Fidel Castro has not yet entirely retired. He might no longer be Cuba's head of state but he has continued to publish a number of public reflections since his formal resignation from most of his positions in 2008. It is a sign of the importance of Cuba's historic leader that these reflections often receive as much coverage by the international press – judging by his comments on the international financial crisis, the internal political crisis leading to the destitution of Carlos Lage and Pedro Pérez Roque, two key names in the Cuban administration, and now, the US-led thaw in the relations between the two countries – as Cuba's official positions receive on these key issues. Thus ends this latest, revised biography of Fidel Castro by Sebastian Balfour, wondering about the strength of the man's legacy to the point of arguing that even beyond the grave he is likely to continue to cast a long shadow over the revolution he initiated and led for five decades.
Castro's imprint on the Revolution and on the history of the second half of the twentieth century is beyond doubt. A political biography is built on this premise and as a result it is not surprising that the man sometimes seems to loom larger than the Revolution itself. But Balfour does not make the mistake, common in some of the early accounts of the Revolution, of assuming that it could not continue without its leader. On the contrary, his assessment is both lucid and fair, finding that difficult balance between merging Castro with the Revolution and assigning to the man his right amount of responsibility for the revolutionary directions of the last 50 years.
This is a deceptively easy-to-read book that flows from chapter to chapter, dissecting the life of Fidel Castro from his childhood to his political training in student politics and his revolutionary experience. Nothing new or particularly controversial is to be found in the first few chapters. In that sense, perhaps, this biography does not compete with other, more recent biographical work based on direct access to the man and published as a final opportunity for Fidel Castro himself to tell his own version of his life. However, the value of this third edition lies in its reading of Castro's contribution to Cuban history since the beginning of the Special Period, which the book's second edition in 1995 could not possibly have captured. In addition, the chapters on the autumn of Castro's life and the discussion of his legacy in the epilogue bring a touch of analysis and reflection on the part of the author that qualitatively enhance this biography.
It is a sign of the didactic approach driving the thinking behind this book that it includes a bibliographical essay in which, in six short pages, the author discusses the most important existing literature on Fidel Castro, making it extremely easy for anyone new to the topic to analyse further a head of state in a third world country who was at the centre of global events, shaping a revolutionary process that has led by example in the construction, albeit imperfect, of a new society. For that process, Cuba has had to pay a heavy political price in the last 50 years. However, a new chapter is quickly becoming a reality, one that might yet allow Cuba to embody a society in which its people continue to benefit from the social gains that have earned the revolution important support at home and abroad, and at the same time provide the personal freedoms cherished by all.
A first step in this direction is taking place with Cuba's rehabilitation in a new Latin American political climate. The growing example represented by ALBA, not just as a simple system of regional solidarity based on barter agreements but as an alternative model of regional development that challenges US-sponsored free trade agreements and even its Latin American version in the form of Mercosur, could be a step in the right direction. A key stepping stone in the achievement of this dream will be the normalisation of relations with the United States. Nobody expects this to happen overnight, but recent US moves to soften the embargo against Cuba and President Obama's first intervention in April 2009 at the Organization of American States in Trinidad and Tobago point to a new start in economic and political relations with Latin America, including Cuba. Ultimately, a reconciliation needs to take place of two confronted visions of Cuba: one based on the increasingly irrelevant portrayal of the island as the last refuge of outdated Cold War ideologies, the other, represented by Castro himself, as the country that brought to life Martí's own vision in ‘Our America’.
In sum, Balfour's latest edition of his acclaimed biography of Fidel Castro is a very well-written book demythologising both the revolutionary process and its historic leader. It is extremely easy to read from cover to cover. Seeing history as a story, those who know little about Cuba's revolutionary process will appreciate the ease with which pages flow and key events are analysed in a clear yet detailed manner. On the other hand, those who know Cuba's history well will also find much to enjoy in this biography, especially its judicious remarks and cool detachment, something not always obvious in much of the literature about the Cuban Revolution.
