This volume is projected as the first in a series of four books describing the results of the research carried out by a team of seven American social scientists in 1960 on elites and nationalism in the British Caribbean area. Volume I covers a variety of topics to be dealt with more intensively in the forthcoming volumes and includes nine articles on problems of individual islands.

One of the best articles is “The Intellectual Background to the Democratic Revolution in Trinidad.” Ivan Oxaal’s conclusions may well apply to the other islands as well. Most of the articles are based on the analysis of responses to questionnaires distributed among the political, social, and economic leaders of the islands, and in one case among a certain number of university and secondary school students. The researchers have assumed that the attitudes of the leaders actually determine the fate of the British West Indies. It is true that universal suffrage and elected governments have succeeded foreign bureaucratic rule in the West Indies, but the use of political power for social and economic reorganization is obstructed by the rather inflexible economic control of former political masters and by the fact that the islands are caught up in external trading and financial mechanisms. If radical reforms are not soon forthcoming, a social revolution may follow the bloodless political revolution. The Caribbean peoples have realized, however, that they cannot exist economically without certain ties with their former European overlords, and in language, education, and communications they are still closer to Great Britain, France, or the Netherlands than to each other.

Reviewing the conclusions of the social scientists, a historian, quite familiar with the area, finds them very similar to his own, arrived at by observation and reading, without questionnaires and data-processing equipment. The conclusions are not startling to foreign observers, but some of the frank revelations may not be welcome to some of the local leaders. Charles L. Moskos and Wendell Bell discovered that only 28 percent of the West Indian leaders consider the voters to be competent to judge the candidates and issues, and only 50 percent of them feel that the democratic form of government is very suitable to the West Indies. Jamaican leaders seem to be the most democratic, while leaders of some small islands and Guyana are mostly authoritarian types. The authors believe that, with the exception of Guyana, the British West Indies are still predominantly pro-Western. However, their attitudes toward egalitarianism justify only mild optimism concerning their future.

The study of racial, class, and power relations in Barbados should have been accompanied by a study of similar problems in Guyana and Trinidad, where they are of particular importance. An outsider feels that, where tested, the Negroes and whites tend to cling together against the East Indians, partially because of economic considerations, and partially because of cultural and religious background. Where the Indian group is small, there is a sharp division between the whites and all non-white groups, only the Chinese siding with the whites. The seriousness of the management and labor problems in Andrew P. Phillips’ article on Antigua has been demonstrated by recent labor riots there. In regard to Jamaica, the book ends in an optimistic vein. Nevertheless, the Caribbean islands do not have much hope for survival, unless they are united in a true federation.

Emphasis has been put on West Indian nationalism and the need to develop West Indian nationality, despite the very diverse racial, religious, and national cultural backgrounds of these peoples. An ancient place name in Tobago—the Bay of Courland—leads the reviewer to an interesting historical contrast. This bay got its name from the western part of Latvia, whose people had once settled Tobago and have long since vanished. While the small West Indian islands have achieved their independence, Latvia and other Baltic States have lost theirs to Russia since World War II. The ancient, culturally highly developed Baltic nations are facing the prospect of losing their national identity and their ancient lands under the pressure of forceful Russification.

Self-determination of nations and equality for all are not yet the lot of all mankind, but one never loses hope for a better world. The reviewer shares Bell’s view that democratic revolution is unfinished business everywhere and that the West Indies, like other areas, will further benefit by it.