ABSTRACT
The Lavalas Project was to be implemented over Jean-Bertrand Aristide's five-year mandate. The Lavalas development model is a variant of the basic-needs or growth-with-equity model that emerged in the Caribbean during the 1970s and 1980s. In Haiti, the transformation of Port-au-Prince into the principal metropolitan center and the accumulation and concentration there of material, social, and cultural resources occurred at the expense of the provincial cities and their hinterlands. According to the Lavalas development model, the point of departure for a reconstructed and democratic Haiti lay in addressing the peasant question and considering the peasants' interests and points of view as primary. The Lavalas development model was essentially a moderate version of social democracy. The Lavalas development model appeared to be very moderate and feasible because it remained compatible with the apparent interests of the Haitian bourgeoisie and would later win the approval of regulatory agencies in the core capitalist countries.
