Cuba: The danger in not putting on one’s boots

By Luis Sexto

I invite to polemics and urge honesty when I say that a real, palpable ghost is still haunting Cuba: the debate.

In figures that for now seem indefinable, Cubans are discussing Cuba’s immediate future. And in a kind of enclosed chamber we find the anonymous commentary heard on streets, the proposals in work centers, the office chat, the conclusions in economic and sociological studies, and theoretical, critical and sometimes irreverent articles disseminated on the Internet or the Intranet, but professing to be of the socialist faith.

Sometimes audible in the media, through letters from readers and still scant journalistic commentaries, that boiling pot has a main virtue: it is not financed or stimulated by a single dollar from the $20 million that Washington recently approved for subversion in the demonized nation of Fidel Castro.

On the other hand, the noise of the ill-called dissidents thunders through the media atmosphere in other countries, generating a minimum of action that facilitates a maximum of dissemination. They are ill-called dissidents because those minority groups, monitored, controlled and paid by the U.S. Interests Section in Havana do not “dissent” from any aspect of a shared faith but oppose the ideas that predominate in Cuban society.

And they propose, as a solution to the crisis, what many influential citizens are trying to avoid: a return to dependent capitalism. In other words, a regime that would return hemispheric tranquility to any administration in the White House, including the current one.

That option appears to be stillborn, or at least has congenital problems, because it is anti-historic, in the judgment of the clearest thoughts that, since the 19th Century, have informed the history of Cuba, beginning with Félix Varela and José Martí. All of it outside the castrating influence of the United States.

I perceive it clearly. If in Cuba people debate the internal problems in the various civil conglomerates, that by itself is a signal – if not of health, then of a struggle to improve that health. And a careful observer might even believe that the revolutionary government (well described, because of the renovative task it has to perform) is subjected to intense pressure from its bases of support.

This commentator opines that, in effect, the pressure, the demand for an aperture that basically benefits the economy is being noted. What’s at stake in Cuba is not, in essence, a political problem or issue. Rather, it has to do with the accords that might unleash the productive forces today immobilized partly by the legacy of “real socialism.”

Now, the first question in this analysis might be the degree in which the Cuban government responds to the demands that arise from the debate. It is evident that a perception exists in government and party circles that the model of socialism heretofore applied in Cuba needs a readjustment in concepts and structures. Those needs were acknowledged in 2007 by President Raúl Castro.

But in Cuba, unlike what the anti-revolutionary propaganda habitually disseminates amid distortions, the vision of leadership can lack consensus or unanimous vote. For that reason, we perceive a tug (I don’t know if we could inject it into the general debate) about what to change and how much to change without excessively endangering the power achieved by the Revolution and sometimes, unfortunately, the bureaucratic power of some entrepreneurial entities.

That, together with the reasonable caution inspired by Ignacio de Loyola’s principle of not “moving from home” in times of crisis, could be holding back the timetable of urgencies, today as it did yesterday. Because, as we well know, the duration of the Revolution has been habitually surrounded by circumstances so adverse and critical that they might constitute a state of siege.

Although some in Cuba may not wish to accept it, to unlock the productive forces, or a portion thereof, is the same as granting more space to individuals and, at the least, promoting private (but not selfish) work, as Decree 259 authorized in 2008, even though the law has not yet been fully applied. Even so, almost 50 percent of the land remains bogged down by lack of productivity, pointing an accusatory finger to decadence.

Control – a control that promises to intervene not to enable but to hold back – is a threatening word, according to the existing bureaucratic terminology, supported by its authoritarianism.

In the farm sector, a decision has just been made that could be interpreted by the population in negative terms. By canceling 100 inefficient enterprises and reassigning to other jobs 40,000 workers who are not directly engaged in field work, that decision presumably has made the affected people unhappy.

This indicates that, in my opinion, the forces that realign the Cuban economy are caught between the extremes of rationality and demagoguery. Either they do what the people ask (from the viewpoint of their needs and aspirations) and possibly everything goes from bad to worst, or they listen, evaluate and decide what – according to a political, technical, mature, profound and far-reaching approach – would imply solutions that might not be understood by social groups that are used to receiving paternalistic gifts from the State.

For example, who wouldn’t like to be told: “Don’t worry. If we must eliminate your job, we’ll pay you to study?” That decision used to be a less-than-effective formula, albeit generous, from an uncontrolled social policy. Today, it might be a way to move in concentric circles.

The question should be phrased differently. I don’t think we need only to ask where to relocate so many jobless people. The main issue is the land occupied by the extinct enterprises. Will it be assigned to other entities within the traditional state-run structure of property, or will it become part of producers’ cooperatives?

What will be best for agriculture: the persistence of an organization that practice has shown to be inoperative or the challenge of notions that, although well-known, have not been concretized with the rigor of autonomy?

Once we see the landscape in broad overview, we might appreciate the scant elbow room available to the Cuban economy to bring itself up to speed. There is too much at risk and too many cracks to fill.

The country finds itself between the worldwide financial crisis, with its depressive resonance on imports and exports, and the economic and media hostility of the United States, which – while it concedes some “charitable gestures” concerning travel or access to the Internet – continues to forbid credit organizations to make loans to Cuba. This veto is never reported by El Nuevo Herald, CNN or El País.

However, the Cuban government moves in an effort to respond to the urgencies and needs. According to public information, the proposals are kept in lists and summaries that the politicians and ministers ponder over. And presumably some of the latest measures have responded to the popular desires, such as output-based salaries, multiple jobs, licenses for private transportation, and the distribution of land to individual producers.

Other measures, which according to information from various unofficial sources include forms of commercialization, cooperativization, and entrepreneurial and municipal autonomy, remain in a process of reflection, which to many seems slow and might become ineffective because of its lateness.

Of course, the government tends to maintain its well-known line of principles, which above all protects the independence and sovereignty of the republic, in addition to its social justice, excluding egalitarianism and paternalism. In consonance with its ideology, it will decide what’s most convenient for the majority desire of affiliated citizens (even if skepticism tempts them) for a socialism that’s adequate for life in this world and responsive to conditions in Cuba. This does not obligate the government to place “the cart before the oxen,” i.e., place the desire before the reality, the origin of various ills of the nation’s social and economic structure.

Although the workers’ proposals are not known in detail (about 1 million workers hold a university degree), their existence affirms, in the first place, an almost unanimous desire to modify what cannot advance from the inside. True, to justify their refusal to condemn what’s obsolete, some opine that socialism does not have a reliable road map.

We have to walk in the dark and learn through practice, they say. And that’s almost true. Paradigms were devaluated in the 1990s. On the other hand, the inoperativeness of the old schemes is well known. Therefore, it is predictable that changes require facing dangers from abroad and doubts from inside. But failure to change might mean losing what we have, without putting our boots on.

Cuban journalist Luis Sexto, winner of the 2009 José Martí Prize, is a regular contributor to Progreso Semanal/Weekly.