The Congress’ political balance

By Jesús Arboleya Cervera

With the enthusiastic support of Fidel Castro, the Sixth Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba has just ended.

Not by happenstance, the date chosen for the meeting coincided with the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the victory of Playa Girón, an event that had enormous repercussions for the Cuban revolutionary process, not only for its military significance but also because it defined the Revolution’s socialist character and instilled in the masses an awareness of their own strength that translates into the political capital necessary for the preservation of the Revolution.

On a symbolic level and also explicitly, this adherence to the continuity of the Cuban socialist project set the tone for a Congress that at the same time was characterized by the promotion of substantive changes in the country’s economic model.

Aside from the fact that the content of the Economic and Social Guidelines can be later analyzed to determine the extent of the changes and their consequences, the strategic sense of their proposals is obvious.

The decentralization of the administrative apparatus, including greater authority and autonomy for the enterprises and regional economies, the emphasis on production efficiency and its control through funding mechanisms, the empowerment of the contracts as a rule for the relationship between the producers and the traders, the expansion of work in cooperatives and self-employment and its adequate relationship with the state’s economy, the strengthening of the tax system as the regulator of social income distribution, the improvement of the legal system and the economic rationalization of social benefits are measures, among others, that seek to give value to labor and to establish its correspondence with the standard of living of people, abandoning excessive egalitarian criteria, which, as the country’s leaders argued and Congress ratified, limit the development of productive forces.

In many cases, they are not even new initiatives but are part of established policies that were violated in the practical management of the economy. Therefore, more than reforms, they are, in the words of Raul Castro, ways to perfect an institutional system that works with “order, discipline and exigency” at a pace that matches the domestic objective situation and the international reality.

Such a statement does not exclude the fact that important changes are coming in the life of the country. So much so that, from my point of view, this call to improve the nation’s economic and political organization is the basis of the social consensus around these proposals, irrespective of specific disagreements with the Guidelines and the real fears of many people regarding their implications for specific sectors of the population.

On the other hand, helping to articulate that consensus was the democratic will demonstrated in the assembly process prior to the Congress, where virtually the entire population participated, s well as the purposes and standards established for the functioning of the leading organizations at all levels. Outstanding in this regard are the policies for better racial and gender representation, the progressive access of young people to leadership positions and the term limits on the performance of these positions.

Raúl’s call to eliminate discriminatory political practices that impede the access of non-Party-members to administrative positions or religious people to the ranks of the party demonstrates the existence of a will far more inclusive in the articulation of a national front where everyone feels equally represented.

To rectify the proper functioning of the party has been set as the objective of the conference to be held on Jan. 28, 2012. To strengthen internal democracy, eliminate bureaucratic methods and dogmatic views, change the policy of promotion of the leaders, and strengthen the role of the press by eliminating “secrecy,” “triumphalism” and lack of objectivity are some of the expressed purposes with a view to change a “mentality” that obstructs journalism’s influence in society.

Clearly, these are not new purposes. Such principles have been part of the revolutionary political discourse since its inception. The question is: what guarantees that these negative trends will not be repeated? and the obvious answer is that only practice will show otherwise, although it is also true that there is nothing more practical than a good theory.

Once, a friend told me that Cubans are sublime only in extreme situations. If that is true, we are bound to be sublime, because we have no alternative.

Perhaps the Congress’ most important political balance has been to understand this reality and prepare to break the inertia to face the reality, as Raúl said, “without haste and improvisation and with our feet and ears glued to the ground.” Amen.