U.S. Media Influence In The Caribbean Historically

In 1990, Far From Paradise: An Introduction to Caribbean Development by James Ferguson noted:

“…Indoctrination is largely the result of the U.S. media…U.S. radio, for instance, can be heard throughout the region, and the Voice of America (famous for its propaganda) spent $50 million during the 1980s on setting up 11 additional transmitters within the area. Television is similarly dominated by the U.S. In 1975, an estimated 82 percent of programs seen on Jamaican television were imported from the U.S. Other Caribbean states had an even more solid diet of U.S.-imported television; Barbados received 97 percent of its programs from this source, and St. Kitts-Nevis 100 percent…

“This media invasion increases U.S. influence throughout the Caribbean. It erodes the cultural independence and separate identity of the various countries in the region and reduces them to passive consumers of news and entertainment provided exclusively by U.S. networks…”

(Downtown 11/23/94)