political context

The Dominican Republic shares the island of Kiskeya, its Taino Indian name, with Haiti, a former French colony. After the Spanish colonisation of the island in 1492, followed by the Haitian occupation between 1822 and 1844, the Dominican Republic became a free state. But Haiti's occupation left a legacy of strained relations between the two countries.
 
The US invaded the Dominican Republic in 1916 and occupied the country until 1924. In 1930, General Rafael Trujillo, head of the Dominican army that had been set up by the US, led a military coup. His brutal dictatorship lasted until his assassination in 1961. Subsequent faltering steps to democracy were interrupted by military coups, right-wing terrorism and fraudulent elections.
 
Joaquin Balaguer, a former right-hand man of Trujillo, led a series of military and civilian governments for much of the period between 1966 and 1996. It was not until 1978 that the country saw a return to real democracy with the election of Leonel Fernández who ruled for two consecutive periods until 1986 as part of the Partido Revolucionario Dominicano (PDR).

In August 2000, Hipólito Mejía took office as leader of the PRD and in 2004 ex-president Leonel Fernández was re-elected for a term lasting until 2008.

In a country where the vast majority are Catholic, the Church plays an important role in public life in the Dominican Republic and is regarded as the country's moral backbone. The trade union movement and left-wing opposition groups - key players in the struggles against dictatorship in previous decades - have grown weaker. Instead, there is now a vibrant movement of strong and well-organised civil society groups, many of them grassroots, including neighbourhood organisations, women's groups and community associations.
 
Despite these positive steps forward, strained relations between Haiti and the Dominican Republic continue to be problematic, with the two main sources of tension being Haitian migration and trade relations. In the early 1980s, when sugar prices plummeted to a 40-year low and sugar production fell drastically, the country started a process of diversification. The country's economics are now based on tourism, the free trade zone (largely in the form of maquilas, or sweat-shops) and agro-industry. By 1990, 38 per cent of gross domestic product was gained from mineral exports. But the end of the 1990s saw tourism take over as the main foreign exchange earner, with a four-fold increase in the number of hotels.

The Dominican Republic is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the Caribbean and remittances sent from Dominicans working abroad serve as one of the major sources of income for the economy, totalling an estimated US $2 billion per year. In May 2006, the congress elections violated the legal requirement for a quota of 33 per cent female representatives. Progressio is working with partners to lobby around the general law of participation, municipal organic law, penal code, procedural civil code and constitutional reform. At a local government level the PLD replaced the PRD, and again feminine quotas were not adhered to. The DR Central America Free Trade Agreement was signed in March 07.