Third Wave Of Haitian Immigration Essay

The first large wave of Haitian immigrants coming to the US happened from 1957 through most of the 1960’s, as Haitians were fleeing the fascist and oppressive Duvalier regime in control of the Haitian government. The Haitian immigrants were families of upper class educated professionals and middle-class skilled workers, with the majority of those groups leaving Haiti, depleting it of its educated and highly-skilled societal members and workforce. The Haitian immigrants in the US were seen as being Black, and soon challenged with societal systemic oppression from institutional racism. However, being that these immigrants had the highest levels of socio-economic status in Haiti, they also had resources to cope with and combat the oppression (Desrosiers & St. Fleurose, 2002; Prou, 2005). The second wave of Haitian immigrants took place during a large part of the 1970’s; whole families legally entered the US and were skilled professionals who still had enough resources to cope with being a marginalized group in American society (Desrosiers & St. Fleurose, 2002; Prou, 2005). …show more content…
The immigrants in the third wave have few economic resources and limited education. Parents may be dislocated from their children, and not reuniting for a decade or more (Desrosiers & St. Fleurose, 2002; Prou, 2005). The third wave still continues today, as evidenced that as of March 14, 2018, in the current fiscal year, the Coast Guard has discovered 1,040 Haitians trying to illegally enter the US by boat (Desrosiers & St. Fleurose, 2002; Neal, 2018; Prou,