Jamaica: Political Parties Material
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- Creator
- Institute of Commonwealth Studies
TitleJamaica: Political Parties Material
Reference codePP.JM
Date1938-
Scope and ContentManifestos, speeches, pamphlets, leaflets, letters, newsletters, journals, posters and miscellaneous election material, 1938 onwards, issued by the Jamaica Labour Party, the People's National Party (Jamaica), the People's Political Party (Jamaica), the Revolutionary Marxist League of Jamaica, the Socialist Party of Jamaica, the Women's Freedom Movement (Jamaica), the Workers' Liberation League (Jamaica), the Workers Party of Jamaica, and Young Jamaica.
NotesJamaican politics, like those of many nations in the region emerging from British rule, has been dominated by parties with close trade union links. The founder of the Jamaican Labour Party (JLP) gave his name to its main affiliated union, the Bustamante Industrial Trade Union (BITU), while its leading rival, the People's National Party (PNP), is supported by the National Workers' Union (NWU). The JLP won the first elections conducted under full universal adult suffrage in 1944 and later the 1962 elections to determine which party would lead Jamaica to independence (following four years in which the country was part of the Federation of the West Indies). In 1972 the PNP's Michael Manley (son of the party's founder Norman Manley) was elected on a programme of social reform whose attempted implementation led to conflict with vested interests on the island (now increasingly represented by the JLP and Edward Seaga) and with the United States. The PLP won the following elections but were defeated at the polls in 1980, both campaigns being marked by violence between the supporters of the two parties. Following a decade of JLP rule Manley and the PLP, having essentially abandoned their previous political stance, returned to power in 1989 and have remained the governing party since.
Conditions governing accessAccess to this collection is unrestricted for the purpose of private study and personal research within the supervised environment of the library.
Extent3 boxes
System of ArrangementAlphabetically by party, and then in rough chronological order.
Finding aidsItem-level descriptions are available on the library catalogue: http://catalogue.ulrls.lon.ac.uk/search~S17/
Related files
See also Jamaica: Trades Unions Material (TU.JM) and Jamaica: Pressure Groups Material (PG.JM), as well as Political Party, Trades Unions and Pressure Group Materials for other Commonwealth countries and material in the Institute of Commonwealth Studies library's main classified sequence. See also Billy Strachan papers (ICS158).
Level of descriptionfonds