The Pact of Zanjon, A Political Event

History is a succession of events, first experienced, and then interpreted by men, a peculiarity that impregnates them with a certain subjective component. The difference between those two moments — the experience and the interpretation — is one in which objective events happening at a concrete moment can suffer various explications over time, depending on interests and ideologies. Thanks to this peculiarity it is possible to return to the events of the past and draw new interpretations, as valid as those that preceded them.

The signing of the Pact on Zanjón, on February 10, 1878, was a practical and consistent manifestation of what was possible at the time, and so contains valid lessons in matters of politics. However, in Cuba, where intransigent acts have always been given precedence over those that did not completely and immediately result in victory, they are denigrated and so lose whatever utility they might contain.

Much has been written and diverse are the opinions of that February 10 132 years ago, when the Cuban forces capitulated to the Spanish, but those prevailing are those that correspond to the dominant ideology, which has been nurtured by the Marxist thesis that considers violence as the engine of history. Such views are widespread through official information and the system of education that simplifies our history to present it as the united march of a people against its enemies. Hence the prominence of the Protest of Baragua over the Pact of Zanjon.

According to the Colonel in, and historian of, the War of Independence, Ramón Roa, the failure of that war lay in the internal problems, including indiscipline, mutinies and uprisings that occurred from 1874 until the end of the war. “A country’s independence,” said Roa, “was tied to personal independence,” an abyss from which emerged deep mistrust of all men. He added, “We welcome the theme of Independence or Death; but never dreaming we would have to struggle with it ourselves: I don’t mean to say the vast majority of Cubans, who were indifferent, who were with Spain, or who could not manage to save us, but with ourselves. “

For his part, General Maximo Gomez, he argued, “Has tried to find a victim who make responsible, but has not attempted to study the facts, know the state of the army, and resources that he could have had, the more or less aid … received from the emigres and how the people of Cuba have responded in general to the call of their liberators. During the war, in its most brilliant period, which was1874 to 1875, the army could count on 7,000 men ready for combat.”

For these reasons Gómez demands that “the responsibility be divided among everyone, the blame belongs to the Cuban people and not the heroic few.” On another occasion the Generalissimo reminded us of the atrocities committed by the Cuban volunteers. There wasn’t a village in the country, however small, that did not have a section of volunteers, all Cubans and with Cuban leaders.

The undisputed historical fact is that the War, which began under the leadership of white plantation owners, ended under the leadership of blacks, poor whites and mulattoes, and the war which reached the central provinces ended up confined to certain regions of the East. To this regional and sociological evolution corresponded different attitudes, which explains why the war culminated in two ways and two scenarios: The Pact of Zanjón in Camaguey and the Baragua Protest in the East.

On February 10, 1878 in Zanjón, most of the forces accepted the peace plan presented by General Martínez Campos. In exchange for independence, Cuba would receive the same political, organizational and administrative conditions enjoyed by the island of Puerto Rico; in exchange for the abolition of slavery, freedom was granted to the Asian settlers and slaves who made up the insurgent ranks. As the pacts are an expression of the correlation of forces of the parties, the Zanjón was simply a reflection of it.

In Mangos de Baragua, a place chosen by Antonio Maceo, there was the famous interview-protest. The Bronze Titan (as Maceo was known), explains Figueredo Socarras, decided to protest against the manner of ending a war that had lasted a decade, but if the protest were energetic and eloquent, new hostilities would break out. The end result was reflected in the words of Captain Duarte Fulgencio “Muchachos, el 23 se rompe el Corojo,” a statement of intention to break the pact on March 23, which served as support for the next attempt for independence.

In the 15 days between March 23, the day hostilities were resumed, and on April 7, the day the fighting stopped, Cuban troops attacked the Spanish forces and they, in compliance with superior orders, did not respond to the machete charges, and instead merely responded with cries of Viva the Peace,” until finally the Cuban troops stopped the attacks. Then the representatives abroad returned their powers and resigned their positions, and by agreement of the Provisional Government, General Maceo left for Jamaica on May 9, 1878.

Zanjón was not everything, but it was what was possible at the time, so it was a political fact. They did not achieve independence from Spain nor the abolition of slavery, but there were the freedoms of press, association and assembly, which specified in detail in publications and associations within the island (political parties, trade unions, newspapers, etc.) that strengthened the activity of Cubans and paved the way for the resumption of the struggle for independence. Those liberties gained with the Pact of Zanjon, and now removed, were the foundation for all subsequent social movements, including those that culminated in the seizure of power in 1959.

Independent Unions Versus Updating the Model

The pronouncement of the Cuban Workers Center (CTC), regarding the measures taken by the Government to deflate workforces and to bring about greater self-employment, published in the Journal of Communist Party on September 13, 2010, is a good reason to discuss the dependence of the Cuban labor union movement with respect to the State.

According to some paragraphs in the document: “The leadership of the Government has been working on a set of measures to ensure and implement the changes necessary and urgent to introduce into the economy and society …; In correspondence with the process of updating the economic model and the economic projections for the period 2011-2015, the Guidelines provide for next year’s reduction of more than 500,000 workers in the state sector …; Our state can not and should continue to maintain businesses, productive entities, of services and budgets with inflated payrolls, and losses that slow down the economy …; the union is responsible to act in its sector with a high level of demand and to maintain systematic control of the progress of this process from start to finish, taking the appropriate actions and to keeping their superior organs and the CTC [Cuban Workers Union] informed… “

Both these paragraphs, like the rest of the document, show the total lack of independence of the CTC. There is no mention in them of the interests of workers, which the organization supposedly represents, such as the failure of wages with respect to the increasing cost of living, violations of the conventions of the International Labour Organisation that have been ratified by the Cuban government and the helplessness of the workers in the face of the administrative arrangements, such as the massive job layoff that is taking place.

To understand the impact updating the model will have on workers it is necessary to understand the process by which the labor movement was denatured.

The Cuban unions gave the first signs of life during the substitution of wage labor for slave labor. The creation of the Association of Cigar Makers of Havana, the first strikes and the establishment of regular workers, since 1865, prove it. The growth and strength of this movement led to the establishment of the great twentieth-century labor unions, which, resting on the freedoms and rights recognized by the Constitution of 1901, achieved considerable benefits, particularly in terms of wage increases and reduction of the duration of the workday, while playing an important role in major political events such as the overthrow of Gerardo Machado regime in the general strike on August 5, 1933: an unprecedented event in the history of Cuba.

The strength achieved by the labor movement was reflected in events such as: labor legislation passed in this period included the legal existence of unions, the right to strike, the eight-hour day, minimum wage for sugar workers, stable employment, holidays and sick leave and maternity pay, among other measures that were expanded and supplemented in April 1938 with Decree 798, the most important Republican labor legislation and one of the most advanced in the world; many workers demands became laws for the benefit of workers. The economic autonomy of the unions was reflected in the acquisition of properties, such as the construction of the modern building of Carlos III by the Electrical Workers and their leasing it to the Electric Company, the construction of the Havana-Hilton hotel by the Gastronomic Union and their leasing it to the Hilton chain, and development of the Grafico, by the Graphic Arts Union.

However, the destructive germ of that movement had been brewing since 1925. In that year, almost simultaneously, they founded the National Workers Center of Cuba (CNOC) and the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC). Then, in 1934, with the founding of the Cuba Revolutionary Party (commonly called “the Authentics”), a struggle began with the Communist Party for control of trade unionism, which worsened in 1939 with the dissolution of the CNOC to make way for the founding of the CTC and, in 1944, with the Authentics victory in elections that year, so that during the celebration of the 5th Congress in 1947 — there were actually two conferences: one controlled by the Authentics and the other by the Communists — a ministerial resolution declared the Authentics Congress legitimate, at the expense of the Communists.

The subordination sharply manifested  itself before the coup d’etat of March 10, 1952. The then Secretary General of the CTC, Eusebio Mujal, who had called a general strike against the coup, accepted an offer from the Batista government in exchange for preserving the rights acquired by the CTC, which  dealt a severe blow to Cuban labor. In 1953, with the resurgence of labor strikes, the Authentics union leadership was trapped: if they supported they strikes they would be in conflict with the government, if they didn’t support them they would lose the workers movement, and Mujal opted for the latter: an alliance with the dictatorship.

The government that took power in 1959 needed to shore up union support for its project, and a general strike from January 1-5 served to consolidate it, and was used to create an illusory image of the role that workers had played during the insurrection. However, on January 22, 1959 came the first blow to trade unionism.

The CTC was dissolved and replaced by the CTC with the surname of Revolutionary (CTC-R). The resistance to such intention was swift. The Humanist Labor Front was created, where 25 of the 33 federations of industries joined together under the slogan Neither Washington nor Moscow! This opened  a period of conflict that was resolved at the Tenth Congress in November 1959, where David Salvador, appointed Secretary General of the CTC intervened, when asked by an observer of the Social Christian Movement, about what was then the plan for the workers, David responded firmly and laconically: “Whatever the Comandante [Fidel] says.”

Faces with the division, the then prime minister of the government, Fidel Castro, proposed a vote of confidence for the candidacy of David Salvador, leaving out the most prominent anti-Communists. However, after the Congress, the Labour Minister, Augusto Martinez Sanchez, did what the government could not do during the sessions of Congress: He began a process of dismissing the officers of the unions, and interventions in the and federations, which was not completed until they had a majority in the leadership.

Already by the XI Congress of the CTC-R in 1961, there were no traces of the former workers’ movement. For the first time a candidate was put forward for each position and every delegate, representing the Government, renouncing almost all the historic gains of Cuban unionism: the nine days of sick leave, the extra Christmas bonus, working a 44 hour week which was constitutionally increased 9.09%, among others.

The coup de grace came in 1966 during the XII Congress (which I attended as a delegate for Santiago de Cuba) in which Lázaro Peña, then Secretary General, was dismissed. Thus unionism came under state control and the CTC became an appendage of the Communist Party to control workers. The results of the subordination results were reflected in the 1976 Constitution, in which only six articles of Chapter VI are dedicated to the rights of workers, and ignore almost everything achieved by the union movement since the creation of CNOC 1925.

The process described was a consequence of considering that people are reducible to a form of organization where people act as mere implementors, which corroborates the undisputed proposition that autonomy is impossible without the existence of a genuine trade unionism.

In the current situation, i.e. in the absence of a genuine trade unionism, the Cuban Government, after exhausting all possibilities to survive without change, is undertaking some reforms under the name of updating the model, which will have a strong negative impact on workers with regards to the degree of helplessness in which they will find themselves before the State, which allows the State to decide for itself and is limited to seeking support for the workers, as evidenced by the current Statement of the CTC-R.

If the current government plan does not address the rights and freedoms that unions require to enable workers to move from the present mass condition to being true subjects of economic management, that is, that they can earn wages corresponding to the cost of living and that being an entrepreneur is no longer a privilege limited to those not born in Cuba, the State will face a new and resounding failure. There is no alternative: Either the independence of unions will be restored or there will be no update of the model.

November 12 2010

Of Pardon and Amnesty

At the close of the Eighth Ordinary Session of the National Assembly of Popular Power, on December 23, 2011, General Raul Castro announced that “in a humanitarian and sovereign gesture,” the State Council of the Republic of Cuba had agreed to pardon more than 2,900 Cuban and foreign prisoners. Despite the positive that will come from 2,900 compatriots leaving prison to live with their birth family, this pardon, like the rest of the steps that the Cuban government has undertaken in recent times is marked by the inadequate, late and limited.

If Cuban socialism is a humanitarian and social justice system, as stated by the government, it would have to accept that releases of prisoners taken by the governments of Cuba prior to 1959, both in the colony as in the Republic, were equally or more humanitarian than the current pardon, and many times those releases were accompanied by other liberating measures that played an important role in social change after their enactment.

The pardon is a measure by which, on an exceptional basis, the Head of State forgives all or part of a sentence or substitutes for it a more benign one. It is, therefore, a favor granted where the prisoner is guilty, but the “magnanimity” of the Head of State can forgive him. However, in our political history it has been more common to offer amnesty which, unlike pardon, means eliminating criminal liability, that is it involves legal erasure of the offense, whether real or perceived. In that sense it is sufficient to cite four such examples:

In 1861, the Spanish government decreed an amnesty that allowed the return to Cuba of those condemned for political reasons, including the physician Antonio de Castro, who organized the irregular Masonic body that developed the separatist rebellion begun in October 1868. Examples of the prior were the patriots from Bayamo, Francisco Vicente Aguilera, Perucho Figueredo, Francisco Maceo Osorio, and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, all Masons and the rise of Las Clavellinas in Port au Prince, where 72 of the 76 participants were members of the Tínima, lodge including Ignacio Agramonte.

In 1878, thanks to the amnesty decreed by Spain in compliance with the Pact of Zanjón many exiles could return to Cuba. Suffice it to mention four of them: José Martí, Juan Gualberto Gómez, Antonio Maceo and Calixto Garcia. That amnesty was supplemented with other liberating measures arranged between 1879 and 1886, such as freedoms of press, of assembly and association enshrined in Article 13 of the Spanish Constitution, which allowed the legal existence of media organizations, and economic, cultural, fraternal, educational, labor union and political associations that participated in the preparation of the War of Independence in 1895.

In 1937, the then president of the republic, the colonel of the Revolutionary War Federico Laredo Bru, before convening the constituent assembly of 1940, intended to restore the constitutional order that had been interrupted since 1928, he issued a political amnesty that benefited more than 3,000 prisoners, thanks to which the exiles could return to Cuba, new political groupings were formed, among which was the Communist Revolutionary Union Party (1937) and its legalization in 1939 and created a conciliatory scenario from which emerged the brand new 1940 Constitution.

In 1955, Fulgencio Batista after the fraudulent elections of 1954, in order to retake possession, restored the 1940 Constitution that he had violated and granted amnesty to political prisoners, including the assailants of the Moncada Garrison, who in June 1955 founded the July 26 Movement, seized power and are the government until today.

These four examples illustrate the relationship between amnesty in Cuba and social change and highlight the limitation of the present pardon for two indisputable reasons: 1 – because the number of prisoners released is almost 5% of the prison population of the country, among them women, the sick, those over 60 and some convicted for crimes against state security who have served an important share of their sentences; and 2 – because forgiveness does not alter the current state of Cuban society, requiring changes, as it leaves in place the measures that allowed the imprisonment and does not recognize the state’s responsibility for such a high prison population.

Based on the information provided, the overwhelming majority of those released are in prison for common crimes. In this sense, the pardon is unfair, because the released are still considered guilty, thereby ignoring the responsibility of the Cuban state for the reasons that, in Cuba, robbery and theft were turned into everyday behavior, because the failure of wages and pensions promote crime as a way to survive, because of the need for subsistence and because of the many constraints imposed on Cubans lead to crime. Therefore a shared responsibility warranted a broader measure numerically, a self-critical recognition and support for other rights and liberties, so that fewer Cubans increase the prison population.

Similarly, with regards to the few political prisoners included in the pardon, the Cuban state has a good deal of responsibility for making a crime of fundamental rights enshrined in the Constitution of 1940. Among them the right to march and form political organizations contrary to the regime, the autonomy of the University of Havana, prohibiting and limiting citizens from participating in the political life of the nation, and recognizing the legitimacy of resistance for protecting individual rights, and making any contrary act a punishable offense. In short, the inadequacy of the current pardon forces a move towards amnesty and the democratization of Cuba.

(Published in el Diario de Cuba on Friday, January 7, 2012)

January 9 2012

Cuban History Marches Backward

For any society, it will be frustrating if its history, instead of progressing forward, heads backwards by leaps and bounds. This is the case for Cuban society, whose situation with regards to freedom and rights is the same or worse than it was leading to the Ten Years’ War.

In mid-nineteenth century Cuba, when the contradictions between a colony and a metropolis seems to be approaching a reformist solution, events took a different path. The Information Board, convened by the Overseas Minister with the participation of the Cuban commissioners in order to outline a colonial reform project, failed. Instead of the island reducing its tax contribution to 6%, a tax of 10% was imposed, which affected the interests of the island’s landowners, especially in the eastern central region.

Let’s look briefly at some of the decisive events.

On September 15, 1868 the Spanish monarchy was replaced by a provisional government, which continued to deny for the Island the freedoms claimed for Spain. The confluence of increased taxes, the lack of freedoms and a growing national sentiment, coupled with external factors unfavorable to Spain, resulted in separatist insurrection becoming the order of the day, which was structured from the Grand Eastern Lodge of Cuba and the Antilles (GOCA)*, an irregular Masonic body that became the center of discussion and investigation of social and political issues.

On October 10, 1868, the independence movement started in the East and in a short time extended to the center of the country. The need to coordinate the efforts of rebel groups led to the convening of the Assembly of Guáimaro, on April 10, 1869, which enacted the first Cuban Constitution of an eminently democratic character, based on the division of powers. However, ten years after the start of that civil-military exploit, the conflicts between military leaders, and between them and the President of the Republic, and between the legislative and executive branches, together with the warlordism and regionalism, put paid to the patriotic effort.

On November 14, 1876, when General Maximo Gomez had to leave the command of the invasion of the West — the largest operation of this war — the strategic initiative, both militarily and politically, was taken over by Spain. The enforcement of the policy of pacification policy enforcement fell on fertile ground. In September 1877, troops from Holguin established an independent canton, one of the regiments of Jiguaní faced the enemy, and in October, President Estrada Palma was taken prisoner. A few days later, representatives of the Chamber entered into conversation with the Spanish forces. And finally, the Central Committee, in charge of peace negotiations, on February 10, 1878, signed a document that ended the independence project; a war which, as José Martí said, “No one let us down, but we let ourselves down.”

From the historical point of view, the result of this enormous effort can not be measured only by the failure to achieve any of its basic objectives, but also by the current state of Cuban society, separated by a century and a half from the Cry of Yara, which had launched the war on October 10, 1868.

Then and Now

At that time, in exchange for independence and the abolition of slavery, between 1879 and 1886 the Press Law, the Law on Meetings and the Law on Associations were approved and put into effect and endorsed in the Spanish constitution. Thanks to these were created news organizations, economic associations, cultural, fraternal, educational, mutual aid and instruction and recreation, trade unions and the first political parties in Cuba. Thanks to the amnesty provided for in the Covenant and the permissibility for the exiles to return to Cuba, José Martí, Juan Gualberto Gómez and Antonio Maceo were able to set foot on Cuban soil once again.

The result speaks for itself: when he arrived in Cuba Gerardo Castellanos, sent by Marti to prepare the new uprising on the island, found a movement already organized in several provinces.

Currently, in the XXI century, those freedoms are limited, but those favoring the continuation of the struggle for independence are absent. Even worse. Each year, upon arrival at October 10, the official press, in tribute, recalls the uprising with events, articles and speeches, while at the same time meticulously going after every civic demonstration of freedom, as evidenced by the continuing repressive actions and the huge number of peaceful opponents arrested.

What did all this immense effort for independence, freedom and dignity of Cubans bring to the present in which we live? How is it possible that people who bled and suffered in the name of freedom are now in such a state?

*Source: Torres-Cuevas, Eduardo y Oscar Loyola Vega. Historia de Cuba 1492-1898, Formación y liberación de la nación. La Habana, Editorial Pueblo y Educación, 2001, p.210

November 14 2011

A First Step

On Thursday November 10 Decree-Law 288 on the legalization of the sale of homes took effect. Complemented with six ministerial resolutions, the decree significantly changes the legislation in effect in this area since the 60′s of last century.

With the new provisions Cubans, formal owners of property, become actual owners. Now they can not only exchange, but also donate, assign or sell their home to other Cubans living in Cuba, to those with residence abroad or to foreigners permanently residing in the country. To make use of this right requires that the property be registered at the Land Registry, along with a statement on the legality of the funds involved, and payment of a tax of 4% per transaction. The price of the property is as stated by the parties, provided that it is not less than the discounted value of the same. And the transactions will be conducted in Cuban pesos through the National Bank.

Now homes owned by Cubans who leave the country permanently will continue to be confiscated but the State will transfer the property to the co-owners or family members up to the fourth degree of consanguinity, for free. That is spouses, children, parents, grandparents, siblings, nephews, uncles and cousins, or persons who, with the owner’s consent, have resided for five or more years in the building.

An assessment of the scope of the new Decree-Law requires that we look at its background.

For years, the population growth, the aging of the housing stock, its deterioration because of lack of maintenance, increasing collapses of existing buildings and the slow pace of construction, formed a tricky situation. The Cuban model is more useful for distribution than productions, and involved itself in resolving the problems while circumventing the participation of citizens.

To that end a “battle for housing” began which ended in complete failure. From 1960 to 1970 they tried to produce 32,000 apartments a year, but the average did not exceed 11,000. From 1970 to 1980 there was a plan for 38,000, but they barely reached 17,000. In the decade of 1980s, the plan amounted to 100,000 homes a year, but the average did not exceed 40,000. Only in the 1990s, did it surpass 40,000, but then it declined. In September 2005, the Secretary of the Executive Committee of the Council of Ministers announced another plan of 100,000 new homes per year, which also failed.

When the housing shortage created a frenzy of occupations and illegal construction, the government turned the focus from plans for construction to controlling the widespread disorder. The Law No. 48-Housing Act, enacted in December 1984, authorized the transfer of ownership to onerous “usufruct” and legitimate occupants, and allowed the legalization of homes that had been built outside the law. This measure gave formal ownership to about 750 thousand families, but its scope was limited to legalizing existing arrangements and putting an end to the lack of control. Illegalities, however, continued their march.

Four years later, in December 1988, a new Housing Act was promulgated. In one of its paragraphs it made that the personal property of the house was understood as the right of enjoyment thereof by the owner and his family, but could not become a mechanism of enrichment or exploitation. That is, the owners were forbidden to sell their property. This law could not prevent black market sales and construction.

In July 2000 Decree-Law 211 was issued authorizing physical inspections of buildings, requiring institutional approval for housing swaps, and giving state officials the right to determine the legitimacy of the property, undermining the rights recognized in the General Law 1988. In the same direction, in February 2001, new Decree-Law was adopted that effectively eliminated the sale between private parties and awarded and Municipal Housing Authorities the right of confiscation. So the box was closed.

The recent provision recognizing the right of the owner and removing the prior authorization of the Housing Authorities, is a recognition of the absurdity of the above laws. Its limitation is that it is directed to the sphere of circulation: property can change hands, but one cannot build new homes. If one of the objectives of the recent legislation is “to contribute to solving the housing problem,” then the right to property must be complemented by measures aimed at building and repair.

According to official figures in 2010 there was a national deficit of about 600,000 homes, more than half of the existing homes were in poor condition, and 85% were in need of repair. However, the reality is that the figures are higher.

Between 2001 and 2005 four hurricanes: Michelle (2001), Charley and Ivan (2004) and Dennis (2005) caused severe damage to housing. Then, in 2008, about half a million homes were damaged or completely demolished by the atmospheric phenomena of Fay, Hannah, Gustav and Ike. Given the failures of the construction plans, population growth and constant collapse of existing buildings, a conservative estimate shows a deficit of about one million homes in a population of more than 11 million. As the current population growth demands an annual 50,000 new houses, it would take several decades building a 100,000 homes a year to solve the critical housing problem.

The solution of the problem demands that citizens participate in parallel with the State, along with the creation of small and medium enterprises — private or cooperatives — for construction materials, repair, sale of materials, transport and alternative financing. It also requires multidisciplinary studies. In short, the joint participation of State and Society.

In this problem, Decree-Law 288 is only the first step. Important because it will generate a change in attitude among Cubans and because it is recognition, so far denied, of the right of ownership. Of course, this is only a first step.

November 15 2011

Back to Square One

All societies require changes. Cuba, trapped in the past half century, requires not only changes but major changes. In the last three years the government has dictated some important steps but that importance lies not in their scope — quite limited of course — but in the government’s need to undertake transformations and to break down the stagnation that characterized the last decades.

The paradox is that the recent measures are simultaneously a step back and a step forward. A step back because after taking the wrong road against the logic of history, we are heading now toward the Cuba of 1958. An advance, because given the time lost overcoming the crisis to the return to the point of departure, and from there to correct the course. The concrete fact is that the Cuba of 1958 with its inequalities and injustices was in better shape than the Cuba of today to undertake a project of changes. Hence, the return is an advance that will allow a getting back on a course that never should have been abandoned. Let’s look at some of the measures taken since 2008.

1 – Decree Law 259 of 2008, which provides grants of land in usufruct is a retreat from the first and second Agrarian Reform Law, passed in 1959 and 1963 respectively. These two laws, on liquidating the landowners’ monopoly over the land, could have been the basis for the formation of a national middle class and a diversified economy. However, the turn toward totalitarianism wasted these possibilities. Almost all of these lands were turned into a great State-owned estate. Then, as a result of mismanagement and loss of interest by those who worked the land, the land was taken over by invasive marabou and other weeds; when the country had to buy 80% of its food from abroad the Government saw itself forced to dictate the decree mentioned above through which 1 caballería (33.2 acres) of land was distributed in usufruct, an arrangement that had to be modified to bring it into line with the Second Agrarian Reform Law of 1963, when  up to 5 caballerías were offered.

2 – The Labor Reform, regulated by Decree Law 276 of September 2010 constitutes the recognition of the failure of the “full employment” policy, in which inflated payrolls were maintained in order to show the world the “superiority” of the Cuban system, against all economic logic. Now this decree leaves more than a million workers without employment, which represents 20% of the Cuban labor force, a figure significantly higher than the 1.7% unemployment declared in 2009 and also the unemployment that existed before 1959.

3 – Self-employment, including the latest amendments introduced in Decree Law 284 in September 2011, increased the number of permitted activities from 178 to 181, and added the flexibility to hire labor in some activities. This list of what is permitted, which for the most part is a legalizing of what already goes on, ignores the development of small and medium businesses. If the widening of self-employment has as its objective to put to work a share of the million and a half workers who are being laid off, and to generate goods and services that the State is incapable of providing, then that list of permitted activities will have to be abandoned and instead only the few activities not permitted should be defined. For the rest, citizen initiative will give ample evidence of its potential, much more so in a country like Cuba with such a high level of education.

4 – In 2011 Decree Law 292 was adopted, which established regulations for the transfer of vehicle ownership through purchase-sale or gift between Cubans who live on the Island and permanent or temporary resident foreigners. Also, Decree Law 288, similar to the former, allows the purchase-sale or gift of real estate. Another recent measure is aimed at barbershops and beauty salons, although the premises remain State property. All of these laws fall short of what existed in these areas before 1959, when cars, homes, barber shops, beauty salons and hundreds of thousands of goods-and-services business were owned by citizens, who could dispose of them freely.

To this must be added the widespread corruption that resulted from taking the wrong path. By eliminating the small owners and true cooperatives, the State enterprises became “estaticulares” — a term coined in 2001 that combines the words “state” and “private” to designate enterprises owned by the state whose earnings accrue to individuals. This results in a vast underground network of goods and services that cannot count on supplies of raw materials, tools, and spare parts, and generates widespread theft, which is known in popular slang as “escape, struggle and resolve,” words to describe actions taken to survive. This abnormality is strengthened by the low salaries, which has made corruption — which until 1958 was essentially limited to the political-administrative sphere — into the survival device that predominates today.

However, this return to the past is an advance relative to the present, taking ourselves back to the point where the tide turned to see if from there, and despite the delay and anthropological damage inflicted, we can get ourselves back on track. It is a possibility that depends on the deepening of the measures to bring us as close as possible back to the starting point. But it also depends on the creation and construction of a social structure that guarantees the participation of Cubans in decision-making and a conception of private property, in which various structures live together and cohabit, because property, be it individual, family, cooperative or state, has the social function of mobilizing the potential and initiative of people to produce.

In short, it requires, once we are back at the beginning, that Cubans be reconverted into citizens.

Published in Diario de Cuba on Wednesday, 13 December 2011 (www.ddcuba.com/opinion/8265-de-regreso-al-punto-de-partida)

Father Varela, Man of the Present

The accords of the Sixth Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC), along with those emanating from its five previous congresses, have demonstrated not only their inability to solve the serious problems of Cuban society, but also to enforce the approved guidelines.

The separation of the functions of the Party from those of the State, one of the basic lines drawn in the Congress and upon which depends the rest of the approved projects, seems unachievable. The mentality of the political-administrative cadres, formed under a prolonged totalitarian leadership, is incapable of fulfilling its own accords.

After having recognized the errors committed, and agreeing to change their methods and to separate political functions from administrative, the 15 provincial assemblies of the PCC held after the Congress, seemed destined to reject this change in methods, as each of them called for a “change in mentality” but then continued on doing the same things as before.

The assemblies concentrated a call to its members to change the language but keep the facts of the previous methods: “The Party has to know what everyone is doing, with names and surnames.” “We need to know in advance what each farmer will plant and harvest.” Or, “We must demand from those who don’t make the land productive.” These were some of the approaches, whose real effect is nothing more than to undermine the interests of the producers and keep them tied to the constraints that prevent them from producing efficiently.

But the exclusion, a problem that has much to do with the dismal state of Cuban society, remains. Civil liberties, without which none of the problems we face can be solved, remain absent. And everything indicates that those who wield the power of the ship are no hurry to amend this direction, as shown by the above provincial assemblies of the PCC.

One of the disparate consequences of this behavior is that in addition to the decline and stagnation suffered, Cuba stands apart from the processes taking place in the world, taking us ever further from contemporary reality, at a time when events that are taking place in different parts of the world that point to greater citizen participation. A process objective, universal, unstoppable and complex requires ways of thinking and acting that enable the coupling of each country to the exigencies of its era.

In short, the most vital is still lacking: the conversion of Cubans into citizens, active participants in the changes, because the implementation of human rights, the starting point for that purpose, has no place in the government agenda. This reality shows the urgent need for a change in mentality, first in political conceptions, a sphere related to decision making, with a relationship between people with common interests and public activities that decide the fate of the nation.

In political matters it is a waste and a contradiction to have valuable contributions of different Cuban thinkers and not to draw from the all they contain that is useful for today. It is even more contradictory that the Central Report to the Sixth Congress of the CCP mentions founding figures of culture and politics such as José Martí Cuban, Father Felix Varela and José de la Luz y Caballero without considering fully their ideas, contributions and definitions on such crucial issues as freedom, democracy, inclusion and civic participation.

In edition No. 8 of Voices magazine, I devoted an article to the major nineteenth century politician, José Martí, under the title: Cuba: the wrongs of the single party. At this opportunity, I write of Father Varela, the first in a logical and historical order, because it was he who first  dealt with the need for changes in the way of thinking because, to paraphrase the historian Eduardo Torres Cuevas, we find him necessary and essential because, across the distances of time, his political teachings remain in full force.

Felix Francisco José María de la Concepción Varela y Morales (1778-1853), was born in Havana and died in St. Augustine, Florida. He studied at the San Carlos Seminary and the Royal and Pontifical University of San Geronimo de La Habana. In 1810 he was ordained as a deacon and in 1811 as a priest (1). In the Seminary he met José Agustín Caballero, who exerted a significant influence in relation to the scholastic and autonomous.

In the Seminary he held the chairs of Latin Language and Culture, Philosophy and Constitution. He was the first to speak in Cuba of the nation, including the whole national territory; the first  who developed a project for the abolition of slavery in Cuba; the first thing who followed his own direction in Cuban thought and set out to teach us to think; and also the first to introduce ethics in scientific, social and political studies. Thus, José de la Luz y Caballero defined him as our true civilizer and José Martí called him the overarching patriot.

Every age and every generation has its historical mission. If the native Havanans of the mid-seventeenth century, led by Felix Arrate, addressed the claim of island politics of equality before the Spaniards; and the Creole-Cubans of the same century, with Francisco de Arango y Parreno in the lead proposed to convert Cuba into the largest producer of sugar and coffee in the world, and succeeded; to the generation of the early nineteenth century — that of Father Varela — were touched by the impact of the bourgeois revolutions that marked a change of era in the history of mankind. Thus, like the two preceding generations, and those that succeeded him, he addressed the adequacy of the forms of thought to the new challenges posed by that time.

Varela was born at the height of the transition from feudalism to capitalism, at the time when a republican constitutional system was introduced in the United States; at the time of the outbreak of the French Revolution that globalized the ideology of bourgeois revolutions; at the time of Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, and of the French constitutions of the late seventeenth century; at the time of the death of the enlightened monarch Carlos III, with which the splendor of Despotism was finished. A context imposed by the need for a different politics, followed by Arrate or Arango y Parreño.

In 1801, returning to Cuba after nearly 13 years living with his family in Florida, Varela enrolled in the seminary of St. Charles, where a cultural movement began to take shape in Havana, fueled by the liberal Bishop Espada, who, as happened later with Rafael María de Mendive with respect to José Martí, gave him books from his own library and introduced him to the gatherings in which they discussed the philosophical, political, legal, artistic or scientific work emanating from the historical events mentioned above.

A few years later, when Spain promulgated the liberal Constitution of 1812, Felix Varela assumed the chair of Philosophy San Carlos Seminary, from where he deepened the critique of the structures of thought already begun by Jose Agustin Caballero against the Scholastics; a criticism directed primarily toward the liberation of thought. His philosophy was characterized by freedom, and on being freed he created the basis for a path based on our reality, “our own way of thinking emanating from the physical, cultural and ethical aspects of emerging and still not clearly defined Cubanness” (2).

From this emerged his political position toward the colonial power, forming what might be called an insular proto-political science, because political science is that, the science that studies the relationship between power and the State toward current social networks.

Eight years later, as a result of Spain’s 1820 return to the liberal Constitution, the Constitutional Chair was established in the St. Charles seminary, where Varela, responding to the request and advice of Bishop Espada, assumed it with an inaugural address saying: “I would call this Chair the chair of freedom, human rights, of national security, of the regeneration of the illustrious Spain, the source of civic virtue, the basis of the great building of our happiness …. ” (3).

His philosophy lessons, Torres Cuevas explains, were composed of three parts:

1-The theory of knowledge (ideology or study of the production of ideas),

2 – The application of that theory to the nature of man and society (ideology applied , ie, ethics and politics), and,

3 – The physical (study of the natural generation of ideas and the only producer of true knowledge).

But the focus of his philosophical concern, in line with ethics, was what constituted man, so that, in addition to having initiated the path toward independence of thought, he gave a solid ethical basis to the aspirations of the Cuban people, whom he considered an actor in social events. He assumed the ethics of his primary character, elemental and essential in social relations, because it also carries the principle of absolute equality of all human beings and because it constitutes the foundation of rights upon which are erected dignity, civil society and civic participation.

For Varela, one of his basic political principles was to do at every moment what it is possible to do in that moment, and to adapt the means to the end, which explains the evolution of his thinking and practical action. Hence the order of events on which he insisted: creating one’s own thought; training in civic and patriotic virtues; fighting for the autonomy for the island and the abolition of slavery, for he which elaborated an Autonomy Project for the Island of Cuba, liberal and progressive in nature, and another project for the abolition of slavery, in the heyday of the sugar plantation.

These were reformist projects that, without breaking abruptly with the existing system, were proposed, in keeping with the historic moment, as the possible: expanding the rights of those born in the island without excluding those from Africa; demonstrating the need for independence and when he understood its momentary unviability, giving himself over to an effort more directed at preparing the minds in which to gestate a conspiracy.

From this new vision he devoted all his efforts to teaching how to think of the island’s needs in national terms. According to Jorge Ibarra (4), this produced for the first time “in the island’s thinking the fusion of national and social aspirations of the classes and strata that constituted the people/nation in 1868.”

It is from this moment, from El Habanero (5) to Letters to Elpidio (6), he focused on what is a rarity in our political action: the formation of conscience and virtue in the future subjects of change, men capable of thinking about the problems of a nation in formation, which explains the phrase of Luz y Caballero: Varela was the one who “taught us first to think” and therefore, said Pope John Paul II, in the Auditorium of the University of Havana, he generated “a school of thought, a style of social interaction and an attitude toward the country which should illuminate Cubans, even today,” adding, “This led him to believe in the power of the small, the efficacy of the seeds of truth, in the desirability of changes made with the appropriate gradualness toward great and genuine reforms” (7).

Many of the current stumbling blocks are related to the ignorance of this source of knowledge and virtues. So, beyond mentioning that Father Varela must be considered in all his political and human dimension, and therefore, like him, considering the Cuban people as a political entity and actor in social changes; like him, starting from the value of freedom as a base of societal functioning; like him, recognizing that the inclusion of everyone is an inviolable principle of coexistence; like him, accepting that the absolute community of property is a delusion, because the very nature of society requires individual differences; like him, accepting that social equality must be understood in terms that all individuals are subject to the law, having a same rights if they proceed in the same way; and like him, in so many other aspects that are pending in our society; but above all because Father Varela, along with the promotion of values ​​and the forging of virtues, was determined to teach us to think, which is not a phrase devoid of content, but consists in seeing that the individual is free of constraints, finding the truth first which is within and from him, with freedom of spirit, to act accordingly to promote social change, for, as he emphatically expressed: there is no nation without virtue.

All this makes Varela not a relic of the past to mention in speeches, but a man of the present.

One can infer, from the above, that the possible solutions to current problems of Cuba, demand a new way of thinking, a thought emerging from our own roots in close relation to global processes to produce a new quality, new thinking . The challenge lies in the transformation of individuals into citizens, into political actors. A transformation that has its starting point in the party of universally recognized human rights, particularly those of the first generation: civil and political rights; since the process of civic education and the formation of a non-existent public opinion, requires action starting from the ethical-moral principles associated with being human as an end, not as a method, as indicated to us by Father Varela.

Footnotes

1 Sacred level immediately before the priesthood.
2 Torres Cuevas, Eduardo y otros. Obras de Félix Varela. Tomo I, p. XX. La Habana: Editora Política, 1991.
3 C M. DE CÉSPEDES. Señal en la noche, p.84
4 Ibarra Cuesta, Jorge. Varela el precursor, un estudio de época. La Habana: Editorial de Ciencias Sociales, 2004.
5 El Habanero, Political, Scientific and Literary Paper (1824-1826). The first Cuban newspaper promoting independence. Its first three numbers were published in Philadelphia and the other four in New York. The Crown forbade its introduction in Spain and adjacent islands.
6 The Letters to Elpidio, constitute a system of ethical and political ideas of the greatest use that were intended for youth, whom he viewed as the only ones disposed to understand, accept and love the freedom of Cuba. Elpidio, taken from Greek, means hope. They are therefore, Letters of Hope.
7 JUAN PABLO II. Discursos de su santidad en su viaje apostólico a Cuba, p.15

(Published in No. 9 of the digital magazine VOICES on Friday, 29 July 2011, on the site VocesCubanas.com)

1 August 2011

The Citizen, A Debt to Padre Varela

Under the title, “The place of citizenship, political participation and the Republic in Cuba,” the Padre Felix Varela Cultural Center was the scene, Saturday, July 2, of a lecture by a lawyer and university professor, Julio César Guanche. The institution, belonging to the Archdiocese of Havana, occupies the building which, until last January, was the site of the San Carlos and St. Ambrose Seminary, where Father Felix Varela y Morales, in the early nineteenth century, held the chairs of Philosophy and Constitution, from which he developed a cultural, educational and civic work, leading to the formation of thinking about Cuban nationality.

In his opening remarks, the president of the Yosvany Carvajal Cultural Center explained that this new area of thought, studies and discussions, will begin its academic functions this coming September and later other educational and cultural functions will be added. The Julio César Guanche conference was a final rehearsal prior to opening.

There is nothing more opportune for the Cuban sociopolitical reality than the issue of citizenship and political participation. In this sense, the young Cuban intellectual’s dissertation began with the words of Felix Varela at the inauguration of the Chair of Constitution in 1821: I would like to call this Chair, the chair of freedom, human rights, and national guarantees, of the regeneration of the illustrious Spain, the source of civic virtue, the basis of the vast edifice of our happiness, for the first time among us has reconciled with the philosophy of law … which contains the fanatic and despotic ….”

Among other approaches, Guanche addressed issues concerning the legality of contemporary Cuban society and the need to create and use spaces, actual or potential, to exercise citizenship through keys defined by Felix Varela. He noted that despite the statistics displayed by the Cuban authorities regarding the high popular participation in elections, the electoral system leaves in place conflicts between institutional and citizen participation and he added that government programs at the local, provincial and national levels are not defined through the electoral process. Thus, the role of citizens and their political participation in Cuban politics became an axis of intense and respectful debate among intellectuals, academics, scholars and journalists present, of all shades, on how to build power, to confirm power, expand power and to use politics to broaden the ways of living together: a practical testimony to the necessity of discussing vital public issues of our society.

Interventions such as those of professors from the University of Havana, Berta Alvarez and Maria del Carmen Barcia, regarding the Cuban constitution and the concept of citizenship, respectively, and the writer Victor Fowler, who explained the difference between the formation of citizens and revolutionaries, proved the appropriateness of the invitations from the editor of the magazine Espacio Laical.

Father Varela, whose name heads the Cultural Center ,was the first to speak in Cuba about the concept of homeland encompassing the entire national territory, of belonging, rootedness and interests, he evolved from autonomy to become a promoter of independence; he moved from the good treatment of slaves to the elimination of the horrific slave trade and the abolition of slavery; he chose education as a path to liberation; he plotted his own course to Cuban thought and insisted on teaching us to think; and in addition, he introduced ethics in scientific, social and political studies. For all that this great teacher, who also held the José de la Luz y Caballero Chair of Philosophy, defined as our real civilization.

The conference and the current debate also revealed that the work begun by Varela 190 years ago is not only unfinished, but pending. Indeed, just two weeks ago the President of the State Council of Cuba, Raul Castro, said in an enlarged Council of the Council of Ministers: We need to discuss and disagree over all levels of management, because in a diversity of views are the best solutions to our current problems. A limited truth, as the diversity of opinion must be extended to public debate.

In a society like Cuba’s, lacking an independent civil society, it is about promoting dialogue as a mechanism for participation and exchange of ideas, without which any project of social transformation cannot succeed, although headed by the Communist Party. In Cuba, for known reasons, people are tired of being objects of slogans and speeches. It is necessary that individuals involved in the survival become public, until the deliberations are transformed into a source of perfecting governance. It is therefore essential to open the doors of politics, whose starting point begins with the exchange of ideas between all parties to identify common interests, to propose measures before they are implemented or are in the process of being implemented.

The policy, whose definition is derived from polis, as the ancient Greeks called the city, from its beginning was related to public activities to ensure the common good. That is, politics like human invention began from the time when communities realized that their fate was subject to decisions to survive. Politics is just that, a relationship between people with common interests to solve problems and, therefore, it predates and transcends the class division of society, and is a natural human activity that requires participation, learning by doing, making mistakes, to become true citizens.

The challenge lies in transforming individuals into citizens, into political actors. A transformation that has its starting point in universally recognized human rights, particularly in the first generation of civil and political rights. This process of civic education and the formation of currently non-existent public opinion, requires acting from ethical and moral principles that place the human being as an end and not as means.

Published in Diario de Cuba, Tuesday, July 13, 2011 (www.dddcuba.com)

July 15 2011

Heroes Without Weapons

Dr. Tomás Romay Chacón

In Cuba, with its pregnant history of violent acts, we pay exaggerated attention to episodes of war in detriment to other ways of making history, such as science–forger of knowledge and of culture–that contributes so much to the formation of nationality the nation and the country over centuries. On May 19 of this year we will arrive at the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Royal Academy of medical, physical, and natural sciences of Havana, whose birth was conditioned by the development reached by the productive forces and by the sustained and joint effort of Cubans, who from different political and ideological positions, united their forces for the development of Cuba. In recognition of these heroes, almost anonymous, I am going to mention nine of them.

Tomás Romay Chacón (1764-1849). Physician, cofounder of Newsprint of Havana and of the Economic Society of Friends of the Country, made innumerable contributions to science and culture, but it was in medicine where he made his greatest contributions; in 1794 he presented to the Ordinary Meeting of the Patriotic Society of the Friends of the Country–the first scientific meeting of Cuban doctors–-his dissertation on the malignant fever commonly called black ball met, and discovered it introduced vaccination against smallpox, introduced the studies of anatomy on the cadaver, those of the clinic in the rooms of the hospital and took students to the sources of the sick and to the morgue to practice autopsies. He was one of those who petitioned King Fernando VII about the necessity of creating a science academy on the island. for his activities in preventing disease and promoting the advancement of medicine he is considered “the first great Cuban hygienist” and the initiator of the scientific movement in Cuba. Romay was a man of his time in class, of the established political system, defender of the established political system, admirer of the Spanish monarchy, and intransigent enemy of revolutionary liberalism; irrefutable proof that one can be a force in science, culture and nationality independent of political or ideological affiliation.

José Estévez Cantal (1771-1841). Chemist and botanist. Student of Tomás Romay was probably the first Cuban who received a scientific education in Europe and the first botanist of some importance. Between them they worked on a catalog of plants, begun by Baltasar Boldo, considered as the first floor of Cuba. He was the first Cuban chemist who distinguished himself in the search for varieties of sugarcane and who applied this science to a new branch of therapy: medical hydrology. Thanks to his analysis of the waters of San Diego–the most famous of our mineral medicinal springs–he was able to take advantage of their healing properties. Through Estévez botany, chemistry, and mineralogy were introduced on the island reinvigorating the already advanced movement of cultural and scientific reform.

Esteban Pichardo Tapia (1799-1879). Lawyer and geographer, born in Santo Domingo. Considered “the most prominent geographer of Cuba.” His geographic and cartographic work was the basis for the contour map drawn to scale, made ​​in 1908 by the American Army of Occupation. His main geographical work was the Route Map of the Roads of Cuba. In 1829 he presented the Compendium of Geography of the Island of Cuba for use in colleges and high schools. He also dabbled in literature with a volume of poems and the Dictionary of Cuban Voices, published in 1836.

Felipe Poey Aloy (1799-1891). Researcher and Professor in Natural Sciences. In France, where he met Jorge Cuvier, he published his first entomological studies. In 1838, he presented a project to establish in Havana a cabinet of natural history, which later became part of the University of Havana. He studied The sugarcane borer and avocado pests, bringing wide knowledge of the basics of biology. He is considered “the initiator of the scientific era in the natural history of Cuba” and was one of the 30 founding members of the Royal Academy of Medical Sciences, Physical and Natural Sciences.

Nicolás Gutiérrez José Hernández (1800-1890). Surgeon, founder of the Havana Medical Journal, Cuba’s first magazine devoted exclusively to medicine. He introduced in Cuba chloroform is a surgical anesthetic. On the death of Tomás Romay, Nicolás became the principal figure in the Havana medical community. He was one of the leading personalities in the struggle to found the Royal Academy of Medical, Physical and Natural Sciences in Havana, where he held the presidency to which he was reelected until his death.

Francisco Frias Jacott, Count of Pozos Dulces (1809-1877). Agronomist, science writer and agrarian reformer. Author of the Agricultural Development Program, aimed at laying the foundations for a national identity agro-technology and agro-science to achieve social and economic equilibrium. An ardent supporter of small farms, small industry and the work of the peasant family. He was the first speaker at the Royal Academy of Medical Sciences, Physical and Natural Sciences of Havana, on the theory of Darwin, and was a defender of the Institute for Chemical Research, founded in 1848, and in 1861 he was a promoter of the Cuban Agricultural Institute. In 1868 he was honored for his work: “Report on the livestock industry on the island of Cuba” and “The scientific basis on which rests the view that the destruction of the animal kingdom, involves that of the plant and vice versa.”

Francisco Fernández de Lara Albee (1816-1887). Engineer. Between the repair of the Convent of San Agustín in Havana, his first work, through the construction of the Isabel II aqueduct, he is found prominently in all the material construction of that era. His great work with the use of the waters of the Vento Springs, for which he investigated the entire relationship between the quality and the transfer of the liquid to the Palatino reservoirs. Through this he demonstrated the negative influence of sunlight on the deposited waters; modify the geology of the terrain to adapt it to protect the canal; and ran it under the Almendares River. A project that was not repeated until the middle of the 20th century, when the tunnel under Havana Bay was constructed. For this work he was awarded, first in Philadelphia and later in Paris, with the gold medal, while the Royal development board called him “the most famous of Cuban engineers.”

Aguirre Andrés Poey (1825-1919). Meteorologist. Precursor in Cuba of research in this field, considered the “true creator of scientific meteorology in Cuba.” In 1848 he prepared an atlas with 28 lithographed maps for primary schools, the first of its kind printed in Cuba. In 1850 he established an observatory at his home where he undertook atmospheric research. In 1855 he produced a catalog of hurricanes entitled “Chronological Table comprising 400 hurricanes and cyclones that have occurred in the West Indies and the North Atlantic from 1493 to 1855;” a work considered essential in this matter.

Alvaro Reinoso y Valdés (1829-1888). Chemist, physiologist, agronomist and industrial technologist. He replaced José Luis Casaseca at the head of the Chemical Research Institute of Havana, which became the Agricultural Station. In 1862, when Cuba ranked first in the world in sugar production, it stood last in agricultural productivity. To the solution of this contradiction Reynoso devoted all his efforts. In his masterpiece, “An Essay on the cultivation of sugar cane,” published in 1862, he developed a comprehensive system of agro-technical measures to ensure the intensive cultivation of sugar cane, for which he fully analyzed all operations related to the cultivation and harvesting of the grass. Reinoso is considered “Father of the Cuban Scientific Agriculture.” Despite all the time that has passed, Cuba today has not exceeded the sugar crops of a century ago.

Along with these nine heroes of Cuban science it is necessary to recognize the contributions of foreign scientists, including Alejandro Humboldt de Hollwede (1769-1859), José Luís Casaseca Silván (1800-1869) y Ramón de la Sagra Periz (1798-1871). The first, in many respects, knew Cuba better than Cuban themselves, the latter is considered the “father of Cuban chemistry” and the third, the leading Professor of Natural History, who created and directed the Botanical Garden and the Havana Institute of Agriculture.

The review of these famous scientists makes a mockery of the absurd attempt to link homeland and nation with socialism and revolution.

Published in Diario de Cuba (www.ddcuba.com) Friday, May 27, 2011

Family and Migration

(Published in Laborem, voice of the Movement of Christian Workers/Cuba. Year 9, No. 36, October-December 2010)

There is a close relationship between the family and migration. The family is a group constituted by blood ties or marriage that, besides preceding other forms of social relationships, due to its functions constitutes the very marrow of society.  It is the school of love, of education and participation in people’s lives, while it gives its members company and security.  Migration, which is as ancient as the family, is a form of reaccommodation in order to survive when material and/or social conditions in the place of residence become insufficient to guarantee the conservation and development of life.

With the exception of the nomadic tribes that moved around with all their members, contemporary migration separates one part of its members, often a married couple.  It is a phenomenon that, becoming universal as globalization develops, affects the traditional functions of the family.  In the particular case of Cuba, the economic crisis, the lack of proportion between income and the cost of living and the prohibition on leaving and returning to the country, among other factors, generate individual as well as mass migration, as the Cuban family immersed in the struggle to satisfy its most elemental needs, when separated, loses a good part of the reasons that held it together.  This has occurred both before and after the embargo, before and after the Adjustment Law and before and after the “Battle of Ideas” and so it will continue.

Migration, with no possibility of returning, besides affecting the family–especially the youngest, who are the principal beneficiaries of its instruction, education and love–also affects the nation, since the flight of professionals is decapitalizing and aging our society.  Perhaps that is why John Paul II, in his homily to the family, told us, “Cuba, take care of your families so that you keep your heart healthy.”

Translated by S. Solá

January 17 2011