California State University, Dominguez Hills
Created: June 7, 2001
Latest update: June 7, 2001
jeannecurran@habermas.org.

This essay is based on a series of posts on Progressive Sociologists Net (PSN) on Cuba:

• In Castro's Changing World, Clashing Voices by David Gonzalez, Ney York Times, p. A1, Wednesday, May 30, 2001. backup

• Re: More on Cuban totalitarianism -- & Orwell, semantics, etc. by Kenneth Gould.

• Whole series of posts on Cuba Some of you may want to pursue this. These are long and involved posts, but they can provide you with a good left perspective on Cuba. Bear in mind that if you choose this series for a text, I will expect you to consider the right perspective response.

  These posts are still going up. Michael Pugliese's from PSN is not yet appearing on the PSN index. This excerpt caught my eye when I picked it up in e-mail:

  When I put this up the post was confusing as to where it was coming from, and I didn't have time to trace it. The citations are in Michael Pugliese's post on June 7, 2001 on PSN. They are part of the review on Carollee Bengelsdorf's work. The quotes are from Samuel Farber's "Cuba: The One-Party State Continues."

  "What was important about the Cuban 60s were not the differences with Asian and European Communism but the dramatic transformation of what had been originally a democratic and, shortly after the successful overthrow of Batista, a radically reformist and anti-imperialist revolution into a member of the Communist family." (About two-fifths of the way down the file.) Here the author is comparing Castro's conceptions to those of Jose Marti, whose work you should know, if you're interested in Cuba.

  "A case in point is her characterization of Castro's regime as paternalism, which she defines as the practice of treating people as children instead of self-reliant adults capable of making decisions. This approach captures an aspect of Castroism but deflects attention from the major role repression has played in almost four decades of rule. While the right-wing incorrectly claims that Castro does not enjoy any popular support and that his regime rules only on the basis of repression, it is disturbing that Bengelsdorf downplays the role of State Security (Seguridad del Estado) and the neighborhood vigilance carried out by the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDRs), resulting in systematic violations of civil and political liberties." (About a quarter of an inch down the file in Pugliese's post at PSN on June 7, 2001.)

  I hope the brief quotes here will give you an idea of the level of the discussion going on at PSN.

Related References

• CUBA : PRESSURE FOR CHANGE By Marian Marshrons - WRITENET (UK) (September 1993) from the Michael Pugliese post on PSN, June 7, 2001. Online.

• Cuba: The One-Party State Continues Samuel Farber [from New Politics, vol. 5, no. 3 (new series), whole no. 19, Summer 1995] from the Michael Pugliese post on PSN, June 7, 2001. Online.