For United States-based academics, writing about Cuba without centring US–Cuban relations is a delicate endeavour even at the best of times. The past five years, putting it mildly, have not been the best of times. Nevertheless, the authors and editors of this volume bravely attempt a comparative approach to Cuba's ongoing transition that, if not completely sidestepping Donald Trump's concerted effort to overturn normalisation at least minimises it in order to foreground Cuba's domestic political, economic and social challenges en route to modernisation.
Paths for Cuba and many of its essays emerged out of a November 2014 conference at the University of Pittsburgh ‘to examine Cuba's internal reforms and their external influences within a comparative framework’ (p. 2). A month later, Presidents Raúl Castro and Barack Obama shocked the world by announcing a normalisation of relations. In the United States, this executive-level sea change did not usher in significant congressional reform, leaving it vulnerable to rollback. Faced with renewed hostility from the Colossus of the North, a weakened Venezuelan ally, continued emigration pressures and a transfer of power that has left its major institutions intact, Cuba since 2017 has continued its largely top-down reforms in fits and starts. By focusing on how its pathway to development can benefit from lessons learnt in Eastern Europe, China, Taiwan, South Korea, Vietnam and Latin America, this book at its best provides insights into those seeking to modernise Cuba from within. Yet it could have grappled more forcefully with impacts of the US embargo, rising Cuban social inequality and generational schisms. It could also have demonstrated greater consistency in spotlighting the benefits of comparative analysis.
Except for an introduction and conclusion, chapters are divided into three parts: ‘Economics’, ‘Policy and Politics’ and ‘Citizens and Society’. Essays in Parts 1 and 2 have some topical overlap and are largely comparative. Those in ‘Citizens and Society’, whilst dealing with race, gender, youth and culture, have little connection to earlier chapters or to each other. Integrating sociology and the humanities in a more robust way would have strengthened the entire volume, since these subjects are discussed only tangentially in Parts 1 and 2. The Cuba expertise of contributors varies widely, further diluting the impact of the comparative approach, and the decision to exclude South Asia and Africa lessen the book's appeal to scholars of the Global South.
Despite these flaws, there are some excellent contributions worthy of highlighting. Carmelo Mesa-Lago's chapter on Cuban social assistance offers vital context on early revolutionary reforms and post-Cold War crises. He casts doubt on the wisdom of Cuba's campaign to reduce infant mortality further, given its already impressive achievements in that regard. Rather, he recommends a more ‘rational’ approach to resource allocation, such as improving potable-water infrastructure and building geriatric hospitals to meet the needs of an ageing populace. He finds Raúl Castro's limited reforms promising but points to inadequately funded pensions, insufficient food subsidies and deteriorating healthcare along with the hated dual-currency system as exacerbating social inequality. Mesa-Lago finds points of comparison with Vietnam, China and elsewhere in Latin America but ultimately concludes that structural reforms are key for Cuba to establish a successful mixed system. Though he could have been more explicit in connecting the halting pace of reform to the stranglehold of the US embargo, his is a clear-eyed assessment of the costs of upholding revolutionary legacies such as universalism in significantly straitened circumstances.
Matías F. Travieso-Díaz's essay considers strategies for resolving US nationals’ property expropriation claims dating back to the 1960s. (The author leaves aside murkier claims by Cuban expatriates in the United States and elsewhere.) In touching on US government efforts to resolve such claims in Cold War-era Vietnam, Iran, Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, the chapter is more suggestive than exhaustive in its comparative approach. Still, it intriguingly offers potential resolutions to the stalemate, such as direct government-to-government negotiation and US nationals’ participation in a claim-resolution programme, should Cuba establish one. Cuba's reliance on joint ventures and other third country foreign investment will no doubt complicate negotiations, as will its claims against the United States for decades of ‘human and economic damages inflicted on the Cuban people’ (p. 126). Another unknown is the reaction of Cuban expatriates and their descendants to any compensation process; different factions could obstruct or advance efforts to end this long-running feud despite not qualifying for claims. More examples from the comparative cases Travieso-Díaz cites might shed light on these issues, but his chapter is nevertheless a fresh take on an old issue.
James McGuire offers more direct comparisons in framing conditions for development in 2018 Cuba vs. those in future East Asian ‘tigers’, South Korea and Taiwan in 1960. Not all points are equally useful, such as contrasting the legacies of Japanese and Spanish colonialism and the presence or absence of ‘Sinic culture’. Still, it is instructive to remember that 2018 Cuba shares with 1960 Taiwan and South Korea ‘a low initial level of GDP per capita, a high initial level of educational attainment and health status, and extremely low wages’ (p. 72). If Cuba were to ensure a wiser allocation of resources, McGuire argues, it could become a ‘Caribbean “jaguar” in part through the export of pharmaceuticals and other technology-intensive products’ (p. 78). This would be much more likely to happen if the United States were to end once and for all its isolationist policy against Cuba, a point McGuire omits. Nonetheless, his chapter, like several others, provides a useful framework for seeing Cuba's challenges as less exceptional than Cubans (and US nationals) may believe.
The lack of attention to the US role in undermining the Cuban economy is all the more glaring at a time when many recommendations laid out in this volume – dual-currency reunification, transfer of leadership to a younger generation, reduced restrictions on the private sector, and further biomedical innovation – continue apace (albeit too slowly for many younger Cubans) despite serious challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic. With Trump's restrictions firmly in place, it is past time for the Biden administration to push for full normalisation – perhaps the surest path to accelerating Cuban modernisation.
