The Triumph of Disorder 1958–1962

Abstract

Examined in retrospect the demise of the federation lends itself to a teleological explanation in which the constant arguments amongst the principal actors led inevitably to its dissolution amidst much rancour and bitterness in 1962. This was not how it was experienced at the time. Until the Jamaican referendum in September 1961, which most expected Manley and the anti-secessionists to win, it was assumed by the participants that the majority of the inhabitants of the Anglophone Caribbean would attain independence as one nation called The West Indies. Constitutional reform was enacted in 1960 in order to introduce a system of Cabinet government and this appeared to mark the penultimate step in the process of decolonisation. At the Lancaster House conference the following year preparations were made for independence in 1962. It was only once the Jamaican people voted to leave the federation that it became evident that the attempt to achieve political unity across the Anglophone Caribbean had been overly ambitious. Faced with the piecemeal, disorderly constitutional process which they had regarded as the worst possible outcome, British policymakers were inclined to blame the regional leaders for the failure and their views have been endorsed by many later commentators. Whilst it is impossible to ignore the contribution made by local rivalry, this ought not to obscure the culpability of a metropolitan government which was committed theoretically to federalism but which was, at the level of detailed policymaking, unsympathetic to the dilemmas which confronted the people of the Anglophone Caribbean.