Cuba: Choice and Change
HAVANA TIMES – Cuba stands at a pivotal moment. Power outages darken Havana’s streets, inflation erodes savings, and young professionals leave in record numbers. Cuban GDP has dropped an estimated 15% since 2018; independent estimates place inflation near 70%. Since 2020, an estimated 2.5 million Cubans—about 20% of the population—have emigrated seeking stability and dignity abroad.
Decades of centralized planning, recurring crises, and external pressure have left the island grappling with shrinking output and deep social strain. Continuity for its own sake cannot guarantee stability, much less prosperity. Durable change must originate within—guided by Cuban decision, leadership courage, and civic participation.
Standing With the People
Most Cubans, especially those under 50, aspire to more than economic survival. They seek opportunity, security, and basic freedoms: the right to speak, to organize peacefully, and to choose their leaders. Emigration, shortages, and declining public services have frayed families and hollowed out confidence. These are not abstract grievances; they are daily realities.
Economic reforms alone—decentralizing management, protecting private enterprise, opening agriculture, energy, tourism, and telecommunications—can mitigate crisis but cannot resolve it. Without expanded civic space, independent institutions, and legal recourse against arbitrary actions, reforms risk remaining rhetorical. Cubans demand accountability, not merely breathing room for a political monopoly.
Lessons and Comparisons
Vietnam’s Đổi Mới offers a relevant precedent: internally driven economic liberalization that restored growth and credibility without abandoning national sovereignty. Cuba’s past reliance on Venezuela’s subsidized oil and episodic external patronage illustrates the fragility of dependence. Durable development cannot be imported; it must be constructed domestically through institutions that reward productivity, protect initiative, and command public trust.
The landing of a Russian Ilyushin Il-76 cargo aircraft at a military airfield in Havana last Sunday night illustrates Cuba’s familiar search for leverage, not a decisive geopolitical pivot. Such gestures signal alternatives to widen bargaining space with Washington—much as Vietnam once balanced U.S. normalization with ties to China, Russia, and global markets. But Cuba is not Vietnam. What matters is not the model, but the logic: reform first, diversify relations, prioritize development over ideology.
Beijing and Moscow may offer investment and political backing, but neither can substitute for reforms rooted in Cuban priorities. US policy—transactional and volatile—cannot deliver stability absent internal transformation. Strategic autonomy and diversified engagement preserve sovereignty only when anchored in a functioning domestic economy and a society that feels invested in its future.
The Diaspora’s Contribution
The Cuban diaspora holds vast potential for national renewal. Its capital, skills, and networks could accelerate reconstruction if paired with credible legal protections, transparent institutions, and guarantees against arbitrary confiscation.
Most Cubans abroad seek not privilege but predictability and fairness—the ability to contribute without fear. Without independent courts and enforceable property rights, however, such guarantees remain promises without consequence. Rebuilding this relationship is reconnection, not dependency, but it can only amplify reforms that create trust.
Reform as Stability and Opportunity
Reform is not the enemy of stability—it is its precondition. Gradual decentralization can rejuvenate fiscal resources, strengthen governance, and restore civic morale. Modernizing property rights and regulatory systems will not dismantle the state; it will reinforce its legitimacy and capacity to govern.
Economic reform that merely preserves monopoly power without expanding political rights ultimately postpones, rather than resolves, national crisis.
Civil servants, professionals, and committed patriots can and should remain contributors to public life. Reform offers continuity of service, not collective erasure. It replaces paralysis with purpose—adaptation rather than rupture.
Choosing the Future
Cuba’s crisis is structural. Alignment with any external power offers temporary relief, not lasting development. The central choice is no longer between socialism and capitalism, East and West, but between stagnation and renewal.
Vietnam’s experience shows controlled, internally led reform can preserve national coherence while opening paths to progress. Cuba’s challenge is profound, but so is its potential. The moment demands pragmatic courage: acting decisively, listening to citizens, and building institutions that make accountability real.
Cuba’s renewal depends not on permission from abroad or preservation of the past, but on the imagination and bravery of its own people. A free, democratic, and prosperous Cuba begins with that choice—made by Cubans themselves.
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*Havana Times guest contributor Khanh Vu Duc is a professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa, Canada.
*Author’s Note: I write as a friend of the Cuban people and nation, not as an ally of any political party, government, or opposition. This analysis prioritizes the aspirations of Cuban citizens, social stability, and strategic reflection on the island’s urgent crossroads.