Tag Archives: Book Review

CUBA IN TRANSITION: PERSPECTIVES ON REFORM, CONTINUITY, AND CULTURE

Posted on January 4, 2022 by Arch Ritter

LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY 63: 4, 2021

Complete Review: Cuba in Transition]

Rubrick Biegon   (Lecturer in international relations at the University of Kent, Canterbury, UK. R.Biegon@kent.ac.uk.)

Books Included in this Review

 
Aviva Chomsky, Barry Carr, Alfredo Prieto, and Pamela Maria Smorkaloff, eds.,The Cuba Reader: History, Culture, Politics. 2nd ed., revised and updated. Durham: Duke University Press, 2019. Figures, notes, index, 744 pp.; hardcover $129.95, paperback $32.95, ebook $32.95.


Carmelo Mesa-Lago, ed., Voices of Change in Cuba from the Non-State Sector . Pitts-burgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018. Abbreviations, appendixes, figures, tables, notes, bibliography, index, 178 pp.; paperback $29.95, ebook $28.76.


Scott Morgenstern, Jorge Pérez-López, and Jerome Branche, eds., Paths for Cuba: Reforming Communism in Comparative Perspective . Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018. Tables, figures, bibliography, index, 408 pp.; paperback $37.95, ebook $29.57.


Louis A. Pérez, Jr., Rice in the Time of Sugar: The Political Economy of Food in Cuba. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2019. Tables, figures, bibliography, index, 264 pp.; hardcover $90, paperback $29.95, ebook $22.99.


Margaret Randall, Exporting Revolution: Cuba’s Global Solidarity . Durham: Duke University Press, 2017. Notes, bibliography, index, 270 pp.; hardcover $99.95, paperback $26.95, ebook $25.60.

Introduction

Cuban politics and society are in a period of extended transition. From 2006 to 2008, Fidel Castro transferred authority to his brother Raúl, who subsequently sought to “update” Cuba’s economic model. The younger Castro stepped down in 2018, not long after Fidel’s death in 2016. Miguel Díaz-Canel, born after the Cuban Revolution, became head of state. Raúl retired from his position atop the Partido Comunista de Cuba (PCC) in April 2021. As the country settles into the post-Castro era, it wrestles with a myriad of social and cultural issues intertwined with ongoing processes of reform and modernization. Academic research has sought to make sense of these developments while situating new trends in the wide sweep of Cuban history.


Cuba’s foreign relations have also seen profound (if uneven) change in recent years. Most prominently, the dramatic events of December 2014, when Barack Obama and Raúl Castro simultaneously announced their intent to reestablish diplo-matic relations, ushered in a new dynamic with the United States, as leaders pledged to move beyond decades of animosity. The two countries formally reestablished full diplomatic ties in 2015. The following year, Obama became the first sitting US pres- ident to visit the island in nearly a century. Donald Trump was elected after pledg – ing to cancel Obama’s “deal,” however. The Trump administration retightened
Washington’s embargo on the country, which had been relaxed under Obama. Even as Havana has forged new international partnerships, scholars have been compelled to scrutinize the twists and turns in Cuba’s all-important, highly asymmetrical rela – tionship with the United States (Biegon 2020; Hershberg and LeoGrande 2016).


The six books under review offer a variety of perspectives on Cuba’s contemporary reality, the historical contexts structuring recent political and economic shifts, and the international currents shaping the country’s post-Castro trajectory. Published after the 2014–16 rapprochement with the United States, they reflect a broadly forward-looking atmosphere in Cuban studies. Written as the generation of revolutionary históricos exited the leadership scene, the texts reinforce the notion that Cuba’s transition is both real and ambiguous. Instead of painting a uniform picture, they offer critical and, at times, competing insights on the intersection of the political and economic reforms undertaken by Cuba’s leadership and the social,
cultural, and global dynamics beyond the scope of state authority. The authors cover a breadth of interrelated topics sure to motivate scholarly discussions of Cuba for the duration of the 2020s and beyond.

Continue Reading.

Posted in Blog | Tagged | Leave a comment

New Book by Vegard Bye, CUBA, FROM FIDEL TO RAÚL AND BEYOND

Posted on June 21, 2021 by Arch Ritter

I have just read Vegard Bye’s Cuba analysis – a bit late as it was published in mid-2020.  It is indeed an excellent analysis of Cuba’s current situation and prospects.  


This is one of the very best general analyses of the inter-relationships between Cuba’s economic conundrums and reforms, its socio-economic transformationsand the character and functioning of the political system.  Bye has drawn from his own experience in Cuba over a number of decades and from a careful and examination of the broad ranges of literature from within Cuba, from Cuban analysts outside Cuba, and from Cuban-American and international analysts. His chapters on the economic changes since the death of Fidel and their social implications is masterful.  Even better is his analysis of Cuba’s political system in Chapters 4, and 6 to 8.  

This volume is a tremendously valuable resource for a comprehension of Cuba’s current situation and its possible future.  

INFORMATION ON THE BOOK:

Title:               Cuba, From Fidel To Raul And Beyond

Format:           Paperback

Published:       August 14, 2020

Publisher:       Palgrave Macmillan

Language:       English

ISBN –             13:9783030218089

OVERVIEW FROM THE BACK COVER:

This book analyzes the economic reforms and political adjustments that took place in Cuba during the era of Raúl Castro’s leadership and its immediate aftermath, the first year of his successor, Miguel Díaz-Canel. Faced with economic challenges and a political crisis of legitimacy now that the Castro brothers are no longer in power, the Cuban Revolution finds itself at another critical juncture, confronted with the loss of Latin American allies and a more hostile and implacable US administration.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. Introduction
  2. Retreat of State as Economic Actor?
  3. Achieving the Required Surge in Investment and Growth?
  4. Political Implications of Socio-economic Changes
  5. T he Evolving International Arena: Fitting into a New Context
  6. More Pluralism or Continued Authoritarianism/
  7. Evolution of Party and State Relations
  8. Towards the End of Gerontocracy
  9. Into the Critical Juncture: Principal Dilemmas and Possible Scenarios

EDITORIAL REVIEWS

“The text that Vegard Bye presents to us summarizes the ideas and visions that he has been developing after years of observing closely the evolution of the Cuban social, political and economic model, especially during the reforms process led by Raul Castro since 2008. His proposals and analysis have the virtue of not falling into common places and stereotypes so usual in the Cuba subject. He found originality from his firsthand knowledge of the Cuban reality, seen from an international perspective and from the prism of modern concepts of political science.” (Pavel Vidal Alejandro, Professor of Economics at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, Colombia)

“This is a timely book and a well-informed contribution to the ever-going debate about Cuba’s future. The author has accumulated decades of experience in assessing and living in the Cuban reality, and the book offers just that, a scholarly as much as a personal view of the events in the Island. Whether you share or not his opinions, this piece will greatly contribute to your knowledge about this fascinating country, in a way that is both enjoyable and useful.” (Ricardo Torres, Professor at the Center for the Study of the Cuban Economy, University of Havana, Cuba)

“Displaying an expertise gained through several decades of closely watching developments on the island, Bye delivered a very perceptive and informed analysis of the economic and political changes in the post-Fidel era, the outcomes of Raúl Castro’s reform and the political scenarios for the future. A most-needed assessment of Cuba’s contemporary realities from a political science perspective.” (Nora Gamez Torres, Cuban-American journalist covering Cuba and US-Cuban relations for Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald)

“A timely and thankfully heterodox volume that gives readers a front row seat and fresh and locally informed analysis of contemporary Cuban political economy. The book provides both a sober assessment of Raúl Castro’s 10 years of economic reforms (2008-2018) and an early analysis of the first year of Miguel Díaz-Canel’s―Raúl’s hand-picked successor―government. Its unique perspective derives equally from the author’s immersion in progressive projects of national renovation in Cuba and Nicaragua as a war correspondent, United Nations official, and representative of various Norwegian development agencies. Bye’s ongoing collaboration with various leading Cuban NGOs and civil society groups gives his book an insider’s insight and balance rare for a volume by a non-Cuban about such a controversial topic as Cuban politics.” (Ted A. Henken, Associate Professor of Sociology at Baruch College, City University of New York, USA)

“A study on Cuba focused on its most pressing issues. A must-read for any researcher―carefully researched and accessible to anyone interested in the past, present and future of the Cuban Revolution.” (Harold Cárdenas, co-founder of the Cuban blog La Jóven Cuba)

VEGARD BYE is a Norwegian political scientist, writer, consultant and ex-politician. He has represented the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Angola and Bolivia, written extensively on Latin America, and is a consultant specializing on human rights, democracy, conflict and post-conflict societies as well as solar energy. He served as a Substitute Representative (Vararepresentant) to the Norwegian Parliament for the Socialist Left Party from Oslo (1993-1997), meeting in the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs.  He is currently a Partner at Scanteam a.s., an Oslo-based consulting company focusing on international development and responsible business.

Posted in Blog | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

“CAN WE STILL BE REVOLUTIONARIES?” ANNA VELTFORT INTERVIEWED BY TED A. HENKEN

Posted on March 1, 2021 by Arch Ritter

No Country Magazine,  02/26/2021

TED A. HENKEN

 Complete Interview:  “Can We Still Be Revolutionaries?”

In this exclusive interview with Ted Henken, New York graphic artist, blogger, and one-time habanera Anna Veltfort shares the contents of her “Cuban Cold War closet,” revealing long-held secrets from the decade she and her family spent in Cuba during the Revolution’s honeymoon years. For her, and for many other young gay artists of her generation, these were both tough and luminous years filled with illusions, idealism, and unforgettable events, both exhilarating and terrifying.

Brought to Cuba by her Communist parents as a 16-year-old in early 1962, Veltfort attended high school and college alongside her Cuban classmates, eventually graduating in Art History from the University of Havana in 1972. As she came of age in this heady and politically polarized environment, she enthusiastically joined in to build a better world as a proud revolutionary, doing voluntary agricultural labor around Havana and conducting social research among the peasants of the Sierra Maestra Mountains.

At the same time, she quickly perceived that daily life for her ordinary Cuban friends bore little resemblance to the privileged circumstances her family enjoyed as “foreign technicians.” Veltfort also endured harrowing first-hand experiences of gay paranoia and repression as she explored and defined her own sexual identity as a lesbian during the time of cruel homophobic purges that swept through Cuban society.

At the most basic level, her book Goodbye, My Havana: The Life and Times of a Gringa in Revolutionary Cuba (Redwood Press, 2019; Verbum, 2017) is a coming of age memoir. But it is also the work of a very talented graphic artist. Perhaps most importantly, it is a first-hand testimonial and admonition about the perverse reality lurking beneath an often-romanticized Revolution.

* This interview was originally done in two separate parts that straddle the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. The first was a public book presentation at the Instituto Cervantes in New York City on February 24, 2020, co-sponsored by the Centro Cultural Cubano de Nueva York (CCCNY). The second was a Zoom-enabled class visit by the author to Henken’s Latin American studies course at Baruch College on June 30, 2020. The two interviews have been synthesized here by Henken and then edited for clarity and accuracy by Veltfort. Note also that some of the questions here accredited to Henken were actually asked by his students in a Q&A with the author.

** This photo shows the School of Letters foreigners at work in the countryside in Cuba on April 1965. Connie is standing in the center.

*** The images are from the book Goodbye, My Havana. The Life and Times of a Gringa in Revolutionary Cuba, Stanford University Press, 2019.

Ted Henken and Anna Veltfort
Posted in Blog | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

LAS TRANSFORMACIONES ECONÓMICAS EN CUBA: VISIÓN EXTERNA

Posted on December 10, 2018 by Arch Ritter

Cubadebate, 12 julio 2015 | 34

 Por: José Luis Rodríguez

Algo que sin dudas ha llamado la atención a lo largo de la historia de la Revolución es la proliferación de múltiples interpretaciones externas sobre lo que se hace en el país, especialmente en el orden de la política económica. Desafortunadamente, la cantidad no hace la calidad y muchos de los trabajos que se han publicado adolecen de un mínimo de rigor analítico en sus análisis, en especial, aquellos que parten de una visión anti socialista excluyente de otro modelo que no sea afín a la economía de mercado en las diferentes versiones de la misma.

En el presente artículo no se pretende realizar un balance exhaustivo de todos estos enfoques, ni siquiera de aquellos que se han producido a lo largo de los últimos cinco años y que se relacionan con la actualización del modelo económico en curso. No obstante, resulta útil destacar algunas tendencias presentes en el ámbito académico y que permiten identificar los principales enfoques acerca de las transformaciones económicas que se desarrollan en Cuba en la actualidad.

Para leer mas:  Las Transformaciones Económicas en Cuba: Visión Externa

 

José Luis Rodríguez es asesor del Centro de Investigaciones de la Economía Mundial (CIEM). Fue MInistro de Economía de Cuba.

Posted in Blog | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

PUNTO FIJO: CUENTAPROPISTAS

Posted on December 5, 2018 by Arch Ritter

El Nuevo Día,  miércoles, 13 de mayo de 2015

por Jorge Duany

En febrero pasado, el gobierno cubano reportó 489,929 trabajadores por cuenta propia, el 9.6% de la fuerza laboral. Dicha cifra representa más del triple de la cantidad registrada inicialmente cuando el gobierno autorizó el autoempleo en 1993, en plena crisis económica bautizada como “Período Especial en Tiempos de Paz”. Conocidos popularmente como “cuentapropistas”, miles de cubanos emprendedores han establecido pequeños negocios privados, especialmente en la elaboración y venta de alimentos, el transporte de pasajeros y el arrendamiento de viviendas.

Este es el tema central del valioso libro del economista canadiense Archibald R. M. Ritter y el sociólogo estadounidense Ted A. Henken, “Entrepreneurial Cuba: The Changing Policy Landscape” (Boulder: FirstForumPress, 2015). Los autores se proponen explicar las causas y consecuencias socioeconómicas del auge del trabajo por cuenta propia durante la era de Raúl Castro (2006–2014).

El estudio se basa en entrevistas a profundidad con 60 microempresarios cubanos, completadas entre 1999 y 2009, así como en extensas observaciones sobre el terreno de varios negocios independientes. Su análisis se concentra en tres sectores  económicos vinculados a la industria turística: los paladares (pequeños restaurantes familiares), las casas particulares (alquiladas a extranjeros) y los taxis privados, incluyendo los “bicitaxis”, “cocotaxis” y “almendrones”, como llaman los cubanos a los antiguos carros americanos. En el 2010, el gobierno cubano anunció el despido de 500,000 empleados estatales “redundantes” como parte de la “actualización” del modelo económico en la Isla. Al mismo tiempo, fomentó la expansión de empleos en el sector no estatal, muchos de los cuales ya se realizaban clandestinamente.

El número de oficios autorizados para el trabajo por cuenta propia incrementó de 55 en 1993 a 201 en el 2013. El grueso son ocupaciones de servicios poco calificados, como aguador, amolador, barbero, jardinero, limpiabotas, mago, masajista, mensajero, payaso, peluquera y productor de piñatas. A la vez, se sigue prohibiendo el autoempleo en los servicios profesionales y técnicos, excepto profesores de idiomas, música y arte, programadores de computadoras y reparadores de equipos electrónicos y de oficina. Según Ritter y Henken, aún persisten numerosas restricciones burocráticas, desincentivos económicos y obstáculos ideológicos al trabajo por cuenta propia en Cuba. Para empezar, las tasas impositivas mucho más onerosas que para la inversión extranjeramantienen artificialmente el tamaño pequeño de las empresas. Más aún, la estigmatización de los cuentapropistas como “macetas” (adinerados, en el argot cubano) niega la legitimidad del motivo de lucro individual. El discurso oficial ni siquiera utiliza los términos “mercado” o “sector privado” al referirse a las pequeñas empresas independientes, sino al “sector no estatal”. El crecimiento del cuentapropismo tiene implicaciones políticas en Cuba, en tanto permite ensanchar un segmento de la población que no depende del gobierno para su sustento. Asimismo, subvierte algunas premisas claves del gobierno, como el monopolio estatal de los medios de producción, la planificación central, la distribución equitativa de los ingresos y la política de pleno empleo.

Los autores de “Entrepreneurial Cuba” recuerdan que la confiscación estatal de todos los establecimientos comerciales privados a fines de la década de 1960 agravó la escasez de productos básicos, infló los precios de bienes y servicios y deprimió los niveles de vida de la población cubana. La intensa antipatía oficial contra cualquier “timbiriche” (pequeña tienda al aire libre) estuvo vigente hasta principios de la década de 1990. Según los autores, las reformas económicas iniciadas por el gobierno de Raúl Castro han impulsado la recaudación de impuestos, ayudando a subsidiar servicios sociales y estimulando nuevas fuentes de ingresos. Sin embargo, Ritter y Henken recomiendan legalizar el autoempleo en todas las actividades económicas incluyendo los servicios profesionales, reducir los impuestos y aumentar la cantidad de trabajadores empleados en cada empresa. Solo entonces podrá el cuentapropismo desempeñar un papel protagónico en la revitalización de la precaria economía cubana.

Jorge Duany

Posted in Blog | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

BOOK REVIEW, ENTREPRENEURIAL CUBA: THE CHANGING POLICY LANDSCAPE

Posted on May 2, 2018 by Arch Ritter

Boulder, CO: First Forum Press, 2015. 373 pp.

By Archibald R. M. Ritter and Ted A. Henken

Review by Sergio Díaz-Briquets,

Cuban Studies, Volume 46, 2018, pp. 375-377, University of Pittsburgh Press

The small business sector, under many different guises, often has been, since the 1960s, at the center of Cuban economic policy. In some ways, it has been the canary in the mine. As ideological winds have shifted and economic conditions changed, it has been repressed or encouraged, morphed and gone underground, surviving, if not thriving, as part of the second or underground economy. Along the way, it has helped satisfy consumer needs not fulfilled by the inefficient state economy. This intricate, at times even colorful, trajectory has seen the 1968 Revolutionary Offensive that did away with even the smallest private businesses, modest efforts to legalize self-employment in the 1979s, the Mercados Libres Campesinos experiment of the 1980s, and the late 1980s ideological retrenchment associated with the late 1980s Rectification Process.

Of much consequence—ideologically and increasingly economically—are the policy decisions implemented since the 1990s by the regime, under the leadership of both Castro brothers. Initially as part of Special Period, various emergency measures were introduced to allow Cuba to cope with the economic crisis precipitated by the collapse of the communist bloc and the end of Soviet subsidies. These early, modest entrepreneurial openings were eventually expanded as part of the deeper institutional reforms implemented by Raúl upon assuming power in 2006, at first temporarily, and then permanently upon the resignation of his brother as head of the Cuban government.

In keeping with the historical zigzag policy pattern surrounding small businesses activities—euphemistically labeled these days as the “non-state sector”—while increasingly liberal, they have not been immune to temporary reversals. Among the more significant reforms were the approval of an increasing number of self-employment occupations, gradual expansion of the number of patrons restaurants could serve (as dictated by the allowed number of chairs in privately owned paladares), and the gradual, if uneven, relaxation of regulatory, taxing, and employment regulations. Absent has been the authorization for professionals (with minor exceptions, such as student tutoring) to privately engage in their crafts and the inability to provide wholesale markets where self-employed workers could purchase inputs for their small enterprises.

The authors of this volume, an economist and a sociologist, have combined their talents and carefully documented this ever-changing policy landscape, including the cooperative sector. They have centered their attention on post–Special Period policies and their implications, specifically to “evaluate the effects of these policy changes in terms of the generation of productive employment in the non-state sector, the efficient provision of goods and services by this emergent sector, and the reduction in the size and scope of the underground economy” (297).

While assessing post-1990 changes, Entrepreneurial Cuba also generated a systematic examination of the evolution of the self-employment sector in the early decades of the revolution in light of shifting ideological, political, and economic motivations. Likewise, the contextual setting is enhanced by placing Cuban self-employment within the broader global informal economy framework, particularly in Latin America, and by assessing the overall features of the second economy in socialist economies “neither regulated by the state nor included in its central plan” (41). These historical and contextual factors are of prime importance in assessing the promise and potential pitfalls the small enterprise sector confronts in a changing Cuba.

Rich in its analysis, the book is balanced and comprehensive. It is wide ranging in that it carefully evaluates the many factors impinging on the performance of the small business sector, including their legal and regulatory underpinnings. The authors also evaluate challenges in the Cuban economic model and how they have shaped the proclivity for Cuban entrepreneurs to bend the rules. Present is a treatment of the informal social and trading networks that have sustained the second economy, including the ever-present pilfering of state property and the regulatory and transactional corruption so prevalent in Cuba’s centralized economy.

While none of the above is new to students of the Cuban economy—as documented in previous studies and in countless anecdotal reports—Ritter and Henken make two major contributions. First, they summarize and analyze in a single source a vast amount of historical and contemporary information. The value of the multidisciplinary approach is most evident in the authors’ assessment of how the evolving policy environment has influenced the growth of paladares, the most important and visible segment of the nonstate sector. By focusing on this segment, the authors validate and strengthen their conclusions by drawing from experiences documented in longitudinal, qualitative case studies. The latter provide insights not readily gleaned from documentary and statistical sources by grounding the analysis in realistic appreciations of the challenges and opportunities faced by entrepreneurial Cubans. Most impressive is the capacity of Cuban entrepreneurs to adapt to a policy regime constantly shifting between encouraging and constraining their activities.

Commendable, too, is the authors’ balanced approach regarding the Cuban political environment and how it relates to the non-state sector. Without being bombastic, they are critical of the government when they need to be. One of their analytical premises is that the “growth of private employment and income represents a latent political threat to state power since it erodes the ideals of state ownership of the means of production, the central plan, and especially universal state employment” (275).

This dilemma dominates the concluding discussion of future policy options. Three scenarios are considered possible. The first entails a policy reversal with a return to Fidel’s orthodoxy. This scenario is regarded as unlikely, as Raúl’s policy discourse has discredited this option. A second scenario consists of maintaining the current course while allowing for the gradual but managed growth of the non-state sector. While this might be a viable alternative, it will have limited economic and employment generation effects unless the reform process is deepened by, for example, further liberalizing the tax and regulatory regimes and allowing for the provision of professional services.

The final scenario would be one in which reforms are accelerated, not only allowing for small business growth but also capable of accommodating the emergence of medium and large enterprises in a context where public, private, and cooperative sectors coexist (311). As Ritter and Henken recognize, this scenario is unlikely to come to fruition under the historical revolutionary leadership, it would have to entail the resolution of political antagonisms between Washington and Havana, and a reappraisal by the Cuban government of its relationship with the émigré population. Not mentioned by Ritter and Henken is that eventual political developments—not foreseen today—may facilitate the changes they anticipate under their third scenario.

In short, Entrepreneurial Cuba is a must-read for those interested in the country’s current situation. Its publication is timely not only for what it reveals regarding the country’s economic, social, and political situation but also for its insights regarding the country’s future evolution.

…………………………………………………………………………….

Table of Contents

 Table of Contents,

 List of Charts and Figures

Chapter I Introduction       

Chapter II      Cuba’s Small Enterprise Sector in International and Theoretical Perspective

Chapter III    Revolutionary Trajectories, Strategic Shifts, and Small Enterprise, 1959-1989

Chapter IV    Emergence and Containment During the “Special Period”, 1990-2006

Chapter V        The 2006-2011 Policy Framework for Small Enterprise under the Presidency of    Raul Castro

Chapter VI    The Movement towards Non-Agricultural Cooperatives

Chapter VII  The Underground Economy and Economic Illegalities

Chapter VIII  Ethnographic Case Studies of Microenterprise, 2001 vs. 2011

Chapter IX  Summary and Conclusions

APPENDIX                                                              

GLOSSARY                                                                                                                         

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Posted in Blog, Featured | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

IS CUBA “OPEN FOR BUSINESS”? BOOK REVIEW BY TED HENKEN

Posted on September 6, 2016 by Arch Ritter

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZBy Ted Henken. Complete review is available here: http://cubacounterpoints.com/archives/3832

A review of Open for Business: Building The New Cuban Economy by Richard E. Feinberg,  August 30, 2016, Washington, D.C.Brookings Institution Press, 264 pages, $22.00;    ISBN-10: 0815727674’;     ISBN-13: 978-0815727675

Introduction

A few years ago I ran into a fellow watcher of Cuba’s economy in my favorite local New York coffee shop. It was just after the publication of my own recent book on the emergent Cuban private sector, which I co-wrote with the Canadian economist Archibald Ritter. Keen on announcing my good fortune (and great timing!) to my colleague, I whipped the book out and proudly presented it to her. However, when she saw the title, Entrepreneurial Cuba, she looked up at me with a skeptical grin and said: “Well, aren’t you the optimistic one?!” I laughed, quickly assuring her that while the title was indeed up-beat, the contents of the book were a decidedly more complex, critical, and ambivalent affair, filled with equal parts new opportunities, old obstacles, significant reforms, and frightful omens.

Similarly, the title of Richard Feinberg’s own eminently readable and richly informative new book, Open for Business: Building the New Cuban Economy, slyly posits a reality of economic “openness” that is aspirational. The author himself admits that this position is still as much a government slogan for the future as it is an achieved present-day reality. While Feinberg tells his readers that Cuba is indeed “open for business” on the book’s eye-catching cover, the actual contents of the book’s wide-ranging eight chapters highlight aspects of Cuba’s new post-Fidel economy that place an emphatic and well deserved question mark (?) after this claim.

Far from falling prey to the “irrational exuberance” of facile boosterism or blatant apologetics that tend to characterize much business-oriented writing about Cuba these days, Feinberg’s book is a critical-minded and deeply informed evaluation of the pro-market experiments undertaken by the Cuban government over the past two decades with a special emphasis on Raúl Castro’s economic reforms between 2010-2016. Thankfully, Feinberg goes beyond an exclusive focus on the top-down administrative efforts on the part of the government to solve its chronic economic problems (chapter 2). Feinberg does consider the so-called “update” of Cuba’s state socialist economic model that is often in league with sympathetic foreign governments like China, Brazil, and Venezuela (Chapter 3) and pioneering foreign firms including Sherritt, Meliá, and Unilever (chapters 4-5).

Notably, chapter 6 on entrepreneurial Cuba tells the fascinating story of Cuba’s emerging private entrepreneurs and middle classes. According to Feinberg, now this new economic class includes as many as two million people and makes up 40% of the island’s workforce (a well-sourced if questionable claim). This is followed by a wonderfully original chapter that profiles a dozen Cuban “millennial voices”; youthful, and quite hopeful, pioneers in fields as diverse as business, art, media, academics, and technology. These innovative sections of the book allow the author to offer his readers a refreshingly rich and diverse portrait of the grass-roots efforts of everyday citizens to “open Cuba for business” from the inside and for the benefit of Cubans themselves.

 ********************

Conclusion

Not a typical academic monograph focused on a single aspect of the Cuban economy, Feinberg’s “Open for Business” is instead a globally-informed analysis of what are arguably the three most important and dynamic aspects of Cuba’s new economy: International trade, foreign investment, and the island’s emerging domestic entrepreneurs. His wide-ranging yet richly detailed focus – enhanced by multiple foreign investor case studies and vivid profiles of Cuba’s emerging entrepreneurs and pioneering millennials – makes this book required reading not just for professional economists and other academics, but also – and perhaps especially – for the growing ranks of potential foreign investors looking for independent, hard-nosed, and practical advice about Cuba’s unique business environment as they contemplate their own entreé into the Cuban market. It will also be useful and revelatory tool for U.S. policymakers as they gauge how best to “engage” the Cuban government over questions of trade and investment and “empower” the Cuban people, especially the emerging Cuban entrepreneurial middle classes.

open-for-business

Posted in Blog | Tagged , | Leave a comment

TO BE A WRITER IN CUBA

Posted on April 18, 2016 by Arch Ritter

Yvon Grenier

Literal: Latin American Voices, April 2016

 Original Article: To be a writer in Cuba

Y wwwww wwwwwwThe methodology of Leonardo Padura

Soy un escritor, en lo fundamental, de la vida cubana, y la política no puede estar fuera de esa vida, pues es parte diaria, activa, penetrante de ella; pero yo la manejo de manera que sea el lector quien decida hacer las asociaciones políticas, sin que mis libros se refieran directamente a ella. De verdad, no la necesito ni me interesa, pero, en cambio, me interesa muchísimo que mis libros puedan ser leídos en Cuba y que la gente pueda dialogar con ellos.

 Leonardo Padura Cubaencuentro, 19 December 2008

“People think that what I say is a measure of what can or can’t be said in Cuba,” Leonardo Padura once stated in an interview with Jon Lee Anderson.  In fact, what he says is a measure of what he—along with some other Cuban writers or artists—is allowed to say in Cuba. It is a privilege, not a right.  Lesser authors who don’t enjoy his international fame (and Spanish passport) probably couldn’t have published a book like El hombre que amaba los perros, as he did in 2010, a year after it was edited in Spain by Tusquets. In fact, the book probably wouldn’t have appeared at all in Cuba decades or even years ago, which makes him the beneficiary (and the confirmation) of a recent openness. The government grants Padura some recognition (he won the National Literature Prize in 2012), as well as some privileges commonly bestowed on successful writers and artists: he can travel and publish abroad, and he can accept monetary compensation in foreign currency. But he is kept in a box. His books are nearly impossible to find on the island. The prestigious awards and accolades he is receiving abroad are mostly glossed over by the Cuban media. Finally, his insightful but politically cautious journalism is read all over the world, but not in Cuba (save for a few exceptions).

Numerous times Padura has made clear his desire to live in the house his father built in Mantilla, a working class municipality on the outskirts of Havana. He sometimes signs his articles, “Leonardo Padura, Still in Mantilla.” He also wants to be a “Cuban writer,” and as such, he feels he has “a certain responsibility because our reality is so specific and so hard for many people.” A genuine writer cannot be a mouthpiece for the government. Padura’s success in conciliating these two potentially conflicting ambitions—to be a writer who lives and work in Cuba—is, as John Lee Anderson put it, “a tribute both to his literary achievement and his political agility.” Blogger Yoani Sánchez wrote, “His ‘rarity’ lies fundamentally in having been able to sustain a critical vision of his country, an unvarnished description of the national sphere, without sacrificing the ability to be recognized by the official sectors. The praise comes to him from every direction of the polarized ideological spectrum of the Island, which is a true miracle of letters and of words.” This is why Padura is often seen as a sort of experiment on how to express freedom in a land bereft of freedom of expression.

…

…

Conclusion

Rather than pushing for more room for expression, Padura’s method seems to be to occupy all the space available without crossing any red lines. This has allowed him to elude the fate that befell so many writers in Cuba. His criticism of many aspects of Cuban society is achieved without directly addressing the political system in Cuba. This method works, in the sense that it provides him with basic guidelines to practice his métier in Cuba. Padura is not an exponent of the “art for art’s sake” viewpoint. He wants to talk about the “reality” in Cuba, but without acting like an activist for change. He cultivates a “practice of social and human introspection that occasionally reaches politics, but that does not part from there..” But one wonders, what happens when it comes to politics, “cuando llega a la política”? The answer is: not much, because he can’t go there and continue living and working in Mantilla. Living and working in Cuba is most valuable not only for him, but also for his readers. In one of his essays entitled “I would like to be Paul Auster,” he complains that he would love not to be constantly asked about politics in his country and how and why he continues to live there. But this is very much his niche: he is widely seen as the best writer in Cuba. He offers us an off-the-beaten path view of a relatively closed society, one that is free of propaganda if not entirely free tout court. No writer could attain global respectability producing a prose laden with official propaganda. By occupying a small but significant critical space in Cuba, Padura becomes more interesting for Cuba observers and more intriguing for students of cultural and literary trends on the island. In this sense, he may be compared to authors and artists who produce somewhat critical material under dictatorial regimes, like Ismael Kadaré (Albania-France) or Murong Xuecon (China) —he is closer, in fact, to the former than the latter.

In sum, Leonardo Padura found a sweet spot that has allowed him to navigate the tumultuous waters of censorship while searching for (and finding) his own voice. He has managed to become, as one observer wrote, “perhaps the foremost chronicler of the island.” Does he (and do his readers) pay too high a price for his privilege to write “from Mantilla”? Would he be more valuable to us, and a better writer, in exile?

Continue Reading: Yvon Grenier, TO BE A WRITER IN CUBA

Yvon Grenier teaches and writes on Comparative politics, Latin American politics (esp. Cuba, Mexico and Central America), Art /literature and politics, as well as political violence.He is also a Contributing Editor for Literal  as well as an occasional  political commentator for Radio Canada/CBC. His Twitter is @ygrenier1

Posted in Blog | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

HOW THE AMERICAN LEFT FELL IN AND OUT OF LOVE WITH FIDEL CASTRO

Posted on November 25, 2015 by Arch Ritter

By Carlos Lozada, Washington Post, November 25

Review of “FIGHTING OVER FIDEL: THE NEW YORK INTELLECTUALS AND THE CUBAN REVOLUTION” by Rafael Rojas,  Princeton University Press. 312 pp. $35.

Original here: Fighting Over Fidel
zz

One of the sharpest divides between political and intellectual life is that changing one’s mind is unforgivable in the former and inevitable in the latter. For politicians, consistency is prized; switching positions elicits the dread flip-flopping charge. Among intellectuals, by contrast, dalliances with competing ideologies over the years are an almost required rite before settling on a worldview — ideally one stronger for the journey — that underpins subsequent inquiry.

Historian Rafael Rojas has written an oddly captivating account of the Cuban revolution as a moment when these two worlds clashed, when a political revolt in one nation upended intellectual forces in another. Rather than focus on Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, John F. Kennedy or the other usual suspects of this Cold War era, Rojas tells the story of the left-wing academics, beat poets, Black Panthers and radical journalists in the United States, particularly in New York, who initially embraced Cuba’s transformations only to splinter over Castro’s repression of individual freedoms and the island’s move toward the Soviet orbit. “The complex relation between the New York left and Cuban socialism,” Rojas writes, “oscillated between a sense of the promise Cuba represented for leftist libertarianism and the sense of disenchantment that resulted from Havana’s alignment with Moscow.”

The initial optimism emerged from Castro’s early promises. When the New York Times interviewed him in 1957, in a dispatch from the Sierra Maestra mountains by Herbert L. Matthews, the young revolutionary declared that he held no animosity toward the United States, that his struggle was against dictatorship in his own country. In 1959, during his first U.S. trip, he pledged that elections would come quickly to Cuba, as soon as the revolution’s social transformations to end poverty and improve health and education were underway. “I advise you not to worry about communism in Cuba,” he declared. “When our goals are won, communism will be dead.”

Princeton University Press

At the time, American leftists were inclined to regard the revolution less as a Cold War battleground than as an upstart victory in the global conflict between rich capitalist nations — especially that great imperialist to the north — and colonial or postcolonial countries. So strong was this perspective that in his book “Listen, Yankee,” Columbia University sociologist C. Wright Mills (popularizer of the term “new left”) wrote that “the Cuban Government, as of mid-1960, is not ‘communist’ in any of the senses legitimately given to this Word. . . . The leading men of Cuba’s Government are not ‘Communist,’ or even Communist-type.” By the third printing of the book, Castro had pronounced the socialist character of the revolution and — after the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961 — had lauded the scientific prowess of the Soviet Union, his soon-to-be patron. Waldo Frank, a social critic and historian of Latin America, found himself in a similar plight; his 1960 book “Cuba: Prophetic Island,” arguing that Cuban socialism could develop to be different and independent from the Soviet Union, proved anything but prophetic, as the revolutionary government began evolving into an oppressive one-party regime with a Marxist-Leninist cast.

Condemnation would arrive, though with caveats. In the left-wing journal Dissent, Daniel M. Friedenberg wrote critically of the Castro regime’s “xenophobia, hate campaigns, the retreat into phantasy fears, the dependence on communist support, the swollen Army, the rigid control of radio and press.” But he concluded that such “frightening symptoms of dictatorship” were responses to the colonialist, interventionist mind-set of U.S. foreign policy. The prime mover, the true culprit, was still outside the island; Castro remained absolved.

The beat poets, exemplified by Allen Ginsberg, were less forgiving. Initially impressed by Castro’s meeting with Malcolm X in Harlem in 1960, Ginsberg would soon portray him “as one more Latin American caudillo,” Rojas writes. In his “Prose Contribution to the Cuban Revolution,” published in 1961, the poet decries the mechanisms of social control that he saw in laws and codes against drug use and homosexuality, in communist as well as capitalist systems. “No revolution can succeed if it continues the puritanical censorship of consciousness imposed on the world by Russia and America,” he wrote. And during a trip to Havana in 1965, Ginsberg denounced the regime’s repression of young Cuban writers and even posited that Raul Castro was gay, earning the poet a quick deportation.

Rojas is most energized when discussing the multiple views of the Cuban revolution among African American civil rights activists and leaders of the Black Panther Party in particular, perhaps because their opinions were varied and less easily categorized. Party co-founder Huey P. Newton “advocated subordinating the black cause to a larger socialist cause,” Rojas writes, and admired the mix of nationalism and socialism that he saw in Ho Chi Minh’s Vietnam and Castro’s Cuba. Others such as Stokely Carmichael, however, rejected any prospect of Cold War alliances with the Soviets or did not necessarily link racial emancipation in America to a socialist project, Rojas explains. Meanwhile, Black Panther leader Eldridge Cleaver noted that few of the Cuban revolution’s commanders were black and highlighted the racism in the island’s daily life and ideological rhetoric.

Cuban revolutionary intellectuals, for their part, admired America’s militant black civil rights leaders, even devoting a full issue of Pensamiento Critico, a journal edited by Cuban philosophers and Marxists, to the Black Power movement in 1968, interviewing Carmichael, Newton and others. “The revolutionary struggle of American blacks was demonstrating that it was possible to strike the enemy in its own technologically developed heart,” the editors wrote.

“Fighting Over Fidel” is translated from Spanish, and it reads that way. There are sentence constructions and word choices that I suspect flow more easily in the original. (“Desencuentro,” for instance, is a lovely noun in Spanish, connoting failed expectations and sundered connections; “disencounter” just makes a jarring noise on the page.) And the author frequently reintroduces characters we’ve already met, sometimes just a few pages ago.

Such moments are forgiven, however, when Rojas introduces us to relatively obscure left-wing advocacy groups in New York that supported the revolution, such as the Fair Play for Cuba Committee or the unforgettably named League of Militant Poets. League members published the radical magazine Pa’Lante, featuring works by Ginsberg, photographer Leroy McLucas and poet Michael McClure. Alas, Pa’Lante survived but a single issue before its editors became disenchanted with the Cuban revolution — just another example of the oscillations between enthusiasm and disappointment, sympathy and tension, among distant thinkers observing a distant land. As Rojas puts it, a bit awkwardly but by all means memorably: “The socialist conga dance that these intellectuals of the New York Left joined in 1961 ended like the congas of the Havana carnival always end: in dissolution and complaints.”

A warning: If you’re wondering how the evolution of left-wing thought in New York affected the Cuban government or U.S. policy toward the island — indeed, affected anything beyond itself — don’t look here. Rojas admits early on that “New York’s critical debates on the Cuban Revolution naturally had few effects” on Washington’s approach to Cuba. “Fighting Over Fidel” is intellectual history entirely for its own sake, and as such, it succeeds. If you’re more interested in high-stakes national security dilemmas than in special issues of briefly published Marxist journals, go read “Essence of Decision.” But if you’re curious, intellectually or otherwise, stick with Rojas. I suspect you’ll be glad you did.

494481-john-ftitzgerald-kennedy-gauche-fidel zzz

Posted in Blog | Tagged | Leave a comment

José Luis Rodríguez: LAS TRANSFORMACIONES ECONÓMICAS EN CUBA: VISIÓN EXTERNA

Posted on August 2, 2015 by Arch Ritter

CubaDebate, 12 julio 2015 | 34

Original Article here : http://www.cubadebate.cu/opinion/vision-externa

ministro-economia-jose-luis

 José Luis Rodríguez es asesor del Centro de Investigaciones de la Economía Mundial (CIEM). Fue Ministro de Economía de Cuba.

Algo que sin dudas ha llamado la atención a lo largo de la historia de la Revolución es la proliferación de múltiples interpretaciones externas sobre lo que se hace en el país, especialmente en el orden de la política económica. Desafortunadamente, la cantidad no hace la calidad y muchos de los trabajos que se han publicado adolecen de un mínimo de rigor analítico en sus análisis, en especial, aquellos que parten de una visión anti socialista excluyente de otro modelo que no sea afín a la economía de mercado en las diferentes versiones de la misma.

 En el presente artículo no se pretende realizar un balance exhaustivo de todos estos enfoques, ni siquiera de aquellos que se han producido a lo largo de los últimos cinco años y que se relacionan con la actualización del modelo económico en curso. No obstante, resulta útil destacar algunas tendencias presentes en el ámbito académico y que permiten identificar los principales enfoques acerca de las transformaciones económicas que se desarrollan en Cuba en la actualidad.

Lo primero que valdría la pena subrayar es que no se aprecia una ruptura con paradigmas anteriores que han preponderado a la hora de examinar la realidad económica en Cuba a lo largo de los años. Ello se aprecia en los análisis que se llevan a cabo por la Asociación para el Estudio de la Economía Cubana (ASCE) de Estados Unidos, que se reúne sistemáticamente todos los años desde 1990 y que publica la memoria de sus debates en los que continúa siendo mayoritaria una visión cercana al neoliberalismo más ortodoxo y al mainstream de la cubanología tradicional al evaluar nuestra realidad.

En este sentido destacan –como ejemplo- los numerosos artículos de Luis R. Luis, uno de los editores del blog de ASCE, que se empeña en pintar con los tonos más oscuros posibles la realidad económica en Cuba calificándola como economía arruinada y carente de liquidez internacional, lo cual se aprecia en sus recientes artículos “Cuba’s Feeble International Liquidity” (La débil liquidez internacional de Cuba) publicado en el blog de ASCE el 9 de abril y “Cuba-US Reconciliation and Limited Reforms” (Reconciliación Cuba-EEUU y reformas limitadas) publicado el 22 de mayo pasado. En ambos trabajos se constata la ausencia de un análisis objetivo, que no excluya otros enfoques desarrollados por la academia en los propios EEUU, y que no ignore informaciones oficiales del gobierno cubano tales como el discurso del Ministro de Economía y Planificación Marino Murillo, pronunciado en la Asamblea Nacional en diciembre de 2014, donde se brindan numerosas informaciones sobre la política de financiamiento externo del país, entre otros temas de importancia para el análisis.[1]

Afortunadamente, se pueden encontrar otros enfoques no necesariamente afines a las ideas socialistas, pero que elaboran sus tesis con una mayor seriedad y rigor, aun en el terreno en el que necesariamente se mantienen discrepancias de fondo con los economistas que defendemos la Revolución.

Si se examinan los años transcurridos desde que se aprobaron los Lineamientos de la Política Económica y Social del país en abril de 2011, se proyecta una valoración crítica de las medidas propuestas en diversos trabajos del profesor Carmelo Mesa-Lago tal y como aparecen en su libro “Cuba en la era de Raúl Castro. Reformas económico-sociales y sus efectos” (Editorial Colibrí, Madrid, 2012), que reseñé en la revista TEMAS Nº 73 de 2013. Su valoración resumió diversos argumentos basados en una ideología keynesiana que sustentaba el análisis de errores que en su opinión llevaban a la inviabilidad del socialismo en Cuba.

Con posterioridad al 17 de diciembre de 2014, Mesa-Lago se ha pronunciado sobre los cambios en Cuba, incluyendo la perspectiva que se abre en las relaciones con Estados Unidos. En un reciente trabajo titulado “Normalización de las relaciones entre EEUU y Cuba: causas, prioridades, progresos, obstáculos, efectos y peligros” (Real Instituto El Cano, Documento de Trabajo Nº 6/2015, 8 de mayo de 2015 disponible en www.blog.rielcano.org ) el profesor Mesa-Lago realiza un interesante análisis de la nueva situación y ofrece una visión notablemente objetiva de muchos temas que atañen a la evaluación de los cambios en Cuba, lo cual resulta destacable en relación a otros trabajos anteriores. No obstante, el documento tiene un enfoque negativo sobre las relaciones de Cuba con Venezuela tomando como válidas informaciones y datos que resultan especulativos, especialmente cuando valora el supuesto impacto sobre la economía cubana de una contracción económica en Venezuela este año y ubica la situación de ese país como un motivo para buscar el acercamiento de Cuba con Estados Unidos, lo cual no se corresponde con la verdad.

Igualmente el documento cierra con lo que el autor denomina como el enigma de la posición cubana frente al proceso de negociación con Estados Unidos, el cual revela un alto grado de especulación y desconocimiento de las razones que asisten a Cuba para fundamentar sus posiciones. A pesar de estos aspectos controversiales, el documento revela un análisis profundo y abarcador de las relaciones posibles entre Cuba y Estados Unidos por parte del autor, que revela el fruto de un trabajo sistemático y serio sobre estos temas durante muchos años.[2]

II

Un aspecto que es tomado como premisa en el análisis de las transformaciones más recientes de la economía cubana por la mayoría de los autores, es el fracaso del modelo socialista de desarrollo y lo inevitable de la transición a una economía de mercado.

Al respecto se destacan investigadores como Richard E. Feinberg, ex funcionario del gobierno norteamericano, actual profesor de la Universidad de California en San Diego y Senior Fellow de Brookings Institution, uno de los principales tanques pensantes de Estados Unidos. Este analista ha venido publicando sistemáticamente trabajos sobre la economía cubana, entre los que se destacan sus ensayos “Extendiendo la mano: La nueva economía de Cuba y la respuesta internacional” Iniciativa para América Latina, Brookings Institution, Washington, noviembre de 2011, www.brookings.edu y “¿Aterrizaje suave en Cuba? Empresarios emergentes y clases medias” Iniciativa para América Latina, Brookings Institution, Washington, noviembre 8 de 2013, www.brookings.edu.

En el primero de estos trabajos Feinberg defiende la tesis de que constituye una anomalía la no pertenencia de Cuba a organismos financieros internacionales como el FMI y el Banco Mundial, por lo que propone un programa de aproximaciones sucesivas para superar esa situación, tomando como ejemplo los casos de Nicaragua y Vietnam para ello. Sin embargo, esta propuesta no parte de aceptar los cambios que Cuba se planteó en los Lineamientos de la Política Económica y Social, sobre los que el autor expresa que “Las pautas están plagadas de contradicciones internas y siguen rindiendo culto a la planificación centralizada, pero las fracciones pro reforma fueron lo suficientemente fuertes para incluir un lenguaje que transformaría la cultura política y la ética social cubana si se lo interpretara y actuara en consecuencia.”

Claramente sale a relucir que la transición al capitalismo es a fin de cuentas lo determinante y para ello se cifran esperanzas en lo que Feinberg denomina como “las fracciones pro reforma”.

Adicionalmente faltaría por demostrar que es posible ingresar al FMI y sostener un programa de desarrollo como al que Cuba aspira, especialmente si se tiene en cuenta el papel que ha jugado este organismo en la aplicación de las recetas neoliberales a toda costa, tal y como se refleja en estos momentos en su posición frente al actual gobierno de Grecia en la Unión Europea.

Acerca de este supuesto papel positivo del FMI, bastaría con examinar su desempeño en la transición al capitalismo en Europa Oriental y la antigua URSS, cuestión abordada muy seriamente por la investigadora del Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo Emily Morris en el artículo “Unexpected Cuba” publicado en New Left Review Nº 88, Julio-Agosto 2014 www.newleftreview.org [3].

Un analista que trabaja los temas de la economía cubana desde la década de los años 70 del pasado siglo es el profesor de la Universidad de Carleton Archibald Ritter. Autor de uno de los pocos libros sobre la estrategia de desarrollo de Cuba –“The Economic d=Development of Revolutionary Cuba: Strategy and Performance”, Praeger, New York, 1974- ha incursionado con una visión crítica en distintos aspectos del desempeño económico del país, dedicándole especial atención en los últimos años al desarrollo del sector privado. En este sentido Ritter publicó junto a Ted Henken el libro “Entreprenurial Cuba: The Changing Policy Landscape” que vio la luz en 2014[2], trabajo que aborda desde diferentes ángulos la temática del llamado sector no estatal.

Al igual que otros textos, en este libro se examinan las insuficiencias para el desarrollo sin límites de la propiedad privada y cooperativa, por lo que se deja establecido que solo en una economía de mercado pueden evaluarse sus verdaderas potencialidades, con lo que evidentemente se niega la posibilidad de su desarrollo en los límites que supone una economía socialista.

Finalmente vale la pena destacar otro trabajo que –previo al escenario actual de posibles relaciones con Estados Unidos- se elaboró anteriormente. Este es el caso del ensayo de Gary Clyde Hufbauer, Barbara Kotschwar y Cathleen Cimino “Economic Normalization with Cuba. A Roadmap for US Policymakers” Policy Analysis Nº 103, Peterson Institute for International Economy, 2014 www.piie.com . Siguiendo la línea de otros autores, en este análisis se propone para Cuba un modelo de transición a una economía de mercado siguiendo el modelo de Europa Oriental a través de diferentes pasos, que incluyen la apertura del mercado de Estados Unidos y el ingreso a los organismos del sistema financiero internacional, es decir, al FMI, Banco Mundial y Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo.

III

Otros análisis de interés sobre la economía cubana en años recientes, que no toman como premisa una transición inevitable a la economía de mercado en nuestro caso, también puede encontrarse en diferentes autores, sin que se pretenda en este breve artículo hacer un listado exhaustivo de los mismos.

Profundo conocedor de la economía cubana a la que ha estudiado durante muchos años, el economista sueco Claes Brundenius, actualmente Profesor Honorario del Research Policy Institute de la Universidad de Lund, elaboró uno de los libros más importantes sobre el desarrollo socioeconómico en Cuba: “Revolutionary Cuba: The Challenge of Economic Growth with Equity” (Cuba revolucionaria: el desafío del crecimiento económico con equidad) Westview Press, Boulder, 1984, al que siguieron numerosos artículos y libros de especial valor –varios de ellos elaborados en esos años con el destacado profesor Andrew Zimbalist del Smith College.  Entre los trabajos más significativos se destaca “Revolutionary Cuba at 50: Growth with Equity Revisited” (Cuba revolucionaria a los 50: crecimiento con equidad revisados) Latin American Perspectives Volume 36, Nº 2, March 2009.

En uno de sus libros más recientes, coeditado con Ricardo Torres: “No More Free Lunch. Reflections on the Cuban Economic Reform Process and Challenges for Transformation” (No más comida gratis. Reflexiones sobre el proceso cubano de reformas y desafíos para la transformación) Springer, London, 2014; Brundenius ofrece una evaluación sobre los cambios en Cuba y las reformas económicas en Vietnam. Sin dejar de plantear ideas que pueden resultar polémicas, Brundenius arriba –como en trabajos anteriores- a conclusiones más objetivas y balanceadas al afirmar en este libro “Es un poco irónico que mientras nosotros hablamos sobe la crisis del modelo socialista en Cuba, el capitalismo en todo el mundo atraviesa su crisis más profunda desde la Gran Depresión (…) Pero claramente, el capitalismo no es “el fin de la historia” y es ahora más que nunca importante buscar modelos alternativos que puedan combinar la eficiencia de la competitividad de los modelos de mercado con sostenibilidad ambiental combinada con equidad, solidaridad y democracia. Modelos cooperativos pueden ser una importante parte de esas soluciones como se discuten en este volumen.”

Además de Emily Morris ya mencionada anteriormente, un grupo de diversos autores se han destacado por aportes puntuales al análisis socioeconómico de la realidad cubana desde posiciones igualmente objetivas y no prejuiciadas de nuestra realidad.

Entre ellos vale la pena destacar la labor de Albert Campbell, Profesor de Mérito de la Universidad de Utah, que durante años ha emprendido estudios sobre Cuba en el campo de la economía política y la filosofía de indudable relevancia y que fue el editor del más reciente libro publicado en Estados Unidos escrito totalmente por autores cubanos residentes en nuestro país: “Cuban Economist on the Cuban Economy” (Economistas cubanos sobre la economía cubana) The University Press of Florida, Gainesville, 2013.[4]

En este grupo pueden incluirse con diversos matices, los británicos George Lambie –uno de los editores del International Journal of Cuban Studies, del International Institute for the Study of Cuba- y Mervyn Bein, especialista en temas de relaciones entre Cuba y los antiguos países socialistas; el canadiense John Kirk, durante muchos años estudioso de la colaboración internacional brindada por Cuba en el campo de la salud y editor de la colección Contemporary Cuba de la University Press of Florida; los académicos norteamericanos Nelson Valdés Profesor Emérito de Sociología en la Universidad de Nuevo México profundo conocedor de la realidad cubana, creador de uno de los proyectos de investigación más completo sobre Cuba contemporánea –Cuba-L Direct-; Frank Thompson, profesor de la Universidad de Michigan; Paolo Spadoni, profesor asistente de Georgia Regents University y autor del libro “Cuba’s Socialist Economy Today. Navigating Challenges and Change” (La economía de Cuba socialista hoy. Desafíos de la navegación y cambio) Lynne Rienner, Boulder, 2014, libro en el que se realiza un análisis macroeconómico –no exento de criterios debatibles pero interesantes- acerca de las transformaciones en desarrollo actualmente en Cuba; y Jorge R. Piñón un destacado especialista en temas energéticos y director de Latin America and Caribbean Energy Program en la Universidad de Texas en Austin.

Lógicamente, con posterioridad al 17 de diciembre de 2014 el tema de Cuba y su economía ha pasado a ocupar un destacado lugar en todos los análisis, tanto por los especialistas, como por aquellos que comienzan a enfrentarse al estudio de nuestro país.

Un examen sobre estas nuevas visiones y las diferentes teorías que se enarbolan para sustentarlos, merecerá una evaluación más detenida en la misma medida en que se vayan despejando obstáculos que –como la permanencia del bloqueo norteamericano contra Cuba- no permiten una proyección clara de los posibles derroteros de las relaciones económicas entre nuestros dos países a corto plazo.

Por el momento, resulta de mucha importancia para los economistas cubanos mantener un seguimiento de todos los trabajos que se publican en el exterior, especialmente de aquellos académicos que han demostrado una mayor rigurosidad en sus análisis hasta el presente, tomando en cuenta su posible contribución al debate científico y a profundizar en el  desarrollo de los estudios sobre la economía cubana.

Notas

[1] En esta misma línea de pensamiento se incluyen autores como Jorge Sanguinetty, Roger Betancourt, Rolando Castañeda, Joaquín J. Pujol y Ernesto Hernández-Catá todos ponentes regulares de “Cuba in Transition” el anuario que publica la ASCE desde 1990. Ver www.ascecuba.org
[2] En este trabajo no solamente se contrastan críticamente los elementos esenciales de la política económica cubana con la aplicada en los ex países socialistas europeos, sino que se incluye una valoración crítica de los enfoques de la cubanología al respecto, lo cual es un valor añadido muy interesante para el análisis.
[3] Hay una versión disponible en español. Ver “Emily Morris: Cuba ha demostrado que la economía socialista es posible” Cubadebate, noviembre 24 de 2014 en www.cubadebate.cu
[4]La introducción a este libro se encuentra en www.thecubaneconomy.com

 

Posted in Blog | Tagged , | Leave a comment