Editorial | Beyond Coopers Pen

The heart-wrenching Coopers Pen affair, in which dozens of homes that illegally occupied private land were demolished by the property’s owner, wasn’t a singular matter. Variations of this issue have played out many times. It will happen again. In that sense, Coopers Pen, Trelawny is a metaphor for the crisis of land/property ownership in Jamaica and the social and economic disparities it helps to breed. It is a signal, too, of the urgency, and depth of attention, that this issue demands.