Translation: Report on Guidelines implementation

On a personal note, readers may be interested to know that I'm beginning a Master of Arts (Research) in Political Economy, under Dr. Tim Anderson, at Sydney University. It's a one-year research thesis on Cuba. Specifically, where is Cuba headed? Perhaps when it's finished I can post a link to this blog.

Here is my translation of a summary of an important address by Marino Murillo, head of the Cuban government's permanent commission overseeing the implementation of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines, to Cuba's National Assembly in late July. I was able to watch a telecast of his address on Cuban TV. It was a very thorough report that took up about two hours, accompanied by a Power Point presentation. 

Murillo used his report to announce two major new initiatives in the implementation process: an experimental phase in the projected overhaul of central planning and state enterprises, and the establishment of 222 experimental non-agricultural cooperatives that will manage small and medium-sizes state-owned entities. Note that state-owned entities will not be privatised but handed over, under various leasing arrangements, to work collectives to manage on a cooperative basis.

It's also worth drawing attention to what this progress report indicates about the status of the Guidelines. Raul Castro has repeatedly stressed that they cannot be allowed to be shelved and forgotten, as as often happened in the past. In his closing speech to the same National Assembly session, Raul explained that "the updating of the economic model has entered a qualitatively new phase with the drafting and approval of the 2012-2015 Strategic Plan for implementation of the Guidelines, with a corresponding timetable for comprehensive, step-by-step measures." He added:

"You have no doubt noticed that in the various reports presented to the Assembly, and in my own address, repeated mention is made of specific guidelines when matters relating to them are being discussed. I must say that this is not by chance, it is intended to firmly establish in our minds a determination to fulfill these Guidelines and to not to allow decisions of the utmost importance for the future of our nation to, once again, become a dead letter."

The country will continue advancing in an organised way in the implementation of the Guidelines 

By various authors 

Juventud Rebelde, July 24, 2012 

Translation: Marce Cameron 

The country will continue advancing in an organised way in the implementation of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines approved by the 6th Communist Party Congress, based on the principle of acting without haste but without pause, as Raul [Castro] has called for.

This was affirmed on Monday by Marino Murillo, vicepresident of the State Council and head of the Commission for the Implementation of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines for the Party and the Revolution, who gave deputies a broad and detailed report on the measures, actions and results of the implementation process from December to the present, in line with a decision of the previous ordinary session of our National Assembly.

He said that for the implementation of the decisions of the 6th Party Congress in this period, a total of 55 objectives belonging to five groups were defined whenever the Guidelines are of a strategic nature and it is virtually impossible to view them in isolation, since they are interrelated.

The first of these groups, he explained, focuses on the most complex task — that of the conceptualisation of the socio-economic model, based on the Guidelines — that would allow us to strive for maximum efficiency within the framework of the socialist system and favour the development of the country’s productive forces.

Elsewhere in his report on progress in the transformation and updating of the economic model, Murillo stressed that the most important sector of our economy will always be the socialist state enterprise. We are now beginning to do certain things in the state enterprises in the search for a new approach to central planning. The idea is to launch it on January 1, 2013 and to train those involved between now and December.

The first thing to be established is a new system of relations between the enterprises, the superior bodies and the Central State Administration agencies. He explained that governing bodies will be set up to watch over their functioning.

It is a new category of enterprise planning, he said, and these leadership bodies will only have to monitor the functioning of the entity, focusing on the measurement of basic indicators. The enterprise will have the authority to do its job.

Murillo added that the enterprises to take part in the trial are being selected now. They will operate solely in regular [rather than convertible] Cuban pesos, and will be allowed to make their social objectives more flexible and to set prices according to production costs, taking into account international parameters.

He considered this an important step in the transformation of the socialist state enterprise, as the basic unit of our economy, in the search for maximum efficiency.

Expansion of cooperative sector

Another important step, he said, is the experimental creation of non-agricultural cooperatives. This should be considered the preferred option among the non-state forms of employment because it is more social and more in harmony with the conceptualisation of the new economic model.

Certain state entities will pass over to this new form of cooperative, comprised of persons who do not own [productive] property but contribute only their labour.

The assets will be handed over in the form of a lease, in usufruct[1], as a loan or otherwise for up to ten years, without ceasing to be state property. The premises will always continue to belong to the state via one of these arrangements, though certain equipment may be sold, such as the refrigeration equipment in the case of a cafeteria.

The enterprise will have a collective character that will be reflected in the distribution of the earnings, which will be according to the labour contribution [of each cooperative member]. However, if some of the participants contribute [financial and other] resources the cooperative will later reimburse them via its earnings, but always with the consent of the cooperative’s management committee. The legal framework is now being drafted and an initial step will involve the establishment of 222 cooperatives, in a gradual manner, in the final three months of this year.

This entails the need to draw up a General Cooperatives Law, because such cooperatives cannot be separated from those that have been established in agriculture.

New thinking in agriculture

With regard to the wholesale commercialisation of agricultural products, Murillo stressed it must be governed by the fulfilment of contracts.

Having fulfilled their commitments to the state, the producer may sell the surplus at an agreed price, he said. What cannot occur is that they don’t comply with their commitments and the produce is sold on by other means. This can’t be rectified after the fact, it has to be dealt with through the signing of appropriate contracts.

He also announced that next year, the list of products with prices fixed centrally will be reduced, and noted that this year 53% of agricultural produce had been contracted while 47% had been sold at prices agreed between the buyer and seller.

Regarding the sale of agricultural products in Havana, Murillo said that the city has 310 state markets, the majority of which are undersupplied, as well as 29 markets where prices are set by supply and demand, 400 produce stalls and more than 900 points of sale. We’ve filled the city with micro-outlets, we’re going to put them all together in the marketplaces and lease the market to a cooperative.

The majority of these micro-outlets say they’re cooperatives selling their produce, but this not true. If you want to sell then get a self-employment permit, as we’ve established.

Regarding self-employment, Murillo stressed that some regulations must continue to be made more flexible and we should cease doing things that embody certain contradictions.

He noted that the leasing of workspaces for personal and technical services had been generalised, and that in this [non-state] sector there are more than 62,000 workers hired by other self-employed workers[2], which has created jobs, the majority in food processing and sales.

In September 2010, there were 157,000 self-employed workers, while as of June of this year there were 390,000. There have been illegalities, he said, but self-employment is being adjusted with a view to flexibility and had become a source of employment.

Elsewhere in his report Murillo referred to the inevitable aging of the Cuban population, which has two basic causes: the low birth rate and increasing life expectancy.

This is now unavoidable, he said, it’s happening and it cannot be turned around in the short term. What we have to do is take measures to encourage births and also to care for the elderly, as well as adapting economic development.

The key difficulty is those entering and those retiring from the workforce. In 2021, more will leave the workforce than enter it. In 2026, for example, 120,000 will reach working age and 170,000 will reach retirement age, a difference of 50,000.

Given this, the productive processes must be improved in order to make them more efficient and require a smaller workforce.

The current Labour Code will also become obsolete and at the appropriate time a new one will have to be drafted and approved by this Assembly, he stressed.

Murillo also mentioned the national entities that are now being overhauled. Among them are the ministries of Information and Communications, Finances and Prices, and Work and Social Security; as well as the creation of two new ones: Energy and Mines, and Industries.

In addition, he said, they will have their own enterprise groups. These will be attended to by the ministries but not managed by them, since state and enterprise functions are being separated, he explained.

He announced that the overhaul of the ministries of Justice and Foreign Trade, the [urban land use] Planning Institute and the National Statistics Bureau has begun, and that the unification of the Civil Aviation Bureau and the Ministry of Transport is underway.

Murillo also noted the merging of the University of Computer Science, belonging to the Ministry of Information and Communications, with the Ministry of Higher Education, and the integration of the [West Havana] Scientific Complex with the Cuban Pharmaceutical Group, which will remain directly subordinated to the Council of Ministers, through which an important [state] enterprise group with great scientific capability will be created.

Regarding the Ministry of Agriculture, he explained that the second phase of its overhaul is underway while its productive base has been transformed.

With respect to the means by which Cuban households cook food, he said that the repair or replacement of such devices will be guaranteed.

Consideration will also need to be given to a system of credits for those who need to purchase cooking equipment, he said, although it’s complicated because some still have debts previously incurred.[3]

In this connection he emphasised that 69% of Cuban households cook with electricity, and that it’s necessary to maintain this proportion because it’s the most rational for the country.

He also announced the setting up of the Technical Advisory Council, which will undertake to organise all of the scientific work being carried out in the universities and scientific research centres that can be drawn on in the implementation of the Guidelines.

The idea is to involve institutions, rather than individuals, and to give them specific tasks, so that all of this accumulated scientific knowledge can be harnessed in the search for practical solutions to problems.

_________________
Translator's footnotes:

[1] Usage rights to state-owned productive property rent-free on a medium or long-term basis and under certain conditions.

[2] An obvious contradiction: if one “self-employed” person hires another, then one becomes a boss (a petit-bourgeois in Marxist terminology) and the other is no longer self-employed, but an employee. Official Cuban discourse glosses over this fact by labelling it all “self-employment”.

[3] To state entities for the mass distribution of stovetops and other kitchen devices, on credit, to Cuban households as part of the comprehensive “Energy Revolution” launched in 2005.

The Economist: wishful thinking on "transition"

This was written for Australia's Green Left Weekly. 

Cuba: Corporate press wishful thinking on 'transition'

Green Left Weekly, Sunday, July 1, 2012

By Marce Cameron

“Under Raul Castro, Cuba has begun the journey towards capitalism. But it will take a decade and a big political battle to complete, writes Michael Reid”. So began the lead article of the London Economist magazine’s March 24 special issue on Cuba, under the heading “Revolution in retreat”.

It's a familiar refrain, but how much truth is there to it? Unfortunately for the credibility of The Economist, authoritative mouthpiece of the Anglo-imperialist ruling class, it’s a dog’s breakfast of factual errors, illogical arguments and wishful thinking.

“When on July 31st 2006 Cuban state television broadcast a terse statement from Fidel Castro to say that he had to undergo emergency surgery and was temporarily handing over to his brother, Raul, it felt like the end of an era,” Reid observed.

“In the event Fidel survived, and nothing appeared to change. Even so, that July evening marked the start of a slow but irreversible dismantling of communism (officially, ‘socialism’) in one of the tiny handful of countries in which it survived into the 21st century.”

Had Reid read Marx, he would understand that communism has never existed, let alone in a small number of countries. According to Marx, it could only be achieved on a world scale on the basis of socialist revolutions in the most developed capitalist societies.

So whatever is being dismantled in Cuba, it isn’t communism. Or even socialism, if this is understood to mean the consolidation of a first stage in the transition to a classless society. Even this would require socialist revolutions to take hold in developed capitalist countries.

For Reid’s argument to hold water he would have to demonstrate that Cuba is abandoning its socialist orientation and gradually restoring capitalism, or that the economic reforms that have been implemented and decided on will inevitably lead to capitalist restoration.

Privatisation?

Since Cuba’s socialist state is the owner and manager of the bulk of the Caribbean island nation’s economic resources, the restoration of capitalism, however gradual, would require the transfer of ownership to individuals of large swathes of productive property that belong to Cuba’s working people. In a word, privatisation.

Reid seemed to imply that this is what’s happening in Cuba today: “Raul Castro, who formally took over as Cuba’s president in February 2008 and as first secretary of the Communist Party [PCC] in April 2011, is trying to revive the island’s moribund economy by transferring a substantial chunk of it from state to private hands, with profound social and political implications.”

Here, Reid should have clarified that what is being transferred to “private hands” ― that is, to the self-employed, small private businesses and cooperatives ― is not ownership, but the management of socially owned productive property.

The distinction is crucial, yet Reid glossed over it.

“The leadership shuns the word ‘reform’, let alone ‘transition’,” Reid said. “Those terms are contaminated by the collapse of the Soviet Union, an event that still traumatises Cuba’s leaders.

“Officially, the changes are described as an ‘updating’, in which ‘non-state actors’ and ‘cooperatives’ will be promoted. But whatever the language, this means an emerging private sector.”

Perhaps, but this is not the kind of Cuban “private sector” that those who dream of capitalist restoration would like to see. Take, for example, barber shops and beautician’s salons with one to three chairs.

Until recently, these were centrally managed by Cuba’s 169 Peoples Power municipal governments following the nationalisation of retail trade and services in 1968.

Today, they are being leased to their workers, who purchase their own supplies, set their own prices, maintain the premises and pay income taxes and retirement contributions to the socialist state. Public ownership of the premises is retained and leases specify how they are to be used in the public interest: a barber shop is for hair cuts, not handicrafts.

The Economic and Social Policy Guidelines, adopted by the Sixth PCC Congress in April last year after an extensive public debate, made it clear the privatisation of social property and the emergence of a new Cuban capitalist class is not on the agenda.

Guideline No. 3 is explicit: “In the non-state forms of management [of socially-owned productive property] the concentration of property [ownership] by juridical and natural persons [that is, by enterprises and individuals] shall not be permitted”.

Other than joint ventures between the socialist state and foreign investors, the scope for private capital accumulation in Cuba will be limited to what can be achieved on the basis of the management under lease ― rather than ownership ― of small and medium-sized economic entities by individuals, small businesses and cooperatives.

And such arrangements will occur where they are considered economically viable and socially desirable.

In the main report to the PCC Congress, Raul Castro said: “Some opinions were not included [in the final version of the Guidelines] … because they openly contradicted the essence of socialism, as for example 45 proposals advocating the concentration of [private] property [ownership].

In the same speech, Castro said: “The growth of the non-public sector of the economy, far from an alleged privatisation of social property as some theoreticians would have us believe, is to become an active element facilitating the construction of socialism in Cuba.

“It will allow the state to focus on raising the efficiency of the basic means of production, which are the property of the entire people, while relieving itself of those managerial activities that are not strategic for the country.”

Reid acknowledged: “The new president often says his aim is to ‘make socialism sustainable and irreversible’. The economy will continue to be based on planning, not the market, and ‘the concentration of property’ will be prohibited, Raul Castro insisted in a speech to the National Assembly in December 2010.”

Yet Reid doesn’t acknowledge that what has been implemented to date, and what has been projected in the guidelines, is consistent with what Raul Castro said then ― and that the PCC leadership’s words and deeds refute his own baseless assertion that Cuba “has begun the journey towards capitalism.”

Clutching at straws

Instead, Reid insinuated that Raul Castro’s speeches were aimed not at the Cuban people but at placating Fidel: “He is careful not to contradict his elder brother openly: his every speech contains several reverential quotes from Fidel, who despite his semi-retirement is consulted about big decisions …

“Fidel’s frail and ghostly presence … doubtless checks the speed of reform.”

Doubtless. And if Fidel Castro is consulted on strategic decisions, doesn’t this suggest that he endorses the PCC’s reform agenda, a course that Reid describes as the “irreversible dismantling of communism”? In this surreal light, Fidel appears as Cuba’s reclusive Deng Xiaoping, a reluctant convert to Deng’s best-known contribution to “communist” ideology: “To get rich is glorious”.

Just in case readers were not persuaded that the PCC leadership under Raul Castro (with or without Fidel’s approval) is intentionally setting in motion a process of capitalist restoration, while feigning socialist continuity, The Economist fell back on the hope that capitalism will inevitably return to Cuba no matter what anyone does.

Capitalism, you see, is the natural order of things, and the odds are stacked against Cuba’s socialist project. “Whatever the intentions of Cuba’s Communist leaders, they will find it impossible to prevent their island from moving to some form of capitalism”, said Reid.

“What is harder to predict is whether they will remain in control of the process of change, or whether it will lead to democracy.” In other words, the only question for The Economist is whether Cuba will adopt Chinese-style “market socialism” or evolve into a typical Third World capitalist “democracy”.

Reid notes that capitalist ideologues such as himself have predicted the end of the Cuban Revolution before, and got it wrong. “When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991,” Reid pointed out, “many outsiders believed that communism in Cuba was doomed”.

Today, however, there can be no doubt: “This time, Raul has insisted, there will be no turning back: the reforms will happen sin prisa, pero sin pausa (slowly but steadily)”.

So, when Raul Castro insists the economic reform agenda adopted by the PCC’s sixth Congress will be implemented, The Economist takes his word for it. But when he says that the reforms will strengthen Cuba’s socialist project, rather than lead to capitalist restoration, it dismisses this without offering either facts or arguments to refute it.

Translation: A magnifying glass on the 'updating'

Note the emphasis in this brief report on the internal, rather than external, challenges and the emphasis on "bureaucratic, centralising and administrative obstacles" to the implementation of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines for the Party and the Revolution.        

Below the online version of this article on the Juventud Rebelde website are 16 comments submitted by readers. One of them, "Rogelio", wrote:

I'm worried about this attention given to the economic transformations in Poland, one of the countries where the ruling class sold the country to the capitalist class and this same class restored capitalism. I think the trajectory should be towards the working class.   

  

The author replied as follows:

Rogelio: I'll explain because I was there, reporting on the seminar. The fact that Señor Polaco had given a lecture there, and the same goes for the Vietnamese specialist, doesn't mean that they're handing out recipes to the Cuban scholars. If you read the brief report I published, it is noted that the approaches of the Cubans are aimed at improving and advancing our socialist economy, which it sorely needs. Kind regards.        

A magnifying glass on the economic updating 

By José Alejandro Rodríguez

Juventud Rebelde, June 23, 2012

Translation: Marce Cameron

The Annual Seminar on Cuban Economy and Management 2012, held over three days in Havana, was a bold academic introspection on the challenges that confront the current process of updating the Cuban economic model, to consolidate it firmly in the face of much external and domestic resistance so as to secure the wellbeing of the nation and the future of socialism.

In the gathering, organised by the Centre for Studies on the Cuban Economy (CEEC) at Havana University, the pressing problems that limit the country's economic growth, and the urgency of radical structural changes that would overcome bureaucratic and top-down obstructions and favour the socialist state enterprise — in harmony with the cooperative and non-state[1] sector — were debated, with a view to freeing up the economy from restrictions and the lack of incentives and initiative that entrench low levels of productivity.

The academics took stock of the transformations that are brewing following the adoption of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines for the Party and the Revolution, and weighed up the decisive factors and the external uncertainties of the Cuban economy, in particular the prolonged US economic blockade. But even more so, they pointed to the internal obstacles that still limit the efficacy and efficiency of our economic management, and that make us more vulnerable to so many pitfalls.

The bureaucratic, centralising and administrative obstacles were also emphasised, as well as the lack of systematic approaches, that still limit and slow down the growth of the productive forces in Cuban agriculture, make it more difficult for the workers to feel a sense of ownership, and don't recognise in reality the role of the market together with planning.

Two keynote lectures, with very different approaches, were presented in the seminar: the Vietnamese experience of foreign direct investment and international trade by Mai Thi Thu, Director General of Vietnam's National Centre for Information and Socioeconomic Forecasting; and the economic reforms in Poland by Grzegorz Kolodko of the Research Institute on Transformation, Integration and Economic Globalisation at Poland's Kozminski University.

The seminar also launched the multi-volume publication Perspectives on the Cuban Economy; The Updating Process — Cuba; Towards a Development Strategy for the Beginnings of the 21st Century; and Elements of Econometrics — Applications for Cuba, by CEEC researchers and other study centres.
________________
Translator's footnote

[1] A reference to self-employment and small private businesses

Translation: With neither subsidy nor explanations

My last post referred to the new housing subsidies Cuba, whereby low-income individuals and households can apply for grants to repair or extend their homes. Priority is given to those whose homes have been damaged by hurricanes and flooding. The scheme is funded by the sale of construction materials by state entities at retail prices. A percentage of the proceeds are allocated to subsidies at the municipal level.

As always, enlightened policies might look nice on paper but their effectiveness depends on implementation. Here, the enemy is what Cubans call "the bureaucracy" — corrupt, incompetent or simply uncaring administrators and, sometimes, entire institutions. 

The problem is not simply petty-mindedness on the part of individuals and an administrative culture that fosters such a mentality. The root cause seems to be hyper-centralised decision-making, in both the political and economic spheres, and a lack of accountability of administrators and institutions to popular constituencies, i.e. "from below". The theme of decentralisation is taken up in another commentary I've translated by the author of the fragment below, Jose Alejandro Rodriguez.

Rodriguez has a regular column in Juventud Rebelde newspaper titled Acuse de Recibo (Acknowledgement of Receipt) in which he summarises and comments on selected letters sent in by readers, most of which deal with specific cases of administrative corruption, incompetence, arbitrariness or insensitivity. As well as exposing and publicly shaming those responsible for such injustices, Acuse de Recibo provides a sober counterpoint to the triumphal style of much Cuban journalism. It arms and emboldens those who struggle against administrative arbitrariness and injustice.

The online version of Juventud Rebelde allows readers to submit comments. These are moderated, of course, but highly critical opinions are often accepted, including from Cubans living abroad who don't support Cuba's socialist order. The regular feature that attracts by far the most commentaries is Rodriguez's column, which has evolved into a forum in which Cuban revolutionaries debate each other and, on occasion, the Revolution's hostile critics. The case below is one of two that appeared in Acuse de Recibo three days ago. It burns with indignation.   

Little wonder, then, that the online commentaries occasionally draw attention to instances in which Juventud Rebelde journalists, or those from other Cuban pro-Revolution publications, have been turned away by officials who probably have something to hide.   

With neither subsidy nor explanations

By José Alejandro Rodríguez

Juventud Rebelde, June 23, 2012

Translation: Marce Cameron

What's worst of all, in some of the tales related in this column, is not the lack of resources or unavoidable objective impediments. No, what's inexcusable is that authoritarian style, blind and deaf to human problems; drastic decisions being taken without even those affected being offered an explanation. A name is crossed out and that's that.

Félix Revilla Castillo of 12th Street, No. 97, between 7th and 14th Steets in the Mármol neighbourhood of Santiago de Cuba, was very upset when he wrote to me. He told me that the mother of his two children, Miosotis Hechavarría, lives with them together with her own mother, now elderly and infirm, in an old and very run-down house at No. 50 Brigadier Marrero, between Calvario and Maceo Streets, in that city.

Miosotis has found it necesary to leave her job, due to health problems, and is a social welfare recipient. Given her precarious economic circumstances, and faced with the urgent need to get to work on the house, she applied for a subsidy to repair it. This she was granted by the [local government] commission established for this purpose, after a monumental effort given that there was always something missing: either a signature or a statement from the People's Savings Bank (BPA) that lacked a name or this or that surname of one of the requisite officials...

Then, at the construction materials distribution centre, the first time they gave her 65 metres of reinforced steel rod, a sink, two towell racks, electrical cables, two soap dishes and the set of components for the toilet cistern.

That was all she got. There were no other kinds of materials assigned to those with subsidies, even though such items were being sold freely[1] to the population. Yet Miosotis has a subsidy precisely because she can't efford to pay for them...

The following week they went back to the distribution centre to ask for the windows, doors and interior lighting. To their astonishment, at the Bank[2] they were told that the subsidy had been suspended as instructed in a letter sent by the Municipal Administration Council, in which they didn't even explain why.

Félix asks: "Why was that subsidy cancelled or suspended? Can anybody, whatever their level of authority, stop a process that up to now has been going well, despite its ups and downs?"

The saddest thing of all is that no offical from the Peoples Power municipal government has written to this family to inform them that the subsidy in question was cancelled, and why. Are these the methods of our society?
_________________

Translator's footnotes

[1] At retail prices, i.e. without subsidies, and in unrestricted quantities 

[2] Once granted, housing subsidies are deposited in a bank account. The bank is supposed to ensure that the funds are only used for their stated purpose, i.e. the purchase and transportation of building materials and the labour of registered small private businesses or self-employed workers (construction cooperatives have been foreshadowed).

Translation: How to view the glass?

Superstitious readers may have noted that my last post was dated Friday April 13. Let me reassure you that nothing bad happened to me on that day; it just so happens that since then I've had dedicate myself almost exclusively to completing my undergraduate degree. I'm now anxiously awaiting the results of exams and assignments.

In this incisive commentary Juventud Rebelde deputy editor Ricardo Ronquillo Bello refers to one of the first significant policy changes announced by Raul Castro when he became acting Cuban president: lifting the ban on citizens staying in Cuban tourist hotels. While most Cubans can't afford to stay in such hotels —  the aim is to maximise income for the socialist state from foreign tourism — lifting the ban was a popular measure and an act of great symbolic significance. Many Cubans had resented the fact that only foreigners were entitled to stay in Cuba's best hotels, regardless of affordability, and pointed out that such discrimination was proscribed by Cuba's socialist constitution. 

In the early 1990s, Cuba turned to foreign tourism as a means to keep its socialist-oriented economy afloat after the demise of the Soviet Union and the tightening of the US economic blockade. The ban on Cubans staying in tourist hotels was aimed at minimising the social and ideological fallout from the sudden and massive expansion of tourism in a relatively egalitarian society amid great hardships and shared sacrifices.

The ethical logic was simple: if the vast majority of Cubans can't afford to stay in such hotels then no Cuban should be allowed to. In the name of solidarity, the government pursued a policy of limiting the possibilities for conspicuous consumption by a minority in the midst of a national emergency. The ban was also aimed at curbing the resurgence of prostitution during the Special Period and the growth of black-market activities aimed at fleecing tourists of their hard currency, both of which contributed to the rise in social inequality that accompanied the economic crisis.

How to view the glass?

By Ricardo Ronquillo Bello 

Juventud Rebelde, May 19, 2012

Translation: Marce Cameron

Some data published in this newspaper last week might pose a dilema for us in the style of Mastropiero. Let’s recall that the famous doctor, going by the name of Alexander Sebastian, is the originator of the well-known uncertainty principle.

That scholar carried out an experiment in which a group of people were placed in a situation in which the glass was either “half full” or “half empty”. It demonstrated that subjectivity is the element of thought that depends on the way of thinking or feeling of the person making the observation.

For Mastropiero, the throught process is linked to memory, recollections, experiences and the knowledge of the people involved, who, as individuals, usually have differing experiences.

The announcement by the Ministry of Tourism that domestic tourism has grown significantly since 2008, and that during the past year alone 580,000 Cuban citizens stayed in hotels, an increase of 32%, is one such figure that can be viewed from different perspectives.

The first, and who would deny it, is very pleasing. It’s gratifying that more of our fellow Cubans have the means to enjoy a little taste of tourism.

Fortunately, as might be expected, this growth affects all of us. As well as demonstrating the soundness and good sense of abandoning a policy that favoured foreign tourists, it dignifies Cubans and stimulates a sector that was always intended to function as an engine of the national economy; a sector that often had many of its rooms unoccupied, while numerous Cubans found themselves unable to satisfy their yearnings and spend their adequate incomes in a pleasant way.

But there’s a more defiant way of viewing the content of this “Mastropierian glass”. The good news also demonstrates that we have a country with a marked social stratification.

As this sector with money to spare grows, with the possibility of using its incomes for some deserved holidays, at the other extreme is another sector whose economic situation obliges it to turn to state subsidies just to be able to satisfy basic necessities.

Hence the need for us to bind to everyone's sensibility, with silken threads, the socialist principle that in Cuba nobody will be left helpless; that in this process of adjustment of the economy and society no person or family will be cast adrift, without lifelines to this magic rope of justice that united us after 1959.

To achieve this implies replacing the egalitarian policy, that subsidised products, with another that subsidises persons, without trauma; and consolidating a taxation strategy that would guarantee the funds for our state to support an appropriate conception of redistribution and welfare, as decided by the Sixth Communist Party Congress.

After the beginning of the updating [of Cuba's socialist economic model], the best sign in this regard was the government's decision to allocate part of the proceeds from the free[1] sale of construction materials to subsidising the construction of a basic housing unit [i.e. a room] for those individuals and families of greatest social vulnerability[2].

As important as the decision itself was the way in which it was announced by the members of Workig Group 6 of the Permanent Commission for the Implementation and Development of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines for the Party and the Revolution. They made it clear that this is neither an act of state charity nor a gift, but the fulfilment of a constitutional obligation.

They stated that the government's decision to grant subsidies to low-income individuals and families is a policy that promotes equality of opportunities in Cuba; that nobody will be left to fend for themselves, and that social solidarity will be put into effect, organised by the socialist state.

Neither can we ignore the fact that ours is a socialist state that must undertake the transformations in the midst of a serious distortion of the social pyramid[3], which means, moreover, that until it is corrected equal access won't always involve equality of opportunities. Thus it might be more complicated for us to place ourselves in front of Mastropiero's glass and answer his disturbing question: It's half full! It's half empty!
_________________
Translator's footnotes

[1] By state-owned retail stores without subsidies and in unrestricted quantities.

[2] 'Social vulnerability' is a Spanish term that is more encompassing than poverty. The UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean defines it as a multidimensional process that contributes to the risk that an individual, a household or a community may be disadvantaged by a situation or a change in circumstances.

[3] A reference to the fact that, for example, a self-employed worker or small business owner may earn more in one day than the monthly salary of a doctor, a teacher or an engineer — a legacy of Cuba's post-Soviet "Special Period".

Translation: Conference on self-employment

I noted in a previous post that official Cuban discourse doesn't distinguish between the self-employed, the owners and employees of small private businesses and members of cooperative societies: all are lumped together under the Spanish term trabajo por cuenta propia, or self-employment.

As far as I'm aware this fudging of the distinction between bosses and workers in small private enterprises has never been explained. It has the positive effect of undermining prejudice against allowing small private enterprises to flourish in Cuba's socialist-oriented economy — but at the cost of blunting social awareness of the unequal power relationships involved. 

Somebody who employs four other people to work in their restaurant may work alongside their employees, but they are not "self-employed". They are an employer, a boss. They belong to that class of people that Karl Marx labelled the petit-bourgeoisie, French for "small capitalist", a term that has the merit of scientific accuracy.

Conference on self-employment held

By Jose Alejandro Rodriguez, Juventud Rebelde, April 9, 2012

Translation: Marce Cameron

The interdisciplinary gathering addressed the viability of various forms of non-state economic management, from the diagnostic and scientific point of view, as part of the changes and transformations of what has been called the Cuban model.

The 1st Conference on Self-Employment in Cuba, organised by the Technology and Knowledge Management Enterprise of the Ministry of Science Technology and Environment, took place yesterday.

Featuring presentations and panel discussions by academics, researchers, economists and social scientists, the multidisciplinary event discussed the viability of various forms of non-state economic management, from the diagnostic and scientific point of view, as part of the changes and transformations of what has been called the Cuban model.

The debates – which centred on the already irreversible expansion of self-employment and the potential of non-agricultural cooperatives, which will begin to be set up on an experimental basis outside the farming sector – demonstrated that non-state forms of management can stimulate significant advances for Cuba’s economy and socialism.

Economist Dr. Pavel Vidal gave a very positive assessment of the relaunching of self-employment in Cuba, in the midst of the complexities of a structural overhaul, with a far more flexible regulatory framework. At the same time, he identified factors that, in his opinion, limit the advance of this form of employment in Cuba: among others, the absence of a wholesale supplies market and the few skilled job categories in which self-employment is permitted.

Two panels of researchers in the field took up the importance of integrating these non-state forms with the core of the socialist system, the state enterprises, which are in turn poised for profound transformations. This was addressed at both the macro-economic and the local and household levels.

Conference participants agreed to establish a network for analysis and the sharing of information among researchers of the non-state forms of management in Cuba: the starting point for systematic scientific research into a sector that will have a growing weight in the Cuban economy.

Translation: Viability of socialism debate

Here is a further contribution to the debate on the viability of socialism. It follows from the previous post. Omar Alvarez Dueñas is a professor at Sagua la Grande University, Villa Clara Province, Cuba.

On the “unviability of socialism” debate

By Omar Alvarez Dueñas

Temas magazine, October 20, 2011

Translation: Marce Cameron

I’ve read with great interest the debate in Temas No. 65 on the Special Period and the resulting controversy between Professor Carmelo Mesa-Lago – I’ve read other recent works of his – and the economist Jose Luis Rodriguez, economy minister during those years. I’d like to offer my modest opinion on this debate. 

One issue in the debate concerns central planning, decentralisation versus centralisation, and the market. In an economy such as Cuba’s, with a history of dependence on Spain as a colony, on the US as a neo-colony and attachment to the USSR and the socialist camp (for better or worse) during the first 30 years of the Revolution – and consequently a distorted, underdeveloped and technologically backward economy with an economic and social legacy in 1959 as described by Fidel Castro in History Will Absolve Me, and known by everybody – how could this problem be resolved? Who in the recent history of humanity has done it without planning? 

Much criticism has been levelled at the leadership and the socialist economy of the Revolution based on planning. Little has been said about the great merit of having lifted millions of Cubans out of poverty and achieving the social indicators of Cuba today, thanks to central planning, despite the mistakes that have been made. 

Thus for a poor, backward and blockaded country such as Cuba, centralised planning of its principal economic resources and activities is vital for survival as a nation and for advancing along the path of development. So I agree with the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines approved by the Sixth Communist Party (PCC) Congress that reaffirm the necessity for planning in economic management. 

Now, another controversial issue is how much planning and how much market. It’s clear that in the present historical circumstances monetary-mercantile relations, and hence the market, have an important role to play in the country’s economic development. I concur with the necessity for us to utilise the market in our socialism whenever it acts as a stimulus to the development of the productive forces, to productivity and work efficiency, but it must be strictly regulated given its inherent dangers which can harm the Revolution itself. 

In terms of centralisation and decentralisation, the key thing is to achieve the right balance. In the present historical conditions there are important economic policy decisions that should be centralised, and the [national] Economic Plan must be the axis around which all the economic forms [i.e. the state sector, joint ventures, cooperatives, small businesses, self-employment – translator’s note] are brought together. The real and difficult task for those that lead the country is to achieve a harmonious relationship between the plan and the market, between centralisation and decentralisation, in such a way that they complement each other for the development of the country. 

I think that the participation of the regions, especially the municipalities, in economic management must be strengthened to stimulate the economy. This is where the economic actors live, where the economy of the country is materialised, and during these years their hands have been tied in many respects, awaiting decisions “from above” to improve the living standards of their inhabitants. The updating of the model must keep this premise in mind if the desire is to successfully guide the Revolution through the new era it is now entering. 

Another issue in the debate is what type of socialism. Professor Mesa-Lago begins with the following proposition: “History has demonstrated the unviability of the socialism of the URSS and the Eastern European countries until the end of the 1980s”. What Professor Mesa-Lago forgets is also forgotten by others both within and outside Cuba: this socialism become the second biggest economic power in the world, defeated fascist aggression, and played a decisive role in the world revolutionary movement in Asia, Africa and even Latin America. 

Many criticisms of this socialism can be made from the economic, political and social point of view, but what we cannot forget is that what failed was not socialism as a system, but the people who built it, who distanced themselves more and more from the foundational ideals of socialism and were unable to reorient socialist construction through the criticism of errors, something that was perfectly possible. This would have had better results than the restoration of savage capitalism, which has resulted in the former USSR and the Eastern European countries being worse off than they were in the socialist era. Of course, the socialism that failed in the former USSR and Eastern Europe is not the socialism that we aspire to in Cuba. 

Professor Mesa-Lago continues: “I consider this socialism to be economically viable”, referring to that of China and Vietnam. The suspiciousness of the words “economically viable” may be missed if one reads this phrase in isolation, given that he goes on to say: “though I personally would like them to include more democratic methods and greater respect for human, civil and political rights”. Does this mean that in terms of political, civil and human rights the socialisms of China and Vietnam are not viable? Doesn’t a society have to be viable in all respects? What would Professor Mesa-Lago consider viable about the capitalism of the so-called Third World and that of the poorest countries in the world? 

The Chinese and Vietnamese experiences are worth taking into account and we should apply what is applicable. Important studies have been carried out in Cuba in this regard but the economic, social and political conditions in these countries are completely different to Cuba’s. Moreover, in our revolutionary history we have already copied too much of the European experiences and it didn’t do us any good. Let’s take foreign experiences into account, but without copying. 

I agree with Jose Luis Rodriguez when he says: “Socialism aims for a political transformation that allows people to achieve a more rounded development in which social justice and solidarity are inherent features of the society that is aspired to.” I emphasise here that socialism is a new society that often advances by trial and error, and with backward steps, from capitalist society in crisis – I hope this is clear to everybody – but not defeated, with great economic, political and military strength and with the mass media in its hands. It benefits from the effects of globalisation, conspiring against the consolidation of the new social regime. Let’s not forget that the same thing happened with nascent capitalism, with significant reversals and monarchical restorations until the new, revolutionary regime imposed itself on the then outmoded feudalism. 

Florida, the Bahamas and Cuba

I share Jose Luis Rodriguez’s vision of society above and I am convinced of the necessity to update the Cuban economic model in order to preserve and improve our socialism, but every change that is made that gives more scope to the market and private economic activity comes at a price and involves political and social risks. It’s the task of researchers to delve into their causes and consequences and to contribute to solutions, and the country must come up with strategies to deal with or minimise them in keeping with the society that we aspire to. 

It is evident Cuban society is undergoing a polarisation, which began in the 1990s. A petty bourgeoisie is emerging that always expressed itself ideologically, but is now being strengthened economically as a result of the changes that are underway. There are self-employed activities that generate considerable incomes, such as food services, the leasing of rooms and homes, and transport – now facilitated by the easing of restrictions on the buying and selling of motor vehicles and homes. There is also a small sector of professionals working for foreign firms, joint ventures or in areas with significant “leakage” [of convertible currency to workers, e.g. via tips for services] – as in tourism – who join this nascent petty bourgeoisie.

The present stage of our socialism is not altogether incompatible with this social sector, as long as the vital interests of the nation prevail over those of individuals. The same is true of the well-off peasants, who are necessary because of their efficiency. Above all, the country needs efficiency, productivity and production today, and these sectors can contribute to the country’s economic development. So we need to change our mindset and accept that the Cuba of the near future will not be the same as the Cuba we built for more than 50 years, but nor can we lose sight of the ultimate objective: the construction of socialism as the only way to live in a better world.

The challenges faced by socialist Cuba in the short term are associated with the increase in poverty[1], marginalisation and crime, administrative corruption[2] as a consequence of the role of monetary-mercantile relations and the impact of the economic crisis itself. Moreover, individual and social values are evolving towards a greater emphasis on the material and money, which necessitates a stepping up of educational efforts regarding all the social factors in order to consolidate those that are an integral part of the socialist society.

Finally, I consider viable the socialism that Cuba aspires to build. In my opinion the options for Cuba to survive as a nation and achieve the much-desired development lie within socialism, but a socialism stripped of dogmas, flexible and non-voluntarist in its economic management, one that places human beings and their integral development front and centre, one that adapts to the historical conditions in each moment, where the economic, the political and the social are in balance. 

______________________

Footnotes to the Spanish text:

[1] Cuban researchers accept that poverty and [economic] vulnerability intensified at the beginning of the 1990s as a consequence of the tightening of the US blockade of Cuba, the political and economic changes that occurred in the former USSR and Eastern Europe and the crisis of the Cuban economic model itself. For example, Lia Añe suggests: “Poverty in the capital [Havana] is characterised by insufficient monetary incomes, that limit the consumption of food and other essential goods and services. Poverty is also revealed in lack of housing [leading to overcrowding rather than homelessness in socialist Cuba – translator’s note] or the deterioration of housing or its facilities and of public transport. It is estimated conservatively that 20% of the population live in poverty” (Lia Añe Aguiloche, “Contribución a los estudios de pobreza en Cuba. Una caracterización de la capital”, see <www.focal.ca>).

[2] Ramón de la Cruz Ochoa recognises the following regarding corruption: “We Cuban revolutionaries know that it is a grave reality that confronts our country, that it's a widespread phenomenon in our society and is not only a problem of corrupt managers and functionaries”. See “Acotaciones al texto del Dr. Fernando Barral sobre la corrupción en Cuba”, Catalejo section, Temas, May 20, 2010 [see my translation of de la Cruz Ochoa’s commentary here – translator’s note].

Translation: Socialism: what unviability?

The website of Cuba's Temas magazine has a section titled "Catalejo" (Telescope) that solicits commentaries in the form of short essays on a variety of topics. Many of these commentaries respond to longer articles in the magazine itself, and some have sparked debate among contributors. 

One of these debates has been initiated by Carmelo Mesa-Lago and Jose Luis Rodriguez. Mesa-Lago is a Cuban-born US economics professor who has written extensively on Cuba. He is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Economics and Latin American Studies at the University of Pittsburgh. Jose Luis Rodriguez was Cuba's Minister of Economy and Planning from 1998-2009. An economist, he is now a consultant at Cuba's Centre for Research on the World Economy (CIEM).

The debate was sparked by the publication in Temas No. 65, January-March 2011, of the transcript of a Temas public forum titled "The Special Period 20 years on", in which Rodriguez was one of the featured speakers. Mesa-Lago responded to Rodriguez's comments in Catalejo. 

According to Mesa-Lago, "A number of forum participants expressed their support for decentralising economic management, the position taken by President Raul Castro and the decisions of the Sixth Cuban Communist Party Congress, but Jose Luis Rodriguez seems to disagree with this and defends the current central planning. During the terrible crisis of the 1990s, the then newly appointed minister of Economy and Planning was one of the architects of the mild but important reforms in the use of market mechanisms, along with decentralisation, that achieved at least a partial economic recovery. But at the beginning of the 21st century, when Fidel Castro launched the Battle of Ideas and pushed for recentralisation, Jose Luis Rodriguez was a supporter of this reversal."     

History has demonstrated the "unviability" of the "socialism" of the USSR and its Eastern European allies, says Mesa-Lago. By contrast, "the Chinese and Vietnamese models of market socialism (with a greater role for the market and the private sector) have been successful for decades" and are viable, as is "the social-democratic socialism of the Scandinavian countries". 

"It's not clear to me what kind of socialism Jose Luis Rodriguez supports: Soviet-style centralised socialism, that of Cuba or China during their idealist periods or the current market socialism of China-Vietnam (I assume he rejects that of social democracy), or if he is in agreement with the 'updating' of Cuban socialism that is underway", wrote Mesa-Lago.      

Below is Rodriguez's succinct reply.   

Socialism: what unviability are 
we talking about?

By Jose Luis Rodriguez, Temas magazine website, September 1, 2011

Translation: Marce Cameron

Following the publication in Temas No. 65 of the results of the debate on “The Special Period 20 years on”, Dr. Carmelo Mesa-Lago made a number of comments on my participation in this debate.

As he himself pointed out, this is not the first time that we’ve had a debate on various aspects of the Cuban economy, and I think it would be timely to enter the fray once again to put forward my own views. Neither is this the first time that I disagree with a number of the judgements of Professor Mesa-Lago.

First of all, we cannot assess the different epochs of the Cuban Revolution’s economic policy without locating them appropriately in the historical context in which they have been implemented, considering not only the economic factors but also the political elements that operate in our society.

In this connection, I should point out that socialism is not just a menu of options for choosing an economic model in which there is a greater or lesser presence of market mechanisms or a more or less centralised decision-making process, among other decisions. Socialism [i.e. the socialist-oriented society – translator’s note] aims for a political transformation that would allow people to achieve a more rounded development in which social justice and solidarity are inherent features of the society that is aspired to.

Attaining the appropriate combination of the economic and political components in a socialist model is no simple matter, and history shows that the disproportion of one of these factors can lead to failure. This can be seen in the sad experience of what happened to the models of market socialism of the Gorbachev era in the USSR that bet on the market and neglected the factors of political mobilisation inherent in any socialist project, and ended up submitting to the most orthodox neoliberalism such that they are now second-rate capitalist countries. 

I don’t support this model of “socialism”. However, it should be pointed out that in evaluating this model, many criticise its multiple characteristic deficiencies of hyper-centralisation, bureaucracy and the lack of worker participation in decision-making that it suffered from, but it is forgotten that market socialism tried to rectify these errors with a cure that was worse than the sickness.

Cuba didn’t make these mistakes, and because of this we survived the most difficult moment [1992-4] of the Special Period and we are now weighing up our options in order to continue advancing. 

In the most recent period of our economic history, the process of “Rectification” of errors and negative tendencies [launched in 1986] fulfilled its function of rescuing the political mobilisation factors that had been seriously eroded by the mid-1980s. While it may not have advanced much in terms of concretising a more efficient economic model – to which must be added the internal deficiencies that impacted on it – we cannot forget that it had to confront the drying up of credit in convertible currency and the gradual disintegration of the model of socialist [state] collaboration that existed at the time. This collaboration was the only way of obtaining the necessary resources for an intensive economic development to deal with the exhaustion of the extensive growth that had been projected. 

Of course the Cuban socialist project has not been perfect, but nor is it a question of wiping the slate clean of everything done before and, above all, of ignoring realities such as those that generally confront any underdeveloped country in the world today. To this must be added the permanent hostility and economic aggression of the US blockade against our country, which not only has an economic cost in terms of resources, but also often obliges us to make decisions under pressure, putting to one side the most efficient options.

In each historical moment of the Revolution I think we did what we could to advance the economic and social development of the country, in line with the prevailing circumstances in each one of them. This is true of the present moment.

The Economic and Social Policy Guidelines for the Party and the Revolution, adopted by the Sixth Cuban Communist Party Congress in April, are a project for the improvement of socialism, not for a transition to capitalism. Given this, it isn’t necessary to define a new model – the model continues to be socialist – but we’re talking about the updating of the economic model based on social ownership of the fundamental means of production in which planning predominates, which will certainly have to take into account market trends.

I see no reason for confusion. If more space is ceded to the market and its inherent laws, these will not be preponderant. It is therefore understandable that the concentration of private [productive] property [ownership] will not be permitted, that foreign investment will be regulated and that the centralised setting of prices will be maintained where desirable. These are among the fundamental elements that determine the functioning of the Cuban system of economic management.

Nor are we talking about insignificant changes. I draw Professor Mesa-Lago’s attention to the fact that the country’s economic strategy is changing. From a strategy focused on confronting the Special Period crisis at minimal social cost and on the reinsertion of the Cuban economy in the world market in the new [i.e. post-Soviet] conditions, it is shifting to a strategy for the establishment of the bases for a sustained development of the country, through an economic policy that promotes state property together with non-state property forms to overcome the two fundamental obstacles to Cuba’s economic development for many years: the external financial disequilibrium and the inefficiency of economic management.

Overcoming the obstacles in the path of the Cuban economy can be done without renouncing socialism. Firstly, the economic policy elaborated in the Guidelines projects a greater space for the utilisation of market mechanisms within a strategic context that would ensure – through planning – the macro-economic proportions that are needed for economic growth.

Secondly, the decentralisation of the state’s economic management towards enterprises and municipalities, with the participation of the workers in decision-making, is feasible with the rational allocation of resources via planning. Centralised planning does not necessarily imply centralised management, but it does mean projecting the allocation of resources globally so that their use can then be decided by other economic actors, according to various alternatives.

Thirdly, in socialism, social ownership of the fundamental means of production is decisive, but this does not exclude spaces for other types of property such as cooperatives or other forms of non-state property such as peasant farming, the small-scale property of the self-employed and mixed property with foreign capital.   

Finally, the experiences of other socialist countries such as China and Vietnam have been taken into account, but this does not mean that they should be copied. It should be remembered that while we share with these peoples common political aspirations, we also differ historically and culturally. Moreover, differences in relative levels of development, as well as in endowments of natural and human resources, make Cuba different to these countries, to which we’d have to add the [degree of ] insertion of China and Vietnam into the world economy – for at least the past 20 years – without them having suffered the economic war that Cuba is subjected to.

For Cuba, the changes that are being carried out today are neither an easy process nor a short term one. Consequently, I think it is correct to talk about the “creation of the bases for a sustained economic development”, which will probably take us longer than the projections for the current five-year period to achieve, but I'm sure that it will be successful.  

In this sense, I don’t agree with the idea of the unviability of socialism that Professor Mesa-Lago expounds in his commentaries. At the same time, I am convinced that the Cuban socialist model, as it is understood by the majority of Cubans today, is the only option for our development. 

Translation: It's time to perfect socialism

As promised, here is a reader's comment in response to Luis Sexto's column in Juventud Rebelde titled "One day we'll wake up" (see previous post). I chose this one because it captures the spirit of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines adopted by the Sixth Congress of the Cuban Communist Party (PCC) in April and endorsed by the National Assembly of People's Power in August.

This is by no means a consensus view among Cuba's revolutionaries, broadly defined, let alone among all Cubans living on the island. As Raul Castro acknowledged in the Main Report to the Congress, there is no consensus and it would be silly to pretend otherwise. He has repeatedly called for an end to displays of false unanimity and for people to speak their minds.

There is a spectrum of political opinion. At one extreme are those who want to see capitalism restored. This is a small minority of Cuban society because there is no significant social base for capitalist restoration. The Cuban bourgeoisie licks its wounds across the Florida Straits; some Cubans on the island are seduced by the "American Dream", but most understand that capitalism would turn Cuba into something like Honduras.

The tiny pro-capitalist opposition is largely, if not wholly, a creature of US subversion. Hopelessly divided and compromised by the willingness of most of its activists to take money, gifts and directives from US agents, it is also infiltrated by Cuban intelligence. 

Far more serious is the threat posed by corrupt administrators who hope to convert illicit privileges into capitalist property. 

In the Soviet Union, the nomenklatura with its institutionalised privileges was the social base for capitalist restoration. In Cuba there is no such system of special privileges for party officials and administrators. Cuba is not ruled by a bureaucracy as some left critics imagine. If it were, then the implementation of the Guidelines would require not a patient yet resolute struggle against administrative inertia combined with a ruthless crackdown on high-level corruption, but an anti-bureaucratic political revolution. 

Cuba's corrupt officials cannot publicly advocate capitalist restoration, nor can they — or anyone else in Cuba — organise openly to this end. They can only fill Swiss bank accounts, make connections inside and outside the island and bide their time, hoping that Raul's highly effective anti-corruption taskforce, the Comptroller General's office led by the formidable Gladys Bejerano, doesn't uncover their crimes through its random audits and investigations. This would appear to be an increasingly forlorn hope.

The bureaucratic mentality, as Luis Sexto calls it, is far more widespread among party and state officials than instances of large-scale corruption. Many in positions of authority do not act in the spirit of the renewal process; they obstruct, distort or delay the implementation of decisions that inconvenience them. They don't want to give up their prerogatives and they defend their little fiefdoms zealously. In some cases — but by no means all — such prerogatives are a source of illicit income: an official who stamps forms may ask for a little something under the table to speed up the process, for example.

At the other extreme are Cubans on the island, among them many sincere and humble revolutionaries, who have dogmatic or mistaken conceptions of the socialist-oriented society in Cuba's conditions. Raul Castro referred to this in his December 2010 address to Cuba's National Assembly, when he spoke about the need to change "erroneous and unsustainable conceptions of socialism that have been deeply rooted in broad sectors of the population over the years as a result of the excessively paternalistic, idealistic and egalitarian approach instituted by the Revolution in the interests of social justice."

Such revolutionaries view any concessions to self-employment and small-scale private and cooperative management of social property as tantamount to abandoning the socialist project. They view the egalitarianism embodied in the ration book not as an emergency measure that has outlived its usefulness, but the very essence of "socialism". The solutions they propose for Cuba's economic problems involve appeals to conscience, selecting the right cadres and asserting control, all of which are necessary but clearly insufficient.

Through the public debate on the future of Cuba's socialist project initiated by Raul Castro in July 2007, when he called for structural and conceptual changes and for a free and frank debate, what I've called the critical renovationist current within the Revolution has emerged and consolidated. In my booklet Cuba's Socialist Renewal (p.10) I define this current as follows:

The critical renovationist current is made up of those revolutionaries who perceive that unity of action and unanimity of opinion are two different things and their confusion in practice does great harm to the Revolution; secondly, that nothing less than a deep, integral transformation of Cuba’s socialist model — of many of its concepts, structures, methods and mentalities — must be carried through if the Revolution is to endure in the post-Fidel era, part of which is forging a real culture of public criticism and debate, something Cuba has lacked.

Raul and the rest of the PCC leadership are the leaders of this current of opinion within the Revolution and the initiators of the socialist renewal process. 

Different trends can be identified within this current.

There are those, such as some economic specialists, who support the general thrust of the Guidelines but think the projected changes don't go far enough. They'd like to see, for example, an opening to medium-sized private businesses while keeping large enterprises in state hands. There are leftist critics both within and outside the PCC who, while also supporting much of the content of the Guidelines, advocate a radical "cooperativisation" of the state enterprise sector. Others dismiss the former as neoliberalism and the latter as left utopianism.

As well as different visions of the socialist-oriented society there are differences on the detail: how much or how little, when and in what order and, importantly, how to carry out the necessary transformations. The debate is ongoing and will be enriched by further experience. 

Meanwhile, as a result of a years-long process of debate, consultation and consensus-building culminating in the Sixth PCC Congress, Raul and the PCC leadership have sought and received a resounding popular mandate in favour of the basic principles of the new socialist-oriented economic model that is emerging and for the Guidelines as a road-map towards this new model.

Something approaching a national consensus has been forged around the premises of a socialist-oriented society that gives more to those who contribute more while protecting those in need, avoiding the extremes of opulence and destitution, on the one hand, and a paralysing egalitarianism on the other; a socialism that is less dogmatic and bureaucratic, more democratic and participatory, with fewer prohibitions and prejudices and greater scope for individual and collective initiative and involvement in decision-making.

I said at the beginning that the comment below captures the spirit of the Guidelines. Perhaps a caveat is needed: the writer's emphasis on economic structures and mechanisms solving everything by themselves is one-sided. A more balanced view, it seems to me, is expressed by Jose Ramon Fabelo, a participant in a panel discussion on the economy published by the Cuban magazine Bohemia in October 2010 (see my translation here): 

If I'm not able to decide what is produced, nor to what end, nor participate in management, in planning, and much of the time what I earn is not related to what I do, what sense of ownership am I going to have, am I going to extract this out of pure ideology? Sometimes yes, but not in the majority of cases. So we have a contrast: love of work as induced consciousness or as the demand of life itself. We've often debated between these two extremes, between moral or material incentives, consciousness or money. I consider this contraposition to be very anti-dialectical. We need to harmonise the two, and I would caution: today we cannot go to the extreme of hoping that economic mechanisms by themselves will stimulate and restore to its proper place the value of work. Educational, pedagogical, political, juridical work is very important in the here and now.

Comment No. 15 by “Dariem”

Contribution to the online debate in response to Luis Sexto's commentary "One day we'll wake up", Juventud Rebelde, December 1, 2011

Translation: Marce Cameron

I note in many reader’s comments an appeal to what amounts to “consciousness”. Señores, it has been clearly demonstrated that “consciousness” is not inherent in human beings in an economy of scarcity, it’s time for us to wake up and realise that however much we call for savings, rationality, discipline etc., etc. this doesn’t work! It doesn’t work because the current economic model (objective conditions) does not allow it.

Social being determines social consciousness: this is a basic axiom of Marxism. The objective conditions determine the subjective; the material determines the spiritual. Men and women and their families must first eat, clothe themselves and have shoes to wear before they are able to dedicate themselves to altruistic questions. This is the harsh reality, however much it may pain us. Very few human beings devote themselves to a cause out of pure consciousness without regard for their material necessities.

So as well as making appeals, what we have to do is complete the transformation of our economic structures and laws, our model, so that work becomes the primary source of individual wealth, that is, complete the socialisation of the means of production, whose absolute control by the state has not exactly been the best way of achieving this.

If someone doesn’t see the benefits of their work, if they don’t see an improvement in their quality of life, then they won’t feel motivated to work, save resources, innovate, come up with ideas, create, undertake something. We’ll achieve this with a new economic model, and all these things that we strive for with appeals to “consciousness” will come by themselves. It’s time to perfect socialism, leaving behind empty slogans and placing our feet firmly on the ground, following a scientific methodology with mathematical precision and abandoning improvisations and dreams that are distant from reality.

Unchain the productive forces, put the means of production in the hands of the workers in a real way, give them the power of self-management, self-financing and participation in decision-making, eliminate salaried employment and move to remuneration according to the earnings produced by the work collective, and you’ll see how we don’t have to tell anyone to save, that they have to work hard, that they have to take care of the means of production, that they have to innovate... because all this will happen by itself.

Translation: The economy, and the economist?

Here, Juventud Rebelde columnist Ricardo Ronquillo Bello takes up the role of the economics profession in the "updating" of the Cuban economic model. 

How to harmonise the political and social objectives of the Cuban Revolution with the striving for labour productivity growth, the wellspring of human social progress for millennia? Where does the pursuit of economic rationality become an end in itself rather than a means to an end? These are difficult questions that Cuba's revolutionaries are grappling with today.   

I've also translated selected comments by readers as they appear on the Juventud Rebelde website.

The economy, and the economist?

By Ricardo Ronquillo Bello,

Juventud Rebelde, November 26, 2011

Translation: Marce Cameron

We won’t have an updated economy if we don’t respect economists. Cuba is obliged to not only transform the former, but to dignify the latter.

Hardly anything we propose regarding the structural, and even moral, reconfiguration of the country in the economic arena will be possible if this “column” – in the way that Jose Marti used this word – is unable to take its rightful place, without the encumbrance of the old traumas and put-downs, in the process of change.

On the eve of this November 26, the day dedicated to economists, I recalled how a prominent National Economics Award recipient and respected lecturer in the field confessed to me that his children didn’t want to follow in his footsteps. They’d been silent witnesses to the “bruisings” that were part and parcel of his profession.

This very Cuban “bruising” transcended insufficient incomes and their material and spiritual consequences for the family or the individual. Those of us who, through our profession, were aware of the dilemmas of the Cuban economists and accountants, know that the deepest wound was the marginalisation that their work – along with their studies, analyses and opinions – suffered within Cuba’s socioeconomic framework.

It seemed that the aggravation of our failings in this area at all levels was proportional to the degree of ignorance of their specialty. All this led to the absence of real participation and leadership in the identification and resolution of the problems of the economy, from the most immediate to the most structural.

Perhaps we need to recognise that in some cases we’ve had a lot of meetings, but we’ve barely listened [to economists]. Otherwise, there’s no explanation for why – in a society structured in such a special way as Cuba’s and with such diverse spaces for the airing of opinions – the economic mismatches ended up imposing themselves on the latter.

Surely, as referred to in an extensive and in-depth report by our Juventud Rebelde colleague Alina Perera, “participation” is a word that is heard frequently, yet in reality it is poorly understood or rarely fully utilised, even though it seems to embody many of the magical combinations we’d fervently get caught up in as we continue to weave the fate of the nation.

As a distinguished analyst in this field would affirm, we’ve passed up opportunities to create a propitious atmosphere for constructive reflection and creative input, which must go hand in hand with taking our plans for social development back to the drawing board. If these spaces for reflection and debate are cultivated, yet certain institutions have such narrow rules that they don’t allow for the channelling of thinking, this creates a disconnect between the scope of the objectives and what can be accomplished.

Quite simply, to the extent to which some procedures become routine, people lose interest in them, when ideally they would feel that these procedures are necessary because something really is at stake.

The circumstances of the updating [of Cuba’s socialist-oriented economic model], including the broad national debate that shaped it, favour a new form of consensus-building between the technical and the political visions, so that the right point is found between radicalism and equilibrium, as Jose Marti brilliantly wrote.

It would be inconsistent with the postulates of flexibility and keeping our ears to the ground of the updating to disregard opinions based on years of experience or solid and well-founded studies, while obstacles that rarefy the desired atmosphere of economic wellbeing – and that the transformations underway seek to clear away – prevail or become entrenched.

Ideally, we wouldn’t have to ask ourselves why a technical workforce as impressive as that trained by the Revolution didn’t work the miracle of multiplying loaves and fishes. Should we not hope for this from the 80,000 members of the National Association of Cuban Economists and Accountants that we have today?

It does not seem that ardour is lacking among these professionals, since they’ve arrived at this November 26, on a date so radically Guevaran*, involved in very diverse ways in the implementation of the Economic and Social Policy Guidelines of the Party and the Revolution.

But to participate in [the management of social] property means abandoning a certain instrumental and mobilisation-oriented vision. To boost the pride of the Cuban economist and accountant, as well as involving them, to have them present or expressing opinions, means to continue solidifying their illustrious position of influencing decisions.

*Ernersto “Che” Guevara served as industries minister and national bank president in Cuba’s revolutionary socialist government in the early 1960s.

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Comment No. 2 by “Pepe”:

In my opinion, the self-criticisms for the decline in the influence of the economists in rectifying the decisions that have created the situation that the country finds itself in don’t apply so much to the economists themselves, but to those who have had the responsibility for defining economic policy. I don’t think you need a university degree to understand what is negative, discouraging and absurd about these decisions. Nor do I understand why it has taken 50 years to begin to discuss these things. There are a pile of things that demonstrated for a long time that they weren’t going to advance the country economically. There’s no doubt that there has been the political will to improve in the areas of education and public health. But with an efficient economy, despite the external blockade, I think the standard of living of Cubans today would have been much higher if the economic policies had been rectified along the way, eliminating everything that had been shown to be wrong. Finally, I’d say: “better late than never”.

Comment No. 3 by “Toyo55”:

Of course the economists must feel “bruised” in an environment where the economy isn’t governed by any of the laws they studied and others that they verified, but by a command and control voluntarism that has nothing to do with this science. Luckily for them and for everyone we’re now beginning to see the changes and their results.

Comment No. 4 by “Sophia”:

To understand in a more practical and realistic way the point of the comment above, I’ll say this, when the top leadership of any society doesn’t make possible the required economic participation in the big and small executive decisions, there will be an accumulation of negative implications for the development of the economy itself, something that is really incomprehensible in a country where the government has trained a notable technical workforce in professions related to the economy. With the new policy of President Raul, steps are being taken to recuperate the economy. In my view this will take several years.

Comment No. 5 by Fidel Garcia:

Certainly there will be no relaunching of an economic model without a professional approach to its redesign. So the work of the economists is vital as a science. The economy is not sociology, it isn’t culture, it’s not politics, it’s not ideology, it’s that: the ECONOMY. If the economic responses place the ECONOMY at the centre of decisions, we’ll achieve better results and our economists will be less “bruised”.

Comment No. 8 by “Davo davo”:

The economy cannot be placed above politics, otherwise we’d end up with neoliberalism. The indignados who protest all over the world don’t do it out of rebelliousness or as a hobby, but because they have no choice. OK, now if politics is done without any basis in economics then everything goes to ruin, there's the squandering of resources and constant ups and downs, social apathy when it comes to finding solutions, the list goes on. Everything we’ve worked on in terms of economics during the past few decades has been pushed aside and even marginalised, this is the reality.

Comment No. 9 by “Dariem”:

An excess of politics and too little economics, this is something that has characterised us for the past 50 years, so no wonder what has happened has happened. Many of our “cadres” have no idea about the economy and many are leading sectors about which they have no idea, because they’re not economics graduates, but are in charge because they’re “politically suitable”. Meanwhile, nobody pays attention to the economists nor the experts in the various branches, and the bureaucracy corrodes everything. The ideas that enter the heads of certain bureaucrats are implemented without consulting experts, while the proposals of qualified people fall on deaf ears because they’re not part of the leadership team. I hope they come to their senses and correct all these deformations in our current economic model.

Comment No. 14 by “JuanCriollo”:

It has become a habit in these forums to take advantage of any topic or opportunity to lash out at our social system. I ask myself how naive we are when we try to paint everything in a bad light, when we know everything is nuanced. Some talk as if in 50 years only mistakes were made in our economy, somebody says in a comment above that the laws of the science of economics are violated. The situation today hardly resembles that of 20, 30, 40 years ago. Therefore we cannot judge today the decisions that were made back then. Mistakes have been made and we’ll continue to make them, above all if the desire is to transform a country the way ours was transformed, and above all because the people who began the transformations were inexperienced and the required knowledge comes from this transformation. I don’t justify or sanctify anything, I just remind them that thanks to how things have developed, many of us who criticise and express opinions here exist today. It’s good that we criticise, it’s necessary, more than necessary it’s indispensable, but let’s do it in an objective manner, let’s point out the error and the corrective action. And please, those who recommend the “traditional” economic recipes, take a look at what’s happening in the world where these recipes are always applied, and ask yourself why there are so many indignados today.