Moving Cuba toward “Socialism of the 21st Century”

Graham Sowa

HAVANA TIMES — “Socialism of the 21st Century” will be the legacy of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.  Cuba should continue to take cues from this new flavor of post-capitalist governance and embrace new atheistic appeals of Socialism. Here I present a few ways Cuba can get a move on re-branding its somewhat dated style.

When sociologist Heinz Dieterich published the phrase “Socialism of the 21st Century” (often credited to Hugo Chavez) in 1996 he said that contemporary socialism needs to be aesthetically self-determined.

Here I’m going to assume Mr. Dieterich was subtly referring to the uniforms of the Cuban Ministry of Interior, because they are way past their expiration date.

Watching workers leave the Ministry of Interior building in the Plaza de la Revolucion looks like some type of sad, post-World War II East German documentary about collective workplaces.

It just smacks too much of the “Spy vs. Spy” mentality that Cuba is accused of having towards its citizens and antagonist foreign counterparts.

But this perception can be radically changed with just a bit of variation of wardrobe.  Instead of olive drab homogeneous uniforms lets talk about colors.  Look what Venezuela did with yellow, red, and blue.  ´

These three severely loud and clashing colors belong on a product marketed to impulse buyers.  However 21st Century Socialism has turned them into a unique, yet versatile, marketing strategy and declaration of political loyalty.

Cuba should abandon the official “I’m a government worker” uniform and get a color scheme.  That way people can wear whatever they want, as long as it falls in the right place on the color wheel.  This would allow for a perfect balance of individuality and wholesale allegiance.

Another way to get Cuba moving toward Socialism of the 21st Century is to put up some new Revolutionary billboards with classic images.  If tourism is going to fund a large part of the post-capitalist economy (please ignore the irony) then the tourists have to think they really are in a Revolutionary Socialist country.

Currently it seems that a lot of billboards that used to say thing like “Hasta la Victoria, Siempre” with a classic Alberto Korda photo are being replaced by “Varadero: Your Vacation Dream” with a generic white sands Caribbean beach photo.

Tourists don’t come to Cuba to see the same photo they saw on their travel brochure blown up to billboard sized proportions.  They want Revolution!  Who goes home from Cuba and tells their friends about the billboard of the beach they saw?

No, they go home and say that they saw giant Che faces everywhere and roadside pictures of a young, bespectacled Fidel jumping off of a tank.  Also, there is no shame in putting up some Revolutionary billboards in English.  Remember, Socialism of the 21st Century is just as much about appearances as it is about practice.

Next, if you are going to have a seemingly omnipresent police force try to tone down the authoritarian feel.  Cuba has already made strides in this regard by lifting bans on fingernail and hair extensions for its female police officers.

However, the National Revolutionary Police Force police stations still look like Medieval Times theaters with their 11th century architecture towers and palisades.  How about turning these somewhat oppressive looking structures into something less likely to be associated with civil rights abuses and put the police stations into more unassuming, low-key buildings?

Also, give the police some new progressive laws to enforce.  As much as tourists may like looking at Revolutionary Billboards most of them don’t like a 1960’s attitude toward cigarette smoke.

Show the progressive side of Socialism of the 21st Century and use those omnipresent police to enforce smoking bans.  Just because we are in 2013 doesn’t mean we can’t impose new laws on individual behavior, just as long as you do it in style.