tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/fidel-castro-14114/articlesFidel Castro – The Conversation2024-03-06T13:35:23Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2231482024-03-06T13:35:23Z2024-03-06T13:35:23ZOppenheimer feared nuclear annihilation – and only a chance pause by a Soviet submariner kept it from happening in 1962<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578712/original/file-20240228-16-283s2r.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C8%2C5496%2C3899&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Onlookers at a Key West, Fla., beach where the Army's Hawk anti-aircraft missiles were positioned during the Cuban missile crisis. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/onlookers-gather-on-george-smathers-beach-in-key-west-news-photo/148266845?adppopup=true">Underwood Archives/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>History has often been shaped by chance and luck. </p>
<p>One of the blockbuster films of the <a href="https://www.oppenheimermovie.com/">past year, “Oppenheimer</a>,” tells the dramatic story of the development of the atomic bomb and the physicist who headed those efforts, J. Robert Oppenheimer. But despite the Manhattan Project’s success depicted in the film, in his latter years, Oppenheimer became increasingly worried about a nuclear holocaust resulting from the proliferation of these weapons.</p>
<p>Over the past 80 years, the threat of such nuclear annihilation was perhaps never greater than during the <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1961-1968/cuban-missile-crisis">Cuban missile crisis of 1962</a>. </p>
<p>President John F. Kennedy’s secretary of state, Dean Acheson, said that nuclear war was averted during that crisis by “<a href="https://academic.oup.com/jah/article/100/2/598/695452">just plain dumb luck</a>.” As I detail in my forthcoming book, “<a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520390966/the-random-factor">The Random Factor</a>,” nowhere was the influence of chance and luck more evident than on Oct. 27, 1962.</p>
<h2>Russian missiles next door</h2>
<p>To set the stage, a cold war of hostilities between the U.S. and the communist Soviet Union began almost immediately following World War II, resulting in <a href="https://www.cfr.org/timeline/us-russia-nuclear-arms-control">a nuclear arms race</a> between the two during the 1950s and continuing through the 1980s. </p>
<p>As a part of <a href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/the-cold-war">the Cold War</a>, the U.S. was extremely concerned about countries falling under the Soviet communist influence and umbrella. That fear was magnified in the case of Cuba.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An aerial photo of a missile base in Cuba." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=544&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578653/original/file-20240228-22-e9caga.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=684&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Aerial spy photos from October 1962 of a medium-range ballistic missile base, with labels detailing various parts of the base during the Cuban missile crisis, San Cristobal, Cuba.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/aerial-spy-photos-of-a-medium-range-ballistic-missile-base-news-photo/3208373?adppopup=true">Hulton Archive/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Tensions between the U.S. and Cuba had dramatically escalated following the failed 1961 U.S. attempt to overthrow revolutionary leader Fidel Castro and his communist ruling party. Known as the <a href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/the-bay-of-pigs">Bay of Pigs invasion</a>, its failure proved to be a major embarrassment for the Kennedy administration and a warning to the Castro regime. </p>
<p>In May 1962, Castro and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev agreed to <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1961-1968/cuban-missile-crisis">secretly deploy strategic nuclear missiles</a> in Cuba, with the intention of providing a strong deterrent to any potential U.S. invasion in the future. The Russian missiles and equipment would be disassembled and shipped aboard freighters bound for Havana, then be reassembled on-site.</p>
<p>On Oct. 14, a <a href="https://airandspace.si.edu/stories/editorial/cuban-missile-crisis">high-flying U.S. U-2 spy plane</a> photographed the construction of a missile launch site in western Cuba. This marked the beginning of the 13 days in October known as the Cuban missile crisis. </p>
<p>After heated deliberations with his cabinet and advisers, Kennedy decided on a <a href="https://www.history.navy.mil/browse-by-topic/wars-conflicts-and-operations/cuban-missile.html">naval blockade</a> surrounding Cuba to prevent further Soviet ships from passing through. In addition, Kennedy demanded removal of all missiles and equipment already in Cuba.</p>
<p>This began a standoff between the U.S. and Russia. Ultimately, the missiles were disassembled and removed from Cuba. In exchange, the U.S. removed its Jupiter ballistic missiles from bases in Turkey and Italy. </p>
<p>But one utterly random – and utterly crucial – aspect of this resolution was not known until years later through the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01402390500088304">memoirs of, and interviews with, Soviet sailors</a>. </p>
<h2>‘Use the nuclear weapons first’</h2>
<p>During the crisis, the Soviet Union had sent four of its <a href="https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/foxtrot-class-old-russian-submarine-notorious-past-208458">Foxtrot-class submarines</a> to the crisis area. Each submarine carried 22 two-ton torpedoes.</p>
<p>Unbeknownst to the U.S., one of those 22 torpedoes aboard each of the four subs was nuclear-tipped with a warhead yielding 15 kilotons, or a force equivalent to the Hiroshima bomb. </p>
<p>In a briefing before the four submarine commanders set out for Cuba, <a href="https://cimsec.org/cuban-missile-crisis-soviet-submarines-attack/">Vice Admiral A.I. Rassokha</a> of the Soviet Northern Fleet gave instructions that if attacked by the American fleet, “I suggest to you commanders that you use the nuclear weapons first, and then you will figure out what to do after that.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A map newspaper map from the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis shows the distances from Cuba of various cities on the North American Continent." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/578691/original/file-20240228-18-tdn122.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=524&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This newspaper map from the time of the Cuban missile crisis shows the distances from Cuba of various cities on the North American continent.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/this-newspaper-map-from-the-time-of-the-cuban-missile-news-photo/515016314?adppopup=true">Bettmann/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>His advice came alarmingly close to being carried out. </p>
<p>In approaching the blockade area on Oct. 27, Captain Valentin Savitsky’s submarine B-59 had been under prolonged harassment from an array of U.S. ships, aircraft and helicopters attempting to force it to the surface. Needing to recharge the boat’s electrical system, the B-59 did eventually resurface, at which point Savitsky thought he had emerged into a full-scale conflict – surrounded by naval ships and planes, shots being fired across his bow, depth charges dropped and powerful blinding searchlights aimed at the conning tower. Thinking he was under attack, Savitsky gave the order to immediately dive and prepare the nuclear torpedo for firing. </p>
<p>And here was where pure luck intervened. </p>
<h2>Stuck on a ladder</h2>
<p>Staff Captain Vasili Arkhipov and an unnamed sailor aboard B-59 likely <a href="https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2022-10-03/soviet-submarines-nuclear-torpedoes-cuban-missile-crisis">prevented World War III from occurring</a>.</p>
<p>As Savitsky tried to descend from the conning tower into the hull of the sub and begin the dive, he was momentarily blocked by a signaling officer who had accidentally gotten stuck on the conning tower ladder. During this split second delay, <a href="https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=8342&context=nwc-review">Arkhipov, who was on the conning tower as well</a>, realized that the chaos on the water’s surface was not an attack but rather an attempt to provide a warning. </p>
<p>Arkhipov, who had equal authority as Savitsky, immediately ordered the submarine to “cancel dive, they are signaling.”</p>
<p>World War III was very likely averted as a result of a brief delay in time caused by a sailor who happened to be stuck in the right place at the right time, along with a second-in-command who, when given a few extra seconds, perceptively realized that the boat was not under attack.</p>
<p>Had this not happened, Savitsky would have dived and in all likelihood within five minutes fired his nuclear-tipped torpedo, causing a cataclysmic reaction on the high seas and the world as a whole. </p>
<p>According to Martin Sherwin, co-author of the <a href="https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/kai-bird-and-martin-j-sherwin">Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Oppenheimer</a> that the recent movie was based on, “The extraordinary (and surely disconcerting) conclusion has to be that on October 27, 1962, a nuclear war was averted not because President Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev were doing their best to avoid war (they were), but because Capt. Vasily Arkhipov had been <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/165952/gambling-with-armageddon-by-martin-j-sherwin/">randomly assigned to submarine B-59</a>.”</p>
<p>This is but one of countless examples where global and military history has been dramatically altered by chance and luck. On Oct. 27, 1962, the world was extremely lucky. The question that Robert Oppenheimer would surely ask is, will we be so lucky the next time?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/223148/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark Robert Rank does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>During the Cuban missile crisis, World War III was likely averted by what one US official called ‘just plain dumb luck.’Mark Robert Rank, Professor of Social Welfare, Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. LouisLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2004112023-10-05T12:34:13Z2023-10-05T12:34:13ZThe splendid life of Jimmy Carter – 5 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/511714/original/file-20230222-26-wdgm71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=129%2C54%2C2027%2C1377&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Cuban President Fidel Castro watches former U.S. President Jimmy Carter throw a baseball on May 14, 2002, in Havana, Cuba.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/cuban-president-fidel-castro-watches-former-us-president-news-photo/73894798?phrase=jimmy%20carter%20fidel%20castro&adppopup=true">Sven Creutzmann/Mambo Photography/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In <em>Mark 8:34-38</em> a question is asked: “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”</p>
<p>Jimmy Carter never lost his soul. </p>
<p>A person who served others, Jimmy Carter did more to advance the cause of human rights than any U.S. president in American history. That tireless commitment “to advance democracy and human rights” was noted by the Nobel Committee when it honored Carter with its <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/2002/summary/">Peace Prize</a> in 2002.</p>
<p>From establishing the nonprofit <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/">Carter Center</a> to working for <a href="https://www.habitat.org/volunteer/build-events/carter-work-project">Habitat for Humanity</a>, Carter never lost his moral compass in his public policies. </p>
<p>Over the years, The Conversation U.S. has published numerous stories exploring the legacy of the nation’s 39th president – and his blessed life after leaving the world of American politics. Here are selections from those articles. </p>
<h2>1. A preacher at heart</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.asbury.edu/about/directory/david-swartz/">As a scholar</a> of American religious history, Asbury University Professor David Swartz believes that a speech Carter gave on July 15, 1979, was the most theologically profound speech by an American president since <a href="https://www.nps.gov/linc/learn/historyculture/lincoln-second-inaugural.htm">Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address</a>, on March 4, 1865.</p>
<p>Carter’s nationally televised sermon was watched by 65 million Americans as he “intoned an evangelical-sounding lament about a crisis of the American spirit,” <a href="https://theconversation.com/revisiting-jimmy-carters-truth-telling-sermon-to-americans-97241">Swartz wrote</a>. </p>
<p>“All the legislation in the world,” Carter proclaimed during the speech, “can’t fix what’s wrong with America.”</p>
<p>What was wrong, Carter believed, was self-indulgence and consumption. </p>
<p>“Human identity is no longer defined by what one does but by what one owns,” Carter preached. But “owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/revisiting-jimmy-carters-truth-telling-sermon-to-americans-97241">Revisiting Jimmy Carter's truth-telling sermon to Americans</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2. Tough-minded policies on human rights</h2>
<p>Though Carter was considered a weak leader after <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2019/11/04/the-iranian-hostage-crisis-and-its-effect-on-american-politics/">Iranian religious militants</a> seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979, his overseas policies were far more effective than critics have claimed, <a href="https://theconversation.com/jimmy-carters-lasting-cold-war-legacy-human-rights-focus-helped-dismantle-the-soviet-union-113994">wrote</a> Gonzaga University historian <a href="https://www.gonzaga.edu/college-of-arts-sciences/faculty-listing/detail/donnelly">Robert C. Donnelly</a>, especially when it came to the former Soviet Union.</p>
<p>Shortly after the <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2014/08/the-soviet-war-in-afghanistan-1979-1989/100786/">Soviet invasion of Afghanistan</a> in 1979, for instance, Carter imposed an embargo on <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/08/16/639149657/farmers-caught-up-in-u-s-trade-war-s-remember-80-s-grain-embargo">U.S. grain sales</a> that targeted the Soviet Union’s dependence on imported wheat and corn to feed its population. </p>
<p>To further punish the Soviets, Carter persuaded the U.S. Olympic Committee to refrain from competing in the upcoming Moscow Olympics while the Soviets repressed their own people and occupied Afghanistan.</p>
<p>Among Carter’s critics, none was harsher than Ronald Reagan. But in 1986, after beating Carter for the White House, even he had to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1986/04/06/us/reagan-acknowledges-carter-s-military-buildup.html">acknowledge Carter’s foresight</a> in modernizing the nation’s military forces, a measure that further increased economic and diplomatic pressure on the Soviets. </p>
<p>“Reagan admitted that he felt very bad for misstating Carter’s policies and record on defense,” Donnelly wrote. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/jimmy-carters-lasting-cold-war-legacy-human-rights-focus-helped-dismantle-the-soviet-union-113994">Jimmy Carter's lasting Cold War legacy: Human rights focus helped dismantle the Soviet Union</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>3. Carter’s unexpected liberal foe</h2>
<p>Reagan’s win over Carter in the 1980 U.S. presidential race was due in part to Carter’s bitter race during the Democratic primary against an heir to one of America’s great political families – Ted Kennedy. </p>
<p>Kennedy’s decision to run against Carter was “something of a shock to Carter,” <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-the-lion-of-the-senate-roared-like-a-mouse-39826">wrote</a> <a href="https://www.bu.edu/cgs/profile/thomas-whalen/">Thomas J. Whalen</a>, a Boston University associate professor of social science. </p>
<p>In 1979, Kennedy had pledged to support Carter’s reelection bid but later succumbed to pressure in liberal Democratic circles to launch his own presidential bid and fulfill his family’s destiny. </p>
<p>In addition, Whalen wrote, Kennedy “harbored deep reservations about Carter’s leadership, especially in the wake of a faltering domestic economy, high inflation and the seizure of the American Embassy in Iran by radical Muslim students.”</p>
<p>In response, Carter vowed to “whip (Kennedy’s) ass.” </p>
<p>And did. </p>
<p>But that win over Kennedy came at a high cost. </p>
<p>“Having expended so much political and financial capital fending off Kennedy’s challenge,” Whalen wrote, “he was easy pickings for Reagan in that fall’s general election.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/when-the-lion-of-the-senate-roared-like-a-mouse-39826">When the Lion of the Senate roared like a mouse</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>4. A quiet fight against a deadly disease</h2>
<p>Guinea worm is a painful parasitic disease that is contracted when people consume water from stagnant sources contaminated with the worm’s larvae. </p>
<p>Clemson University Professor Kimberly Paul has <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=yb246-8AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">worked as a parasitologist</a> for over two decades. </p>
<p>"I know the suffering that parasitic diseases like Guinea worm infections inflict on humanity, especially on the world’s most vulnerable and poor communities,” she <a href="https://theconversation.com/guinea-worm-a-nasty-parasite-is-nearly-eradicated-but-the-push-for-zero-cases-will-require-patience-199156">wrote</a>.</p>
<p>In 1986, it infected an estimated 3.5 million people per year in 21 countries in Africa and Asia. </p>
<p>Since then, that number has been reduced by more than 99.99% to 13 provisional cases in 2022, in large part because of Carter and his efforts to eradicate the disease. Those efforts included teaching people to filter all drinking water.</p>
<p>Over time, Carter’s efforts proved tremendously successful. On Jan. 24, 2023, The Carter Center, the nonprofit founded by the former U.S. president, <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/news/pr/2023/2022-guinea-worm-worldwide-cases-announcement.html">announced</a> that “Guinea worm is poised to become the second human disease in history to be eradicated.”</p>
<p>The first was smallpox. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/guinea-worm-a-nasty-parasite-is-nearly-eradicated-but-the-push-for-zero-cases-will-require-patience-199156">Guinea worm: A nasty parasite is nearly eradicated, but the push for zero cases will require patience</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>5. Carter’s brave step in Cuba</h2>
<p>In 2002, long after his departure from the White House in 1981, Carter became the the first U.S. president to visit Cuba since the <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/post-revolution-cuba/">1959 Cuban Revolution</a>. Carter had accepted the invitation of then President Fidel Castro.</p>
<p><a href="https://chrd.gsu.edu/profile/jennifer-mccoy-2-4/">Jennifer Lynn McCoy</a>, now at Georgia State University, was director of <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/peace/americas/index.html">The Carter Center’s Americas Program</a> at the time and accompanied Carter on that trip, on which he <a href="https://www.cartercenter.org/news/documents/doc517.html">gave a speech in Spanish</a> that called on Castro to lift restrictions on free speech and assembly, among other constitutional reforms.</p>
<p>Castro was unmoved by the speech but instead invited Carter <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/cuba-and-the-united-states-play-beisbol-diplomacy/">to watch a Cuban all-star baseball game</a>. </p>
<p>At the game, McCoy <a href="https://theconversation.com/jimmy-carter-in-cuba-46109">wrote</a>, “Castro asked Carter for a favor” – to walk to the pitcher’s mound without his security detail to show how much confidence he had in the Cuban people.</p>
<p>Over the objections of his Secret Service agents, Carter obliged and walked to the mound with Castro and threw out the first pitch.</p>
<p>Carter’s move was a symbol of what normal relations could look like between the two nations – and of Carter’s unwavering faith. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/jimmy-carter-in-cuba-46109">Jimmy Carter in Cuba</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives</em>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200411/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Beloved in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, Jimmy Carter became the 39th US president and used his office to make human rights a priority throughout the world.Howard Manly, Race + Equity Editor, The Conversation USLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2095742023-07-24T14:47:08Z2023-07-24T14:47:08ZSeven things to read and watch on the 70th anniversary of the movement that sparked the Cuban revolution<p>It’s been 70 years since the moment that sparked the Cuban revolution. On July 26 1953, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/26th-of-July-Movement">an attack on army barracks</a> in eastern Cuba heralded the consolidation of a Cuban national resistance movement against the dictatorship of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Fulgencio-Batista">General Batista</a>. A group of 111 young rebels attacked the army barracks, the Cuartel Moncada and Cuba’s second most important military fortress. The latter contained 1,000 soldiers from Batista’s army.</p>
<p>The attack was intended as a diversionary tactic. The hope was that soldiers based at the army headquarters in Havana would be redirected to the east of Cuba, leaving the capital open to occupation by the rebels. The attack was unsuccessful. Many of the young rebels were tortured, killed or imprisoned. </p>
<p>Despite this, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08263663.2012.10817030?casa_token=dnjrfVIuR2UAAAAA:YoM9EvRx1b1gGMx_Gs5ZKfnRxaH27JP3rKFMm2RU5VXaqAvbEkQqclP1Bj44LtsFkra0RJTsBz5M">the 26 of July Movement</a> (as it came to be known) became a central part of the campaign that emerged triumphant in early January 1959.</p>
<p>Here are seven things I recommend reading and watching to better understand and mark the anniversary. </p>
<h2>1. Fidel Castro’s defence speech</h2>
<p>The imprisonment of key actors in the attack – most notably a 27-year-old <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Fidel-Castro">Fidel Castro</a> – quickly created a mythology and symbolism around the events, as well as a narrative promising a better future. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="A black and white photograph of a bearded Fidel Castro." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=888&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=888&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=888&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1116&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1116&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537041/original/file-20230712-21-naxodh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1116&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fidel Castro in the 1950s.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fidel_Castro_1950s.jpg">Mondadori Publishers</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When Castro stood trial in October 1953, his self defence not only detailed the atrocities committed against the rebels of the 26 of July Movement, but also laid out the blueprint for a new Cuba based on social justice. He cited the 19th century writer and independence leader <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Jose-Marti">José Martí</a> as the inspiration and intellectual guide.</p>
<p>In particular, he laid out <a href="https://www.marxists.org/history/cuba/archive/castro/1953/10/16.htm">six areas</a> of social injustice that required radical change via revolution: housing, health, education, land, industrialisation and unemployment. The speech <a href="https://library.brown.edu/create/modernlatinamerica/chapters/chapter-4-cuba/primary-documents-w-accompanying-discussion-questions/document-no-10-history-will-absolve-me-by-fidel-castro-ruiz/">ended with the words</a> “Condemn me. It does not matter. History will absolve me.”</p>
<p>Castro was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment, but served only two and left for Mexico. Three years later, he returned to the east of Cuba by yacht with a group of 82 rebels (including <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Che-Guevara">Ernesto “Che” Guevara</a> and others). There he began the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Cuban-Revolution">popular insurrection</a> from the mountains of the Sierra Maestra.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiSUw9GjXgQ">text of Castro’s speech</a> was smuggled out in note form by a young Cuban journalist, <a href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Cuba-Mourns-the-Death-of-Prolific-Journalist-Marta-Rojas-20211004-0017.html">Marta Rojas</a>, and published after 1959. It gave voice, credibility and momentum to the frustrations of many Cubans about the inequalities and social divisions that characterised their nation. </p>
<p>Owing to the silencing of critique by the dictatorship, it was predominantly Cubans living in exile abroad that were first able to capture this zeitgeist in their artistic work.</p>
<h2>2. El Mégano (1955)</h2>
<p>Released in 1955, the short documentary El Mégano highlighted the extreme poverty that afflicted rural Cuba. It was made by young Cuban filmmakers <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0305651/">Julio García Espinosa</a>, <a href="https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=Jose+Massip&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8">Jose Massip</a> and <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Tomas-Gutierrez-Alea">Tomás Gutiérrez Alea</a>, who were trained in the <a href="https://www.movementsinfilm.com/italian-neorealism">Italian neo-realist</a> tradition.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/sPH8ew77CWU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">El Mégano.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The documentary reflected (through experimental techniques no doubt partly intended to evade censorship) the miserable working and living conditions of the charcoal burning sector in the southern coast of Cuba.</p>
<h2>3. The novels of Alejo Carpentier</h2>
<p>The Cuban writer and musicologist <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Alejo-Carpentier-y-Valmont">Alejo Carpentier</a>, writing from exile in Caracas, published startlingly original novels with experimental forms. They contained <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/latin-american-literature-in-transition-19301980/return-of-the-galleons/99321A5994D121649A0514C75BD32C9A">a radical message about colonialism</a> and its impact in Latin America and the Caribbean. </p>
<p>He saw the “<a href="https://newsletters.theatlantic.com/unsettled-territory/625712fcc42c7900211727a4/marvelous-real-alejo-carpentier-literature/">marvellous real</a>” (a precursor to the magical realism genre) as a cultural heritage that characterised Cuba and would eventually allow it to fulfil its destiny of national sovereignty after four centuries of colonialism, delayed independence and 50 years of neo-colonial rule.</p>
<p>His novels, <a href="https://archive.org/details/kingdomofthiswor00carp">The Kingdom of this World</a> (1949) and <a href="https://archive.org/details/loststeps00alej">The Lost Steps</a> (1953), offer fascinating explorations of the impact of colonialism and the wealth of cultures in the region.</p>
<h2>4. The poetry of Nicolás Guillén</h2>
<p>The Cuban poet <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Nicolas-Guillen">Nicolás Guillén</a> was equally prolific in exile, but with a distinctive focus on race and racism.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="Close up sepia photograph of Nicolás Guillén's face." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=856&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=856&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=856&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1076&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1076&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537042/original/file-20230712-23-3rme4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1076&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Nicolás Guillén photographed in 1942.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NicolásGuillén-1942.jpg">Casa Natal de Nicolás Guillén</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Having joined the Cuban Communist Party and travelled widely in China, Europe (including during the Spanish Civil War) and South America, he was refused entry to Cuba in 1953 and took exile in Chile until 1959.</p>
<p>Much of his work deals with the impact of colonialism, although it is explicitly political and often conversational in style. Collections such as <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40653134">West Indies Ltd</a> (1934) offer an insight into the racialisation of power in pre-1959 Cuba.</p>
<h2>5. The poetry of Roberto Fernández Retamar</h2>
<p>Many of the intellectuals and artists mentioned above left exile to return to Cuba soon after 1959. While much cultural production embraced the opportunity to describe history in the making, the continued focus on the socio-economic injustices of the 1950s remained centre stage for at least a decade.</p>
<p><a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/159/article/745841/pdf">Roberto Fernández Retamar</a> is best known for his seminal essay, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/25088398">Caliban: Notes towards a Discussion of Culture in Our America</a> (1968), that reworked the Shakespearean figure of Caliban as a metaphor for anti-colonialism. But he also wrote poetry that underlined the humanist underpinnings of the rebel and revolutionary movements, such as <a href="https://www.poetryinternationalonline.com/poems/11938/">Blessed Are the Normal</a> (1962).</p>
<h2>6. The Situation by Lisandro Otero (1963)</h2>
<p>Lisandro Otero’s novel, The Situation, examined <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/23050260.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3Aca135f6a0abf1ed473566f34de9964d2&ab_segments=&origin=&initiator=&acceptTC=1">the bourgeoisie</a> in 1950s Cuba. </p>
<p>With its publication, Otero – a middle-class Cuban when the revolutionary government came to power in 1959 – marked his changing position to a writer in service of the Revolution.</p>
<h2>7. Bertillón 166 by José Soler Puig (1960)</h2>
<p>New writers from the lower classes were also contributing to the movement, both in terms of depicting extreme inequality but also growing popular resistance. <a href="https://www.radioenciclopedia.cu/cultural-news/exclusive/the-undisputed-masterpiece-of-jos-soler-puig-20201126/">José Soler Puig</a>’s novel, <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=fStXcoGYKkUC&printsec=frontcover&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false">Bertillón 166</a>, narrated the events of the second half of the 1950s in Santiago de Cuba, including the growth of the 26 of July Movement.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="The 26 July Movement flag flying on a building in on building in Santa Clara, Cuba." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/537056/original/file-20230712-25-erv1zd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The 26 July Movement flag flying on a building in on building in Santa Clara, Cuba.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/santa-clara-cuba-january-5-2017-762743548">Riderfoot/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The events of July 26, 1953 marked just one of many stages in a complex and often violent exit from colonialism that lasted for half a century. For many Cubans, the date is as significant and <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0022009403038001969?casa_token=dtibfg_fvEwAAAAA:D-2ECif-TjWSFIL_F62ldMOK74GErwKVFq5YJ1W5jdZf0lIpIIXuXXS031JaSMjo-OqwzAf4lQza">ripe for commemoration</a> as the return of the exiled rebels in 1956 to begin the insurrection in the mountains or, indeed, January 1, 1959, <em>el triunfo de la revolución</em> – the triumph of the revolution. </p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/536131/original/file-20230706-17-460x2d.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em>Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight,
on Fridays. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/something-good-156">Sign up here</a>.</em></p>
<hr><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/209574/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Parvathi Kumaraswami received funding from The Leverhume Trust in 2004-9 and 2014-19.</span></em></p>The 26 of July Movement became a central part of the movement that emerged triumphant in early January 1959.Parvathi Kumaraswami, Chair in Latin American Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2007442023-03-09T14:28:58Z2023-03-09T14:28:58ZJimmy Carter’s African legacy: peacemaker, negotiator and defender of rights<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512455/original/file-20230227-1191-gv4ueg.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Carter's interest in southern Africa was crucial to keeping the peace.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons/Flickr</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>When historians and pundits praise Jimmy Carter’s <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-american-studies/article/abs/nancy-mitchell-jimmy-carter-in-africa-race-and-the-cold-war-stanford-ca-stanford-university-press-2016-4500-pp-xiv-883-isbn-978-0-8047-9358-8/DB52A5925C6F10E199F93FB881AB03D9">achievements</a> as the US president and extol his exemplary post-presidential years, they mention the recognition of China, the <a href="https://billofrightsinstitute.org/e-lessons/the-panama-canal-treaties-jimmy-carter">Panama Canal Treaties</a> and the <a href="https://carterschool.gmu.edu/why-study-here/legacy-leadership/camp-david-hal-saunders-and-responsibility-peacemaking">Camp David Accords</a>. Almost no one mentions what Carter achieved in Africa during his presidency. This is a serious oversight. </p>
<p>When I interviewed President Carter in 2002, <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/extra/?id=25540&i=Excerpt%20from%20the%20Introduction.html">he told me</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I spent more effort and worry on Rhodesia than I did on the Middle East.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The archival record supports the former president’s claim. Reams of documents detail Carter’s sustained and deep focus during his presidency on ending white rule in Rhodesia, and helping to bring about the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/zimbabawean-independence-day">independence of Zimbabwe</a>.</p>
<p>There were several reasons for Carter’s focus on southern Africa. First, realpolitik. Southern Africa was the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/25798909?seq=4">hottest theatre</a> of the Cold War when Carter took office in January 1977. A year earlier, Fidel Castro had sent <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Conflicting-Missions-Havana-Washington-1959-1976/dp/0807854646">36,000 Cuban troops</a> to Angola to <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Conflicting-Missions-Havana-Washington-1959-1976/dp/0807854646">protect the leftist MPLA</a> from a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Conflicting-Missions-Havana-Washington-1959-1976/dp/0807854646">South African invasion</a> backed by the Gerald Ford administration. The <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Visions-Freedom-Washington-Pretoria-1976-1991/dp/1469628325">Cubans remained in Angola until 1991 </a>.</p>
<p>Mozambique was no longer governed by America’s NATO ally, Portugal, but instead by the <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/4185752">left-leaning Frelimo</a> . Apartheid South Africa – so recently a stable, pro-American outpost far from the Cold War – suddenly faced the prospect of being surrounded by hostile black-ruled states.</p>
<p>The unfolding events in southern Africa riveted Washington’s attention on Rhodesia, where the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jimmy-Carter-Africa-International-History/dp/0804793859">insurgency against the white minority government</a> of <a href="https://www.mandela.ac.za/Leadership-and-Governance/Honorary-Doctorates/Ian-Smith-1979">Ian Smith</a> was escalating. One week after the Carter administration took office it assessed the crisis in Rhodesia: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>This situation contains the seeds of another Angola … If the breakdown of talks means intensified warfare, Soviet/Cuban influence is bound to increase.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The administration knew that if the war did not end, the Cuban troops might cross the continent to help the rebels.</p>
<h2>And then what?</h2>
<p>It was unthinkable that the Carter administration, with its <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1977-1980/human-rights#:%7E:text=He%20intended%20to%20infuse%20a,the%20fate%20of%20freedom%20">stress on human rights</a>, would intervene in Rhodesia to support the racist government of Ian Smith. But, given the Cold War, it was equally unthinkable that it would stand aside passively enabling another Soviet-backed Cuban victory in Africa. Therefore, the administration’s first <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/44376206">Presidential Review Memorandum</a> on southern Africa, written immediately after Carter took office, announced:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>In terms of urgency, the Rhodesian problem is highest priority.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The Carter administration assembled a <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=25540">high-powered negotiating team</a>, led by <a href="https://aysps.gsu.edu/andrew-young-biography/">UN Ambassador Andrew Young</a> and <a href="https://history.state.gov/departmenthistory/short-history/vance">Secretary of State Cyrus Vance</a>, to coordinate with the British and hammer out a settlement. These negotiations, spearheaded by the Americans, led to the <a href="https://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/5847/5/1979_Lancaster_House_Agreement.pdf">Lancaster House talks</a> in Britain, and the free elections in 1980 and black majority rule in an independent in Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>There was another reason for Carter’s interest in southern Africa: race. Carter <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Hour-Before-Daylight-Memories-Boyhood/dp/0743211995">grew up in the segregated South</a> of the 1920s and 1930s. As a child, he did not question the racist strictures of the <a href="https://www.ferris.edu/HTMLS/news/jimcrow/what.htm">Jim Crow South</a>, but as he matured, served in the US Navy and was elected governor of Georgia, his worldview evolved. </p>
<p>He appreciated how the <a href="https://www.loc.gov/collections/civil-rights-history-project/articles-and-essays/">civil rights movement</a> had helped liberate the US South from its regressive past, and he regretted that he had not been an active participant in the movement. When I asked Carter why he had expended so much effort on Rhodesia, part of his explanation was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I felt a sense of responsibility and some degree of guilt that we had spent an entire century after the Civil War still persecuting blacks, and to me the situation in Africa was inseparable from the fact of deprivation or persecution or oppression of Black people in the South. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Parallels with the US South</h2>
<p>Carter’s belief that there were parallels between the freedom struggles in the US South and in southern Africa may have been naïve, but it was important. </p>
<p>Influenced by Andrew Young, who had been a <a href="https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/young-andrew">close aide</a> to <a href="https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1964/king/biographical/">Martin Luther King </a>, Carter transcended the knee-jerk anticommunist reaction of previous American presidents to the members of the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/struggle-Zimbabwe-Chimurenga-War/dp/0949932000">Patriotic Front</a>, the loose alliance of insurgents fighting the regime of <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/lifeinfocus/a-life-in-focus-ian-douglas-smith-last-white-prime-minister-rhodesia-zimbabwe-a8754971.html">Ian Smith</a>.</p>
<p>Young challenged the Manichaean tropes of the Cold War. <a href="https://stanfordpress.typepad.com/blog/2017/04/race-and-the-cold-war.html">He explained in 1977</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Communism has never been a threat to me … Racism has always been a threat – and that has been the enemy of all of my life. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Young helped Carter see the Patriotic Front, albeit leftist guerrillas supported by Cuba and the Soviet Union, as freedom fighters. Therefore, unlike the Gerald Ford administration which had <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jimmy-Carter-Africa-International-History/dp/0804793859">shunned</a> the Front and tried to settle the conflict through negotiations with the white leaders of Rhodesia and South Africa, Carter considered the Front the key players. He brought them to the fore of the negotiations. This was extraordinarily rare in the annals of US diplomacy during the Cold War. </p>
<p>Carter has not received the credit his administration deserves for the Zimbabwe settlement. It was a success not only in moral terms, enabling free elections in an independent country. It also precluded a repetition of the Cuban intervention in Angola. It was Carter’s signal achievement in sub-Saharan Africa. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/512411/original/file-20230227-24-kep09i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The late former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan (C) speaks as former US president Jimmy Carter and Graca Machel of Mozambique look on.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alexander Joe/AFP via Getty Images</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Angola and the Cold War reflexes</h2>
<p>Carter also improved US relations with the continent as a whole. He <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jimmy-Carter-Africa-International-History/dp/0804793859">increased</a> trade, diplomatic contacts and, simply, treated Black Africa with respect.</p>
<p>During the <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jimmy-Carter-Africa-International-History/dp/0804793859">war in the Horn of Africa</a>, he resisted intense pressure to throw full US support behind the Somalis when the Somali government waged a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jimmy-Carter-Africa-International-History/dp/0804793859">war of aggression</a> against leftist Ethiopia. His administration attempted valiantly to <a href="https://academic.oup.com/dh/article-abstract/34/5/853/490367">negotiate a settlement</a> in Namibia and condemned apartheid in South Africa. </p>
<p>But in Angola, as historian Piero Gleijeses’ superb <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Visions-Freedom-Washington-Pretoria-1976-1991/dp/1469628325">research</a> has shown, Carter reverted to Cold War reflexes. He asserted that the US would restore full relations with Angola only after the Cuban troops had departed. This, even though he knew that the Cubans were there by invitation of the Angolan government, and were essential to hold the South Africans at bay. Carter’s was the typical response of US governments to any perceived communist threat. But it serves to highlight – by contrast – how unusual was the administration’s policy of embracing the Patriotic Front in Zimbabwe. </p>
<p>For the next 40 years, Carter focused more on sub-Saharan Africa than on any other region of the world. The Carter Center’s almost total <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2023/02/23/1158358366/jimmy-carter-took-on-the-awful-guinea-worm-when-no-one-else-would-and-he-triumph">eradication of Guinea worm</a> has saved an estimated 80 million Africans from this devastating disease. Its election monitoring throughout the continent, and its conflict resolution programmes, have bolstered democracy. </p>
<p>Carter’s work in Africa, and especially in Zimbabwe, forms a significant and underappreciated part of his impressive legacy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/200744/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nancy Mitchell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Carter’s work in Zimbabwe forms a significant and under appreciated part of his legacyNancy Mitchell, Professor of History, North Carolina State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1987182023-02-17T12:09:56Z2023-02-17T12:09:56ZCuba: why record numbers of people are leaving as the most severe economic crisis since the 1990s hits – a photo essay<p>Record numbers of Cubans <a href="https://english.elpais.com/international/2022-11-15/the-never-ending-cuban-exodus.html">are fleeing </a> their country as the island suffers its worst <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/cuba-economy-reform-explainer-idINKBN28L2AD">socio-economic crisis</a> since the collapse of <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WP/Issues/2016/12/30/The-Fall-and-Recovery-of-the-Cuban-Economy-in-the-1990-s-Mirage-or-Reality-4066">the Soviet Union</a>.</p>
<p>The number of Cubans seeking entry to the US, mostly at the Mexican border, leapt from 39,000 in 2021 to <a href="https://sgp.fas.org/crs/row/IF10045.pdf">more than 224,000 in 2022</a>. Many have sold their homes <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/06/07/1103456116/cuba-cuban-migrants-real-estate">at knockdown prices</a> to afford one-way flights to Nicaragua and travel through Mexico to the US. </p>
<p>Cuba’s 11 million inhabitants find themselves in increasingly desperate straits. Internal migration from the poorer provinces has led to overpopulation in the capital Havana. Those for whom the government can’t provide homes live in <em>albergues</em> (precarious abandoned buildings refashioned as temporary homes). Others live in <em>solares</em> (tenement buildings), some at serious risk of collapse.</p>
<p>Acute shortages of food and medicine are <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/cuba-forecasts-only-slight-growth-rise-crisis-grips-island-2022-12-12/">a daily reality</a> in a country that’s been ravaged by a <a href="https://english.elpais.com/usa/2022-02-07/the-us-embargo-against-cuba-turns-60-with-no-policy-change-on-the-horizon.html">US trade embargo</a> since 1962, and strict government control of the economy since 1959. Regular power outages have reminded Cubans of the early 1990s when <a href="https://academic.oup.com/book/11824/chapter/160918064">Soviet subsidies ended</a> as the USSR collapsed, leaving the island struggling. </p>
<p>To survive that “<a href="https://america.cgtn.com/2018/04/17/cuba-past-and-present-the-special-period">special period</a>”, Cuba became reliant on hard currency earnings from international tourism and nationals working abroad. Both are now much reduced. COVID measures closed the island to foreign tourists and reduced visitor numbers <a href="http://www.onei.gob.cu/sites/default/files/turismo_nac_e_int_indicadores_seleccionados_enero-diciembre_2020_0.pdf">by 75%</a> during 2020. </p>
<p>Ill-timed <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/cuba-economy-reform-explainer-idINKBN28L2AD">currency reforms</a>, which unified Cuba’s two currencies, in early 2021 created an inflationary shock. Food shortages have sparked a <a href="https://fee.org/articles/cubas-bustling-black-markets-hold-an-important-economic-lesson/">black market boom</a>. </p>
<p>On a recent trip to Cuba, co-author of this piece James Clifford Kent talked to local people and took photographs. Luis Lázaro, a construction worker from Havana, told him: “It’s got really bad. A complete crisis: food, medicine, clothes. If it’s not one thing it’s another. You work non-stop just to make ends meet and sometimes it’s not enough.”</p>
<p>As recently as 2016, after more than half a century of hostilities, US-Cuban relations were coming in from the cold. Barack Obama became the first serving US president <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/20/barack-obama-cuba-visit-us-politics-shift-public-opinion-diplomacy">to visit the island</a> since Calvin Coolidge in 1928. The Rolling Stones rocked Havana <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-live-reviews/rolling-stones-thrill-huge-crowd-at-historic-havana-show-160574/">with a free concert</a>. </p>
<p>Packed cruise ships unloaded their passengers at Havana’s harbour, to be whisked off on open-top classic car tours of the capital. Planeloads of foreigners hopped down to Havana to soak up the heady atmosphere, with <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/photos/2015/10/rihanna-in-cuba-the-cover-story-november-photos">Rihanna</a>, Beyoncé and Jay-Z among the vanguard of high-profile western visitors. Private enterprise flourished and the spirit of optimism was everywhere.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/u-s-cuba-relations-will-joe-biden-pick-up-where-barack-obama-left-off-153269">U.S.-Cuba relations: Will Joe Biden pick up where Barack Obama left off?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>But Cuba’s economy and relationship with the United States faltered again after <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10714839.2017.1331828">Donald Trump was elected</a> in November 2016, just as the island’s revolutionary <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-38114953">leader Fidel Castro</a> died. President Trump reinstated longstanding travel and business restrictions. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, US diplomats and intelligence officers stationed on the island reported hearing loss, headaches and vertigo in a mysterious outbreak of “<a href="https://www.vice.com/en/article/m7gyxq/havana-syndrome-podcast">Havana syndrome</a>” in late 2016. Washington blamed Cuba and withdrew most of its embassy staff, just two years after both governments had reopened embassies in their respective capitals for the first time since 1961. </p>
<p>One of Trump’s last acts before leaving office in January 2021 was to return Cuba to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/cubas-mass-protests-are-driven-by-the-misery-of-covid-and-economic-sanctions-164505">list of state sponsors of terrorism</a>, obstructing its access to international finance. Trump had already restricted the remittances that Cuban-Americans could send to the island.</p>
<p>President Joe Biden has now shifted policy again as pressure mounts over increased illegal migration to the United States. He re-opened the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/10/cuban-exodus-us-embassy-havana-immigration-policy">US embassy in Havana</a> for visa applications in January 2023, offering some Cubans an official route to emigration.</p>
<h2>Cuban resistance</h2>
<p>Increased mobile internet access since 2018 and widespread use of social media play significant roles in a new mood among Cubans. The <a href="https://country.eiu.com/cuba">Economist Intelligence Unit</a> describes their double impact: the demand for political and economic liberalisation and accountability has increased, while US sanctions and dissident support have emboldened those hardliners resistant to reform. </p>
<p>Despite <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/03/why-the-internet-in-cuba-has-become-a-us-political-hot-potato">government restrictions</a> and poor infrastructure, 68% of Cubans now have access to the internet. Whatsapp, Instagram and other social networks are much used by Cubans, particularly young people.</p>
<p>Internet access was key to the <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-57818918">2021 Cuban protests</a> when local discontent fuelled by COVID restrictions and widespread shortages resulted in street protests that police quickly suppressed. Many <a href="https://www.frieze.com/article/looking-back-year-art-and-protest-cuba">high-profile artists</a> and Cuban bloggers accused by the government of being funded by the United States were detained.</p>
<h2>Making a mass exodus</h2>
<p>Ana María, a 52-year-old Cuban mother-of-two, described how delinquency and corruption are on the rise. People prefer to sell products on the black market than work for a salary that doesn’t cover basic needs, she said. </p>
<p>One 29-year-old Cuban artist, who didn’t want to be named, said: “Many of my close friends have joined <em>el rumbo al norte</em> (the route north) in search of socio-economic stability for themselves and their families.”</p>
<p>Cubans’ famed ability to <a href="https://www.wired.com/2017/07/inside-cubas-diy-internet-revolution/"><em>resolver</em></a> (be resourceful) in the face of immense difficulties is reaching its limit. Hope is fading fast.</p>
<p>After six decades of trade blockades and a rigid socialist model, plummeting living standards have led <a href="https://sgp.fas.org/crs/row/IF10045.pdf">2% of Cuba’s population</a> to abandon the island in just one year. </p>
<p>Many more are desperate to follow them.</p>
<p><em>Some names have been changed and some sources requested anonymity.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198718/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The island is facing the harshest economic conditions since the 1990s, prompting 224,000 people to leave in 12 months.James Clifford Kent, Senior Lecturer in Latin American Studies & Visual Culture, Royal Holloway University of LondonChristopher Hull, Senior Lecturer in Spanish and Latin American Studies, University of ChesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1724342021-11-24T16:01:52Z2021-11-24T16:01:52ZCuba: five years after Fidel Castro’s death, how fares the revolution?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433520/original/file-20211123-27-1uc95jn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">h</span> </figcaption></figure><p>If recent events in Cuba are anything to go by, the government of Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez is facing significant challenges as the country marks five years since the death of its revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro, on <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-crisis-stricken-venezuela-fidel-castros-legacy-lives-on-69531">November 25 2016</a>. </p>
<p>At least one leading dissident, journalist Guillermo Farinas, was <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/13/cuban-opposition-figure-arrested-ahead-of-banned-protest">taken into custody</a> ahead of a protest planned for November 15, while, according to some reports, others were placed <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/16/cuba-democracy-protests-thwarted-after-rallies-banned-and-leaders-arrested">under house arrest</a>. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/21/world/americas/yunior-garcia-exile-spain.html">Yunior García</a>, one of the organisers of the protest – which was shut down by authorities – was placed under house arrest but allowed to leave Cuba for Spain. </p>
<p>It’s tempting to view protests – and the idea of constant internal crisis – as the defining feature of contemporary Cuba. But critique and protest have been a part of Cuba’s history since independence. And – more importantly – Cubans are taught that it is their revolutionary duty to question and critique constructively. </p>
<p>Debates are not confined to the intelligentsia either – most Cubans have an opinion on how to improve their country. But, on the whole and despite the undeniable hardships that still face the Cuban people, the majority continue to demonstrate a <a href="https://www.mintpressnews.com/cuba-more-excited-about-school-reopening-then-protests/278972/">commitment to</a> maintain the system – albeit while working to improve conditions.</p>
<p>The way in which the death of Castro was commemorated in Cuba tells us much about the complexity of Cuban society. The <em><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-38201169">Caravana de la Libertad</a></em> (Caravan of Freedom) that carried his ashes to the Santa Ifigenia Cemetery in the eastern city of Santiago de Cuba mirrored the route that the triumphant <em>guerrilleros</em> took in early 1959 as they returned to Havana, having ousted the dictator Fulgencio Batista.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="Two women, one with face painting honouring the late Cudan president Fidel Castro." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=811&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=811&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=811&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1019&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1019&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433544/original/file-20211123-19-1g2vjof.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1019&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘Yo soy Fidel’.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sonia Almaguer</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 2016, just as in 1959, Cubans lined the central highway along the length of the island to pay their respects, many of them holding images of Fidel Castro, waving the Cuban flag or displaying the hashtag <em><a href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/I-Am-Fidel-Cubas-Youth-Deepen-Commitment-to-Revolution-20161204-009.html">#Yo soy Fidel</a></em> (I am Fidel). Some outside commentators <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2016/nov/28/fidel-castro-he-was-no-hero-says-the-uks-national-press">interpreted this</a> unusual commemoration as evidence of an authoritarian – or, at least, coercive – system which demands loyalty and obedience. Others noted <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/04/cuba-fidel-castro-three-generations">varying responses</a> from different generations, whose expectations have changed as those with direct memories of pre-revolutionary Cuba have begun to die out.</p>
<p>Those who closely follow Cuban society recognised a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/27/today-we-dont-talk-about-baseball-cubans-react-to-castros-death">complex range</a> of responses and emotions by Cubans of all generations across the island. Some were there to mourn a figure who had improved their lives, others to commemorate the end of a historical period, and yet others to witness a historical moment that captured the world’s attention.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/in-crisis-stricken-venezuela-fidel-castros-legacy-lives-on-69531">In crisis-stricken Venezuela, Fidel Castro's legacy lives on</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>From Obama to Trump to Biden</h2>
<p>Five years on, that complexity is very much still in evidence, but the context has changed immeasurably and in ways that could not have been anticipated. <a href="https://theconversation.com/diplomatic-thaw-with-the-us-is-a-gift-to-the-cuban-economy-35692">The rapprochement</a> between Cuba and the US during the Obama administration was reversed – and sent into punitive overdrive – by the raft of <a href="https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/cuba-us-sanctions-caused-billions-of-dollars-in-losses/2277824">243 sanctions</a> implemented by Donald Trump’s administration to restrict Cuba’s economic activity. Joe Biden has yet to reverse these sanctions, which have hit Cuba particularly hard in terms of income from tourism – the island’s economic mainstay since the collapse of trade with the Soviet Bloc in the early 1990s. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Cubans, some holding portraits of the late Fidel Castro, mourning the death of the president in Havana's Plaza de la Revolución, November 2016." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/433541/original/file-20211123-13-6aky1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cubans mourn the death of Fidel Castro in the Plaza de la Revolución, Havana, November 2016.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sonia Almaguer</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2021/1/1/what-will-cubas-new-single-currency-mean-for-the-island">Currency reforms</a> in December 2020 – the <em><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2021/1/1/what-will-cubas-new-single-currency-mean-for-the-island">Tarea Ordenamiento</a></em> or “fusion” of the dual currencies that had existed since the 1990s as a response to the end of trade with the Soviet Bloc – brought increased salaries for public sector workers, but led to rising inflation. This, coupled with the restrictions of life under the pandemic and the negative impact of the heightened US embargo, created further economic instabilities, inequalities and precariousness. </p>
<p>Meanwhile Castro’s death, the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/cuban-president-diaz-canel-made-communist-party-leader-ending-castro-era-2021-04-19/">retirement from office</a> of his brother Raúl Castro, and the election of a new generation of leader in the shape of party stalwart Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez in 2019 have created additional unknowns – not least since the “<a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/04/16/988019067/cuba-without-a-castro-the-islands-old-guard-exits-the-stage">historic generation</a>” that led the revolution in 1959 has all but disappeared.</p>
<h2>The impact of COVID</h2>
<p>On the face of it, <a href="https://covid.observer/cu/">data shows</a> that Cuba has handled the pandemic very well: with just 8.5% of the population infected and 0.73 deaths per thousand in Cuba (compared to 15% and 2.13 respectively in the UK). In addition, figures sourced from the University of Oxford’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/world/covid-vaccinations-tracker.html">Our World in Data project</a> shows that Cuba has fully vaccinated 80% of its population. This places the country third in the world behind UAE and Brunei.</p>
<p>Cuba’s renowned biotech sector has also produced <a href="https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n1912">five COVID-19</a> vaccines – the first Latin American country to produce a vaccine. Meanwhile the tradition of medical internationalism, for which Cuba is famous, continued with the <a href="https://www.salon.com/2017/01/09/its-time-to-give-cuba-the-credit-it-deserves-for-its-global-medical-accomplishments/">Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade</a>, which sent medical professionals to 40 countries. </p>
<p>But COVID has also created social divisions – largely between those who followed the rules and those who didn’t. Early on in the pandemic, debates raged about how Cubans depended on the <em>coleros</em> (queuers). These are people who wait in line for now-precious basic commodities and often re-sell at increased prices. There were criticisms that some of these people were compromising collective pandemic discipline and social equality. </p>
<h2>Who decides the nature of change?</h2>
<p>It is against this backdrop of political and economic insecurity and COVID restrictions that the protests of July and November <a href="https://theconversation.com/cubas-mass-protests-are-driven-by-the-misery-of-covid-and-economic-sanctions-164505">must be seen</a>. In effect they are not greatly dissimilar to similar demonstrations in the US, the UK or Europe. But in Cuba these protests have an additional component. There is <a href="https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2111/S00040/why-is-the-us-fueling-the-november-15-cuba-protests.htm">evidence of</a> clear, sustained and organised interference from organisations in the US. </p>
<p>Since 1959, Cubans have been emphasising that revolution is a constant process, not an event. Current discussions by Cubans of all generations, including the leadership, focus on the revolutionary duty to “change everything that needs to be changed” – a reference to Fidel Castro’s 2000 <a href="https://www.radiogritodebaire.cu/English/cuba/fidel-concept-revolution/">definition of revolution</a> as a constant concept underpinning the Cuban revolution. In this sense, the real issue at stake is the concept of change and who decides to implement it. </p>
<p>In 2021, as in 1959, the key issue is who controls Cuba. Cuba gained its independence in 1898, almost a century after many other Spanish colonies in the Americas. Another century on, and – thanks to US intervention – Cuba’s destiny as a sovereign nation – the right to make its own mistakes as well as celebrate its own successes – is still not entirely in its own hands.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/172434/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Parvathi Kumaraswami received funding from the Leverhulme Trust and the British Academy. </span></em></p>Cuba has handled COVID well, but sanctions and economic uncertainty are causing unrest among some sections of society.Parvathi Kumaraswami, Chair in Latin American Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1706112021-11-19T13:16:28Z2021-11-19T13:16:28ZCuba’s post-revolution architecture offers a blueprint for how to build more with less<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429039/original/file-20211028-19-1ndyd3h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=5%2C118%2C3602%2C2428&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Builders construct experimental vaults of brick and cement blocks in Santiago de Cuba in December 1960.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Centro de Documentación, Empresa RESTAURA, Oficina del Historiador de la Ciudad de La Habana</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Around the world, there’s a conjoined crisis of climate change and housing shortages – two topics at the <a href="https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/comment/comment/cop26-climate-change-and-why-housing-matters-73166">top of the list of discussions</a> in the recent <a href="https://ukcop26.org/">COP26 climate summit</a> in Glasgow. </p>
<p>Construction and buildings <a href="https://unhabitat.org/the-climate-is-changing-so-must-our-homes-how-we-build-them">account for more than one-quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions</a>. Meanwhile, according to a September report by Realtor.com, the U.S. alone <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/14/america-is-short-more-than-5-million-homes-study-says.html">is short 5.24 million homes</a>.</p>
<p>Addressing both crises will require building structures <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2020/jan/15/the-case-for-making-low-tech-dumb-cities-instead-of-smart-ones">more sustainably</a> and <a href="https://www.designworldonline.com/abb-robotics-advances-construction-industry-automation-to-enable-safer-and-sustainable-building/">more efficiently</a>.</p>
<p>But this isn’t the first time architects and governments have had to deal with dwindling resources and the task of housing large numbers of people. <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/post-revolution-cuba/">In 1959</a>, an armed revolt led by Fidel Castro ousted Cuba’s military dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista. As part of a broader plan to improve the quality of life for millions of Cubans, Castro’s new government sought to develop a program to mass-produce new housing, schools and factories.</p>
<p>In the years that followed, however, this dream clashed with difficult realities. Sanctions and supply chain disruptions had created a shortage of conventional building materials.</p>
<p>Architects realized they needed to do more with less and invent new construction methods using local materials.</p>
<h2>A thousand-year-old technique</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1525/jsah.2021.80.3.321">In an article</a> that I co-authored with architect and engineer <a href="https://www.arct.cam.ac.uk/people/mhr29%40cam.ac.uk">Michael Ramage</a> and architect <a href="https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1406-4588">Dania González Couret</a>, we explored the creative challenges of this period by focusing on a specific structural element that these Cuban architects soon seized upon: the tile vault.</p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/988501">Tile vaulting</a> is a technique that flourished in the eastern Mediterranean <a href="https://www.academia.edu/46049241/2021_BRICK_CONSTRUCTION_IN_ALMORAVID_MARRAKECH_THE_QUBBAT_AL_BARUDIYYIN">after the 10th century</a>. </p>
<p>It involves constructing arched ceilings made of multiple layers of lightweight terra cotta tiles. To build the first layer, the builders use fast-setting mortar to glue the tiles together with barely any temporary support. Afterward, the builder adds more layers with normal cement or lime mortar. This technique doesn’t require expensive machinery or use of a lot of timber for formwork. But speed and craftsmanship are paramount.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Pencil drawings of different arches." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=266&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429024/original/file-20211028-26-1rirswx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=334&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Three types of vaults – clockwise, from top left: conventional stone, tiled dome and tiled vault.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://oa.upm.es/38027/">Luis Moya Blanco</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Because of its affordability and durability, tile vaulting spread <a href="https://researchportal.vub.be/en/publications/the-construction-of-tile-vaults-in-belgium-1900-1940-contractors">to different parts of Europe</a> and <a href="https://papress.com/products/guastavino-vaulting-the-art-of-structural-tile">the Americas</a>. It became known as <a href="https://sap.mit.edu/article/standard/guastavino-vaulting-art-structural-tile">Guastavino tiling</a> in the U.S – a nod to Spanish architect Rafael Guastavino, who used the technique in <a href="https://savingplaces.org/stories/7-majestic-guastavino-tile-vaults-from-around-the-country#.YZS4P9BBzIU">over 1,000 projects in the U.S.</a>, including the Boston Public Library and New York’s Grand Central Station. </p>
<h2>Vaults in vogue</h2>
<p>In Cuba, tile vaults were famously used to build the National Art Schools, or Escuelas Nacionales de Arte. </p>
<p>Fidel Castro advocated for the construction of the five schools on what, before the revolution, had been a golf course in Cubanacán, a town west of Havana. </p>
<p>Designed by Ricardo Porro, Vittorio Garatti and Roberto Gottardi, the <a href="https://papress.com/products/revolution-of-forms-updated-edition-cubas-forgotten-art-schools">schools integrate terra cotta shells and arches with the site’s green landscape</a>. They were long thought to be the only tile vault buildings in post-revolution Cuba. </p>
<p>However, we discovered that the National Art Schools are only the tip of the iceberg. From 1960 to 1965, a range of vault experiments and projects took place across the country. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black and white photo of an open air arched building." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429025/original/file-20211028-13-11t51l9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The School of Ballet by Vittorio Gratti, one of the five vaulted National Art Schools in Havana.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">M. Wesam Al Asali</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Shortly after the revolution, architects and engineers at the Ministry of Construction – known as MICONS – went to Camagüey, a province known for its terra cotta brick-making, to learn more about the craft. One of these architects, Juan Campos Almanza, then a recent graduate of the University of Havana, led the research team. As an experiment, he built a load-bearing vault on the grounds of the Azorin brick factory. </p>
<p>It was a success. He went on to use the design to construct affordable and elegant beachfront homes in Santa Lucía, north of Camagüey, using the same vault design.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Vaulted homes lined up side by side." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=194&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=194&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=194&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=243&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=243&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429026/original/file-20211028-19-13u43mb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=243&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Juan Campos Almanza’s beachfront homes were built based on a vaulting experiment that took place in 1960.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Documentation Center, Office of the Historian of Havana</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The best of both worlds</h2>
<p>Brick-and-tile vault construction appeared to be a promising solution to build replicable and cost-effective ceilings. </p>
<p>The Center of Technical Investigations, an agency tasked with developing housing, schools and factories, used Almanza’s research to construct its own vaulted offices. An outdoor space nearby – famously called “El Patio del MICONS” – became a staging ground for more structural experiments.</p>
<p>In El Patio, craftspeople, engineers and architects worked together to develop affordable vaulted buildings, while teachers at El Patio’s tile masons’ school taught building techniques to cohorts of apprentices.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429033/original/file-20211028-25-hbesj8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=601&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Builders practice putting together a vaulted roof in the Patio del MICONS in 1961.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Documentation Center, Office of the Historian of Havana</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Vaulted buildings and homes soon started cropping up across the country. In 1961, Juan Campos Almanza completed his first housing projects in Altahabana, a new neighborhood located near Havana, building simple barrel vaults on prefabricated beams. Similar designs were used for more beachfront houses, schools and factories.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=611&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=611&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/429036/original/file-20211028-17-1ui2vdc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=611&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Architect Mario Girona built a vaulted elementary school in Marianao, Cuba.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Documentation Center, Office of the Historian of Havana</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In his report about the Altahabana pilot project, Campos defined his method as “tradicional mejorado,” or “improved traditional construction” – a mix of conventional building methods with some prefabricated elements. </p>
<p>This way, he argued, builders could gain the best of both worlds: The construction, some of it built by hand, was fast and replicable. And it didn’t require a lot of materials and preexisting infrastructure.</p>
<p>The best example of this construction method is the vaulted Pre-University Center at Liberty City, the site of a former U.S. Army base. The structure was designed in 1961 by Josefina Rebellón, who at the time was a third-year architecture student. </p>
<p>Only a couple of miles from the Schools of Art, Rebellón’s design was completed in 18 months. It was made up of two circular vaulted buildings, with conical vaults and prefabricated beams, with an undulating two-story classroom building between the two circles.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Bird's-eye drawing of two circular buildings" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/432083/original/file-20211115-13-1bgtdne.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A sketch of Josefina Rebellón’s Pre-University Center.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Documentation Center, Office of the Historian of Havana</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A brief experiment with a lasting legacy</h2>
<p>These exciting new construction methods didn’t last long. </p>
<p>In 1963, Havana hosted the conference for the International Union of Architects. That year’s theme was <a href="https://www.uia-architectes.org/webApi/en/congress/havana-1963.html">Architecture in Developing Countries</a>.</p>
<p>The conference gave Cuban architects an opportunity to reflect on their recent experiences. The Ministry of Construction pushed to end what it viewed as a period of experimentation; mass housing, they argued, demanded industrialized construction.</p>
<p>Buildings started being made in factories and then assembled on site. Skilled and specialized labor, like vault-building, was no longer seen as an asset but an obstacle, since vault builders were difficult to find in the country’s remote areas, and novice builders required extensive training.</p>
<p>[<em>More than 140,000 readers get one of The Conversation’s informative newsletters.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?source=inline-140K">Join the list today</a>.]</p>
<p>Yet the story of these buildings offers lessons for designing with scarcity. </p>
<p>The ability to experiment is important. Coordination among builders, governments and architects is crucial. And craftsmanship matters, too, whether it’s tile vaulting or <a href="https://practicalpreservationservices.com/traditional-joinery-what-it-is-and-why-is-it-important-in-preservation/">traditional carpentry</a>. </p>
<p>For too long, buildings that required craftsmanship have been thought of as overly expensive pet projects that deployed techniques better suited for a different era. But the Cubans were able to show that craftsmanship can be developed, scaled up and combined with technological advances.</p>
<p>Today, a handful of promising initiatives show how the craft of tile vaulting can serve for the <a href="https://architizer.com/projects/rwanda-cricket-stadium/">low-carbon construction of buildings</a> or engineered <a href="https://block.arch.ethz.ch/brg/research/rib-stiffened-funicular-floor-system">ceiling systems</a>. Back in Cuba, tile vaulting is now being taught in the <a href="http://www.eusebioleal.cu/noticia/se-crea-aula-taller-eusebio-leal-spengler/">Escuela Taller Gaspar Melchor</a>, a training center in Havana’s historical center.</p>
<p>Cuba’s vaulted architecture reflects the relationship between necessity and invention, a process that many people mistakenly think of as automatic. It isn’t. It is a relationship based on perseverance, trial and error and, above all, passion.</p>
<p>Look no further than what Juan Campos Almanza and his peers left behind on the island: beautiful, replicable buildings, many of which are still standing today.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/170611/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>M. Wesam Al Asali is the Lead Designer and Founder of IWlab and CERCAA.
</span></em></p>After Fidel Castro took power, government plans to build new housing, schools and factories were hindered by sanctions and supply chain issues, forcing architects to come up with creative solutions.M. Wesam Al Asali, Global Fung Postdoctoral Fellow, Princeton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1649962021-08-04T12:32:27Z2021-08-04T12:32:27Z5 ways Americans often misunderstand Cuba, from Fidel Castro’s rise to the Cuban American vote<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413828/original/file-20210729-21-1rd251l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C25%2C5681%2C3807&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Street view of Havana, Cuba, July 26, 2021, several weeks after mass protests broke out.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/view-of-a-street-decorated-with-a-cuban-flag-in-tribute-to-news-photo/1234213570?adppopup=true">Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Cuba recently erupted in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-protests-4-essential-reads-on-dissent-in-the-post-castro-era-164456">largest protests</a> seen there in six decades, reflecting popular anger over a crippling economic crisis, scarce food and medicines and a half-century of repression.</p>
<p>Cuba remains largely an enigma to outsiders, and especially to Americans. Myths prevail because of Cuban government censorship and the United States’ historic tendency – born of the Cold War – to stereotype and simplify the communist island.</p>
<p>“The truth is that Cuba is often more talked about, idealized or vilified than known,” <a href="https://jacobinlat.com/2021/07/22/esta-en-juego-la-vida-buena-y-justa-para-cubanos-y-cubanas/">wrote Martín Mosquera</a>, editor of the Latin American edition of Jacobin, a leftist publication, recently. </p>
<p>This article examines five common areas of confusion about Cuba, Cuban Americans and the U.S.-Cuba relationship. </p>
<h2>#1. The Cuban Revolution</h2>
<p>Fidel Castro and a band of guerrillas overthrew the brutal <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/12/books/backing-the-wrong-tyrant.html">U.S.-backed</a> dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista in 1959. At the time, Castro’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1986/10/19/magazine/fidel-castro-s-years-as-a-secret-communist.html">political ideology was unclear</a>; he had not yet publicly committed to communism. <a href="https://atom.library.miami.edu/chc0510">Anti-communist revolutionaries</a> allied with him. </p>
<p>In Castro’s famous 1953 “<a href="https://library.brown.edu/create/modernlatinamerica/chapters/chapter-4-cuba/primary-documents-w-accompanying-discussion-questions/document-no-10-history-will-absolve-me-by-fidel-castro-ruiz/">History Will Absolve Me</a>” speech, he said his revolution would return “power to the people” and proclaimed Cuba’s liberal democratic 1940 Constitution as “the Supreme Law of the State” until “the people should decide to modify or change it.”</p>
<p>The revolution was a nationalist revolution for most Cubans, then, not a communist one. When Castro installed a socialist economy and a one-party political system, many fellow revolutionaries <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/post-revolution-cuba/">felt betrayed</a>. Cubans fought to form a government that would answer to the Cuban people, rather than foreign interests. They got Castro’s Soviet-backed regime. </p>
<p>Many poor Cubans revered Castro for implementing policies that promoted equity and minimized discrimination, including <a href="https://www.ascecuba.org/asce_proceedings/cuba-and-venezuela-revolution-and-reform/">major reforms</a> in land, agriculture, education and housing. </p>
<p>Others fled because of fear and persecution. Exiles included large landowners, Batista supporters, religious leaders, the middle class and revolutionaries who opposed Fidel’s manner of governing.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Marchers on street hold pictures of Cuban leaders" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413832/original/file-20210729-17-ad9q34.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A counterprotest of Cubans who defend Castro’s revolution against the anti-government marches of July 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/woman-holds-a-portrait-of-cuban-late-leader-fidel-castro-news-photo/1234023834?adppopup=true">YAMIL LAGE/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>#2. The US embargo</h2>
<p>The Cuban government <a href="https://diariodecuba.com/cuba/1603531638_25909.html?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=pmd_5568ec19b405bd48be28217b33bd4a545e4ec6ba-1627425505-0-gqNtZGzNAfijcnBszQk6">blames the United States</a> for poverty on the island, but many of Cuba’s economic problems are homegrown.</p>
<p>The U.S. embargo originated in the early 1960s to prevent the spread of communism from Cuba to other Latin American countries. It also sought to compel Cuba’s new government to compensate American corporations for property expropriated by the regime and to prevent further confiscations.</p>
<p>Today the embargo has evolved to include six separate pieces of legislation. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/104th-congress/house-bill/927/text">Some laws</a> put pressure on the Castro regime in the 1990s, when Cuba’s economy was vulnerable after the fall of the Soviet Union. They deny U.S. visas to leaders of companies that invest in Cuba. Additional embargo policies restrict Americans from traveling or sending money to Cuba – though <a href="https://www.treasury.gov/services/Pages/tsra.aspx">there are loopholes</a> enabling U.S. Treasury-licensed food and medical supply sales to Cuba.</p>
<p>The 60-year-old embargo inhibits the fledgling Cuban private sector and makes it harder to obtain the goods they need. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.letcubalive.com/">Many people</a> in the U.S. and beyond are urging President Joe Biden to lift the embargo to ease Cuba’s current food and medical shortages. But the president of the United States cannot do that unilaterally. Lifting the embargo would require Congress to either certify that Cuba has become sufficiently democratic according to the 1996 <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/104th-congress/house-bill/927?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22hr927%22%5D%7D&s=3&r=14">Libertad Act</a> or pass a new bill overturning it.</p>
<p>However, the embargo is not the primary reason Cuban people are struggling. </p>
<p>The Cuban government has a history of political repression and fiscal mismanagement, both of which harm the economy. For example, it tightly controls who may obtain state-issued licenses to start their own businesses. It bans <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2021/country-chapters/cuba#6a43ba">independent labor unions</a>, which would protect workers from exploitation.</p>
<p>Finally, <a href="http://misiones.minrex.gob.cu/en">few countries</a> still limit trade or diplomatic relations with Cuba because of the embargo. They have <a href="https://www.ibanet.org/article/872A709E-49DE-4153-92C7-798FA9A88196">created laws</a> that help protect their businesses from retaliatory U.S. legal action when operating in Cuba.</p>
<h2>#3. US interference in Cuba</h2>
<p>Just as it blames the U.S. embargo for poverty in Cuba, the Cuban government blames U.S. interference for political unrest there, as it did <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/cubas-president-blames-discontent-us-sanctions-2021-07-12/">after protests</a> erupted on July 11.</p>
<p>Indeed, the U.S. government has upheld Cuban dictators – before Castro – and employed wide-ranging coercive sanctions against the country. The United States even <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/comandante-pre-castro-cuba/">occupied Cuba</a>, in the early 20th century. After Castro took power, the U.S. <a href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/the-bay-of-pigs?gclid=CjwKCAjwgISIBhBfEiwALE19SU5D0g6sGdtuIwiy9-nR_yO4ihrzBjJjKppBLhazu-SYMEb7EwFCCRoCXHwQAvD_BwE">supported anti-Castro uprisings</a>. </p>
<p>Ultimately, though, the Cuban government’s <a href="http://ccdhrn.org/">long record</a> of <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2021/country-chapters/cuba">human rights abuses</a> and repression created the current political instability. </p>
<p>Cuba has a well-documented history of <a href="https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2016/mar/22/raul-castro/are-there-political-prisoners-cuba/">harassing, intimidating and imprisoning activists and dissidents</a>. <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-38omFpJdDiKTSBoUOg19tv2nJxtNRS3-2HfVUUwtSw/htmlview">Over 700</a> Cuban protesters have been <a href="https://www.cibercuba.com/noticias/2021-07-26-u185759-e185759-s27061-ascienden-700-detenidos-cuba-protestas-11j">detained or disappeared</a> since July 11, according to the human rights organization Cubalex.</p>
<p>The government continues to suppress freedom of expression and closely monitor civilians, which has <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/12/cuba-san-isidro-movement-allies-under-frightening-levels-surveillance/">spurred resistance</a> from artists, journalists and civil society organizations. LGBTQ people <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-48242255">still face persecution</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Mariela Castro rides in a car decked out in pride flags surrounded by crowds in a pride parade" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413834/original/file-20210729-13-hg9xjc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mariela Castro, center, daughter of Cuban former President Raul Castro, advocates for LGBTQ rights at the 2018 Havana Pride parade.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/mariela-castro-daughter-of-cuban-former-president-raul-news-photo/957823510?adppopup=true">YAMIL LAGE/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>#4. Cuban Americans</h2>
<p>The media often stereotypes Cuban Americans as overwhelmingly conservative. But they are a <a href="https://theconversation.com/so-called-latino-vote-is-32-million-americans-with-diverse-political-opinions-and-national-origins-149515">racially, economically and politically heterogeneous community</a>.</p>
<p>Cubans who’ve come to the U.S. <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/12/23/as-cuban-american-demographics-change-so-do-views-of-cuba/">since 1990</a> are even more diverse than the largely white first waves of <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/cuban-migration-postrevolution-exodus-ebbs-and-flows">exiles who came after the Cuban Revolution</a>.</p>
<p>Cuban Americans’ political opinions differ depending on their <a href="https://cri.fiu.edu/research/cuba-poll/2020-fiu-cuba-poll.pdf">race, socioeconomic status, gender and age</a>. Cuban Americans as a group became overwhelmingly Republican after <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1984/03/25/the-cuban-bloc-florida-anti-communists-rally-to-gop/b53aeb4d-b013-4640-9110-68f33593ab30/">Ronald Reagan courted them</a> in the 1980s, but they are increasingly <a href="https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-ne-cuban-american-poll-20190131-story.html">independent voters</a>. In the 2020 presidential election, around <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/trump-cultivated-latino-vote-florida-it-paid-n1246226">55% of Cubans in Florida</a> voted for Donald Trump. </p>
<h2>#5. Race and equality in Cuba</h2>
<p>Castro’s Communist revolution brought disadvantaged Cubans greater <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-cuba-is-an-education-success-story-and-what-it-can-teach-africa-50211">access to education</a> and <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0169796X19826731">universal health care</a>. Many poor Cubans became world-class doctors, scholars and scientists.</p>
<p>However, Cuba is not an egalitarian society. Its political leaders are overwhelmingly white and male, and the government <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/07/19/cuba-protests-afro-cubans/">does not treat all Cubans equally</a>. </p>
<p>Afro-Cubans, who comprise at least <a href="http://www.onei.gob.cu/sites/default/files/publicacion_completa_color_de_la_piel__0.pdf">one-third</a> of Cuba’s 11.3 million people, experience <a href="https://minorityrights.org/minorities/afro-cubans/">widespread discrimination</a>. As a result, they have higher poverty rates, less access to stable currency and low rates of property ownership. Afro-Cubans also <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/09/09/cuba-government-blm-police-racism-black-lives-needs-to-look-within-as-it-denounces-us/">suffer more police violence</a> than white Cubans.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 100,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletter to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=100Ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p>
<p>Black and brown Cuban <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/07/19/cuba-protests-afro-cubans/">artists are leading</a> the current protests. The rap song “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pP9Bto5lOEQ">Patria y Vida</a>” – which means “Homeland and Life,” a word play on the revolutionary slogan “Homeland or Death” – has become an anthem for Cuban government opposition.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/164996/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Caroline McCulloch interned with the U.S. Department of State but is not currently affiliated.</span></em></p>Cuba: It’s complicated.Caroline McCulloch, Professor of International Relations, Florida International UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1644562021-07-13T22:23:03Z2021-07-13T22:23:03ZCuba protests: 4 essential reads on dissent in the post-Castro era<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411111/original/file-20210713-25-grrygz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=29%2C450%2C4891%2C2825&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A rare unauthorized public gathering in Havana on July 11, 2021. Some demonstrators on the streets that day chanted 'Down with the dictatorship.' </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-take-part-in-a-demonstration-against-the-government-news-photo/1233929528?adppopup=true">Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Street protests erupted across Cuba on July 11, 2021, with crowds of Cubans demonstrating against food scarcity, medicine shortages and economic misery in their island nation. Some demanded “freedom” and the end of “dictatorship” – anti-government sentiments that were soon echoed in the United States by Cuban-Americans and politicians, including President Joe Biden. </p>
<p>In a televised address, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel blamed the spontaneous demonstrations – by far the largest mass protests in decades – on U.S. interference and threatened a “battle in the streets.” Protesters say hundreds were arrested.</p>
<p>These four stories describe current conditions in Cuba and the recent history behind this rare public outpouring of anger.</p>
<h2>2018: Cuba gets a new president</h2>
<p>The Communist Party has run Cuba since the 1959 Cuban Revolution. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Picture of an aged Fidel Castro in olive army garb, smiling slightly" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=753&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=753&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=753&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=946&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=946&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411112/original/file-20210713-23-1rjr3xo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=946&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fidel Castro in 2010.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/NnXxgX">Ismael Francisco/ Cubadebate</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For five decades, its leader was the fiery, anti-American revolutionary Fidel Castro. Castro led the country until 2008, when he fell sick and was succeeded by his more subdued younger brother, Raúl. </p>
<p>The younger Castro, also a Cuban Revolution fighter, maintained the his party’s total grip on politics but liberalized Cuba’s Soviet-style economy, recognizing private property and allowing Cubans to run small businesses. He also cultivated a less antagonistic relationship with the United States during the Obama administration.</p>
<p>Raúl Castro’s April 2018 retirement marked the end of the revolutionary era. But the selection of Díaz-Canel as president in April 2018 seemed unlikely to herald the beginning of a new Cuba. </p>
<p>“I don’t expect any drastic changes in direction from Díaz-Canel – at least, not right away,” wrote the American University Cuba analyst <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=WM+Leogrande&btnG=">William LeoGrande</a> shortly after <a href="https://theconversation.com/cubas-new-president-what-to-expect-of-miguel-diaz-canel-95187">Diaz-Canel took office</a>. </p>
<p>Díaz-Canel is a seasoned Communist Party insider and Raul Castro’s chosen successor. Castro also remained in Cuba’s government until 2021 as first secretary of the Communist Party, “arguably a post more powerful than the presidency,” says LeoGrande.</p>
<p>Díaz-Canel came into office facing serious problems, including a weak economy and bad relations with the U.S. under then-President Donald Trump. </p>
<p>He also faced a new challenge: the internet, which had just become widely available to everyday Cubans. Access to online information and social media makes it harder for Díaz-Canel to repress dissent as effectively as for his predecessors.</p>
<p>“Internet expansion on the Communist island has produced a growing chorus of domestic critics,” LeoGrande wrote. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cubas-new-president-what-to-expect-of-miguel-diaz-canel-95187">Cuba's new president: What to expect of Miguel Díaz-Canel</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2019: Cuba gets a new constitution</h2>
<p>Those critics gained more leeway to show their discontent in February 2019, when the Cuban National Assembly <a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-expands-rights-but-rejects-radical-change-in-updated-constitution-112578">passed a new Cuban Constitution</a>.</p>
<p>It included provisions that would “substantially expand social, political and economic rights in Cuba,” wrote the Cuban-American scholar <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=A6rP7kYAAAAJ&hl=en">María Isabel Alfonso</a>. </p>
<p>One of those rights was freedom of assembly.</p>
<p>“Previously, Cubans had the ‘right to meet, demonstrate and associate, for licit and peaceful purposes,’” explained Alfonso, “but only as part of a so-called ‘organización de masa’ – the Cuban term for state-run groups.” </p>
<p>The new constitution removes the ‘organizaciones de masa’ restriction, theoretically giving people and civil society groups more freedom to gather. </p>
<p>But Alfonso cautioned that the government could still crack down on “independent organizations – especially if those groups are political in nature.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Police in riot gear walk man in handcuffs down the street" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411109/original/file-20210713-19-tykrv5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Arrests following an anti-government demonstration in Havana on July 12, 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/man-is-arrested-during-a-demonstration-against-the-news-photo/1233949512?adppopup=true">Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In her Feburary 2019 article, she quotes the Cuban blogger José Gabriel Barrenechea saying that, in Cuba, “spontaneous gatherings are not seen positively and are always perceived to be the product of a foreign power.”</p>
<p>Among other changes, Cuba’s 2019 Constitution also gave constitutional legitimacy to Raúl Castro’s economic reforms and limited Cuban presidents to two five-year terms.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-expands-rights-but-rejects-radical-change-in-updated-constitution-112578">Cuba expands rights but rejects radical change in updated constitution</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2020: Artists revolt</h2>
<p>Cuba’s new Constitution reflects how Díaz-Canel has largely followed his mentor Raúl Castro’s path of gradually giving Cubans greater economic and social freedoms but resisting pressure for democratic reform. </p>
<p>One result of Castro’s 2009 move to legalize small businesses, for example, was a flourishing of activist art. </p>
<p>As galleries and theaters opened across Cuba, enabling artists to show their work in nongovernment-run cultural spaces, “<a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-cracks-down-on-artists-who-demanded-creative-freedoms-after-unprecedented-government-negotiations-152073">dissident artists took advantage of this newfound freedom to advance their political demands</a>,” says Alfonso. </p>
<p>In 2018, the Díaz-Canel government issued a decree imposing restrictions on independent artistic production and cultural venues, angering many artists. Then, in November 2020, the government raided the home of an artist who openly opposed the government’s decree.</p>
<p>Cuban artists and intellectuals rebelled. Days after the raid, about 300 of them convened via WhatsApp to stage a protest outside the Culture Ministry. They demanded negotiations with the government to restore freedom of expression.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Woman in black wearing a face mask speaks, surrounded by a crowd" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=412&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=412&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=412&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=517&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=517&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/375530/original/file-20201216-19-1q9q8uo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=517&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cuban artists regroup after a Nov. 27, 2020, meeting with Cuba’s vice minister of culture.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/cuban-installation-and-performance-artist-tania-bruguera-news-photo/1229826871?adppopup=true">Yamll Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“The negotiations would end soon after they began, followed by a major crackdown on dissent,” wrote Alfonso. But “the size, duration and public nature of the artists’ opposition were unprecedented.”</p>
<p>The artists’ uprising was, she says, “a sign of how resistance in Cuba has grown and changed.”</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-cracks-down-on-artists-who-demanded-creative-freedoms-after-unprecedented-government-negotiations-152073">Cuba cracks down on artists who demanded creative freedoms after 'unprecedented' government negotiations</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>2021: The Castro era ends</h2>
<p>Raúl Castro stepped down from his top post in the Communist Party in April 2021, leaving behind a <a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-next-for-cuba-and-the-united-states-after-raul-castros-retirement-159002">changed Cuba</a>. </p>
<p>It is no longer a Soviet-backed ideological challenger – or nuclear threat – to the United States. Bereft of international communist patrons and financially isolated from the world by the strict, decades-old U.S. embargo, Cuba is ailing. </p>
<p>For so long the bearded, fatigues-clad Fidel Castro defended the pain of the Cuban people as the righteous struggle of a proudly sovereign nation. Díaz-Canel, born in 1960, lacks Castro’s charismatic ability to invoke the faded revolutionary past.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="People march down the streets of Havana holding Cuban flags" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/411110/original/file-20210713-27-wxzmnk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=523&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A counterprotest in support of the Díaz-Canel government in Havana, July 11, 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-take-part-in-a-demonstration-to-support-the-news-photo/1233931266?adppopup=true">Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Ever fewer Cubans even remember those heady post-revolution years, says the Cuba historian <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/joseph-j-gonzalez-577624">Joseph Gonzalez</a>. </p>
<p>“Unlike their parents and grandparents, Cubans in their 20s, 30s and 40s never enjoyed a sustained, functional contract with the regime: We provide you a living, and in exchange you give us support, or at least acquiescence.”</p>
<p>Gonzalez says younger generations in Cuba still trust the government to provide free quality health care and education – both achievements of the Castro era.</p>
<p>“But they know it cannot feed, clothe and house its people in any but the most basic way,” he says.</p>
<p>Today Cubans have to hustle to survive; many work two jobs. A recent currency change means cash is scarce and many everyday goods are unaffordable. And after a year keeping the pandemic largely at bay, COVID-19 is surging on the island. </p>
<p>Recent protests suggest some Cubans are sick of so much struggle.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/whats-next-for-cuba-and-the-united-states-after-raul-castros-retirement-159002">What's next for Cuba and the United States after Raul Castro's retirement</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/164456/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
Experts explain the recent history behind the rare public outpouring of anger in Cuba.Catesby Holmes, International Editor | Politics Editor, The Conversation USLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1590022021-04-19T21:27:51Z2021-04-19T21:27:51ZWhat’s next for Cuba and the United States after Raul Castro’s retirement<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395771/original/file-20210419-19-ve9yk3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=12%2C6%2C4285%2C2854&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">With Raul Castro's resignation as first secretary of the Communist Party, the Castro era is officially over in Cuba.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/cuban-first-secretary-of-the-communist-party-and-former-news-photo/1189655929?adppopup=true">Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Cuba’s Castro dynasty has officially ended. </p>
<p>On April 16, 2021, Raul Castro – younger brother of longtime Cuban leader Fidel Castro – <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/article250465321.html">relinquished his position as first secretary</a> of the Communist Party of Cuba, the most powerful position in Cuba. </p>
<p>Castro, 89, became Cuba’s president in 2008, after his brother’s incapacitation, and took over the first secretary role from Fidel in 2011. Fidel Castro died in 2016. </p>
<p>Just as Fidel’s death did not <a href="https://theconversation.com/castros-conundrum-finding-a-post-communist-model-cuba-can-follow-81242">suddenly transform antagonistic U.S.-Cuban ties</a>, neither does Raul Castro’s departure.</p>
<p>Cuban <a href="https://theconversation.com/cubas-new-president-what-to-expect-of-miguel-diaz-canel-95187">President Miguel Díaz Canel</a>, who took office in 2018 after Raul Castro stepped down as president, has resisted calls for democratic reforms and has <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/nation-world/ct-aud-nw-cuba-raul-castro-resigns-20210416-5atqyx5infhmra6fptoneoabpa-story.html">pressing economic issues</a> to manage, as well as a pandemic. </p>
<p>So does his American counterpart, President Joe Biden. The White House <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article249826558.html">recently said Cuba policy</a> is “not a top priority.”</p>
<p>Neither leader is likely to <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2021-04-16/white-house-says-shift-in-policy-on-cuba-not-one-of-bidens-top-priorities">risk his political future</a> with bold diplomacy. But younger Cubans continue to separate themselves from the policies and priorities of their government, creating a basis for a different relationship with the U.S.</p>
<h2>No longer a threat</h2>
<p>Raul Castro’s retirement coincided with the <a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?510599-1/bay-pigs-60th-anniversary">60th anniversary</a> of Cuba’s military triumph over the U.S. at the Bay of Pigs.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black-and-white image of militiamen with weapons in a field" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395779/original/file-20210419-23-1rhxoqx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cuban troops use Soviet-made anti-aircraft artillery to thwart a U.S.-supported invasion at the Bay of Pigs in April 1961.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/picture-dated-april-1961-of-cuban-troops-using-soviet-made-news-photo/504769636?adppopup=true">AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On April 17, 1961, Cuban nationals aided by the CIA <a href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/the-bay-of-pigs">began an invasion</a> designed to overthrow Fidel Castro. The Cuban army quickly defeated them, humiliating the Kennedy administration. </p>
<p>Cuba soon allied itself with the Soviet Union, then America’s greatest enemy. The U.S. responded with a <a href="https://www.state.gov/cuba-sanctions/">rigorous trade embargo</a>. </p>
<p>In the six decades since, U.S.-Cuban relations have alternated between hostile and icy, with a <a href="https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2016/03/18/cuban-thaw-a-history-of-us-cuban-relations">brief thaw</a> under President Barack Obama. </p>
<p>Fidel Castro’s Cuba supported <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/castro-and-cold-war/">leftist insurgencies and Soviet allies</a> across Latin America and the world, from Nicaragua to Angola. In 1962, Castro permitted <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1961-1968/cuban-missile-crisis">Soviet missiles</a> to be set up in Cuba and aimed at the U.S., about 100 miles away, leading the U.S. and Soviet Union to the brink of nuclear war. </p>
<p>Today Cuba is still communist and it remains on the State Department’s <a href="https://www.state.gov/state-sponsors-of-terrorism/">list of countries</a> that support terrorism, alongside Iran and North Korea. But bereft of <a href="https://dra.american.edu/islandora/object/0708capstones:137/datastream/PDF/view">patrons like the Soviets</a>, it presents no danger to the U.S. mainland or its allies. </p>
<p>Cuba can do little more than irritate U.S. presidents by supporting Latin American leaders who resist American power, like <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-cuba-sanctions/u-s-slaps-sanctions-on-cuba-defense-minister-over-support-for-venezuelas-maduro-idUSKBN1Z11IM">Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro</a> and Bolivia’s ousted former leader <a href="https://cubasi.cu/en/cuba/item/14625-bolivian-president-evo-morales-greets-raul-castro-on-social-media-praises-cuba-s-solidarity">Evo Morales</a>.</p>
<h2>Entrepreneurship, Cuban-style</h2>
<p>The Cuban people have changed just as much, according to my <a href="https://today.appstate.edu/2016/01/26/gonzalez">two decades of research on and travel to the island</a>. </p>
<p>Unlike their parents and grandparents, Cubans in their 20s, 30s and 40s <a href="https://theconversation.com/fidels-cuba-is-long-gone-120271">never enjoyed a sustained, functional contract with the regime</a>: We provide you a living, and in exchange you give us support, or at least acquiescence. </p>
<p>Cubans who came of age during or after the so-called “Special Period” of the 1990s – when Cuba faced <a href="https://cubaplatform.org/special-period">economic collapse</a> – rely on the government to deliver certain services, primarily health care and education. But they know it cannot feed, clothe and house its people in any but the most basic way. </p>
<p>Young Cubans have to <a href="https://theconversation.com/fidels-cuba-is-long-gone-120271">hustle to survive</a> – or “<a href="https://medium.com/@d.yau/cubas-resolver-mentality-makes-it-the-next-startup-hub-2f10ea2096a0">resolver</a>,” a Spanish verb that means “to resolve” but which in Cuba refers to providing for one’s family. </p>
<p>And the Cuban hustle has a capitalist bent.</p>
<p>In 2008 <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2012-12-27-sns-rt-cuba-economyreforml1e8nq23a-20121227-story.html">Raul Castro’s government cut</a> public payrolls and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-politics-castro-changes-explaine/explainer-the-state-of-raul-castros-economic-reforms-in-cuba-idUSKBN1HO0CL">allowed Cubans to earn private incomes</a>, hoping Cubans would earn more money and generate more tax revenue. Previously, all jobs in Cuba were government jobs, whether you were a grocer or an architect, with government-regulated salaries. </p>
<p>Today, official statistics say about a <a href="https://oncubanews.com/en/cuba/economy/the-private-sector-generates-32-of-employment-in-cuba/">third of Cubans</a> are privately employed. But the real proportion is almost surely higher. Almost all the adult Cubans I know have their own business – whether cutting hair or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casa_particular">renting their home as a bed and breakfast</a> – along with a traditional government-regulated job. </p>
<h2>Cuban resolve</h2>
<p>Meanwhile, the government has <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/cuban-reforms-reduce-subsidies-and-raise-costs/av-56263057">begun to eliminate</a> the subsidies that long defined Cuban life. Ration books for staple foods are disappearing and with them, subsidized prices.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An elderly person wearing a face mask walks along a street of Havana, holding a grocery bag" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395789/original/file-20210419-21-18d1tw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Food prices have gone way up in Cuba, and lines at government-run markets can be long.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-elderly-person-wearing-a-face-mask-walks-along-a-street-news-photo/1232189703?adppopup=true">Yamil Lage/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Food and clothing costs have doubled or tripled in Cuba in the past year. <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-economy-analysis/analysis-cubas-looming-monetary-reform-sparks-confusion-inflation-fears-idUSKBN29418I">Utility prices have increased</a> by factors of four or five.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/cuba-announces-increase-wages-part-economic-reform-n1024451">Cuban state salaries have risen</a> since economic liberalization, but not that much. </p>
<p>Consequently, many Cubans operate outside of the law, trading in everything from clothing to scrap metal or gasoline stolen from the state. Cubans call people with illegal businesses “<a href="https://www.spanishdict.com/answers/163581/what-does-bisnero-mean-appears-in-a-cuban-text">bisneros</a>.”</p>
<p>Whether legal restaurateur or black-market bisnero, Cubans operate businesses not to become rich but to “<a href="https://medium.com/@d.yau/cubas-resolver-mentality-makes-it-the-next-startup-hub-2f10ea2096a0">resolver</a>.” They hope to improve their lots modestly, allowing their families to eat a wider range of fresher foods, or to save for a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2018/oct/12/teens-tiaras-quinceanera-celebrations-cuba-havana-diana-markosian-in-pictures">child’s birthday party</a>. </p>
<p>Cuba “forces us to be criminals just to make a living,” said 26-year-old Carlo Rodríguez, a server at a Havana restaurant. </p>
<h2>Generational divide</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.gc.cuny.edu/CUNY_GC/media/CUNY-Graduate-Center/PDF/Centers/Bildner%20Center%20for%20Western%20Hemisphere%20Studies/Publications/Strug6_000.pdf">Older Cubans remain</a> faithful to the Castros’ vision of Cuba as an anti-imperialist, anti-American outpost. But revolutionary slogans like “socialismo o muerte” – “socialism or death” – <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-latin-america-56606748">do not resonate</a> with young Cubans. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black-and-white photo of Castro, in his traditional revolutionary beret, driving a horse-drawn sleigh in the snow, surrounded by Russians in traditional dress" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=414&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/395785/original/file-20210419-13-2hdjer.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fidel Castro visits Moscow, Russia, in 1964.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/moscow-ussr-cuban-revolution-leader-fidel-castro-at-a-news-photo/522502032?adppopup=true">TASS via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Young Cubans also want more free speech. While Cubans <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/cubans-are-using-social-media-to-air-their-grievances--and-the-government-is-responding-sometimes/2019/07/07/01b3cba2-912e-11e9-956a-88c291ab5c38_story.html">can and do complain</a> privately, the Cuban government has long restricted civil liberties. Journalism is mostly state sponsored, and the country’s few independent newspapers run into trouble when stories criticize the regime.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/stories-50823142">Social media</a> only recently became legal and relatively widespread in Cuba. </p>
<p>Last year, a <a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-cracks-down-on-artists-who-demanded-creative-freedoms-after-unprecedented-government-negotiations-152073">dissident artists movement</a> organized via WhatsApp and gained enough popular support to force the government into unprecedented negotiations about expanding freedom of expression in Cuba. A crackdown followed, with some dissidents jailed. But calls for free expression persist among <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/10/opinion/cuba-san-isidro-movement.html">younger Cubans</a>. </p>
<p>[<em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>Most Cubans also <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/poll-shows-vast-majority-of-cubans-welcome-closer-ties-with-us/2015/04/08/6285bfe4-d8c3-11e4-bf0b-f648b95a6488_story.html">want closer ties</a> to the U.S., according to a 2015 poll. Since the adoption last year of <a href="https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2020/12/16/cuba-ends-its-dual-currency-system">a single currency pegged to the U.S. dollar</a>, American money is “like gold” on the island, my friend Tony, a shopkeeper, told me. </p>
<p>It is the U.S. embargo and former president <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-nods-to-cuban-exiles-rolls-back-ties-experts-react-79559">Donald Trump’s tightened restrictions on travel to the island</a> – not the Cuban government – that prevent Americans from spending their dollars on the island. </p>
<p>Cubans know this, and they resent the <a href="https://www.state.gov/cuba-sanctions/">embargo</a> for making their lives miserable. But younger Cubans recognize Cuba’s <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-16/raul-castro-to-stand-down-as-head-of-cuba-s-communist-party">ailing centrally planned economy</a> as a problem, too. </p>
<p>Cuban Americans, on the other hand, largely <a href="https://cri.fiu.edu/research/cuba-poll/2020-fiu-cuba-poll.pdf">supported Trump</a>. Recent <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/us/frustration-over-lack-of-democratic-reform-in-cuba-fuels-growing-support-for-u-s-trade-embargo-among-south-florida-cuban-americans-poll">polling showed</a> about 45% support keeping the embargo, up 10 points from two years ago. </p>
<p>Such sentiments make it more difficult for Biden to initiate his own Obama-style “thaw.” But they cannot stop the changes at work in Cuban society.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/159002/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joseph J. Gonzalez does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Just as Fidel Castro’s 2016 death did not transform US-Cuba ties, his brother Raul’s exit from politics is unlikely to do so. But Cuba itself is changing. Eventually, Havana and Washington will, too.Joseph J. Gonzalez, Associate Professor, Global Studies, Appalachian State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1574732021-04-02T12:16:53Z2021-04-02T12:16:53Z60 years after Bay of Pigs, New York Times role – and myth – made clear<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392866/original/file-20210331-23-8d40xr.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=9%2C0%2C3091%2C2108&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Bay of Pigs debacle: Watched by armed guards, grim-faced US-backed invaders are marched off to prison after their capture by Fidel Castro's forces.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/havana-cuba-watched-by-armed-guards-grim-faced-invaders-are-news-photo/515411326?adppopup=true">Bettmann via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Sixty years ago, The New York Times is said to have muzzled itself in reporting about plans for the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Bay-of-Pigs-invasion">CIA-backed Bay of Pigs invasion</a>, earning a lasting niche of dishonor in the history of American journalism. </p>
<p>The Bay of Pigs-New York Times suppression tale has been cited in <a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/215359/freedom-of-speech-by-david-k-shipler/">books</a>, <a href="https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-2004-05-05-0405050193-story.html">newspapers</a>, on cable news shows and <a href="https://www.bloombergquint.com/gadfly/max-hastings-60-years-later-cuba-s-bay-of-pigs-is-a-cautionary-tale">elsewhere</a> as a study in self-censorship and its consequences. </p>
<p>Had the Times resisted the requests of President John F. Kennedy, had it printed all it knew about the pending invasion of Cuba, the suppression tale goes, the ill-fated assault might have been scrapped and the U.S. spared a foreign policy debacle.</p>
<p>The suppression tale makes for a <a href="https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-2008-03-28-0803270121-story,amp.html">timeless lesson</a> about the perils for news organizations in yielding to government pressure and withholding vital if sensitive information, ostensibly because of national security implications. When government officials invoke national security, publishing secret material becomes a thorny matter for news outlets. </p>
<p>Yet in the case of the Times and the Bay of Pigs, the object lesson is not relevant.</p>
<p>That’s because the suppression narrative is exaggerated. It’s a <a href="https://mediamythalert.com/2009/11/02/media-myths-faqs/">media-driven myth</a> – one of many well-known tales about the news media which, under scrutiny, dissolve as false or fanciful.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Kennedy and Great Britain's Prime Minister Harold Macmillan on the presidential yacht." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=758&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=758&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=758&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=952&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=952&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392881/original/file-20210331-23-zhi280.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=952&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kennedy and British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan were together at the time Kennedy was rumored to have called editors at The New York Times.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/asset-viewer/archives/JFKWHP/1961/Month%2004/Day%2006/JFKWHP-1961-04-06-B">JFK Presidential Library</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Widely known, often retold</h2>
<p>As I discuss in “<a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520291294">Getting It Wrong: Debunking the Greatest Myths in American Journalism</a>,” the Times did not suppress reports about the approaching invasion, which was launched April 17, 1961, and <a href="https://www.britannica.com/video/187489/News-footage-relations-breakdown-Cuban-invasion-Bay">failed to dislodge Cuban dictator Fidel Castro</a>.</p>
<p>In fact, the Times reports about preparations for the assault were detailed and often prominently displayed on the front page. Readers could tell what was coming, if not always in specific detail.</p>
<p>Moreover, there is no evidence Kennedy knew in advance about the Times report published April 7, 1961, a front-page article about invasion preparations that lies at the heart of the suppression myth. </p>
<p>There is no evidence that Kennedy or anyone in his administration lobbied or persuaded the Times to hold back or significantly dilute that story, as many accounts have claimed.</p>
<p>The April 7 article was written by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/22/world/tad-szulc-74-dies-times-correspondent-who-uncovered-bay-of-pigs-imbroglio.html">Tad Szulc</a>, a veteran foreign correspondent who reported from Miami that an assault by CIA-trained Cuban rebels was imminent. </p>
<h2>Modest and judicious edits</h2>
<p>According to subsequent accounts by senior editors at the Times, references to imminence and the CIA were removed before the article was published.</p>
<p>They reasoned that “imminent” was more prediction than fact. <a href="https://mediamythalert.wordpress.com/2011/01/28/fact-checking-keller-on-nyt-bay-of-pigs-suppression-myth/">The managing editor, Turner Catledge</a>, later wrote that he “was hesitant to specify the CIA when we might not be able to document the charge.” The term “United States officials” was substituted. Both decisions were modest and judicious. </p>
<p>Dispute arose among Times editors internally about trimming to a single column the headline that accompanied Szulc’s story. A headline spanning four columns had been planned. </p>
<p>The size of a newspaper headline typically corresponds to an article’s relative significance. A four-column headline would have signaled “a story of exceptional importance,” former Times reporter and editor Harrison E. Salisbury noted in “<a href="https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1980/09/25/winners-and-losers-at-the-times/">Without Fear or Favor: The New York Times and Its Times</a>,” an insider’s account. Four-column display was infrequent, although not unheard of, on the Times’ front pages of the early 1960s. </p>
<p>But without a reference to the invasion’s imminence, a four-column headline was difficult to justify. Even so, Szulc’s lengthy article received prominent placement at the top of the Times’ front page. </p>
<p>“<a href="https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/library/world/americas/040761cuba-invasion.html">Anti-Castro Units Trained To Fight At Florida Bases</a>,” the headline read.</p>
<p>It’s highly unlikely that Kennedy made a private appeal to anyone at the Times on April 6, 1961, the day Szulc’s dispatch was filed, edited and readied for publication. White House logs show no telephone calls to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1983/04/28/obituaries/turner-catledge-dies-at-82-former-editor-of-the-times.html">Catledge</a> or other senior Times executives on April 6, according to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library in Boston.</p>
<h2>Little opportunity to call</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="'Anti-Castro Units trained to fight at Florida bases,' reads the headline on a New York Times story published before the Bay of Pigs invasion." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1469&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1469&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1469&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1846&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1846&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/392875/original/file-20210331-21-y1rrsi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1846&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">One of reporter Tad Szulc’s stories for The New York Times before the Bay of Pigs invasion.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://mediamythalert.com/2011/04/06/busting-the-nytimes-suppression-myth-50-years-on/">Media Myth Alert</a>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The president spent the last half of the afternoon that day playing host to Harold Macmillan, the British prime minister, on a cruise aboard the presidential yacht down the Potomac River. It was nearly 6:30 p.m. when Kennedy returned to the White House. </p>
<p>That left scant opportunity for him to have called Times executives before the newspaper’s first edition went to press.</p>
<p>Salisbury’s “Without Fear or Favor” offers a detailed discussion about internal deliberations on Szulc’s article and his account is adamant.</p>
<p>“The government in April 1961,” Salisbury wrote, “did not … know that The Times was going to publish the Szulc story although it was aware that The Times and other newsmen were probing in Miami. Nor did President Kennedy telephone [senior Times officials] about the story. … The action which The Times took [in editing Szulc’s report] was on its own responsibility,” the result of internal discussions.</p>
<p>“Most important,” Salisbury added, “The Times had not killed Szulc’s story … The Times believed it was more important to publish than to withhold. Publish it did.”</p>
<p>The run-up to the Bay of Pigs was no one-off story. Indeed, the ongoing nature of the Times’ pre-invasion coverage is almost never noted when the <a href="https://mediamythalert.com/2011/04/06/busting-the-nytimes-suppression-myth-50-years-on/">suppression myth</a> is told.</p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>After publishing Szulc’s article, the Times expanded its reporting about the pending invasion. Its front page of April 9, 1961, for example, carried a story by Szulc that Cuban exile leaders were trying to reconcile their rivalries while “preparing a thrust” against Castro. </p>
<p>“The first assumption of the [leaders’] plans,” Szulc wrote, “is that an invasion by a ‘liberation army,’ now in the final stages of training in Central America and in Louisiana, will succeed with the aid of an internal uprising in Cuba.” </p>
<p>With that, Szulc broadly described the objectives of a mission that brought 1,400 armed exiles to landing beaches in southwest Cuba. </p>
<p>Their assault was crushed within three days.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/157473/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>W. Joseph Campbell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The New York Times gave in to White House pressure and did not publish crucial information about an impending US-backed invasion of Cuba. It’s an old story, much repeated – but it’s wrong.W. Joseph Campbell, Professor of Communication Studies, American University School of CommunicationLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1532692021-01-26T14:22:47Z2021-01-26T14:22:47ZU.S.-Cuba relations: Will Joe Biden pick up where Barack Obama left off?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380489/original/file-20210125-21-1pam6z5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C6362%2C3933&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">American and Cuban flags hang from a wall with an old camera hung in between in Havana, Cuba, on Jan. 11, 2021.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Under the new Joe Biden administration in the United States, significant changes in foreign policy are already taking place. <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-signs-executive-orders-day-one/">The 15 executive orders</a> Biden signed during his first day in office make this very clear. One of his next foreign policy challenges, and opportunities, will be Cuba.</p>
<p>The Donald Trump administration rejected the successful rapprochement of Cuba-U.S. relations <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/10/14/presidential-policy-directive-united-states-cuba-normalization">established under former president Barack Obama</a>. </p>
<p>Instead, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-administration-announces-new-measures-against-cuba/2019/04/17/cfc2bc96-6132-11e9-9ff2-abc984dc9eec_story.html">Trump introduced measures that reduced remittance money from exiles</a>, prohibited cruise ship traffic, stopped flights from the U.S. to most Cuban cities, encouraged legislation against the Cuban state, outlawed the possibility of U.S. investment on the island, fined companies that assisted trade with Cuba, and made cultural and academic exchanges almost impossible.</p>
<p>In Trump’s last week in office, Cuba was also placed on the U.S. list of <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/trump-hits-cuba-with-new-terrorism-sanctions-in-waning-days-1.5262326">countries supporting terrorism</a>.</p>
<p>What path will the Biden administration follow?</p>
<h2>Troubled relationship</h2>
<p>Unlike Canada, the U.S. has a long and troubled relationship with post-revolution Cuba that’s included <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/fidel-castros-death/fidel-castro-cia-s-7-most-bizarre-assassination-attempts-n688951">several assassination attempts against Fidel Castro</a>, a trade embargo that has lasted 60 years and a record of <a href="https://cuba-solidarity.org.uk/resources/usintervention.pdf">supporting terrorism attacks</a>. More than 3,400 Cubans have been killed in these attacks, according to the book <em><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt183p8v9">Voices from the Other Side: An Oral History of Terrorism against Cuba</a></em>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.voanews.com/americas/obama-moved-aggressively-restore-relations-cuba">The relationship improved dramatically</a> under the Obama administration. Diplomatic relations were renewed, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/20/barack-obama-cuba-visit-us-politics-shift-public-opinion-diplomacy">the president visited Cuba in 2016</a> (the first by a sitting president since 1928), 22 bilateral agreements were signed, U.S. investment started, trade increased, hundreds of thousands of Americans visited the islands, Havana became a major stop for U.S.-based cruise lines, medical co-operation on cancer research began and cultural, sports and academic exchanges flourished. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Raul Castro lifts Barack Obama's arm." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=419&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=526&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=526&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380459/original/file-20210125-23-1q21591.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=526&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In this March 2016 photo, Cuban President Raul Castro, right, lifts up the arm of U.S. President Barack Obama, at the conclusion of their joint news conference at the Palace of the Revolution, in Havana, Cuba.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/donald-trump-reverses-barack-obamas-cuba-policy">Then along came Trump</a>, undoing these initiatives.</p>
<p>But now Obama’s vice-president is in the Oval Office. Speaking in September 2020, <a href="https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/biden-discusses-approach-to-cuba-in-nbc-6-interview/2603419">Biden said</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“I’d try to reverse the failed Trump policies, they inflicted harm on Cubans and their families … [and] done nothing to advance democracy and human rights.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This won’t be without challenges, however, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/11/us/politics/cuba-terrorism-trump-pompeo.html">and former secretary of state Mike Pompeo’s move</a> to place Cuba on the list of countries supporting terrorism, <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/fury-trumps-11th-hour-yemen-cuba-sanctions/story?id=75184964">although criticized</a>, could delay any meaningful reforms the new administration by several months. Cuba will also be expected to show that it is prepared to make concessions on human rights issues to the United States.</p>
<h2>Quick progress</h2>
<p>Nonetheless, there are several areas where Biden could move relatively quickly by reintroducing some of Obama’s policies.</p>
<p>Limits on remittances from Americans to Cuba <a href="https://www.theguardian.pe.ca/news/world/cubans-applaud-biden-win-hope-for-easing-of-sanctions-517979/">could be re-established</a>. They were without limit under Obama, but reduced to a maximum of $1,000 every quarter by Trump. Post-pandemic, Biden could also easily allow flights to resume from the U.S. to Cuba, a move that would be popular in the Cuban-American community. </p>
<p>By September 2019, <a href="https://www.tourism-review.com/cuban-tourism-reported-decreased-numbers-news11245">almost a million Americans and Cuban-Americans had visited Cuba that year</a>. This trend would likely resume.</p>
<p>In the medium term, and barring any radical changes in international politics, Biden could remove Cuba from the list of countries that support terrorism. Americans would then be allowed to travel to Cuba without the need for special licences designed to limit their trips there. Many U.S. commercial organizations <a href="https://www.agri-pulse.com/articles/15164-farm-groups-ask-biden-to-improve-cuba-relations">could again be allowed to trade with Cuba</a>.</p>
<p>Americans who want to take cruises to Cuba <a href="https://www.travelweekly.com/Cruise-Travel/Insights/Biden-as-president-Cuba-cruises">could again be permitted to do so</a>. Cultural and educational exchanges, as well as academic projects, could be reinstated. Some joint scientific projects, <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/views/2020/04/12/promising-cubaus-cooperation-cancer">ranging from the successful cancer research project</a> at Roswell Park in Buffalo, N.Y, to <a href="https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-cuba-oil-clean-water-20150201-story.html">coral reef research in the Florida Straits</a>, could be renewed.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380470/original/file-20210125-17-1r6p8g3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An American cruise ship that arrived from Miami is seen in the Havana harbour in 2016.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Desmond Boylan)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/cuba-sends-white-coat-army-doctors-fight-coronavirus-different-countries-n1240028">Cuba has sent thousands of medical personnel</a> to dozens of countries during the COVID-19 crisis, a sign that bilateral medical collaboration offers tremendous opportunities for the U.S. as it’s ravaged by the coronavirus.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-steps-up-in-the-fight-against-coronavirus-at-home-and-around-the-world-137565">Cuba steps up in the fight against coronavirus, at home and around the world</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Sooner or later the thorny issue of the so-called “<a href="https://theconversation.com/sonic-attacks-how-a-medical-mystery-can-sow-distrust-in-foreign-governments-98417">sonic attacks</a>” reported by American and Canadian diplomats in 2016 and 2017 needs to be addressed. So far, despite investigations by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and the RCMP, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/07/health/cuba-sonic-attack-crickets-scli-intl/index.html">no cause has been definitively identified</a>. Meanwhile, the U.S. Embassy <a href="https://thehill.com/latino/376454-us-embassy-in-havana-permanently-sticking-with-skeleton-staff-after-attacks">is operating with a skeleton staff</a>, and consular services are virtually non-existent. Restoring the full staff complement would go a long way to improve U.S.-Cuba relations.</p>
<h2>Guantanamo, embargo</h2>
<p>Two long-term issues may remain unresolved during the Biden administration. </p>
<p>Human rights organizations have long called for the U.S. military base in Guantánamo <a href="https://www.amnesty.org.uk/guantanamo-bay-human-rights">to be closed</a>, and it’s unclear whether Biden will take up Obama’s unsuccessful efforts to shut down the notorious detention centre. </p>
<p>Equally challenging is the American economic, commercial and financial embargo of Cuba, in place since the early 1960s. This, too, has resulted in international condemnation. In November 2019, <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2019/11/1050891">187 countries condemned the embargo</a>, with only three supporting it. While the embargo can only be lifted with an act of Congress, Biden has ample options to amend the implementation of the legislation, which could pave the way for it to end.</p>
<p>Canadians look askance at the approach taken by various U.S. administrations on Cuba. By contrast, we have a normal relationship with the island. <a href="https://oncubanews.com/en/cuba/canadians-return-to-cuba/">Over a million Canadians travel there every year for vacations</a>. </p>
<p>Sherritt International, a nickel mining and energy development company based in Toronto, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-19/biden-easing-up-on-cuba-would-boost-canadian-miner-ceo-says">is one of the largest foreign investors</a>.</p>
<p>Pierre Trudeau and Fidel Castro were good friends — Castro even attended Trudeau’s funeral.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Fidel Castro looks at Pierre Trudeau's casket, draped with a Canadian flag." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/380482/original/file-20210125-21-wwctiu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=599&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cuban President Fidel Castro pays his respects to former prime minister Pierre Trudeau during the lying-in-state ceremony at Montréal’s city hall in October 2000.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">CP PHOTO/Aaron Harris</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>It remains to be seen if Joe Biden can return to the heady days of the Obama administration when, for the first time in more than 50 years, embassies were reopened in both Cuba and the United States. </p>
<p>The government in Havana clearly remains open to a rapprochement, while the Cuban people <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/12/15/bb-bidens-team-is-planning-a-Cuba-reset-sources">would welcome it</a> with open arms. The U.S. could also gain from Cuba’s assistance in <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/30/heres-how-the-us-venezuela-relationship-reached-a-boiling-point.html">seeking a political solution to the Venezuelan quagmire</a>.</p>
<p>Hopefully, common sense will prevail and Biden will be able to return to the path blazed by Obama, <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/world/cuba-biden-obama-trump">when two years of bilateral negotiations</a> helped undo more than five decades of hostility. It is clearly time to turn the page.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/153269/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Kirk does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Joe Biden could return to the path blazed by Barack Obama on Cuba, when two years of bilateral negotiations helped undo more than five decades of hostility.John Kirk, Professor of Latin American Studies, Dalhousie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1443312020-08-26T21:59:16Z2020-08-26T21:59:16ZThe other WE Charity scandal: White saviourism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354733/original/file-20200825-14-1fjp8fh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4705%2C2986&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Co-founders Craig (left) and Marc Kielburger introduce Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his wife Sophie Gregoire-Trudeau as they appear at the WE Day celebrations in Ottawa in November 2015. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The recent WE Charity scandal has stemmed largely from the relationship between Craig and Marc Kielburger and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his family members. </p>
<p>But <a href="https://canadiandimension.com/articles/view/we-charity-and-the-white-saviour-complex">WE’s own practices and policies are now also being scrutinized</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-charitys-international-development-efforts-offered-quick-fixes-not-real-impact-144473">WE Charity's international development efforts offered quick fixes, not real impact</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>It’s about time. </p>
<p>Fifty years ago, Canada’s first volunteer-deploying development agency took a look at a WE-type proposal, and immediately dismissed it as arrogant and insulting to recipient countries of the Global South. Fittingly enough, this took place under the auspices of former prime minister Pierre Trudeau, Justin’s father. </p>
<h2>The Trudeau connection</h2>
<p>Youth volunteer programs have a long Liberal party history, particularly during <a href="https://activehistory.ca/2020/07/from-me-to-we-to-the-cyc-liberals-and-the-controversial-history-of-youth-volunteerism/">Pierre Trudeau’s years as prime minister in the 1960s and 1970s</a>.</p>
<p>Pierre Trudeau also had a relatively open-minded approach to Cuba, including a friendship, of sorts, with Fidel Castro. These two affinities — Cuba and international youth volunteer programs — helped pave the way for Canada’s first major presence in revolutionary Cuba. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Pierre Trudeau smiles as he stands next to Fidel Castro." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354746/original/file-20200825-21-gx2ja5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Former prime minister Pierre Trudeau looks on as Cuban President Fidel Castro gestures during a visit to a Havana houising project in this January 1976 photo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Fred Chartrand</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In the 1960s and 1970s, well before Canadians travelled to Cuban beach resorts, Cuba welcomed young Canadian teachers and researchers. Via the non-governmental organization Canadian University Service Overseas (CUSO), Canada was the first NGO invited to Cuba in the tumultuous decades after the 1959 Revolution. </p>
<p>CUSO operated for more than 10 years in Cuba, <a href="https://collectionscanada.gc.ca/pam_archives/index.php?fuseaction=genitem.displayItem&rec_nbr=5289898&lang=eng&rec_nbr_list=5289898,4773685">and Library and Archives Canada houses a huge selection of documents and correspondence related to the organization</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/canada-cuba-relations-take-a-sad-turn-with-new-visa-requirements-117241">Canada-Cuba relations take a sad turn with new visa requirements</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Revolution was in the air, but CUSO saw Cuba primarily through the lens of an opportunity for international development.</p>
<p>As CUSO’s volunteer handbook explained:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“For those who know the countries of the under-developed world, Cuba will present a surprisingly advanced state of development in health, education and social conditions.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Even the <em>Globe and Mail</em> enthused, in 1969, that Cuban-Canadian co-operation could “teach Canada a lot about an experiment in development which has had its unusual successes.”</p>
<p>Cuba requested aid from Canada to rebuild its engineering capacity, decimated by the exodus of skilled professionals after the revolution. CUSO oversaw a program for Canadian engineering professors to train a new generation in Cuba. Canada sent highly skilled teachers, but this program was based on reciprocity.</p>
<p>“What can we learn from a sugar cane economy?” asked one of the Canadian professors who spent a month teaching in Cuba in 1973. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A painting of Cuban sugar cane cutters." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=595&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=595&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/354377/original/file-20200824-16-17lww3p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=595&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Macheteros/Cane Cutters, circa 1973, by Cuban-Canadian painter Harry Tanner.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Plenty, as it turned out. Canadian engineering professors and other researchers who taught in Cuba in the 1970s were enthusiastic about their students, as well as how much the experience changed their own perspectives on teaching, global development and the practice of engineering in the developed world.</p>
<h2>No Canadian teens sent to Cuba</h2>
<p>But as this project was percolating, another possible CUSO initiative emerged in Ottawa that almost sunk it. The brief but intense controversy about sending young Canadians to Cuba as volunteer sugar cane cutters raises questions about why the Kielburgers’ international development approach hasn’t been controversial for years.</p>
<p>An Ottawa CUSO staffer watched the Cuba program develop and had an idea. CUSO should organize a massive brigade of Canadian youth to cut sugar cane in Cuba in the summer of 1971. </p>
<p>This would address two issues: ongoing concerns about Canadian youth summer unemployment, and the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1970/01/26/archives/cuba-mobilizes-for-sugar.html">Cuban campaign to harvest 10 million tons of sugar</a> (a goal that was not met).</p>
<p>In Havana, CUSO’s field officer Joe Vise hit the roof. </p>
<p>“My reaction to CUSO getting into this brigade type work in Cuba is, from Cuba, COMPLETELY NEGATIVE.” </p>
<p>Reading the CUSO archives in Ottawa decades later during my research into Canada/Cuba relations, I could almost hear his outrage on the page. Drawing from his previous experience working in Kenya, Vise argued that recipient countries were sensitive to “receiving the cast-offs of labour that can’t be used in donor countries.”</p>
<h2>Wanted capitalist technology</h2>
<p>Why would Canada dump their unemployed kids on poor countries, Vise wondered? </p>
<p>“We have been invited by the Cubans to provide western technological knowledge, methods and contacts. They want from us fast development and education in the aspects of capitalist technology and production where Soviet bloc technical aid has not provided them with the answers.”</p>
<p>What will it mean, asked Vise, to “recipient countries’ feelings of self-respect” if, instead of technical expertise, they’re on the receiving end of unemployed teenagers?</p>
<p>CUSO’s engineering exchange program continued for several years and was considered a success by both countries. More than 100 Cuban students obtained graduate degrees, and Canadian-educated professors quickly built the capacity of Cuba’s engineering schools. </p>
<p>I’ve been interviewing retired Canadian-trained engineering professors in Havana, all of whom have detailed how this Canadian project facilitated their country’s 1960s-era dream of independent development.</p>
<p>No more was heard about the proposal to send Canadian youth to cut Cuban sugar cane; it was clearly considered a bad idea at the time. It remains a bad idea, and WE stands apart from what most development scholars, teachers and organizations consider good practices. WE, in fact, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/we-charity-volunteer-white-saviour_ca_5f0e0652c5b648c301f07314">has often been accused of white saviourism</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1293621237793595393"}"></div></p>
<p>From today’s perspective, when WE tells youth <a href="https://briarpatchmagazine.com/articles/view/we-is-actually-we">unskilled in anything but Canadian good intentions</a> that their mere presence in the Global South is helpful, the story of the cane cutters seems a warning flare for the future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/144331/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Karen Dubinsky has received SSHRC funds for this research </span></em></p>An intense controversy over sending Canadian teens to Cuba to cut sugar cane in the 1970s raises questions about why WE Charity’s international development approach hasn’t been controversial for years.Karen Dubinsky, Professor, Global Development Studies and History, Queen's University, OntarioLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1344292020-03-26T10:26:52Z2020-03-26T10:26:52ZBy sending doctors to Italy, Cuba continues its long campaign of medical diplomacy<p>As Italy continues its battle against the global coronavirus pandemic, Cuba has sent <a href="https://www.repubblica.it/esteri/2020/03/21/news/coronavirus_cuba_in_soccorso_dell_italia_52_medici_e_infermieri_in_arrivo_a_crema-251931147/">52 doctors and nurses</a> to the country to help. The excellent training of Cuban doctors as well as the fact that they are used to working in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/20/opinion/cubas-impressive-role-on-ebola.html">precarious and high-risk situations</a> will provide invaluable support for the Italian people. </p>
<p>For nearly 60 years, Cuba has been sending healthcare professionals around the world. It does this in solidarity with those in need, but also as part of a concerted campaign of medical diplomacy and to make money to help the country survive an ongoing US embargo. </p>
<p>Since the very early years of the Cuban revolution, its former leader, Fidel Castro, made clear that universal healthcare and internationalism would be key to the country’s strategy. Based on the socialist concept that everyone should have the same opportunities in life, Cuba believed these ideals should be applicable at the global level. The Cuban programme was born out of an interest to export its revolutionary socialist ideals, first to Africa, and later to South America and the rest of the world. </p>
<p>Cuba sent its first long-term mission of Cuban doctors to Algeria in 1963, a country facing a territorial conflict with Morocco. Since then, Cuba has sent more than 400,000 healthcare professionals to work in 164 countries, according to <a href="http://www.granma.cu/mundo/2020-03-23/cubasalva-practica-humanista-de-la-revolucion-23-03-2020-01-03-38">statistics published</a> by the state media.</p>
<p>They have helped both in disaster relief, as well as to provide access to healthcare for those living in remote areas, for example in Venezuela and Brazil. These interventions are born out of trade cooperation agreements between the receiving country and Cuba, for which the Cuban government <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/12bd92f8-1bae-11d9-8af6-00000e2511c8">gets paid either in cash or in goods</a>. </p>
<p>In 2019, more than <a href="https://elpais.com/sociedad/2020-03-22/cuba-envia-a-italia-y-america-latina-brigadas-medicas-para-enfrentar-el-coronavirus.html">28,000 Cuban healthcare professionals</a> were working abroad. And before the outbreak of the coronavirus, 59 countries were benefiting from Cuba’s medical internationalism. The Cuban government recently <a href="http://www.granma.cu/mundo/2020-03-23/cubasalva-practica-humanista-de-la-revolucion-23-03-2020-01-03-38">confirmed</a> that its medical missions will be maintained and that, where needed, the services provided by their doctors would focus on combating the virus.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1241675000794558466"}"></div></p>
<p>The national press never misses an opportunity to present Cuba’s <a href="http://www.granma.cu/mundo/2019-05-22/los-medicos-son-los-heroes-22-05-2019-21-05-15">internationalist doctors as heroes</a>, responsible for giving hope to people all over the world who are in desperate situations. Pedro*, one of the doctors I interviewed as part of my <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/26382599?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">research</a> on the life stories of Cuban healthcare workers, explained the uniqueness of the Cuban doctors’ position:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The doctor can be Cuban, or from another country, but not every doctor will sacrifice their life and put themselves in danger to save lives, and this without any kind of financial compensation. This is something we Cubans only do. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Critics and fugitives</h2>
<p>Despite the admirable aspects of the programme, it has also received criticism. Some suggest the <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/5531/d06ec4e99076859a725a397f7b6c83752a2c.pdf">real interests</a> of the programme are economic and diplomatic and that it allows Cuba to shift scrutiny away from its own <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2020/country-chapters/cuba">poor human rights record</a>. </p>
<p>Others have <a href="https://www.ascecuba.org/asce_proceedings/cubas-business-of-humanitarianism-the-medical-mission-in-haiti/">criticised</a> what they see as the “selective humanitarianism” of the programme, calling attention to the lower numbers of doctors available to the Cuban population due to the high numbers of doctors working abroad. In my research in Cuba, I’ve witnessed long waiting times in medical centres and several of the people I interviewed spoke of a lack of continuity in doctor-patient care.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/is-the-cuban-healthcare-system-really-as-great-as-people-claim-69526">Is the Cuban healthcare system really as great as people claim?</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>As for the doctors and nurses who take part, their participation is not always driven by solidarity but in <a href="https://theconversation.com/castros-legacy-cuban-doctors-still-go-abroad-but-its-no-longer-driven-by-international-solidarity-65181">some cases by the opportunities</a> these missions represent for them and their families. In many cases, working on a mission will improve their standard of living when they return to the island. Many are also able to send goods such as fridges or other household appliances to their families while they are away. </p>
<p>Many doctors have also used the mission as a way to escape a country that is still governed by an authoritarian regime and between 2006 and 2016, more than 7,000 Cuban doctors <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/cuba-usa-doctors-idUSL1N14S1LY20160108">defected to the US</a>. Several have even <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/world/americas/brazil-cuban-doctors-revolt.html">accused the Cuban government</a> of using them as modern slaves. </p>
<h2>A moment for global cooperation</h2>
<p>Cuba always offers its medical help, but Italy is the first developed European country which has decided to accept it. </p>
<p>Many global leaders have been wary of doing so, because of Cuba’s poor human rights record. The case of Hurricane Katrina in 2005 is illustrative here. Castro offered to send 1,500 doctors to the US to help with the relief effort. A special group of healthcare professionals was formed for the task called the Henry Reeve medical brigade, <a href="http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/discursos/2005/esp/f040905e.html">named after</a> an American who supported the Cuban independence forces in 1868 and died in combat for the cause. But US president George W Bush <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/americas/09/05/katrina.cuba/index.html">never got back to Castro</a> and the doctors and nurses were redeployed elsewhere. It’s this same brigade which has now gone to Italy. </p>
<p>In 2005, while waiting for Bush’s response, Castro <a href="http://www.fidelcastro.cu/it/node/1257">made clear</a> what should be at the centre of decisions in times of crisis:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>This is not a war between human beings, it is a war for the life of human beings, it is a war against diseases, against repeating calamities, and one of the first things this world should learn especially now, with the changes that are taking place and the phenomena of this type, is to cooperate.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>While everyone may not agree with Castro’s revolution, perhaps this is a moment for the world to put ideological disagreements aside and focus on the global war against coronavirus by all working together. </p>
<p><em>* Names have been changed to protect the anonymity of interviewees.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/134429/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stéphanie Panichelli-Batalla has received funding related to this research from the British Council.</span></em></p>Cuba stresses its programme to send doctors abroad is based in solidarity. But there are diplomatic and economic reasons too.Stéphanie Panichelli-Batalla, Associate Professor in Global Sustainable Development, University of WarwickLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1242482019-09-27T17:16:55Z2019-09-27T17:16:55ZSpies and the White House have a history of running wild without congressional oversight<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/294454/original/file-20190926-51414-h53rap.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani in late November 2016, after Trump won the presidential election. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Trump/e499e75d52224697a2aac62bc854030a/138/0">AP/Carolyn Kaster</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>At the heart of the current crisis over <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/25/us/politics/ukraine-transcript-trump.html">President Donald Trump’s dealings with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy</a> is an <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/09/26/us/politics/whistle-blower-complaint.html">intelligence whistleblower</a> whose information has finally made it into public view.</p>
<p>The whistleblower’s complaint about Trump’s interaction with Zelenskiy was initially <a href="https://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=688">withheld from the House Intelligence Committee</a>, something which the committee chairman protested was a violation of the law. </p>
<p>The complaint was ultimately <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/25/us/politics/whistle-blower-complaint-trump.html">turned over</a> after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced an <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Weaoc5EZN0c">impeachment inquiry of the president</a> and almost two weeks <a href="https://intelligence.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=708">after the committee subpoenaed</a> it, and after the Senate had <a href="https://www.rollcall.com/news/house-changes-whistleblower-resolution-to-match-senate">passed a unanimous resolution</a> to provide the complaint to Congress.</p>
<p>For decades now, the evolving role of congressional oversight of U.S. intelligence has involved major clashes and scandals, from the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Iran-Contra-Affair">Iran-Contra affair of the 1980s</a> to the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/05/washington/05cnd-intel.html">intelligence abuses that led to the 2003 war in Iraq</a>. </p>
<p>Central to all of these clashes are attempts by intelligence agencies, the president and the executive branch to withhold damning information from Congress. Another common element is the use of civilians to carry out presidential or intelligence agency agendas.</p>
<h2>Coups and assassinations</h2>
<p>“Intelligence” is the government’s term for collection of information of military or diplomatic value. After World War II, large, new agencies – <a href="https://www.cia.gov/about-cia/history-of-the-cia">the CIA</a> and the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/National-Security-Agency">National Security Agency</a> – <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-INTELLIGENCE/html/int022.html">were established</a> to conduct information gathering and secret operations.</p>
<p>From the aftermath of World War II to the 1970s, there was <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/intel/R45175.pdf">virtually no congressional oversight</a> <a href="https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/10388.pdf">of this intelligence apparatus</a>. And there was only intermittent <a href="https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal76-1189802">presidential direction</a>. During the Cold War, intelligence was considered too sensitive for Congress to know. </p>
<p>Some of the agencies’ intelligence work, called “covert activities,” was not mere information-gathering. And some of the <a href="https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/frus/johnsonlb/xxvi/4440.htm">activities undertaken by these agencies</a> had a profound impact around the world – without U.S. democratic institutions playing a role. </p>
<p>For example, in 1953 the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/19/cia-admits-role-1953-iranian-coup">CIA overthrew the democratically elected leader of Iran</a>, Mohammad Mossadegh, and installed in his place the shah, an autocrat who proved happy to do what the U.S. wanted. </p>
<p>The public and Congress had <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2017/06/20/64-years-later-cia-finally-releases-details-of-iranian-coup-iran-tehran-oil/">little or no awareness that the CIA</a> engineered this.</p>
<p>In the 1970s, between <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1974/07/03/archives/cia-is-criticized-over-watergate-minority-staff-in-senate-says.html">information uncovered in the Watergate hearings</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1974/12/22/archives/huge-cia-operation-reported-in-u-s-against-antiwar-forces-other.html">some key investigative journalism</a>, the lid blew off the intelligence agency’s secrecy about the CIA’s many covert interventions both in other countries’ affairs <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1974/07/03/archives/cia-is-criticized-over-watergate-minority-staff-in-senate-says.html">and in the U.S.</a> </p>
<p>A special temporary committee headed by <a href="https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/investigations/ChurchCommittee.htm">Senator Frank Church (D-Idaho)</a> <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/94th-congress/senate-resolution/21">was established</a> <a href="https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/investigations/pdf/ChurchCommittee_SRes21.pdf">in 1975</a> to explore “the extent, if any, to which illegal, improper, or unethical activities were engaged in by any agency of the Federal Government.” </p>
<p>The activities uncovered included various <a href="https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/02/24/fidel-castro-cia-mafia-plot-216977">unsuccessful attempts to kill Fidel Castro</a>, the communist leader of Cuba. The CIA’s plans for Castro’s assassination included help from organized crime figures like Santo Trafficante and other people who were not U.S. government officials. Rudy Giuliani is not an organized crime figure, but <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/9/25/20883309/rudy-giuliani-ukraine-trump">he’s similar in that he’s a civilian involved in foreign affairs</a>: in this case, the president’s dealings with Ukraine. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.aarclibrary.org/publib/contents/church/contents_church_reports.htm">The Church Committee discovered</a> CIA plots that were known by presidents; they discovered some that were not. None was known by Congress. The very idea that <a href="https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB222/">intelligence agencies could plot overthrowing or murdering foreign leaders</a> without congressional oversight <a href="https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/looking-back-at-the-church-committee">flabbergasted lawmakers</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294435/original/file-20190926-51414-oyh6cv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A meeting of the Church Committee, 1975.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-AP-A-DC-USA-APHS454379-Senate-Intelligen-/838371c2f2ef4ef38cb8f7bfc4febe49/2/0">AP Photo/Henry Griffin</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Keeping Congress informed</h2>
<p>The Church Committee and <a href="https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/winter98_99/art07.html">its sister committee in the House</a> recommended a major reform: the creation of <a href="https://www.cia.gov/news-information/featured-story-archive/2011-featured-story-archive/cia-and-congress-hpsci.html">House</a> and <a href="https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/investigations/pdf/ChurchCommittee_SRes400_SSCI.pdf">Senate Intelligence Committees</a> that would have oversight over intelligence agency activities. </p>
<p>These oversight committees were to be <a href="https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/investigations/ChurchCommittee.htm">kept fully and currently informed by the intelligence agencies</a>. Nothing was to be withheld from Congress. </p>
<p>The notion that President Trump could force a Ukrainian government investigation of Joe Biden, and that this would be withheld from the House Intelligence Committee, directly contradicts the <a href="https://www.belfercenter.org/publication/confrontation-or-collaboration-congress-and-intelligence-community">imperative of congressional oversight</a> established by Congress in the late 1970s.</p>
<p>In the 1980s, the House Intelligence Committee faced one of its greatest challenges – <a href="https://www.brown.edu/Research/Understanding_the_Iran_Contra_Affair/iran-contra-affairs.php">the Iran-Contra affair</a>. President Reagan had kept secret from the committee that he had approved arms-for-hostage deals with Iran and used the proceeds for resupplying arms to the Contras, who were opponents of the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua. </p>
<p>These covert measures fulfilled some of Reagan’s major foreign policy goals. They were not matters of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/25/us/politics/donald-trump-impeachment-probe.html">personal political benefit for the president, as the Ukraine affair represents with Trump</a>. When the scandal broke from news about hostage-trading and about a plane crash in the Contra resupply operation, <a href="https://archive.org/stream/reportofcongress87unit#page/n7/mode/2up">the House formed an Iran-Contra investigating committee</a>. I was special deputy chief counsel of that committee, which was a select committee drawn in part from the House Intelligence Committee. </p>
<p>The Iran-Contra initiatives, although <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/reagan-iran/">led by Oliver North</a> of the national security staff, also relied on civilians to carry out plans, not unlike Rudy Giuliani. These were <a href="https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1988-03-21-8803020354-story.html">Richard Secord, with a military background, and Albert Hakim</a>, an accountant who spoke fluent Persian. </p>
<p>Such private figures have enormous power by virtue of their connection to the White House while simultaneously being exempt from routine public sector oversight by congressional intelligence committees.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=397&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/294436/original/file-20190926-51457-4bss88.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=499&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Donald Regan, President Reagan’s chief of staff, testifies before the Iran-Contra Committee in 1987.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-AP-A-DC-USA-APHS315187-Iran-Contra-Regan-1987/d987988c38d7479d9345cddf4375677d/19/0">AP Photo/Lana Harris</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Scrutiny grows</h2>
<p>After <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/September-11-attacks">9/11, when al-Qaida terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center</a>, the CIA and President George W. Bush came under congressional scrutiny for how much <a href="https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/11/cia-directors-documentary-911-bush-213353">they had known in advance – and ignored</a>. </p>
<p>Initially, they were reluctant to divulge what they knew, much like Trump at first fought oversight about his talks with Zelenskiy. </p>
<p>But eventually it came out that <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20110429015452/http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/05/19/bush.decision.911.cnna/">President Bush’s daily briefing from the intelligence community had warned</a> of plots to crash airplanes into buildings.</p>
<p>In 2002 came <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/2015/05/29/dick-cheneys-biggest-lie-333097.html">what many consider</a> one of the greatest abuses of intelligence. President Bush and Vice President Richard Cheney <a href="https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5166040">bent the CIA’s intelligence reporting to support a United States invasion</a> of Iraq. Internally, the CIA knew its intelligence was extremely weak about whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.</p>
<p>But the CIA served Bush and Cheney and made the public case to invade Iraq. Only after the war was over could the House Intelligence Committee penetrate the secretiveness of the CIA and find out the case for the Iraq war was built on foundations like the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/feb/15/curveball-iraqi-fantasist-cia-saddam">extremely dubious tales of the informant known as “Curveball</a>.” </p>
<h2>Presidential accountability</h2>
<p>What can be learned from history about the Ukraine scandal? </p>
<p>One lesson is the enormous struggle Congress in general, and the House Intelligence Committee in particular, has waged to exercise democratic accountability over presidential actions. That accountability is made impossible when private citizens – Richard Secord, Albert Hakim, Rudy Giuliani – are used by presidents to carry out foreign affairs.</p>
<p>Another lesson is the power of the CIA to withhold from Congress what it knows would embarrass the president. </p>
<p>And yet another lesson is the disastrous foreign affairs repercussions when the intelligence system is abused by presidents. </p>
<p>The Ukraine affair is the latest intelligence crisis in the troubled control of foreign affairs by the representatives of the American public.</p>
<p>[ <em>Like what you’ve read? Want more?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=likethis">Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/124248/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charles Tiefer does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A former congressional staffer says withholding damning evidence from Congress and using civilians to carry out presidential or intelligence agency agendas links the Ukraine crisis to other scandals.Charles Tiefer, Professor of Law, University of BaltimoreLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1202712019-09-24T11:28:47Z2019-09-24T11:28:47ZFidel’s Cuba is long gone<p>Cuba is no longer the Americas’ lonely outpost of communism.</p>
<p>This Caribbean island has become a nation of entrepreneurship, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/03/opinion/international-world/cuba-youth-revolution.html">democratic aspiration</a>, even pro-Americanism. About <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article216243190.html">13% of Cuban workers</a> are in the private sector, operating their own businesses. They are called “cuentapropistas,” meaning “people who work for themselves” – not for the government. </p>
<p>Much of this economic activity is due to former president Raul Castro, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/28/opinion/cuba-economy.html">who expanded</a> the rights of Cuban business owners, albeit in <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-politics-castro-changes-explaine/explainer-the-state-of-raul-castros-economic-reforms-in-cuba-idUSKBN1HO0CL">fits and starts</a>.</p>
<p>Raul’s brother Fidel Castro, who led Cuba’s 1959 communist revolution and ran the country until 2008, would not recognize his country today. </p>
<p>Since Cuba’s emerging private sector depends heavily on tourism – including, until a recent Trump administration crackdown, from the United States – the cuentapropistas have transformed the nature of U.S.-Cuban relations, my area of <a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/28443/discussions/1732572/h-diplo-article-review-759-%22%E2%80%98between-two-communities-so-diverse%E2%80%99">research as a historian</a>. </p>
<p>Anti-Americanism is still official Cuba policy. But now, for the first time in Cuba’s modern history, some people openly disagree.</p>
<h2>Economic transformation</h2>
<p>When I first traveled to Cuba as a graduate student in 1996, Cubans were suffering through what Fidel called “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Period">The Special Period in Time of Peace</a>” – an era of economic distress after the fall of the Soviet Union. </p>
<p>A Cuban friend recalls it as “the time when we ate cats and dogs.”</p>
<p>For decades, the Soviets aided the Cuban economy by <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1988/03/16/world/soviet-said-to-reduce-support-for-cuban-economy.html">purchasing</a> Cuban sugar at above-market prices and supplying Cuba with free oil. Cuba re-exported excess oil for profit.</p>
<p>The dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 deprived Cuba’s economy of <a href="https://www.upi.com/Archives/1983/06/18/Soviet-aid-to-Cuba-11-million-a-day/2328424756800/">about US$5 billion dollars</a> a year. </p>
<p>Food and consumer goods disappeared from stores in under a month. The Cuban economy shrunk by <a href="http://www.environmentandsociety.org/tools/keywords/cubas-special-period">more than a third</a> between 1991 and 1995. Cars disappeared from roads, replaced by horses, bikes and overcrowded buses. Blackouts were common. Eggs became a luxury, given as gifts. Cubans lost anywhere from <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/04/how-cubans-health-improved-when-their-economy-collapsed/275080/">12</a> to <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=8YzDOtRjNlcC&lpg=PT14&dq=cuban%20lost%20kilograms&pg=PT14#v=onepage&q=cuban%20lost%20kilograms&f=false">20 pounds</a> during the Special Period.</p>
<p>By the mid-1990s, even Fidel Castro knew that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Cuba#cite_note-35">Cuba needed to update</a> its economic model. So the country embraced tourism, <a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Cuba">investing over $3.5 billion</a> in hotels and resorts, aimed at Europeans. </p>
<p>Tourism fueled <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=NGjxCQAAQBAJ&pg=PA83&lpg=PA83&dq=Due+to+the+continued+growth+of+tourism,+growth+began+in+1999+with+a+6.2%25+increase+in+GDP&source=bl&ots=snVGnpwUeL&sig=-fxiBUZKRRtLjPqhUgvCFHVFfHE&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjR6-XqjdzRAhXLl5QKHdPCBvgQ6AEIGzAA#v=onepage&q=Due%20to%20the%20continued%20growth%20of%20tourism%2C%20growth%20began%20in%201999%20with%20a%206.2%25%20increase%20in%20GDP&f=false">Cuba’s recovery</a>, but the economy really took off after Fidel <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/20/world/americas/20castro.html">relinquished power</a> in 2008. His brother Raul Castro trimmed bloated state payrolls and <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article214855810.html%20%22%22">encouraged Cubans</a> to start their own businesses. </p>
<p>By 2014, the government had <a href="http://www.granma.cu/cuba/2014-01-17/entrega-de-tierras-en-usufructo-al-compas-de-la-actualizacion">transferred millions of acres</a> of idle land into private hands, reigniting Cuba’s agricultural sector.</p>
<p>Cuba’s government is still officially communist and it <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-cuba-the-post-fidel-era-began-ten-years-ago-71720">still controls the economy</a>. But it has a <a href="https://theconversation.com/cubas-new-president-what-to-expect-of-miguel-diaz-canel-95187">new president who’s not a Castro</a>, internet access is expanding, and it’s home to a community of taxi drivers, hair stylists, restaurant owners and tattoo artists who meet demand with supply and pocket the profits.</p>
<h2>More money, less red tape</h2>
<p>Cuba’s new entrepreneurs seem to have little faith in socialism.</p>
<p>The owner of a successful eatery in Havana, Alejandro, mostly sees the Cuban government as a barrier to success. To protect their identities, I do not use the names of Cubans when writing about my research.</p>
<p>“Even if I have money, there is no guarantee that I will be able to get supplies from abroad,” Alejandro told me over dinner recently. “No one in the government helps me.”</p>
<p>Contradictory legislation makes it <a href="https://thecubaneconomy.com/articles/tag/private-sector/">difficult to open bank accounts in Cuba</a>, sign contracts and import goods from abroad. Alejandro relies on “mules” to get kitchen equipment, rare foodstuffs and other goods into Cuba. </p>
<p>During the Special Period, most Cubans I met blamed the U.S. trade embargo for their troubles. And not without <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-economy-un/us-trade-embargo-has-cost-cuba-130-billion-un-says-idUSKBN1IA00T">justification</a>: The embargo prevents U.S. companies and their foreign subsidiaries from investing in Cuba.</p>
<p>The embargo is still in place. But now I meet Cubans who are openly anti-communist, not anti-American. They have relatives and friends in the United States. They sell smuggled American goods. And they want politicians to get out of the way of the economy so that American dollars return to Cuba.</p>
<p>Only about <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/20704879/ns/travel-destination_travel/t/americans-break-law-visit-cuba/#.XTdkyi-ZOuU">20,000 Americans</a> visited Cuba in 2007. In 2017, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/sharp-decline-u-s-travel-cuba-spurs-overall-drop-tourism-n868856">1.5 million Americans</a> traveled to the island, including Cuban Americans. They spent millions at businesses run by cuentapropistas. </p>
<p>“Politics means nothing to me,” a young woman named Yemayá told me. “It’s just a way for some people to make themselves rich while I work hard.”</p>
<p>Research validates her view. A study from Baruch College found that Cuba’s bureaucrats <a href="https://thecubaneconomy.com/articles/tag/private-sector/">have responded</a> to Raul’s initiatives by creating more burdensome regulations. They know that if all the red tape goes away, so will their jobs.</p>
<h2>Cuban capitalists</h2>
<p>The United States remains a major obstacle to Cuba’s economic development.</p>
<p>Rejecting Obama’s policy of more open relations with Cuba, the Trump administration has waged <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-declares-economic-war-on-cuba-115672">economic war</a> on the regime, putting severe <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/06/05/730057551/the-fallout-of-the-trump-administrations-new-restrictions-on-travel-to-cuba">restrictions on travel</a> to and <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-declares-economic-war-on-cuba-115672">investment in</a> Cuba. </p>
<p>Overall tourist activity in Cuba has declined <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/sharp-decline-u-s-travel-cuba-spurs-overall-drop-tourism-n868856https:/www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/sharp-decline-u-s-travel-cuba-spurs-overall-drop-tourism-n868856">20% this year</a>. That primarily <a href="https://www.apnews.com/3fe98af293ce4cbd8c60b072054bcf89">harms Cuban capitalists</a> – not the government. </p>
<p>“We who work are suffering,” Miguel, an English teacher turned tour guide, told me. “The military will not suffer. Neither will the police. They know how to feed themselves.”</p>
<p>But Cuban entrepreneurs blame Cuba’s leaders for their hardships, too.</p>
<p>“[Cuba] wants Trump and the U.S. to shut off the tourists,” a taxi driver named Pablo insisted. That way, “they can blame the Americans for their own economic failures.”</p>
<h2>Change from within</h2>
<p>Cubans have changed, says Luis, an expert on Afro-Cuban religions.</p>
<p>Cubans used to depend on the government for everything. Now, he says, “there are more like me who want to work for themselves.”</p>
<p>“I have a nice apartment and a good life,” Luis told me. “The government did not give me that.”</p>
<p>Cuba’s capitalists still value the social achievements of the Cuban Revolution, which gave their country world-class <a href="https://countryeconomy.com/demography/literacy-rate/cuba">literacy rates</a> and <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?locations=CU">life expectancies</a>. They want to keep those gains.</p>
<p>“The rest we will change,” said Tony, a restaurateur in Old Havana. </p>
<p>A transformation is underway in Cuba, and the United States can help or hurt it. But I doubt anything can stop the process.</p>
<p>[ <em>Deep knowledge, daily.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=deepknowledge">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120271/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joseph J. Gonzalez does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Some Cuban entrepreneurs are so openly anti-communist that they sound like, well, capitalists.Joseph J. Gonzalez, Associate Professor, Global Studies, Appalachian State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1172412019-06-23T13:24:54Z2019-06-23T13:24:54ZCanada-Cuba relations take a sad turn with new visa requirements<p>There has been some commotion about the <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/notices/havana-service-changes-2019.html">Canadian government’s decision</a> to suspend visa processing for Cubans in Canada’s Havana embassy that will require them to travel to a third country to obtain the document. </p>
<p>The move is part of an overall staff reduction in the wake of an <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/diplomats-sue-ottawa-cuba-embassy-sickness-1.5008794">embassy employee lawsuit.</a> Embassy workers believe the government failed to protect them from ailments sustained as a result of the <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/11/19/the-mystery-of-the-havana-syndrome">mysterious “Havana syndrome”</a> that has affected diplomats at both the United States and Canadian embassies. </p>
<p>Media reports, rallies in Canadian cities and a widely circulated <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nM8zt7cyeU">home-made video released in Havana</a> within days of the recent announcement all focused on the people most directly affected by this change. That’s because few Cubans, with their average monthly salary of US$30, will be able to travel to a third country to obtain the needed documents.</p>
<p>The personal stories highlighted in the video are brutal: Cuban students who can’t take up offers of admission to Canadian universities; Cuban–Canadian couples who must wait even longer to travel freely between their two countries; Cuban grandmothers unable to visit newborn grandchildren.</p>
<p>But this <a href="https://www.opencanada.org/features/dark-days-canada-cuba-relations/">ugly turn in Canadian-Cuban relations</a> has another casualty: decades of creative, productive connections between Cuban and Canadian people. </p>
<p>Canada’s official relationship with Cuba is well known. <a href="http://natoassociation.ca/the-unlikely-friendship-a-look-back-on-the-trudeau-castro-alliance-during-the-cold-war/">Canada pursued a different path than the United States</a>. The Canadian government neither blockaded nor invaded. Pierre Trudeau and Fidel Castro went fishing together; Margaret Trudeau brought her youngest baby along to Cuba on a visit.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/nM8zt7cyeUk?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>But formal political ties fluctuate. And Canada, no matter who’s in power, always treads cautiously in the shadow of Uncle Sam. Nonetheless, the story of Canada and Cuba also include countless, less famous but more enduring connections — in education, culture, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and business, to name a few.</p>
<h2>Canadian NGO arrived after revolution</h2>
<p>The first international NGO Cuba invited in after the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Cuban-Revolution">1959 revolution</a> was <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/cuso-international">Canadian University Service Overseas</a>, or CUSO.</p>
<p>CUSO opened a field office in Havana in 1969, and for more than a decade co-ordinated educational and technical co-operation with Cuban schools and research institutes. </p>
<p>CUSO’s most significant program trained a new generation of Cuban engineering professors. In the early 1970s, engineering professors from several Canadian universities taught short courses to technologically hungry Cuban students.</p>
<p>A group of English-as-a-second-language (ESL) instructors from George Brown College accompanied the group, quickly preparing the Cuban students to understand their Canadian professors. In addition, close to 100 Cuban graduate students came to Canada for three-month stints for consultation with their Canadian thesis advisers.</p>
<p>Canadians deemed the project a grand success. The final report and other CUSO documents, <a href="http://collectionscanada.gc.ca/pam_archives/index.php?fuseaction=genitem.displayItem&lang=eng&rec_nbr=3930969">available at Library and Archives Canada</a>, is a testament to grassroots development projects. </p>
<p>The project succeeded, wrote the dean of engineering at the University of Waterloo in 1977, because Canadian universities worked as “genuine partners” and did not set the agenda. “The solution to Cuba’s problems could never be found in any Canadian university…. It could only be nurtured in Cuba,” he said.</p>
<p>Noble words, but what did this look like from the Cuban perspective?</p>
<h2>Learning opportunities still cherished</h2>
<p>For a new book on Canada-Cuba relations, I recently interviewed retired engineering professors in Havana who got their start in the CUSO program. </p>
<p>They had all been trained by Canadian professors in Havana, and spent time in Canadian universities. They reminisced fondly about their student days in Toronto and Winnipeg, making inevitable jokes about the cold, but also spoke seriously about the learning opportunities they still cherish.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280720/original/file-20190621-61733-atl0j3.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cuban engineering professors educated by CUSO’s 1970 project. Left to right: Antonio A. Martinez Garcia, Vincente Lazaro Elejalde Villargo, Juan Lorenzo Almiral, Roberto Ignacio Ugarte Barazain.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Karen Dubinsky</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“In that era, we realized we needed to learn to resolve our own problems,” Juan Lorenzo Almiral told me. “The Canadian universities gave us the skills.” </p>
<p>Another example of co-operation can be found in the culinary world. <a href="https://www.ivanchef.com/">Ivan Chef Justo</a> is a well-known restaurant, located in an 18th century house in Old Havana. The food is the draw, but the décor is mesmerizing: a heady mix of photos, art and antiques drawn from Cuban history. </p>
<p>But there are also some oddities: an Ontario licence plate, a postcard from Montreal’s Expo ‘67, Canadian Indigenous art prints.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=270&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=270&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=270&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/280520/original/file-20190620-149818-1a205ru.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=339&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chef Ivan Justo Havana Paladar Restaurant in Havana.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Adrian Lamela Aragones, Havana VIP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>That’s because one of the owners, Justo Pérez, learned the restaurant business 50 years ago in Montréal. A friend of some of the Canadians who gathered in Havana as CUSO volunteers, Pérez spent a year in Montréal in the early 1970s on a self-styled educational tour of Montréal’s café and restaurant world. </p>
<p>His exit visa — an extreme rarity in those days — was organized by his CUSO friends. After a year, he returned to Cuba, opened the country’s first private restaurant in Varadero, and decades later continues to make his mark on the Havana restaurant scene. </p>
<h2>Cuban music</h2>
<p>Canadians, like people around the world, love Cuban music. </p>
<p>Luminaries such as singer <a href="https://ottawajazzfestival.com/artists/omara-portuondo/">Omara Portuando</a> and musician <a href="https://www.chucho-valdes.com/">Chucho Valdés</a> grace all the important Canadian stages, and there are vibrant communities of talented Cuban musicians in all Canadian cities.</p>
<p>Cuban-Canadian musical ties extend for decades, beginning with bandleader <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/chicho-valle-emc">Chicho Valle</a>, who hosted the CBC Radio show <em>Latin American Serenade</em> and was the undisputed king of dance music at Toronto’s Inn on the Park in the 1960s and ‘70s. </p>
<p>Surely the most unusual musical exchange took place in the early 1960s, when <a href="https://ottawacitizen.com/entertainment/jazzblog/when-gaby-warren-met-chucho-valdes">Gaby Warren</a>, a Canadian diplomat and now an Ottawa jazz celebrity, smuggled American jazz records into Cuba via diplomatic mailbags to nascent Valdés and <a href="https://paquitodrivera.com/">Paquito d’Rivera</a>. </p>
<p>Somehow when it comes to Cuba, the American absence rather than the enduring Canadian presence gets more attention.</p>
<p>But personal relations, friendships, joint projects and enduring mutual interests among Cubans and Canadians have created mechanisms for policy and social, economic and cultural development.</p>
<p>These are the connections — past and present — that are endangered by this ill-considered policy by the Canadian government.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/117241/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Karen Dubinsky receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>The ugly turn in Canadian-Cuba relations stemming from Canada’s new visa requirements puts at risk decades of creative, productive connections between Cuban and Canadian people.Karen Dubinsky, Professor, Queen's University, OntarioLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1140572019-03-25T16:29:19Z2019-03-25T16:29:19ZCuba after Castro: royal visit to Havana reflects important shift in UK policy<p>From Winston Churchill to the Rolling Stones, Cuba has hosted its fair share of famous Britons over the years. But the first official royal visit by the Prince of Wales and his wife the Duchess of Cornwall in 2019 heralds an important shift in Her Majesty’s Government’s longstanding policy towards the island. </p>
<p>Until recently, little had changed since 1898, when the US intervened to end Spanish colonial rule in Cuba and <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gb/book/9780230295445">Britain largely surrendered</a> to growing US dominance in the Caribbean sphere. But Britain’s soft power play today indicates an alignment with Barack Obama’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-latin-america-35858350/barack-obama-in-cuba-at-start-of-historic-visit">2014 diplomatic re-engagement</a> with the island, rather than <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/donald-trump-reverses-barack-obamas-cuba-policy">Donald Trump’s rolling back</a> of this initiative. Obama judged the 54-year-long US trade blockade a failure, and ordered the unfreezing of Cold War-era policy. </p>
<p>Fidel Castro’s fiercely anti-American outlook and accommodation with Moscow were always the main issues for Washington. While Fidel and his then younger brother, Raúl Castro, were in charge, Britain could not disentangle its relations with Cuba from its much weightier “special relationship” with the United States. With <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/19/world/americas/miguel-diaz-canel-bermudez-cuba.html">Miguel Díaz-Canel</a> now president in a post-Cold War, <a href="https://theconversation.com/cuba-private-home-ownership-recognised-for-first-time-since-the-revolution-100204">post-Fidel Cuba</a>, the British government is freer to steer a more independent course. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=756&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=756&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=756&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=950&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=950&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265426/original/file-20190323-36260-17o6wh0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=950&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A young Cuban couple in Buenavista, Havana.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Felko</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Change in the wind</h2>
<p>The future king and his wife are the first British royals to set foot in Cuba since the Duke of Windsor. He sailed in from West Palm Beach in 1955, following visits in 1948 and 1954 to play amateur golf. On his final trip, the US ambassador, <a href="https://history.state.gov/departmenthistory/people/gardner-arthur">Arthur Gardner</a> (a non-career diplomat), hosted the former King Edward VIII – not famed for his sound political judgement – and his American wife Wallis Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor. </p>
<p>Cuba’s dictator Fulgencio Batista granted the two friends a special audience at the Presidential Palace, now the Museum of the Revolution. Just two months later, Batista committed the grave error of granting amnesties to imprisoned brothers Fidel and Raúl Castro. This freed them to plot his revolutionary downfall just two years after their first failed uprising. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265424/original/file-20190323-36279-n1fee8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Barbershop, Havana.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Arien Chang Castán</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>British writer Graham Greene correctly sensed pending political change, reflected in his iconic espionage satire Our Man in Havana which was published 12 weeks before the Revolution on January 1 1959. A new <a href="https://www.wwnorton.co.uk/books/9781643130187-our-man-down-in-havana">biographical study of Greene in Cuba</a> reveals the backstory to his spy spoof, including the novel’s insight that “the president’s regime was creaking dangerously towards its end”.</p>
<p>When Greene began writing the story in Old Havana itself in late 1957, the capital was abuzz with rebel insurrection and rampant hotel construction. The Capri, Habana Riviera, and Habana Hilton hotels towered over the city’s Vedado neighbourhood. The Castro-led Revolution soon replaced free-market capitalism with Soviet-style socialism, nationalising the new hotels (the Hilton becoming the Habana Libre) and other established US businesses on the island. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265429/original/file-20190323-36252-mim3l0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=509&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Grand Packard hotel under construction.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lissette Solórzano</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A good view</h2>
<p>Today, foreign rather than Cuban representations still dominate the way Westerners imagine Havana and its inhabitants. The city’s transformation into a visual mecca became particularly evident in the 1990s, when a stream of visual cliches in film and photography appeared in advertising, travel guides, coffee table photobooks, movies, music videos and documentaries. The highly influential film Buena Vista Social Club (1999) by Wim Wenders became the benchmark for the way outsiders came to imagine Havana. His documentary’s iconic scenes helped shape the dominant perception of a city frozen in time.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265425/original/file-20190323-36276-1isdinr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Street scene, Havana.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Arien Chang Castán</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Various types of images further popularised a time capsule myth about Havana, underlining the city’s survival in the face of a relentless economic blockade. It encouraged people to make a mental link between pre-Castro Cuba and its revolutionary present. Footage of vintage American cars and crumbling buildings was accompanied by traditional Cuban songs performed by ageing musicians. Over the past two decades, this type of aesthetic has been extended through foreign representations of Havana.</p>
<p>The royal tour’s inclusion of a meet and greet with current Buena Vista Social Club band members indicates the way this phenomenon still shapes the tourist experience today. But the reality is quite different. For example, despite the outdated way outsiders still view the country, Cubans – especially the young – have embraced new technologies, including latest generation <a href="https://thehill.com/latino/434847-4g-sim-cards-fly-off-the-shelves-in-cuba">WiFi and 4G internet</a>. Dynamism and modernity are in the air. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gb/book/9783319640297">new book</a> reveals how different ways of seeing have shaped the way foreigners imagine Havana. The upcoming exhibition <a href="https://www.royalholloway.ac.uk/about-us/events/this-is-cuba-documentary-photography-after-fidel">This is Cuba: Documentary photography after Fidel</a>, featuring recent, unseen work by Cuban and foreign photographers (some of which accompanies this article), at Royal Holloway, University of London, further explores these themes.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=337&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265427/original/file-20190323-36256-uy53xu.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Havana’s Malecón esplanade at sunrise.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">James Clifford Kent</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Economic and political isolation, intensified by the aforementioned US trade embargo, reinforces outsiders’ impression that Cuba is a “unique” island of communism, surviving – come hell or high water – in a sea of global capitalism. But tourists – including both “bucket list” and repeat visitors – travel to Cuba in their millions to experience an intoxicating cocktail of cultures, set in tropical surroundings to the sound of a distinctive Afro-Cuban beat. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265431/original/file-20190323-36273-gt6e11.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mourning Fidel Castro’s death in Havana’s Revolution Square.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Raúl Cañibano Ercilla</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>No golden arches</h2>
<p>Foreigners appear in a hurry to experience a communist post-Cold War relic before either they or the revolution disappears – or before McDonald’s opens its first franchise and spawns a vista of golden arches across the island. Rather than product advertising, however, roadside billboards implore Cubans to resist their dominant northern neighbour. Big Macs remain off the local menu, and therein lies Cuba’s special appeal.</p>
<p>Before Fidel Castro’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/fidel-castro-immortalised-in-photographs-70380">death in late 2016</a>, outsiders presumed the revolution would die alongside its leader and the island would revert to its pre-revolutionary condition of US dominance. The moment passed, yet his revolutionary project and the city’s romanticised aesthetic endure.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/265428/original/file-20190323-36276-wc1lzs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A vigil in Havana following Fidel Castro’s death.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Leandro Feal</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Cuba in the Western imagination continues to teeter doggedly but alluringly on the cusp of change, with the Revolution’s day of reckoning constantly postponed. Echoing the years preceding 1959, large foreign investment (including from France, Spain, and Qatar) is once again transforming Havana’s skyline. Recent openings of luxury hotels in the rundown capital include the Gran Hotel Manzana and the Grand Packard, with the Prado y Malecón due to complete in late 2019.</p>
<p>From where and from whom, therefore, should we anticipate change? The British royal visit itself signals a departure from the long-held Cuban policy of Washington’s closest ally. With other Western countries <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/9ef0f118-4fcd-11e8-a7a9-37318e776bab">exploiting economic openings in Cuba</a> – and Britain keen to compete with them more openly – does only Trump’s administration stand in the way?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114057/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Clifford Kent acknowledges support received from MEITS, a flagship AHRC-funded project which aims to revitalize Modern Languages and shape UK language policy by showing how multilingualism can empower individuals and transform societies.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Hull does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A first-ever official royal visit now signals a sea change in British foreign policy towards post-Fidel Cuba.James Clifford Kent, Lecturer in Hispanic Studies, Royal Holloway University of LondonChristopher Hull, Senior Lecturer in Spanish and Latin American Studies, University of ChesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1119472019-02-18T13:16:32Z2019-02-18T13:16:32ZTrump may seek more punishment of Cuba<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259405/original/file-20190217-56232-1g3m074.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">If Cuban exiles can sue businesses operating in Cuba, it could affect flights to the country, like this JetBlue landing in Havana.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Cuba-U-S-/085608a155c04bf5b52d6f19a246548c/12/0">AP/Desmond Boylan</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>President Donald Trump may soon do a huge favor for Cuba’s wealthy, upper-class exiles, many of whom are now U.S. citizens living in Miami.</p>
<p>Some of them <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article213916384.html">still dream</a> of recouping their lost fortunes in Cuba, and Trump may try to make that possible.</p>
<p>Much of that wealthy upper class went into exile in Miami in the 1960s, when the Cuban revolution turned to socialism and Fidel Castro’s government <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Cuban-Revolution">nationalized their businesses and confiscated</a> their property.</p>
<p>More than 20 years ago, Congress passed a sanctions law that included a provision to help these Cuban exiles who are now U.S. citizens. The <a href="https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/world/latin-america/article224646995.html">provision would allow them to sue in U.S. courts</a> companies that operate using property that the exiles lost in the 1959 revolution. </p>
<p>The lawsuit provision, known as Title III, was <a href="https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/19991214_RL30386_714aa7ff79cec8fc7f29926c448f6d1bc1d6bef2.pdf">put on hold because it triggered immense opposition</a> from U.S. allies, whose companies operating in Cuba would become targets of litigation in U.S. courts. </p>
<p>If Trump activates the provision, it could reignite that opposition, complicating already rocky relations with Mexico, Canada, the European Union – and obviously Cuba – at a time when the U.S. needs <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2019/02/04/world/europe/ap-eu-venezuela-political-crisis.html">their help</a> to deal with the crisis in Venezuela.</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://www.american.edu/spa/faculty/wleogra.cfm">scholar of U.S. relations with Latin America</a>, especially Cuba, I’ve closely followed the Trump administration’s growing antagonism toward Havana. But activating Title III would represent a quantum leap in hostility.</p>
<h2>Triggering new sanctions</h2>
<p>The people who stand to benefit from activating this law are Cuba’s pre-revolutionary rich – what was once <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/castro-cuban-exiles-america/">Cuba’s “One Percent.”</a></p>
<p>They arrived in the U.S. expecting Washington to quickly overthrow Fidel Castro and restore their power, property and privilege. Instead, the revolutionary government survived and by the <a href="https://repositorio.cepal.org/bitstream/handle/11362/1139/1/S0900391_en.pdf">1990s was attracting foreign direct investment</a> from Canada, Europe and Latin America.</p>
<p>In 1996, Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., and Rep. Dan Burton, R-Ind., sponsored the <a href="https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/documents/libertad.pdf">Cuban Liberty and Democratic Solidarity Act</a>. It passed after anti-Cuba sentiment in the U.S. was galvanized when the <a href="http://www.cnn.com/US/9602/cuba_shootdown/25/">Cuban Air Force shot down two civilian planes piloted by Cuban-Americans</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=723&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=723&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=723&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=908&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=908&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259406/original/file-20190217-56220-1ka7vl8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=908&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cuban women who fled their country in an Immigration Service room in Jacksonville, Fla., while arrangements are made to grant them political asylum in the U.S., Jan. 1, 1959.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-AP-A-FL-USA-APHS460141-Cuba-Revolution-C-/cfa63ac7d7ac445d95673fabb8324785/12/0">AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-cuba/us-considering-allowing-lawsuits-over-cuba-confiscated-properties-idUSKCN1PA30I">Title III</a> of the law specifically targeted foreign investors in Cuba.</p>
<p>It gave naturalized Cuban Americans permission to <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/22/6023">sue in U.S. federal court anyone “trafficking” in (that is, using or profiting from) property</a> the exiles lost in the 1959 revolution, when they were Cuban citizens. </p>
<p>Normally, U.S. courts have no jurisdiction over property owned by non-citizens that is nationalized by a foreign government. For U.S. courts to sit in judgment of another government’s actions towards its own citizens would be a challenge to that government’s sovereignty.</p>
<p>Since virtually all property in pre-revolutionary Cuba was privately held, the foreign companies operating there, including many that also do business in the U.S., fear <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-cuba-economy/investors-in-cuba-wary-of-impact-from-u-s-threats-venezuela-crisis-idUSKCN1PW2UJ">being accused of profiting</a> from confiscated property and getting caught up in Title III lawsuits.</p>
<p>Consequently, U.S. allies bitterly opposed the law as illegal U.S. interference in their commerce with Cuba. </p>
<p>The European Union <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB931464187753635502">filed a complaint</a> against the U.S. with the World Trade Organization in 1996 and adopted a statute prohibiting EU members and their companies from complying with Title III. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1996/06/13/world/canada-and-mexico-join-to-oppose-us-law-on-cuba.html">Mexico, Canada</a> and the <a href="http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1996/3171/contents/made">United Kingdom</a> passed similar legislation.</p>
<p>In response, President <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/21/world/europeans-drop-lawsuit-contesting-cuba-trade-act.html">Bill Clinton suspended</a> Title III of the act for six months, which the law allowed. The suspension has to be renewed every six months. Since then, every president, Democrat and Republican, has renewed the suspension. Donald Trump has already renewed it three times.</p>
<p>But recently, there have been indications that the longtime practice of suspending Title III’s provisions may end soon.</p>
<p>In November 2018, National Security Adviser John <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article220976370.html">Bolton threatened to activate Title III</a>, saying, “This time, we’ll give it a very serious review.” In January, Secretary of State Mike <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/trump-weighs-dramatic-tightening-of-us-embargo-on-cuba/2019/01/17/4f8e3da0-1a8f-11e9-b8e6-567190c2fd08_story.html?utm_term=.5d3741640c7a">Pompeo announced</a> a short 45-day suspension while the administration studied the issue. </p>
<p>The president has until the end of February to notify Congress if he decides to extend the suspension. Otherwise, Title III takes effect automatically.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259411/original/file-20190217-56212-10rq0o1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., at a Miami event in 2017 where President Trump announced the revised policy against Cuba.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Trump-Cuba/02e2bcf00f64494795fdf45389daf850/27/0">AP/Lynne Sladky</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Politics in command</h2>
<p>According to <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/11/19/the-mystery-of-the-havana-syndrome">The New Yorker</a> magazine, Trump gave White House staff paltry guidance on Cuba policy at the beginning of his administration. </p>
<p>“Make Rubio happy,” he told them. </p>
<p>Sen. <a href="https://www.elnuevoherald.com/noticias/mundo/america-latina/cuba-es/article224693495.html">Marco Rubio</a>, R-Fla., and Rep. <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-cuba/us-considering-allowing-lawsuits-over-cuba-confiscated-properties-idUSKCN1PA30I">Mario Díaz-Balart</a>, R-Fla, are <a href="https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/world/latin-america/article224646995.html">the principal advocates for Title III</a>. They are Cuban-Americans who represent the oldest, most conservative and wealthiest segment of the Miami Cuban community. From their mansions in Miami, that elite still wields disproportionate influence over U.S. policy through these legislators.</p>
<p>Most Cuban-Americans will gain nothing from Title III. It exempts private residences from compensation. So, if an exile’s main asset was their home, they are out of luck. </p>
<p>The provision also <a href="http://cubantriangle.blogspot.com/2019/01/more-on-title-iii.html">exempts businesses worth less than US$50,000 in 1959 </a> – $433,000 today, adjusted for inflation. The exiled owners of thousands of <a href="https://havanatimes.org/?p=74021">small mom-and-pop shops nationalized in 1968</a> are out of luck, too.</p>
<p>Still, a 1996 <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R44822">State Department analysis</a> estimated that Title III could flood U.S. federal courts with as many as 200,000 lawsuits, creating a legal morass that would take years to sort out. </p>
<p>In the meantime, most U.S. firms and some foreign ones would likely <a href="https://money.usnews.com/investing/news/articles/2019-02-07/investors-in-cuba-wary-of-impact-from-us-threats-venezuela-crisis">hesitate to enter</a> into commercial relations with Cuba for fear of becoming litigation targets in the United States. That’s a major purpose of Title III – to stymie Cuba’s economic development. </p>
<p>Cuban American families have already voiced claims for the <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article213916384.html">port of Havana</a> and <a href="https://www.tampabay.com/news/cuba/us-might-allow-lawsuits-over-us-properties-nationalized-in-cuba-20190117/">José Martí International Airport</a>, putting cruise ship companies and airlines on notice that they could face potential legal jeopardy over their use of these properties. </p>
<p>If these companies pull out of the Cuban market, Americans would still have a right to travel to Cuba, but no way to get there. </p>
<p>If Title III reduces foreign investment in Cuba, it will damage Cuba’s already <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-economy/cuba-lowers-economic-growth-forecast-as-trade-continues-to-drop-idUSKCN1N90JO">fragile economy</a>, which in turn would hurt the standard of living of ordinary Cubans. </p>
<p>In retaliation, Havana might well stop buying agricultural goods from U.S. farmers. That’s a market of over <a href="https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/americas/cuba">$250 million</a> annually that American farmers can ill afford to lose when exports are down due to Trump’s <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/06/farm-crisis-trump-trade-policies-1147987">trade wars</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/donald-trump-says-cuban-voters-love-him-but-hes-wrong-9146019">Trump believes</a> he won Florida in 2016 because of the Cuban-American vote, and he thinks Rubio can deliver it again in 2020. </p>
<p>I think Trump is miscalculating. </p>
<p>The remnants of Cuba’s pre-revolutionary “One Percent” no longer represent the Cuban-American community as a whole. By decisive majorities, <a href="https://cri.fiu.edu/research/cuba-poll/2018-fiu-cuba-poll.pdf">Cuban-Americans support</a> free travel between the U.S. and Cuba, broader commercial ties and President Obama’s decision to normalize relations. Every year, they send <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/17/opinion/cuba-castro-united-states.html">$3 billion</a> to family on the island, and hundreds of thousands of them travel there to visit.</p>
<p>Those Cuban-American voters may not want to inflict more economic pain on ordinary Cubans, including their friends and family. Come 2020, they may punish a president who does.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111947/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William M. LeoGrande does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Cuban exiles in the US may soon be able to sue companies that use property seized from them in the Cuban revolution. If Trump moves to allow that, it could slow economic development in Cuba.William M. LeoGrande, Professor of Government, American University School of Public AffairsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1083012018-12-10T11:41:57Z2018-12-10T11:41:57Z5 things to know about Guantanamo Bay on its 115th birthday<p>The naval base at Guantanamo Bay is quietly commemorating its 115th anniversary. </p>
<p>On <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/a-useful-corner-of-the-world-guantnamo">Dec. 10, 1903</a>, the United States established its first overseas military base on 45 square miles of Cuban territory.</p>
<p>Today, the base at Guantanamo Bay is infamously associated with images of Muslim detainees wearing orange jumpsuits – alleged terrorists detained after the Sept. 11 World Trade Center attacks.</p>
<p>But there’s much more to this naval base than its use as an offshore prison, as I documented in my book, “<a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520255401/guantanamo">Guantánamo: A Working-Class History between Empire and Revolution</a>.” </p>
<p>Here are five things you probably don’t know about Guantanamo Bay.</p>
<h2>1. The U.S. won it as a spoil of war</h2>
<p>The United States intervened in Cuba’s decades-long battle for independence from Spain in 1898, waging a six-week military campaign that Secretary of State John Hay memorably described as a “<a href="https://www.nps.gov/prsf/learn/historyculture/spanish-american-war-a-splendid-little-war.htm">splendid little war</a>.” </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.amazon.com/War-1898-United-History-Historiography-ebook/dp/B00ZVEJR1I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1544069997&sr=8-1&keywords=War+of+1898+Louis+Perez">Spanish quickly surrendered</a>, signing the <a href="https://www.loc.gov/rr/hispanic/1898/treaty.html">Treaty of Paris</a> and then handing over Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam to the United States. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=409&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249503/original/file-20181207-128202-1bkr0na.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=514&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The military personnel at Guantanamo Bay is American, but most workers are from Jamaica and the Philippines.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/APTOPIX-Cuba-The-Two-Guantanamos-Photo-Essay/43bde3e7df124a8b999b3d3040541e1d/41/0">AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To achieve full independence, the U.S. required the Cuban government to <a href="https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/mod/1901platt.asp">amend</a> its new Constitution to allow the U.S. to “<a href="https://sourcebooks.fordham.edu/mod/1901platt.asp">sell or lease</a>” territory for a naval <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1866-1898/mahan">base</a>. The Cubans did so grudgingly. </p>
<p>Unlike most leases, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Leasing-Guantanamo-Praeger-Security-International/dp/0313377820/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1544072077&sr=1-1&keywords=Michael+Strauss+guantanamo">this one has</a> no end date. The U.S. military <a href="http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/dip_cuba003.asp">may use the site indefinitely</a>.</p>
<p>The base in Guantanamo Bay has been a reminder of American imperialism in the Caribbean ever since. </p>
<p>Cuba wants the land returned. In his historic meeting with Barack Obama in 2016, President Raúl Castro <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2016/03/21/cuba-wants-back-the-illegally-occupied-base-at-guantanamo-the-u-s-isnt-budging/?utm_term=.e880b952cad3">cited the base</a> as a key obstacle in improving U.S.-Cuban relations. </p>
<h2>2. The Cuban revolution took place nearby</h2>
<p>When I tell people I study Guantanamo, they immediately imagine the military base. I’ve never set foot there. </p>
<p>My research is about the eastern Cuban city of Guantánamo, located some 15 miles inland from Guantanamo Bay. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=802&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=802&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=802&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1008&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1008&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249504/original/file-20181207-128214-84ivyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1008&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Che Guevara and Fidel Castro.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/47/CheyFidel.jpg">Alberto Korda/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Guantánamo, home to about 200,000 people, is an 18-hour bus ride from Havana in an eastern Cuban region called <a href="https://www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/products/60061">Oriente</a> – a stronghold of the Cuban Revolution. </p>
<p>Starting in December 1956, brothers Fidel and Raúl Castro and a small group of guerrillas began a military campaign in Oriente that would ultimately overthrow <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1973/08/07/archives/batista-excuban-dictator-dies-in-spain-unending-exile-succession-of.html">Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista</a>.</p>
<p>Cuban base workers at Guantanamo Bay aided the Castros’ insurgency by raising money on the base and pilfering supplies like gasoline. Evidence suggests that some U.S. military personnel <a href="https://www.versobooks.com/books/2642-where-the-boys-are">secretly funneled arms</a> to the guerrillas. The <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780809053414">sons of three American servicemen</a> even ran off to join the uprising in 1957.</p>
<p>The Cuban base workers generally escaped punishment, but at least one U.S. sailor faced a court martial for supporting the Castros’ revolution. </p>
<h2>3. Jamaicans and Filipinos are the main workforce</h2>
<p>Approximately <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/guantanamo/article208401179.html">6,000 people</a> live on the Guantanamo Bay naval base today, including American military personnel, their families and civilian staff. </p>
<p>Historically, most of the staff at Guantanamo Bay were <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520255401/guantanamo">Cubans</a> from the city of Guantánamo. The base offered steady jobs at wages far higher than those on local sugar plantations. </p>
<p>But in 1964 Fidel Castro cut off the base’s Cuban water supply in a diplomatic conflict with the United States. President Lyndon Johnson ordered most <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520255401/guantanamo">Cuban workers fired</a> to make the base more self-sufficient. </p>
<p>Jamaican and later Filipino guest laborers were brought in to take their place. Today, these guest workers live in <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/guantanamo/article168273127.html">trailers and old barracks</a> on the base and do everything from <a href="https://roadsandkingdoms.com/2018/welcome-to-rasta-hill-at-guantanamo-bay/">construction and food services</a> to laundry. Many are paid <a href="https://roadsandkingdoms.com/2018/welcome-to-rasta-hill-at-guantanamo-bay/">less than the U.S. minimum wage</a>. </p>
<h2>4. Guantanamo Bay is a mostly Constitution-free zone</h2>
<p>The 1898 Guantanamo Bay lease agreement created a paradox over who has legal authority on the base by stipulating that Cuba retains “<a href="http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/dip_cuba002.asp">ultimate sovereignty</a>” over the territory while the U.S. has “<a href="http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/dip_cuba002.asp">complete jurisdiction</a>.”</p>
<p>Local Guantánamo journalist <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520255401/guantanamo">Lino Lemes</a> wrote about the practical implications of this legal contradiction in the 1940s and 1950s. He observed that the working conditions of Cubans employed at Guantanamo Bay complied with neither Cuban nor American labor laws. </p>
<p>In 1954, U.S. officers on the base <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520255401/guantanamo">jailed a Cuban employee for two weeks without trial</a> for allegedly stealing a couple hundred dollars in cigarettes from the naval exchange where he worked. </p>
<p>Leaders of the base workers’ union said that his detention violated due process. </p>
<p>“We could not conceive that in a naval establishment of the most powerful nation in the world, champion of democracy, things like this could happen,” they wrote.</p>
<p>More recently, in the 1990s, the Coast Guard intercepted thousands of <a href="https://gitmomemory.org/timeline/haitians-and-gtmo/">Haitians fleeing post-coup political unrest</a> in boats and brought them to Guantanamo Bay. Most were denied asylum and sent home.</p>
<p>But 205 HIV-positive refugees <a href="https://www.uncpress.org/book/9781469626314/rightlessness/">were detained</a> at Guantanamo Bay for months. Though they had been granted asylum, immigration officials would not admit them into the United States because of their health status. </p>
<p>Human rights lawyers and <a href="https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Storming-the-Court/Brandt-Goldstein/9781416535157">law students took on their case</a>, charging that the base was a “<a href="http://www.nylslawreview.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/16/2017/09/Law-Review-61.1-Koh.pdf">legal black hole</a>.” </p>
<p>A federal judge <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1993/06/09/nyregion/judge-orders-the-release-of-haitians.html">agreed</a>, writing in 1993 that the base had become “<a href="https://theconversation.com/us-turned-away-thousands-of-haitian-asylum-seekers-and-detained-hundreds-more-in-the-90s-98611">an HIV prison camp</a>.” He ordered all the Haitian asylum-seekers released and the Guantanamo Bay detention center closed. </p>
<p>The Haitians were admitted to the United States, but the unused facilities remained. And the base’s nebulous legal status – and therefore the question of whether the Constitution applies there – remained unresolved. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/249497/original/file-20181207-128214-17aqzxo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay: a thorn in Cuba’s side for 115 years and counting.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Guantanamo-Planning-for-the-Future/ee87435c097f4b18b320f962204c431b/26/0">AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>5. Dozens of people are still detained at Guantanamo Bay</h2>
<p>This set the stage for the Bush administration to transform Guantanamo Bay into a prison for alleged enemy combatants after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.</p>
<p>The U.S. has held <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/guantanamo/detainees/current">780 men from more than 35 countries</a> at the base. Conditions there have included <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/guantanamo/article1939250.html">imprisonment in cages</a>, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/09/world/cia-torture-guantanamo-bay.html">sensory deprivation</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/11/us/politics/guantanamo-hunger-strikes-force-feeding.html">forced feedings</a> – treatment that many believe <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-guantanamo-torture/u-n-expert-says-torture-persists-at-guantanamo-bay-u-s-denies-idUSKBN1E71QO">amounts to torture</a>. </p>
<p>Arguing that this was <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/02/23/remarks-president-plan-close-prison-guantanamo-bay">“contrary” to American values</a>, President Barack Obama signed an executive order to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/22/us/politics/22gitmo.html">close the detention center</a> in 2009 during his first days in office. Nearly 200 prisoners were released to their home countries or resettled elsewhere.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/projects/guantanamo/detainees/current">40 people are still detained there</a>. The vast majority were never charged with a crime. </p>
<p>President Donald Trump has since <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/01/31/582033937/trump-signs-order-to-keep-prison-at-guantanamo-bay-open">ordered</a> the Guantanamo Bay military prison to remain open indefinitely. </p>
<p>The naval base in Guantanamo Bay will likely have many more anniversaries. Whether anyone celebrates is another matter.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108301/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jana Lipman has been an adviser to the Guantanamo Public Memory Project. She has also received the US Army Military History Institute's General and Mrs. Matthew B. Ridgway Military History Research Grant. </span></em></p>On Dec. 10, 1903, the US military leased 45 square miles of Cuban territory to build a naval base. How did Guantanamo Bay become an infamous prison for alleged terrorists?Jana Lipman, Associate Professor of History, Tulane UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/951872018-04-18T17:09:07Z2018-04-18T17:09:07ZCuba’s new president: What to expect of Miguel Díaz-Canel<p>Cuba has a <a href="http://www.14ymedio.com/nacional/Cuestiones-importantes-traspaso-poder-Cuba_0_2420757905.html">new president</a> – and for the first time in six decades, his last name is not Castro. </p>
<p>Cuba’s National Assembly has elected Cuba’s First Vice President <a href="http://www.americasquarterly.org/content/cuba-new-leaders#Miguel">Miguel Díaz-Canel</a> to replace 87-year-old Raúl Castro, who took over as Cuba’s leader in 2006 after his brother Fidel Castro fell ill. </p>
<p>Raúl Castro stepped down in observance of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/world/americas/17cuba.html">two-term limit for senior government and party officials</a> that he himself mandated in 2011. In so doing, he opened the door not just for a new president but for a generational transition in Cuba. </p>
<p>This is one of the most important moments I’ve seen in 40 years of <a href="http://uncpress.unc.edu/books/13863.html">studying and writing on Cuba</a>. </p>
<p>Díaz-Canel faces real challenges. Cuba’s economy is weak, relations with Washington are deteriorating and internet expansion on the Communist island has produced a growing chorus of domestic critics. </p>
<h2>Who can fill Castro’s shoes?</h2>
<p>The political rise of 57-year-old Díaz-Canel represents the final stage of a transfer of power away from the “historic generation” that waged Cuba’s 1959 revolution. The charisma of Fidel Castro, who <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2016/11/26/americas/fidel-castro-obit/index.html">died in 2016</a>, was for decades a pillar of Cuba’s regime. </p>
<p>Díaz-Canel – a trained engineer who worked his way up from local party leader to first vice president – will have to earn his authority through performance.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=969&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=969&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=969&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fidel Castro in 1959.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/66/Fidel_Castro_-_MATS_Terminal_Washington_1959_%28cropped%29.png/466px-Fidel_Castro_-_MATS_Terminal_Washington_1959_%28cropped%29.png">U.S. Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Those who have followed <a href="http://www.ibtimes.com/who-miguel-diaz-canel-all-you-need-know-about-cubas-heir-apparent-after-fidel-castros-2452701">his career</a> say Díaz-Canel is a seasoned, pragmatic politician. As a Communist official in his home province of Villa Clara in the 1990s, when <a href="https://www.havanatimes.org/?p=102373">Cuba suffered a prolonged economic depression</a>, he rode his bicycle to work rather than take a car and driver. </p>
<p>He appears ill at ease with large audiences but relaxed and congenial in small groups – much like his mentor, Raúl Castro.</p>
<p>As president, Díaz-Canel will still benefit from Raúl Castro’s experience and authority. Castro <a href="https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/23394/cuba-after-castro-the-coming-elections-and-a-historic-changing-of-the-guard">remains first secretary</a> of the Communist Party – Cuba’s only party – until 2021. </p>
<p>This is arguably a post more powerful than the presidency. The party leadership makes all major economic, social and foreign relations policies, which the president is obliged to carry out. </p>
<p>So I don’t expect any drastic changes in direction from Díaz-Canel – at least, not right away.</p>
<h2>What’s in store for Cuba</h2>
<p>This political transition is still significant, though. For the first time, the leader of the Communist Party and the leader of the government are different people. Both Fidel and Raúl Castro held both positions simultaneously. </p>
<p>Cuba must now sort out the lines of authority between party and state. As Díaz-Canel staffs government ministries with his own team, he will gain ever more control over how policy is interpreted and implemented.</p>
<p>He will immediately face some tough issues. Cuba’s <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/11/26/fidel-castros-economic-disaster-in-cuba/">economy is struggling</a>, dragged down by the dual-currency system Fidel Castro adopted in 1994 to attract cash remittances from Cuban expats. </p>
<p>Raúl Castro <a href="http://www.cubanews.acn.cu/cuba/7615-president-raul-castro-says-solution-to-dual-currency-cannot-be-prolonged">has declared</a> that currency reunification “cannot be delayed any longer.” But <a href="https://elestadocomotal.com/2018/01/24/perspectivas-de-una-devaluacion-monetaria-en-cuba-cuando-la-montana-de-la-politica-no-viene-hacia-los-economistas/">turning two currencies into one</a> is a tricky business with unpredictable economic consequences. </p>
<p>Díaz-Canel will also face pressure to reinvigorate the Cuban economy by pushing ahead with the <a href="http://www.cubastudygroup.org/index.cfm/files/serve?File_id=046febac-1f56-4690-8107-a6e6568c5bf0">controversial economic reform program</a> launched by Raúl Castro early in his tenure, which loosened restrictions on private enterprise and enabled foreign investment in Cuba. </p>
<p>The pace of change has since slowed, <a href="https://theconversation.com/castros-conundrum-finding-a-post-communist-model-cuba-can-follow-81242">frustrating Cubans</a>. If Díaz-Canel opens up Cuba’s economy too quickly, he’ll alienate Communist Party conservatives. Going too slowly will anger reformers. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/215413/original/file-20180418-163966-1j4mmhw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cuba has opened up to foreign investment in recent years, creating a special economic zone and building a new port in Mariel Bay.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Franklin Reyes,File</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Another contentious issue is freedom of expression. <a href="https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/18723/between-reforms-and-repression-can-cuba-s-new-forces-of-change-succeed">Public criticism of the Cuban regime</a> has grown as more citizens connect to the internet. Last year, hard-liners launched a <a href="https://www.havanatimes.org/?p=127288">campaign vilifying critical bloggers</a>, which – to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/24/opinion/cubas-promising-new-online-voices.html">many onlookers’ surprise</a> – <a href="http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article168657017.html">Díaz-Canal supported</a>. </p>
<p>Other <a href="https://www.havanatimes.org/?p=127288">prominent Cubans pushed back</a>, though, and the campaign ended without any of the targeted web sites being closed down.</p>
<p>Raúl Castro has balanced conflicting factions with a delicate strategy he described as reform “without haste, but without pause.” Díaz-Canel must now demonstrate he, too, can manage these conflicts.</p>
<h2>US-Cuba relations in flux</h2>
<p>Finally, the new president has to deal with the mercurial U.S. administration. President Donald Trump has largely <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/15/marco-rubio-donald-trump-cuba-plan-239597">outsourced</a> Cuba policy to conservative Cuban-Americans in Congress, led by Sen. Marco Rubio, a Republican from Florida. </p>
<p>In June 2017, Trump declared he was “<a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-policy-united-states-towards-cuba/">cancelling</a>” some Obama-era Cuba political reforms and <a href="https://www.economist.com/news/americas/21723882-he-wants-hurt-regime-may-end-up-hurting-ordinary-cubans-donald-trump-closes-door">re-tightening parts of the economic embargo</a>.</p>
<p>In October, Trump further battered bilateral ties by <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/353061-us-cuts-staff-at-embassy-in-havana-by-60-percent-report">downsizing the American Embassy in Cuba</a> after U.S. government personnel <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-trump-using-health-attacks-on-us-diplomats-in-havana-as-an-excuse-to-punish-cuba-85163">suffered unexplained health problems there</a>. He also expelled 17 Cuban diplomats from Washington.</p>
<p>Recent Trump appointments do not bode well for the future of U.S.-Cuban relations. The incoming secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, was a <a href="https://ijr.com/opinion/2016/03/254428-mr-president-there-is-a-reason-no-u-s-president-has-visited-cuba-for-88-years/">vocal opponent</a> of Obama’s rapprochement with Havana. <a href="https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/beyond-the-axis-evil-additional-threats-weapons-mass-destruction-0">National security adviser John Bolton</a> once deemed Cuba part of an “axis of evil,” <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/opinion/john-bolton-republicans.html">falsely accusing</a> it of developing biological weapons. </p>
<h2>Anticipation and trepidation</h2>
<p>In December, I was in Havana, a city where the benefits of Raúl Castro’s economic reforms are most tangible. Cubans I spoke with there seemed ready for younger leadership and excited about the impending power transition. </p>
<p>But 80 percent of Cubans have always had a Castro as their president. So the anticipatory mood is leavened by trepidation: People fear that instability may accompany this major political change.</p>
<p>If Díaz-Canel can deliver on the economy – <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/668226">the top priority for most Cubans</a> – he’ll be judged a success. If not, he will face a rising tide of discontent from a population impatient for change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/95187/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William M. LeoGrande is the co-author with Peter Kornbluh of the 2015 book "Back Channel to Cuba: The Hidden History of Negotiations between Washington and Havana."</span></em></p>Cuba has a new president — and for the first time in six decades his last name is not Castro. Who is Miguel Díaz-Canel, the man who inherits a Cuba born of Fidel’s 1959 revolution?William M. LeoGrande, Professor of Government, American University School of Public AffairsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/940602018-03-30T10:54:08Z2018-03-30T10:54:08ZCuba’s getting a new president<p>Leadership changes don’t happen often in Cuba – there’s been just one since 1959, in fact. That was in 2006, when President Fidel Castro fell ill and was replaced by his brother Raúl. </p>
<p>Raúl Castro turned out to be a real agent of change. But after <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/world/americas/17cuba.html">two terms</a> as president, the 86-year-old is stepping down. On April 19, the National Assembly will meet to pick Cuba’s next leader. </p>
<p>And for the first time in six decades, his last name will not be Castro. </p>
<p>This is a momentous occasion — one of the most important I’ve seen in 40 years of <a href="http://uncpress.unc.edu/books/13863.html">studying and writing on Cuba</a>. For any state born in revolution, the first transfer of power to a new generation is always politically risky. </p>
<p>Raúl Castro’s successor must grow Cuba’s economy, contend with the United States and deal with a growing chorus of critics. And he will have to tackle these tasks while the Communist Party is still dominated by Fidel’s revolutionary comrades, who have sharp disagreements on all these issues.</p>
<h2>Who can fill Castro’s shoes?</h2>
<p>The clear favorite to replace Raúl Castro is Cuba’s 57-year-old First Vice President <a href="http://www.americasquarterly.org/content/cuba-new-leaders#Miguel">Miguel Díaz-Canel</a>. His ascension would represent a transfer of power away from the “historic generation” that waged Cuba’s 1959 revolution, many of whom are now pushing 90. </p>
<p>In 2011, Raúl Castro mandated a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/17/world/americas/17cuba.html">two-term limit for senior government and party officials</a>. It “is never positive” for the elderly to cling to power, <a href="http://en.cubadebate.cu/news/2016/04/18/7th-pcc-congress-central-report-presented-by-first-secretary-raul-castro-ruz/">he declared</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=771&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=969&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=969&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212693/original/file-20180329-189804-1fmg6eq.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=969&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fidel Castro in 1959.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/66/Fidel_Castro_-_MATS_Terminal_Washington_1959_%28cropped%29.png/466px-Fidel_Castro_-_MATS_Terminal_Washington_1959_%28cropped%29.png">U.S. Library of Congress</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But the charisma of Fidel Castro, who <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2016/11/26/americas/fidel-castro-obit/index.html">died in 2016</a>, has been a pillar of Cuba’s regime. Díaz-Canel – a trained engineer who worked his way up from provincial party leader to first vice president – will have to earn his authority through performance.</p>
<p>Those who have followed <a href="http://www.ibtimes.com/who-miguel-diaz-canel-all-you-need-know-about-cubas-heir-apparent-after-fidel-castros-2452701">his career</a> say Díaz-Canel is a seasoned, pragmatic politician. He is apparently a bit stiff in front of large audiences but relaxed and congenial in small groups – much like his mentor, Raúl Castro.</p>
<p>As president, Díaz-Canel would still benefit from Castro’s experience and authority. Castro <a href="https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/23394/cuba-after-castro-the-coming-elections-and-a-historic-changing-of-the-guard">remains first secretary</a> of the Communist Party – Cuba’s only party – until 2021. </p>
<p>This is arguably a post more powerful than the presidency. The party leadership makes all major economic, social and foreign relations policies, which the president is obliged to carry out. </p>
<p>So I don’t expect any drastic changes in direction from Díaz-Canel – at least, not right away.</p>
<p>The leadership transition is still significant, though. It marks the first time that the leader of the Communist Party and the leader of the Cuban government will be different people. Both Fidel and Raúl Castro held both positions simultaneously. </p>
<p>Cuba must now sort out the lines of authority between party and state. As Díaz-Canel staffs government ministries with his own team, he will gain ever more control over how policy is interpreted and implemented.</p>
<h2>Is Cuba in for a change?</h2>
<p>The new president will face some tough issues. </p>
<p>Cuba’s <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/11/26/fidel-castros-economic-disaster-in-cuba/">economy is struggling</a>, dragged down in particular by the dual-currency system Fidel Castro adopted in 1994 to attract cash remittances from Cuban expats. Raúl Castro <a href="http://www.cubanews.acn.cu/cuba/7615-president-raul-castro-says-solution-to-dual-currency-cannot-be-prolonged">has declared</a> that currency reunification “cannot be delayed any longer.”</p>
<p>But <a href="https://elestadocomotal.com/2018/01/24/perspectivas-de-una-devaluacion-monetaria-en-cuba-cuando-la-montana-de-la-politica-no-viene-hacia-los-economistas/">turning two currencies into one</a> is a tricky business with unpredictable economic consequences. And unlike almost every other country in the world, Cuba cannot turn to the International Monetary Fund or World Bank for support because <a href="http://www.cubatrademagazine.com/analysis-cuba-international-lending-agencies/">it withdrew from them after the revolution</a>.</p>
<p>Díaz-Canel will also face pressure to reinvigorate the Cuban economy by pushing ahead with Raúl Castro’s <a href="http://www.cubastudygroup.org/index.cfm/files/serve?File_id=046febac-1f56-4690-8107-a6e6568c5bf0">controversial economic reform program</a>. Castro loosened restrictions on private enterprise and foreign investment in Cuba early in his tenure, but the pace of change has since slowed. </p>
<p>If Díaz-Canel opens up Cuba’s economy too quickly, he’ll alienate Communist Party conservatives. Going too slowly will anger reformers, not to mention frustrate the Cuban people. </p>
<p>Another contentious issue facing Cuba’s incoming president is freedom of expression. <a href="https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/18723/between-reforms-and-repression-can-cuba-s-new-forces-of-change-succeed">Public criticism of the regime</a> has grown as more Cubans connect to the internet. Last year, hard-liners launched a <a href="https://www.havanatimes.org/?p=127288">campaign vilifying critical bloggers</a>, which – to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/24/opinion/cubas-promising-new-online-voices.html">many onlookers’ surprise</a> – <a href="http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article168657017.html">Díaz-Canal supported</a>. </p>
<p>Other <a href="https://www.havanatimes.org/?p=127288">prominent Cubans pushed back</a>, though, and the campaign ultimately ended without any of the targeted web sites being closed down.</p>
<p>Castro balanced conflicting factions with a delicate strategy he described as reform “without haste, but without pause.” He also benefited from unquestioned authority in the party. Díaz-Canel will have to establish his own legitimacy.</p>
<h2>US-Cuba relations in flux</h2>
<p>Finally, Díaz-Canel must deal with the mercurial Trump administration, which has largely <a href="https://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/15/marco-rubio-donald-trump-cuba-plan-239597">outsourced</a> Cuba policy to the conservative Cuban-Americans in Congress.</p>
<p>This faction, lead by Sen. Marco Rubio, a Republican from FloridaR-F, denounced President Barack Obama’s <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/obama-restored-relations-with-cuba/3612438.html">restoration of U.S.-Cuba relations</a>. Although Trump declared he was <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-policy-united-states-towards-cuba/">“cancelling”</a> Obama’s policy, he <a href="https://www.economist.com/news/americas/21723882-he-wants-hurt-regime-may-end-up-hurting-ordinary-cubans-donald-trump-closes-door">has so far left most Obama-era commercial openings untouched</a>.</p>
<p>In October, Trump further battered bilateral ties by <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/353061-us-cuts-staff-at-embassy-in-havana-by-60-percent-report">downsizing the U.S. Embassy in Cuba</a> after U.S. government personnel <a href="https://theconversation.com/is-trump-using-health-attacks-on-us-diplomats-in-havana-as-an-excuse-to-punish-cuba-85163">suffered unexplained health problems there</a>. He also expelled 17 Cuban diplomats from Washington.</p>
<p>Recent Trump appointments do not bode well for the future of U.S.-Cuban relations. The incoming secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, was a <a href="https://ijr.com/opinion/2016/03/254428-mr-president-there-is-a-reason-no-u-s-president-has-visited-cuba-for-88-years/">vocal opponent</a> of Obama’s rapprochement with Havana. And <a href="https://www.heritage.org/defense/report/beyond-the-axis-evil-additional-threats-weapons-mass-destruction-0">national security adviser John Bolton</a> once deemed Cuba part of an “axis of evil,” <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/23/opinion/john-bolton-republicans.html">falsely accusing</a> it of developing biological weapons. </p>
<h2>Anticipation and trepidation</h2>
<p>In December, I was in Havana, a city where the benefits of Raúl Castro’s economic reforms are most tangible. Cubans I spoke with there seemed ready for younger leadership and excited about the impending power transition. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/212695/original/file-20180329-189804-8q0txl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Loosened economic restrictions have led to a surge of investment in Havana over the past decade.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/YHP6H5">Pedro Szekely/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But 80 percent of Cubans have always had a Castro as their president. So the anticipatory mood is leavened by trepidation. People fear that change at the top could bring instability.</p>
<p>If Díaz-Canel can deliver on the economy – <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/668226">the top priority for most Cubans</a> – he’ll be judged a success. If not, he will face a rising tide of discontent from a population impatient for change.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94060/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William M. LeoGrande does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Miguel Díaz-Canel, a 57-year-old engineer and Communist Party loyalist, is expected to succeed Raúl Castro as president of Cuba. Will change bring prosperity or instability to the Cuban people?William M. LeoGrande, Professor of Government, American University School of Public AffairsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/851182017-10-08T10:05:08Z2017-10-08T10:05:08ZThe Russian Revolution: a reflection on the role of women revolutionaries<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188784/original/file-20171004-6713-vkl7ga.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>This year marks the centenary of the <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/the-russian-revolution-of-1917-1779474">Russian Revolution</a> – in fact it’s two revolutions. The one in February 1917 overthrew the Russian monarchy. The second one, in October 1917, came about after a nearly bloodless coup put the Bolsheviks in charge under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin.</p>
<p>Creating the world’s first communist country, it was a central event of the twentieth century. It’s an event experienced as an electric shock throughout much of the colonialised world. </p>
<p>Recollections of this seismic event often revolve around images of powerful men – the ideas of <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/marx_karl.shtml">Karl Marx</a> and <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1895/misc/engels-bio.htm">Friedrich Engels</a>, and the political strategy of <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/lenin_vladimir.shtml">Lenin</a> and <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/trotsky_leon.shtml">Leon Trotsky</a>. But women have always been key participants in the Communist movement, in terms of theory and practice, including in the October Revolution. </p>
<p>Leading Marxist historian <a href="http://vijayprashad.org/">Vijay Prashad</a> recalls that in October 1917 women factory workers in St Petersburg marched to see Lenin in the <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/kollonta/1917/lenin-smolny.htm">Smolny</a>, the compound in the city where he worked, and asked him to, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Take power, Comrade Lenin: that is what we working women want. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Lenin famously replied: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It is not I, but you - the workers - who must take power. Return to your factories and tell the workers that. </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Before the Russian Revolution</h2>
<p>But women played decisive and revolutionary roles even before the Russian Revolution.</p>
<p>In seventeenth century England women were a powerful presence in what was known as the <a href="http://www.northamptonshiretimeline.com/scene/1607-newton-rebellion/">Midland Revolt</a>. The more than thousand-strong crowd that gathered at Newton in 1607 to protest against the land enclosures by the Tresham family, who were aggressively enclosing the lands of East Midlands, included women and children. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.onthisdeity.com/5th-october-1789-%E2%80%93-the-womens-march-on-versailles/">Women’s March</a> on the Palace of Versailles in October 1789 was a decisive moment in the struggles that brought down the power of the French Monarchy. Nearly 7,000 women, <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/womens-march-on-versailles-3529107">chanting “bread! bread!”</a>, marched from Paris to the palace. The uprising contributed to the fall of Louis XVI and the much-hated Marie Antoinette.</p>
<p>The women who initiated the march were called “Mothers of the Nation”. Importantly, the march wasn’t only a turning point for Republicans, but also crucial for gender equality. </p>
<p>In 1802 Edward Despard, an Irish soldier who served in the British army but who became involved in revolutionary politics, and his African-American wife, <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2011/11/2011115131942562643.html">Catherine Despard</a>, led a plot to seize the Bank of England and the Tower of London, and to assassinate King George III. He was arrested for the failed Despard plot.</p>
<p>Catherine <a href="https://mikejay.net/edward-and-catherine-despard/">publicly defended</a> her husband against charges of terrorism and sedition, and also lobbied and campaigned on his behalf. She <a href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/02/22/catherine-despard-abolitionist/">petitioned</a> the Home Secretary and
enlisted the help of an independent MP who raised the plight of the men incarcerated at the Coldbath Fields prison, where Edward was detained. Catherine also worked with the wives of other political prisoners. </p>
<p>Despite Catherine taking the fight to the highest authorities, Edward was found guilty on charges of <a href="http://equianosworld.tubmaninstitute.ca/content/edward-despard">high treason</a>. He was hanged, drawn and quartered. Catherine was one of 20,000 people who witnessed his execution. </p>
<p>As capitalism consolidated its hold over land and labour through the industrial revolution the <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-the-luddites-really-fought-against-264412/">Luddite movement</a> attacked factories and destroyed machines. It was not to halt the development of technology but to subject it to the interests of the workers. </p>
<p>Ned Ludd, a fictional character, based on an amalgam of various apprentices came to provide the name and face of the movement. But women often led the attacks on the factories. On 24 April 1812, a particularly successful attack was launched against a mill outside Bolton in North West England under the leadership of sisters <a href="https://womenshistorynetwork.org/luddite-women/">Mary and Lydia Molyneux</a>. The mill was destroyed. </p>
<p>In 1871, just over a hundred years after the Women’s March on Versailles, French women took to the streets with the same militant vigour, during the <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/05/kristin-ross-communal-luxury-paris-commune/">Paris Commune</a>. Leftwingers took over the French capital, but the radical experiment in socialist self-government only lasted 72 days.</p>
<p>In stark contrast to the supposed fragility of women, the militant anarchist and feminist, <a href="https://spaceinvaderjoe.wordpress.com/2012/05/06/female-badasses-in-history-nathalie-lemel-1827-1921/">Nathalie Lemel</a> <a href="https://www.marxist.com/women-in-the-paris-commune.htm">called</a> women to militant action during the Commune:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We have come to the supreme moment, when we must be able to die for our Nation. No more weakness! No more uncertainty! All women to arms! All women to duty! Versailles must be wiped out!</p>
</blockquote>
<p>On Sunday 22 January 1905 women, once again were at the forefront of the march on the Winter Palace in St Petersburg that came to be known at Bloody Sunday. Many paid with their lives for the transformation of Tsarist autocratic rule. </p>
<h2>Women and Communist thought</h2>
<p>Before and during the Russian Revolution, the Polish-born German philosopher <a href="http://spartacus-educational.com/RUSluxemburg.htm">Rosa Luxemburg</a> was a leading Communist theorist. Thereafter women like the American Marxist, <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/dunayevskaya/">Raya Dunayevskaya</a>, Trinidad-born journalist, political activist and feminist, <a href="https://theculturetrip.com/europe/united-kingdom/england/london/articles/claudia-jones-communist-black-activist-and-mother-of-notting-hill-carnival/">Claudia Jones</a> – also known as the “mother” of London’s Notting Hill Carnival, South African academic and journalist, <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/ruth-heloise-first">Ruth First</a>, and longstanding American activist and feminist, <a href="https://feministstudies.ucsc.edu/faculty/singleton.php?&singleton=true&cruz_id=aydavis">Angela Davis</a>, played key roles in the development of Communist thought.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=797&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188788/original/file-20171004-32388-yy8x9n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1002&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">South African journalist and activist, Ruth First.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sunday Times</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A closer look at the great male figures in the Communist tradition often shows that they worked closely with and relied heavily on radical women. Engels could not have written <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/824042.The_Condition_of_the_Working_Class_in_England">“The Condition of the Working Class in England”</a> without the guidance of his working class Irish partner, <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/how-friedrich-engels-radical-lover-helped-him-father-socialism-21415560/">Mary Burns</a>. </p>
<p>Marx’s daughters <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/bio/family/laura.htm">Laura</a> and <a href="https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2014/11/how-eleanor-marx-changed-world">Eleanor</a>, were leading communists and significant activists in their own right. <a href="http://www.counterfire.org/women-on-the-left/15628-women-on-the-left-nadezhda-krupskaya">Nadezhda Krupskaya</a>, Lenin’s lifelong partner and comrade was a leading educational theorist and radical communist. <a href="https://socialistaction.ca/2014/06/08/celia-sanchez-heroine-of-the-cuban-revolution/">Cecilia Sanchez</a>, one of Fidel Castro’s closest and most trusted comrades, is hardly known outside of Cuba.</p>
<p>When women are remembered as part of the Communist or any other political tradition it is often as an afterthought, or as part of the support system of the revolution, taking care of the home and the family. These are important tasks in any struggle but by focusing only on this precludes women from inhabiting the identity of a revolutionary or a theorist. This is in marked contrast to one of the most significant of the achievements of the Russian Revolution in its early phase – it’s radical action in support of full equality between men and women.</p>
<p>Lenin, often invoked by very <a href="https://books.google.co.za/books?id=r8_OCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT15&lpg=PT15&dq=Lenin+masculinist+forms+of+politics&source=bl&ots=7pAVaDY3lS&sig=_7h1QaDct1Dk6PFVF5r5XbMGCDQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwie3MfL09bWAhWHKsAKHR6YA8kQ6AEIMjAC#v=onepage&q=Lenin%20masculinist%20forms%20of%20politics&f=false">masculinist</a> forms of politics was crystal clear on this score. He <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1921/mar/04.htm">insisted</a> that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The female half of the human race is doubly oppressed under capitalism. The working woman and the peasant woman are oppressed by capital, but over and above that, even in the most democratic of the bourgeois republics, they remain, firstly, deprived of some rights because the law does not give them equality with men; and secondly — and this is the main thing — they remain in ‘household bondage’, they continue to be ‘household slaves’, for they are overburdened with the drudgery of the most squalid and backbreaking and stultifying toil in the kitchen and the individual family household.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>This is the first of a series of articles on the centenary of the Russian Revolution.</strong></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85118/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Vashna Jagarnath is affiliated with the National Union of Metal Workers of South Africa</span></em></p>When women are remembered as part of the Communist or any other political tradition it’s often as an afterthought, or as part of the support system of the revolution.Vashna Jagarnath, Senior Lecturer, History Department, Rhodes UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/802492017-08-02T13:14:05Z2017-08-02T13:14:05ZVenezuela: what Chávez’s mentor told me about the country’s Castro-inspired road to ruin<p>Even as citizens took to the streets in their hundreds of thousands to protest and boycott it, Venezuela’s president, Nicolás Maduro, <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-40772531">declared victory</a> in an election that could allow him to rewrite the country’s constitution. The result, which elevates hundreds of representatives to Maduro’s <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/07/venezuela-maduro-constituent-assembly-170729172525718.html">constituent assembly</a>, is highly contentious. The government claims that 8m, or <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2017/07/31/americas/venezuela-constituent-assembly-election/index.html">41.53%</a> of eligible voters, turned out, but the opposition claims that only 2.2m, or <a href="http://www.elnuevoherald.com/noticias/mundo/america-latina/venezuela-es/article164479802.html">less than 15%</a>, actually did.</p>
<p>Luisa Ortega, the once-loyal attorney general turned government critic, <a href="http://runrun.es/nacional/319774/las-20-mejores-frases-de-la-fiscal-general-despues-de-la-eleccion-constituyente.html">said</a> the result “makes a mockery” of the country, offering “too much power for a very small group.” The government also faces international condemnation, with <a href="http://runrun.es/nacional/319659/mas-de-40-paises-estan-en-contra-de-la-constituyente.html">more than 40 countries</a> speaking out against the constituent assembly. </p>
<p>The proposals, such as they are, are a sham. Maduro claims that his plans will bring peace to Venezuela, but hasn’t explained what specific elements of the 1999 constitution need changing. Under a new constitution, the opposition’s ongoing efforts to challenge Maduro would be rendered moot; the current parliament, with its opposition majority, could even be dissolved, or reduced to a rubber stamp for the president’s orders. </p>
<p>This would complete Venezuela’s transition from democracy to a system more closely resembling the Castros’ Cuba. That particular country and its ways of doing politics have long been an inspiration for Venezuela’s leftist leaders – to their country’s severe detriment. </p>
<h2>A shrine of the revolution</h2>
<p>As I was gathering material for my research back in 2007 and 2009, I twice interviewed a figure who saw this process play out: Hugo Chávez’s onetime political broker and mentor, <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/12803">Luis Miquilena</a>.</p>
<p>Miquilena, who was actively involved in Venezuelan politics from the 1940s until his death in 2016, put Chávez up at his house after he was <a href="https://videosenglish.telesurtv.net/video/365779/looking-back-chavez-released-from-yare-prison-1994/">released from prison</a> in 1994. When we spoke, Miquilena described the many long nights they spent talking about the problems in the country and how to improve it once in government; “Chávez,” he said, “was like my adopted son.” But he didn’t see his protégé as a great white hope. Far from it: “Once you know Chávez well, you realise that he is not presidential material.”</p>
<p>Nonetheless, Miquilena seriously invested in Chávez, hoping to transform Venezuela from behind the scenes. The “Chávismo” phenomenon that’s held sway in Venezuela for the last two decades would have never materialised without his contacts, endeavour and political wit. It was Miquilena who assembled an impressive coalition of small and medium-sized political parties and influential figures to support Chávez’s successful <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/americas/9812/06/venezuela.results/index.html">1998 presidential bid</a>.</p>
<p>But Miquelena’s plan to rule by proxy a <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0094582X14521991">passive revolution</a> didn’t come off. His almost fatherly bond with Chávez soon began to fray, and he soon found himself sidelined by another ideological heavyweight. </p>
<p>In October 2000, Fidel Castro himself visited Venezuela and insisted on visiting the house in Sabaneta where Chávez was born and lived during his childhood. According to Miquilena, when they got there, Fidel told Chávez: “We’ll make this house a shrine of the revolution” – and starting then, Chávez began distancing himself from Miquilena as Fidel inflated him with messianic delusions of grandeur. Feeling used and betrayed, Miquilena resigned his government post in January 2002 and ended his relationship with Chávez.</p>
<h2>Push and shove</h2>
<p>Thus began Venezuela’s Fidelist radicalisation. Chávez’s charisma and gift of the gab thrilled people who felt ignored and marginalised in a polarised society; after a coup against him <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/apr/15/venezuela.alexbellos">failed in 2002</a>, he cemented his position with the benefit of abundant petrodollars. Nevertheless, Chávez’s dominant alpha male persona was not enough to guarantee electoral success, and his incendiary rhetoric was increasingly matched with efforts to <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-venezuelas-revolutionary-dream-descended-into-chaos-75685">tweak the system in his favour</a>.</p>
<p>The undemocratic and bloody events Venezuela has seen in recent months have their roots in Chávez’s decision to gradually impose a Cuban-style socialist revolution at all costs. As he <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-salute-idUSN1142580120070511">famously said</a> in 2007: “Homeland, socialism or death … I swear!”</p>
<p>Today, it seems that the idea of revolution is to be defended at all costs, including violence, even at the highest levels. On June 28, 2017, Bladimiro Lugo, a colonel of the National Guard responsible for the safety of parliament and parliamentarians, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p52dQ5KD978">manhandled and shoved</a> Julio Borges, president of the opposition-led National Assembly. This occurred as Borges asked Lugo to explain the physical attacks opposition female parliamentarians and journalists had suffered earlier that day. The next day, Maduro <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfy794SVz5M">awarded Lugo a presidential honour</a> for his contribution to safety and public order. </p>
<p>The incident illustrates a grubby way of maintaining power: the armed forces are kept loyal with the benefits, influence and even impunity that come with promotion, as the government flatters personal interests to make sure military leaders will defend the revolution at all costs. This might explain why Venezuela has <a href="https://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2017/06/272001.htm">more active military generals</a> than the NATO alliance countries combined: it now boasts <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-05-06/venezuela-s-military-needs-to-get-out-of-business">more than 4,000 generals</a>, up from fewer than 50 in 1993. </p>
<p>To make things more complex, the government also provides weapons and political power to civilian groups. Known as the <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-protests-colectivos-idUSBREA1C1YW20140213">Colectivos</a>, they play a key role in crushing any protests against the government. On July 5, Lugo’s National Guard which is responsible to safeguard the National Assembly – opened the gates to let <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-latin-america-40511146/mob-storms-venezuela-national-assembly">Colectivos</a> into the building to attack opposition parliamentarians. These events tally with a <a href="https://youtu.be/X_nn2H_uuzI">belligerent speech</a> Maduro delivered on June 27, 2017: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>If the Bolivarian revolution is destroyed, we will go to combat, we will never surrender. What couldn’t be done with votes, we will do with weapons.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Fall from grace</h2>
<p>Many on the Latin American left are clear-eyed about what has happened to a country once regarded as a beacon of hope. One particularly interesting and visible <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiiDsc3XT8k">critic</a> is Jose Mujica, ex-president of Uruguay. A left-guerrilla who spent altogether 13 years in prison, turned down an offer of <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-29946977">US$1m</a> from a Arab sheikh for his VW Beetle and <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20243493">donated 90%</a> of his presidential salary to charity organisations, he is as sanguine about what’s happened to Venezuela as many of Chávez and Maduro’s western detractors. </p>
<p>In the 2015 book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Una-oveja-negra-poder-Confesiones-ebook/dp/B00XZA2LD6">A Black Sheep in Power</a> (Una Oveja Negra en el Poder), Mujica claims he warned Chávez that “he was not going to construct socialism” and that in the end, “he didn’t construct a damn thing.” Mujica also notes that “Cuba was like a teenage girlfriend that he saw deteriorating as years went by.” Apparently, Mujica never believed in the Cuban model: “In spite of all the crap related with capitalism, it manages to bring growth.”</p>
<p>Having taken the path it did, Venezuela is now a political disaster for the global left. The impact of more than a decade of apparent anti-neoliberal policies in an oil-rich Latin American country has given a bad name to ideological alternatives to free-market doctrines, and puts socialists who respect and follow democratic processes throughout the world in a very awkward position. Chávez and his successors’ gross overuse of the word “socialism” is more than partly to blame. </p>
<p>The government they have built over the years is not populist or socialist: it is totalitarian. It can no longer claim to be democratic, or that it’s primarily occupied with improving the lives of ordinary people. Its principal goal, to the near-exclusion of all others, is to safeguard the elite – even as that elite fails to rescue the country from crisis.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/80249/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ryan Brading does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Venezuela is long gone; say hello to Cuba-zuela.Ryan Brading, Teaching Fellow, Department of Development Studies, SOAS, University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/812422017-07-28T05:46:58Z2017-07-28T05:46:58ZCastro’s conundrum: finding a post-communist model Cuba can follow<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179809/original/file-20170726-2676-1q8xnpb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In Cuba, unlike in many Latin American countries, when you see children on the street, they're not begging; they're playing. And therein lies Castro's dilemma: how to reform Cuba's stagnant economy without losing what's working?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/HAaxKZ">Dan Lundberg/flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When US President Donald Trump <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/16/politics/trump-cuba-policy/index.html">imposed new restrictions on Cuba</a> in June 2017, he professed his administration’s aim was to “encourage greater freedom for the Cuban people and economic interaction”.</p>
<p>Raúl Castro, who took over from his brother Fidel in 2008, has been trying to <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-cuba-the-post-fidel-era-began-ten-years-ago-71720">figure out that last part for years</a>. In 2010, Castro spoke of the need to “<a href="http://www.elnuevoherald.com/noticias/mundo/america-latina/cuba-es/article139985523.html">update the economic model</a>”, but the world has regrettably few models for a communist country in transition can follow.</p>
<p>As Rafael Hernandez, editor of the Cuban journal <a href="http://www.temas.cult.cu/">Temas</a>, informed America’s <a href="http://www.npr.org/2012/08/21/159466378/cuba-views-china-vietnam-as-economic-hope">National Public Radio</a> in 2012, “a new model for Cuba is still taking shape, but it would be foolish for the island to try copying China or Vietnam”. </p>
<p>In both of these countries, but particularly in China, the transition to a market economy in recent decades has created <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/business-13945072">gross economic inequality</a> and come at a <a href="https://www.internationalrivers.org/campaigns/three-gorges-dam">high social cost</a>. Such outcomes would be unacceptable in Cuba, where <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-donald-trump-change-cuba-79734">the revolutionary spirit of egalitarianism lives on</a>.</p>
<h2>Cuba’s <em>cuentapropistas</em></h2>
<p>In the meantime, Castro is giving Cuba’s <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/11/26/fidel-castros-economic-disaster-in-cuba/#563ca56f6b65">stagnant economy</a> a cash injection by pursuing a simple premise: maintain state control of the economy but give the private sector more room for manoeuvre. </p>
<p>At the March 2011 <a href="http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/documentos/2011/ing/l160711i.html">Sixth Congress of the Cuban Communist Party</a>, Castro spearheaded the approval of 300 historic measures to unlock the country’s entrepreneurial spirit, including reducing public sector jobs, decentralising the state apparatus and encouraging self-employment.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179505/original/file-20170724-16930-xx41zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rickshaw drivers are among Cuba’s burgeoning self-employed class.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Antonio Castillo</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>After a half-century of prohibition on where and how they could earn money, Cubans jumped at the opportunity to start their own small businesses. </p>
<p>Ramiro is one of them. “It was unbelievable, I took more than a hundred photos of Obama,” he told me on a crisp April afternoon while walking along the Malecón, the eight-kilometre esplanade along Havana’s north coast. </p>
<p>Barack Obama and his family landed at José Martí international airport in March 2016, the first US president to set foot on the island since Calvin Coolidge in 1928. </p>
<p>Ramiro, who sells <em>churros</em> in touristy Old Havana, is also a freelance photographer, and he followed the Obamas around the city, documenting their stay.</p>
<p>“Look at this one,” he said, showing me an image of the former president entering a restaurant with his wife and two daughters. “This is Obama when he went to have dinner at San Cristobal”, one of Cuba’s top-rated <em>paladares</em>, or private eateries. </p>
<p>“You should try the food there, you know Mick Jagger ate there, too?” </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179508/original/file-20170724-7881-th6vxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tourism is the engine that fuels Havana’s upscale private eateries, called <em>paladares</em>.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">advencap/flickr</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The tourist engine</h2>
<p>Ramiro’s recommendation is tongue-in-cheek: I can’t afford San Cristobal and he knows it.</p>
<p>Happily, there are more affordable options among Havana’s 1,700 <em>paladares</em>. These in-home restaurants are part of the new economic model that encourages <em>cuentapropismo</em>, or self-employment, in Cuba. </p>
<p>By the end of 2016, there were more than 535,000 <em>cuentrapropistas</em> on the <a href="https://www.martinoticias.com/a/cuba-mas-medio-millon-cuentapropistas-cifras-oficiales/136867.html">island</a>. Self-employment now represents 26% of non-state employment, and it is projected to rise to 35%. </p>
<p>Other than owning a <em>paladar</em>, Cuban entrepreneurs may now legally engage in 202 other private activities, including being an electrician, animal trainer, gardener, hairdresser, street vendor and rickshaw driver.</p>
<p>Tourism is the engine of this change. According to Cuba’s Ministry of Tourism, more than <a href="http://www.cubadebate.cu/noticias/2017/07/12/ministro-del-turismo-cuba-proyecta-cerrar-el-ano-con-cuatro-millones-700-mil-turistas/#.WXe4jNOGNPM">4 million tourists are expected to land on the island in 2017</a>.</p>
<p>US tourism has long been banned here, even under Barack Obama, so Americans must seek one of 12 specific licences to avoid <a href="https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/Programs/pages/cuba.aspx">violating US sanctions against Cuba</a>.</p>
<p>Lester and Laura, a Catholic couple in their 60s, told me that they “came in under the religious activities” license, citing one reason Americans can <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/entry/how-to-travel-to-cuba_n_6489024">get authorisation to travel Cuba</a>.</p>
<p>Both schoolteachers, Lester and Laura were staying in an affordable <em>casa particular</em> (private home) on Old Havana’s Plaza Vieja. Like the <em>paladares</em>, these bed and breakfast-style accommodations are part of the <em>cuentapropista</em> economic plan.</p>
<p>The average host makes US$250 per booking, <a href="http://fortune.com/cuba-havana-airbnb/">according to Fortune magazine</a> – good money in a country where the average monthly salary is US$23. Business is clearly booming.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"872035360896933888"}"></div></p>
<p>Jaime and Mario, the owners of the <em>casa particular</em> hosting Lester and Laura, have impeccably renovated the fourth floor of their six-floor apartment building, splitting it into two self-contained bedrooms. </p>
<p>They’d like to add a third, they told me, but navigating Cuban bureaucracy is as slow as dancing <em>merengue</em>. Approval to expand will take months.</p>
<h2>An equitable society</h2>
<p>Fidel Castro, who died in 2016 at the age of 90, remains a revered figure among Cubans. He is buried 800 kilometres from Havana, in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/04/fidel-castro-funeral-ashes-interred-cuba-cemetery">the Santa Ifigenia cemetery</a> in Santiago de Cuba, the birthplace of the Cuban revolution.</p>
<p>Don Raúl, a <em>Santiagueño</em> engineer who drives an unpainted 1954 Chevrolet, met me at the cemetery on one of those steamy, scorching Santiago mornings. He directed me to Fidel’s tomb (“Walk to the entry and then turn left”). </p>
<p>Fidel’s ashes are encased under a bulky granite boulder bearing a minimalist dark plaque engraved with just his first name. To pay respects to the legendary <em>comandante</em>, just as with so many things in Cuba from buying coffee to accessing the internet, one must queue.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/179506/original/file-20170724-7881-3i7jtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Fidel Castro remains a hero for many Cubans.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Antonio Castillo</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“Without Fidel we are heading to an unequal society,” Don Raúl told me. He is suspicious of <em>cuentapropismo</em>, which enriches some and leaves others out. “It’s not good.” </p>
<p>He doesn’t consider himself an entrepreneur. “I’m just a driver,” he said. </p>
<p>Don Raul, who still gets emotional when he speaks of Fidel, worries that <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-cuba-castro-diaz-canel-idUSKBN13P0FC">Miguel Díaz-Canel</a>, Raúl Castro’s designated successor, will push Cuba to become a “US-style country” when he takes the reins in 2018. </p>
<p>A girl, perhaps ten years old, leaves a bunch of red roses at Fidel’s tomb. </p>
<p>“He was a friend,” she told me. “He fought for the country and for the education of children.” </p>
<p>She’s onto something. Unlike elsewhere in Latin America, kids in Cuba don’t beg or sell candy on the streets. Education levels <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/salim-lamrani/world-bank-cuba-has-the-b_b_5925864.html">rival those of the developed world</a> and <a href="https://www.unicef.org/publications/files/Progress_for_Children_-_No._4.pdf">childhood malnutrition</a> is almost nonexistent. </p>
<p>These are key indicators of human development. Even in bad times, Cuba has been an equitable society. And herein lies the existential dilemma facing Castro (and, soon enough, Díaz-Canal): Cuba is poor, but it has also avoided many of the maladies facing its neighbours. </p>
<p>Raul Castro has described his vision for the country as “prosperous and sustainable socialism”. Now he just has to figure out what that looks like.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/81242/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Antonio Castillo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Cuba won’t tolerate the high social costs paid by China and Vietnam in their shift to market capitalism, but its economy desperately needs a reboot.Dr Antonio Castillo, Director, Centre for Communication, Politics and Culture, RMIT UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.