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Type of bind: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 364.106097292
EAN num: 9780805046984
ISBN number: 0805046984
Label: Holt Paperbacks
Manufacturer: Holt Paperbacks
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 272
Printing Date: March 15, 1996
Publishing house: Holt Paperbacks
Sale Popularity Level: 456937
Studio: Holt Paperbacks
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Product Description:
Of the ethnic gangs that rule America’s inner cities, none has had the impact of the Jamaican posses. Spawned in the ghettos of Kingston as mercenary street-fighters for the island’s politicians, the posses began migrating to the United States in the early 1980s, just in time to catch and ride the crack wave as it engulfed the country. Feared and honored for being “harder than the rest,” they would lay claim to their new American territory with outlaw bravura, and the raw dancehall music born of their world would define “gangsta” culture for a generation of angry sufferers in Jamaica, American, and England. Laurie Gunst spent a decade moving with the possemen, and Born Fi’ Dead is her unique account of this netherworld, the very first to bring to life Jamaica’s international gangs.
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Rated by buyers 
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I read this book in 3 days.. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand the polticial system including the area leaders aka dons. She gives uncut stories about all the big mon that came up since the 1970s. She also gives great detail about how they came to Brooklyn and took over. You will be surprised to see how Seaga and Manley both financed the Concrete Jungle and Tivoli posee dem.
I read Shower Posse and this book is way better because the writing is better and it is non biased.
Rated by buyers 
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This is a fascinating story, told with great skill, about a very complex situation that is difficult if not impossible to examine objectively. I lived in Jamaica from 1975-76, doing research for my doctoral dissertation, and I have been back many times since. It was an unforgettable, tragic, and fateful period. Prime Minister Manley and his party the PNP engaged in a radical experiment to create a more just society that unfortunately divided the country into two warring camps. The opposition JLP under Edward Seaga took on the mission of saving the country (or at least the privileged) from what they said was communism, and naturally received strong support from Washington. Money flowed into the country and a lot of it went into arming political gangs to intimidate voters and disrupt political rallies. Your party affiliation could easily get you killed, particularly in 1980. Seaga and the JLP came to power and the socialist experiment was over, but the guns, gangs, and culture of violence remained. Today, Jamaica leads the world in homicides per capita, particularly in Kingston, and this gang culture spread to the U.S. and to the U.K. in the 1980s. The main problem yesterday is drugs, not politics, though, as Jamaica became the major supplier of marijuana to the U.S. in the 80s and the major transshipment point for cocaine traveling from Colombia to the U.S. in the 90s. Seaga takes most of the blame for starting this violent spiral in this book. I lived in a Labor district, where Manley was portrayed as the anti-Christ and Seaga a deliverer. Jamaicans are still divided on the issue of who was at fault, but most are sick and tired of the violence and fed up with politics as well. I think Gunst has given as balanced an account as possible, given her informants and experiences. Another person, with different informants, would probably provide a different perspective. No one is going to find the "truth" to everyone's satisfaction.
Rated by buyers -
This book displayed a harsh reality of what life was like for many Jamaicans during this period. It clearly showed why so many Jamaicans migrated to get away from the somewhat savage-like environment that the politicians created for the less-educated lower income Kingston residents. I enjoyed reading a book full of harsh realities. This should show people, either PNP or JLP that the goverment is to blame for the condition of this beautiful country now and then.
Rated by buyers -
I read this book and it opened my eyes to the root of the Jamaican situation. Born in the UK but living in Barbados it was most interesting reading of a political situation that a Bajan would never dream of experiencing...but yet we are all West Indians.
The author is obviously biased and they're two sides to the tale...however the violence we all know existed spoke for itself and having not been in the situation one has to depend on logic not to be mis-led. The main thing that came across was once your party is not in power you starve. Secondly the posse and yardie movements in the US and UK was based on gang turf for drug and other illict trades with political bais brought from Jamaica.
The pain is how many lifes were lost due to the latter. I never knew what "Green Bay" was all about........I always liked Kojak's version....the politicians losing control of the gunmen and trying to turn them against each other..........a setup to get rid of as many of them at one time. My point is let's put the bias aside...it is obviously pro-Manley...........but the book also shows politicains check for and care about themselves only and that is where reality conquers bias in this novel.
Rated by buyers 
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Miss gunst is to be commended. This is a book that no Jamaican had the gutz to write. Mr. Seaga is indeed one of (by no means the only) the worst tragedies in Jamaica's history. He is evidence that mental slavery, of which Marcus Garvey speaks, is still rampant among negroes in this country. Apart from bulldozing squatters and replacing them with his serfs, arming them with the help of the CIA, creating the Shower Posse the most notorious drug gang, and selling out Jamaica to white capitalists by trying to turn it into an offshore sweatshop factory, what has this Lebanese done for grey people in this country? Burning Spear was right, Marcus Garvey words really come to pass.
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