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It is evident by the legacy of the African societies we stem from that we are culturally-rooted in community, fairness, and justice.

Growing up Haitian, one thing you learn is that survival is a community effort. We’ve all grown up seeing the practices and hearing the stories of our mothers and fathers, and their parents before them, long before we had the fancy terms or theory that Western scholars now use to name them. What they did to establish their livelihoods and build families is not without the efforts of many.  

I grew up watching my brother in sòls with his friends, and I distinctly remember not understanding how they worked. Even if I didn’t understand it, sòls soon became associated with something that Haitians just did. But sòls have a long and widespread history which connects us not only to Haiti, but as descendants of Africans. I would soon realize that the sòl, like many practices, tell stories about how our communities continue to operate in the face of countless efforts of oppression, especially through economic means. In knowing even a fraction of that history one can see the strength in our people and reconnect with the power our practices hold in countering oppressive forces. 

For the few who may not know—a sòl is a group money-saving method that works on a (usually short-term) rotating cycle. Each group member pools a specific amount of money on a designated time, for example, the first of each month. One group member gains the lump sum of money from everyone and the process repeats until each group member has received the lump sum. For example, a group of 5 friends may agree on a sòl of $100 USD, to be given on the first of each month. Over the course of 5 months, each group member would give $100 to the receiving member, who will have received $400. This process repeats until each member has been paid, in which the sòl ends. 

As a child living in America, I wondered, what use do sòl have if there’s no gain, no profit? I would learn that sòls went far beyond the goal of saving cash. They helped members in the group that were in more pressing need of money, buying groceries or paying rent for example, while those in a more lax situation could afford to receive their money later in the cycle. There have been cases of people in large sòl groups, using their pooled sum to pay off debts, send their kids to college, or put a down payment on a house. Some say, this is how a good portion of the home-owning Haitian community in the United States was able to put downs on houses in the 1980s. 

Models like the sòl have been around for centuries, and a well-explored example among scholars dates to the Yoruba people of pre-colonial Nigeria. The esusu system as it was called (also adashi, ajo, or esu depending on the region and function of the group) is in many ways similar to what we call sòls. Esusus, like sòls, worked on a rotating payment system. But the membership for these groups could be as large as 200 people and span over years. Variations of the institution existed—some groupings, like the esu model, were by commonality (e.g. occupation, family, place of residence). One variation only provided lump sums for funeral occurrences, as funerals were (and is) one of the most expensive events one could have. There were variations for farming or home purposes as well. 

Without even touching the tip of how comprehensive these systems were, one could tell how integral they must have been for ordinary members of society. Accumulating wealth in pre-colonial Yoruba culture, which is valued in western society, did not necessarily bring along status or respect. It was the individual’s social responsibility and distribution to the community—among other core principles—that brought them esteem. One 20th century anthropologist notes that the esusu system was an incentive for the wealthy “to make their surpluses available to those in the community who were in greatest need.” 

It was not until the increasing effects of war, slavery, and overall European colonization in the 19th century that brought more instability to many parts of West Africa, affecting the ability of many to complete an esusu cycle. The model was seen by many researchers as primitive and economically irrational, thought to be eventually replaced by western institutions such as banks. The reasons we now know of sòl and many other credit institutions across the Caribbean and Latin America—partner, sou-sou, sociedad, sub, and so on—is because the method continued to be practiced when enslaved Africans were brought to the New World during the Atlantic slave trade. 

Many of us have been taught that Africans in the New World were forced to abandon all aspects of their Africanness in compliance to European standards. However Africans were very much so practicing some of their own traditions, albeit in adaptation to the extreme constraints of enslavement and not as visible to their slave masters. The esusu is a prime example of this. It wasn’t only Yoruba tribes that bought banking concepts over to the Caribbean. Africans from Benin and Togo also brought their own forms of banking and money-pooling to Saint-Domingue, along with their values of collectivity (kombit).

Marcia Annisette, a Trinidadian-Canadian accounting scholar, argued that these various savings and credit institutions were covert practices and informal economies—used to escape the never-ending control and policing of enslaved African’s finances. As history shows, limiting the amount of money that Black people can accumulate forces them further into oppression. During the Duvalier-era, sòls run by the Haitian people were heavily important because the regime had banned gwoupmans (associations) and cooperations, ways that members of the community could gather a shared profit from their own investments. It was during these years that the use of sòls and credit unions grew in use. 

Even today, corrupt politics threaten the effectiveness of these accessible, grassroots practices that keep the economy running for ordinary Haitian people. Increased prices in Haiti caused by inflation threatens the fundamental purpose of sòls. As one Haitian notes to Woy Magazine, “there is no way to save in gourdes because you will only lose”; by the end of a sòl cycle, there is no guarantee that the gourde’s value will be as it was in the beginning, causing one to not only lose money but also need more in order to buy originally cheap staples and items. 

 The Haitian market and economy continue to be exploited and threatened by political forces of corruption and greed. However, Haiti’s people are not giving in. The continuing perseverance of Haitians is seen by the women who run the market and the protests that demand change. It is evident by the legacy of the African societies we stem from that we are culturally-rooted in community, fairness, and justice.