

76.

RFK Human Rights (2024) Stateless and Vulnerable: The Ongoing Crisis of Haitian Descent in the Dominican Republic. RFK Human Rights.

77.

RFK Human Rights (2025) Organizaciones de la sociedad civil condenan expulsiones colectivas de República Dominicana y llaman a su cese inmediato. RFK Human Rights. Available at: https://rfkhumanrights.org/our-voices/organizaciones-de-la-sociedad-civil-condenan-expulsiones-colectivas-de-republica-dominicana-y-llaman-a-su-cese-inmediato/ (accessed 14 October 2025).

78.

Robinson

(1983) Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition. Zed Press.

79.

Ruguoy

(2008) Al pie de la Cruz. Vida y Pensamiento 28(2): 103–124.

80.

Ruppel

(2025) The making of a reserve army of labor: Paradoxes of American disability policy. Critical Sociology 51(3): 451–469.

81.

Sayad

(2006) The Suffering of the Immigrant ( Macey

, Trans.). Polity Press. (Original work published 1999.)

82.

The Guardian (2025) Dominican Republic deports pregnant women in “inhumane” migrant crackdown. The Guardian. 20 April. Available at: https://theguardian.com

83.

Trouillot

(1990) Haiti: State Against Nation. The Origins and Legacy of Duvalierism. Monthly Review Press.

84.

Tull

Salusky

(2019) Help-seeking among women of Haitian descent in the Dominican Bateyes. Journal of Black Psychology 45(5): 379–404.

85.

United Nations (1965) International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. Available at: https://www.ohchr.org/en/instruments-mechanisms/instruments/international-convention-elimination-all-forms-racial

86.

USAID (2025) Call for Diaspora Partnership Concept Papers – USAID. Available at: https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/2022-05/72052122APS242_APS-OAA-21-00001_Addendum_USAIDHaiti.pdf (accessed 20 March 2025).

87.

U.S. Department of Labor (2025) Seventh Periodic Review of Implementation of Recommendations in the U.S. Department of Labor’s Public Report of Review of Submission 2011-03 (Dominican Republic). U.S. Department of Labor. Available at: https://www.dol.gov/sites/dolgov/files/ILAB/DOL-Seventh-Periodic-Report-on-Submission-2011-03-Dominican-Republic-Sugar-v2.pdf (accessed 14 October 2025).

88.

Valdéz

MBG

(2021) Migración, racismo y cultura. Elementos para analizar “la cuestión haitiana” en República Dominicana. 1991. Revista de Estudios Internacionales 3(1): 1–17.

89.

Wallerstein

(1983) Historical Capitalism. Verso.

90.

Wallerstein

(1995) Historical Capitalism with Capitalist Civilization. Verso.

91.

Weber

(1947) The Theory of Social and Economic Organization ( Henderson

Parsons

, Trans.). Free Press. (Original work published 1922.)

92.

Weber

(2009) The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. Simon & Schuster.

93.

Wiarda

(1968) Haitians in the Dominican sugar industry. Caribbean Studies 8(2): 5–24.

94.

Wooding

Moseley-Williams

(2004) Needed But Unwanted. Catholic Institute for International Relations.

95.

Wooding

, et al. (2004) Inmigrantes haitianos y dominicanos de ascendencia haitiana en la República Dominicana (Vol. 4). Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo (CID).

96.

World Bank (2025) Dominican Republic Raw Cane Sugar, in Solid Form – Imports and Exports (Comtrade, 2023). WITS/World Bank Group. Available at: https://wits.worldbank.org/trade/comtrade/en/country/DOM/year/2023/tradeflow/Exports/partner/ALL/product/170111 (accessed 14 October 2025).

“We work in the light but get paid in the dark”: Structural violence and Haitian labor in Dominican sugarcane production

Abstract

Keywords

Get full access to this article

References