Abstract

The Haitian Revolution was the most radical revolution in the «Age of Revolutions». Overthrowing the system of planation slavery and colonial domination in the late 18th century, the revolution led by formerly enslaved Africans and Afro-Caribbeans operated at least two levels within the domain of political ideas and action. In the first elements of the revolutionary leadership were deeply influenced by the Jacobin current of the French Revolution. In the second instance subaltern figures and groups within the Revolution attempted to create both ideas and practices of radical equality. This essay will attempt to explore these two currents within the Revolution and argue that the practices of these two currents not only collided but opened up an alternative terrain of radical thinking and political thought.