Lectures: Atlas d'Haïti

Summary

This review assesses the Atlas d'Haïti, published by CEGET. It acknowledges the atlas as an impressive reference work, with abundant information, beautiful maps, and precise notices. However, it expresses dissatisfaction: despite claiming to explore the spatial dimension of national reality, the atlas fails to provide a clear synthetic view of Haitian space, its specificity, regional patterns, and dramatic inequalities. The conventional thematic organization divides essential information, separating food-crop systems from rural development and landforms. The author argues that adding maps of economic and political networks, peasant poverty, and control structures—as in Girault's thesis—would demonstrate the value of cartographic analysis for development issues.