Re: [Marxism] Cujban CP official Oscar Martinex on new economic policy

[Manuel Barrera]

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Oscar Martínez said:"... But also our productivity is too low. We need greater 
efficiency and more saving to ensure economic growth. We are a small country 
with limited resources. We need better organize our production, improve 
discipline, and update our economic model. We are importing far too much, 
especially food, and need to be more self-sufficient. We need to focus far more 
on agriculture. Food production has now become an issue of national security."



Yes, isn't that whole "socialism [or even close to socialism] in one country" 
thing a bear (sic)? 
I used to believe that being a great example of "what could be done" was a 
great point of departure in showing people interested in socialism that at 
least there was one country where capitalism had been overturned And there were 
revolutionary internationalists at the helm who could and should be emulated.

I believe that still to be true. However, I believe the epoch in which such 
exemplars are a sufficient guide to action is (or at least in process of) 
passing. At some point, "swimming in a sea of mud" just to survive is simply an 
exercise for the dying. Cuban leaders and their pretenders in Venezuela and 
Bolivia, while not complacent, seem stuck in their perceived roles as example 
to others. However, the Cuban people are a truly conscious (in their majority 
at least) people with great intellectual, programmatic, and organizational 
"wealth" in the 50+ years of struggle against insurmountable odds. Is providing 
doctors, teachers, even soldiers to countries in need really the best way to 
defend the revolution? The metaphors have to change; no more swimming in mud. 
To find ways for a "socialist" state to survive economically using the language 
and tactics more akin to radical trade unionists fighting for better conditions 
within a capitalist system illustrates the futility of trying to "hang on" (as 
if the laws of the class struggle are somehow immune and not simply exacerbated 
within a worker's state). 
What the world needs is a nation of organizers--proletarian internationalist 
activists, international party builders--not "excellent stewards" of dismal 
resources in one "island in the sun". The Cuban example is powerful not in its 
defeat of capital within its borders, but in its potential capacity to 
galvanize the world working class. To think otherwise is selling the Cuban 
revolution short at best and confining itself into a stalinist bureaucratic 
quagmire of isolationism at worst. 


Being a person of color, I have spent a lifetime learning and then simply 
knowing that I would have to do better than my privileged counterparts just 
even to be acknowledged. I turned that reality into an understanding that it 
would Never matter what I could individually accomplish as doing so would never 
bring me anything but grudging tolerance and ultimate rejection regardless. I 
say this simply to point out that no matter how sterling our efforts or those 
of our comrades (e.g., in Cuba), such great examples will Never suffice because 
the kernel of our strivings is a society corrupt in its evolution no matter how 
material the history from which it spawned. There really is only one outcome 
that will bring any of us peace; and it is not finding and simply defending our 
own "little piece of heaven". 


The materialist dialectic indicates that out of the contradictions of class 
exploitation will come the conditions for proletarian usurpation of the world 
of privilege and inhumanity. But that usurpation is Never inevitable as history 
has shown; at least not without the ultimately dialectical intervention of 
revolutionary leadership. That leadership, to be sure, will be born of that 
same proletariat who began as a class tied to survival with the meager means it 
was/is provided by the liars, cheats, and hoarders of the world wealth but that 
will finally become the liberators of the world from the scourge of privilege 
with want. For such a leadership to emerge, we must go beyond examples to 
action; from fending for oneself in a "revolutionary" fashion to driving the 
example forward and fomenting it not with zealous "emulation" but with helping 
to empower, galvanize, and organize the rest of "us" in every corner of this 
globe.  

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[Marxism] Cujban CP official Oscar Martinex on new economic policy

[Fred Feldman]

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Cuba's Economic Reform: 
Interview with Oscar Martínez
by Yunus Carrim 
Oscar Martínez is Deputy Head of the International Relations Department of
the Cuban Communist Party.  This interview was conducted during the South
African Communist Party visit to Cuba this month.

What is the nature of the economic problems Cuba is currently experiencing?

In the context of our other problems, the US economic and financial blockade
is hurting our economy more now.  The blockade has been the main obstacle to
our social and economic development over 48 years.  With the collapse of the
Soviet Union and the socialist bloc, we lost our main trading partners.  It
was a severe blow from which we have not yet recovered.  The 2008 global
economic crisis also hit us hard.  The price of nickel, a major export
earner, has gone down.  And we have had huge losses with the hurricanes.
But also our productivity is too low.  We need greater efficiency and more
saving to ensure economic growth.  We are a small country with limited
resources.  We need better organize our production, improve discipline, and
update our economic model.  We are importing far too much, especially food,
and need to be more self-sufficient.  We need to focus far more on
agriculture.  Food production has now become an issue of national security.

Isn't the US blockade easing?

In practical terms, no.  The main aspects remain and overall the blockade
has even got worse.  Since 2009 there have been more prohibitions on
companies doing business with Cuba.  Yet 187 countries voted against the
blockade in the UN General Assembly.  Direct economic damages to Cuba since
the blockade began in 1962 until December 2009, according to conservative
estimates, surpass 154 billion US dollars.  If this was calculated according
to the present value of the US dollar, it would be about 239 billion
dollars.

But if you have economic problems how does it follow that you have to
retrench half a million state workers?  Especially since you're a socialist
state?

We are not retrenching.  That's a capitalist term.  We are not putting
people out in the street.  We are not going to leave them without social
assistance.  We are re-organising the workforce, not firing workers.  We are
directing them to other areas of work vital for the economy, mainly food
production.  We are making these changes as part of updating our economic
model in order to ensure that our socialist system is sustainable on the
basis of the rational and effective use of the workforce.  The first phase
will be concluded by the first quarter of 2011.  As part of the process, we
are giving people land, and helping them to make productive use of it.  A
significant section of this land is near the urban areas, where 80% of the
working population lives.  If this land is used to produce food, it will
also reduce the fuel and transport costs because it's near the urban areas.
We have too many bureaucrats and professionals, not enough artisans.  We
want to move people from just producing paper to areas of the economy in
which they can be productive and contribute to the economy.  We are trying
to find new areas of work for them.  As President Raul Castro says, 'We have
to remove once and for all the notion that Cuba is the only country in the
world where you can live without working'.  If they do not accept work that
the government directs them to, they can be self-employed.  We have opened
up 178 areas in which they can work.  Over 2 years, the state will have to
give up about a million workers.

Are you going to re-skill the workers?  And what areas are you opening up?

Yes, we are going to fully support the workers to get new skills and other
means to get started.  Our higher educational institutions are also going to
assist.  Banks will help with loans.  Our main priority, of course, is food
production, with the emphasis on substitution of imports, but we also want
to increase imports in certain areas.  The new areas being opened are in
tourism, trade and services, mainly.  We are to allow more people to be
self-employed as transport providers, bricklayers, stonemasons, plumbers,
electricians, panel-beaters, shoe-repairers, hairdressers, shoe-makers,
accountants and so on.  We are also to allow people to have restaurants with
up to 20 seats.  Labour must be got from the owners' families, but they can
also employ a limited number of people.

Will there be a minimum wage for those employed and any restriction on the
profits of the restaurant owners and others?

Yes, there will be a minimum wage.  These will be limited enterprises and
they won't be able to make huge profits.  We are introducing new
redistributive taxes.  In fact, new regulations related to this, including
the modification of the tax system, have