Education and Multi-Cultural Cohesion in the Caribbean:the Case of Belize, 1931 - 1981

The thesis of this book is concerned with the British neglect of education in Belize and the emergence of increased tensions between church and state, from the twin catalysts for social change of the 1931 hurricane and economic depression until independence in 1981. This conflict has revealed a contradictory web of power structures and their influence, through the medium of schools, on multi-cultural development. The fundamental argument is that despite a rhetoric-of-difference, a cohesive society was created in Belize rooted in the cultural values propagated through an often contradictory church,state education system, and that Jesuit supremacy of Belizean education came too late to unsettle or exploit the grass root forces of cultural synthesis. Racial conflict in Belize is more a matter of habitual rhetoric and superficial.