Cuba: Where Is Rock Bottom?

By Angry GenXer

HAVANA TIMES – They say that when someone loses footing in a pool, lake, or along the seashore, they can let themselves sink to the bottom, push off, and return to the surface—then catch their breath and swim. But Cuba tells us a different story.

The Paradox of the Haiku

I wonder where the bottom is in our current sinking, the point from which we might begin to rise.

Other people use the familiar metaphor of “the light at the end of the tunnel,” but in such a way that it begins to resemble a Zen koan or a Japanese haiku:

Where is
the light at the end of the tunnel
if there is no tunnel?

Now imagine you are part of the everyday Cuba—like millions of us, like me—and what is moving through that vanished tunnel is your life. Under such circumstances, to speak of a “life project” inside Cuba is either ironic or cynical.

Here comes the paradox: how long can a society remain in full collapse without changing—beyond the toxic changes produced by the collapse itself? Especially when those of us living in the crisis are fully aware of the societal breakdown. For a ground-level view, see my previous text.

The Trailer and the Film

Many people of my generation or older compare today’s Cuban reality with the so-called (and euphemistically named by Fidel Castro) “Special Period”—the structural crisis of the 1990s that peaked mid-decade and was never officially declared over. It was triggered by the collapse of the Soviet bloc, Cuba’s main economic partner since 1960. Things improved slightly around 2000, partly due to market-oriented measures by the Cuban government, but mostly thanks to a new alliance with Chavez’s Venezuela.

However, it seems that the now-famous Cuban saying was born in the Special Period: “No one can topple this, but no one can fix it either,” which many people still find completely applicable today. The sense of being trapped in an ongoing crisis never left the Cuban population “at the bottom” (as the late Tato Quiñones might say—from the bottom of the cauldron). Since 2019, however, that crisis has intensified dramatically into what some experts now call a “polycrisis” or “permacrisis.”

As Verónica V. wrote on her Facebook profile: “The Special Period was the trailer. This is the movie.”
Indeed, many people in Cuba believe things are now much worse than in the ‘90s—despite the blackouts, food shortages, and massive migration of that decade. Today—even among those born before the 1959 revolution or shortly after, and who supported the Cuban establishment in the ‘90s—there is a strong outcry against the current leadership’s incompetence, the ineffectiveness of its measures, and a loss of faith in the future (even if they don’t always criticize Fidel and Raul Castro with the same intensity—and some even miss them).

This loss of faith among the founding generation of the revolutionary process in the so-called “continuity government” is probably the clearest symptom of the establishment’s ideological breakdown. Another symptom is easily visible on social media: the overwhelming majority of reactions and comments from inside Cuba to official posts are negative, scornful, or skeptical (except where there’s censorship or access is restricted).

To make matters worse, some articles in local Communist Party outlets—on sensitive topics—are virtually indistinguishable from those published in the “alternative” press. Most of the influential Cuban intellectuals (including many well-known and award-winning figures) take critical public stances, as seen in their widespread support for the recent student strike. Very few intellectuals support the establishment today, and they are always the same faces repeated ad nauseam in state media.

These signs confirm the paradox of, on one hand, the near-total collapse of the system and, on the other, its persistence. “They [those ‘at the top’] just don’t care what’s happening to us,” a 75-year-old neighbor from a devoutly “revolutionary” family tells me.

To be honest, many of us in the ‘90s also felt there was no light at the end of the tunnel. But now we understand why the system “held on” back then:

• There was a relatively new basic infrastructure (now deteriorated);
• There was a competent human talent pool (many of whom have now emigrated, passed away, or work outside their fields);
• There was a functional sugar industry (mostly dismantled in the early 2000s—today, Cuba imports sugar);
• Tourism was growing (now declining);
• Foreign investment was rising (now, less);
• Cuban private enterprise was seen as a productivity and inclusion opportunity (today, increasingly focused on import-based commerce and seen as a source of inequality, classism, nepotism, and exclusion).

In other words, the perception that the current crisis is worse than the previous one is not an optical illusion but based on knowledge of concrete facts. Also: in the 1990s, there was no internet.

And back then, two important factors existed that are absent today:

(1) The charismatic leadership of Fidel Castro and his team—controversial as they were—backed by the legitimacy of the insurgent struggle and 30+ years of governance. Today’s leadership is seen as over-privileged, incompetent, and without charisma.

(2) A sense of solidarity-based ethics among the population, which went beyond mere materialism and rejected bad faith. This stemmed from pre-1959 values like “poor but decent” and three decades of preaching “socialist morality.” Generational change and the shift in the legitimacy structure of social cohesion have radically eroded that ethical framework, along with the atmosphere of solidarity and goodwill it fostered.

The Seeds of Today Were Sown Back Then

Cuba’s current social fabric was born out of the precarity most of us experienced during the 1990s. For the first 30 post-revolutionary years, there was a limited but externally subsidized “welfare state” (education and healthcare for all, basic family provisioning through rationing, social security, etc.) and a “social contract” that guaranteed upward mobility to anyone who worked hard, got educated, and stayed loyal to the system.

Around 1991, everything began to change. Many rationed products disappeared from the “libreta” (ration book)—today they offer even less. Government salaries stopped covering basic needs. Theft from the State flourished, as did scams targeting foreigners, and the informal market became the main space for obtaining goods and money. With the majority of the population living on the edge, good faith (even among Cubans) began to evaporate. Community and interpersonal solidarity persisted a bit longer, as a primary means of subsistence and a guarantee of reciprocity.

Nevertheless, the damage was done: the social ethic had changed. In Cuba, we refer to this with the euphemistic and redundant phrase “values were lost.” Some would say “prison morality spilled into the streets.”

Toward the turn of the century, Fidel Castro tried to reverse that trend. The plan was called the “Battle of Ideas.” It included educational programs for youth and other disadvantaged groups (as well as for political cadres) to promote their social advancement and moral formation, along with an extensive social work program and a major ideological mobilization. In terms of mobilization, it was a failure, as was the large-scale teacher training program in which instructors were nearly the same age as their students (resulting in staggering levels of fraud). Some of the “Battle” resources (financed with Venezuelan support) were squandered opportunistically.

Under Raúl Castro’s government, the “Battle” ended—including its more sensible components, such as social work and community-based university colleges.

But the hope pinned on a thaw in relations with the United States failed. Chávez and Fidel died. Then came Trump 1.0 and SARS-CoV-2.

In the past seven years, Cuba has gone through a constitutional debate and referendum, a new Constitution and Head of State, multiple self-organized protests, the COVID pandemic, the collapse of tourism, acts of political repression, a fraudulent and failed monetary and exchange reform, a nationwide social uprising in July 2021, forced “banking reforms,” the debate and plebiscite over the Family Code, runaway inflation, massive blackouts and several energy collapses, numerous natural and technological disasters, and the emigration of more than a million compatriots. There have been no changes in the pattern of domination or meaningful economic reforms.

Social cohesion is breaking down

Poverty (officially called “vulnerability”) is spreading, and according to Cuban economist Pablo Monreal, a person facing it has three options: emigration, crime, or resignation. As for emigration, Cuba has recently experienced the largest wave in its history. As for crime, social dispair is growing: some speak of a“Haitianization” and some even call for a Bukele-style strong man figure.

Cuban activist Raymar Aguado, after suffering a robbery, blamed the establishment “above” for the social insecurity “below.” I propose a similar thesis regarding scams: when those at the top act in bad faith and scam those below, then those below end up scamming and stealing from one another. Prison morality prevails in the streets when there is no cohesion in pursuit of moral change. Regarding scams, one could even think of a pyramid scheme or Ponzi scheme—where only those who got in first come out ahead.

As for resignation, we hold the record for endurance (which the UN prefers to call “resilience”), even in places where blackouts now last 24 hours and the economy is collapsing. Is it possible to reasonably invest in social change in a situation of societal collapse? It depends—but the kind of ethical ties and cohesion that have developed among people over the last few decades doesn’t help. Perhaps that is a pessimistic answer to the paradox I posed at the beginning.

Will there be any initiatives “from above”? We don’t know—but they don’t seem to care for now.

A Ray of Hope

The recent student strike and the solidarity it sparked across so many different spheres may be a ray of hope, not the light at the end of a tunnel that no longer exists.

Meanwhile, some ask whether, given everything happening on the planet, human civilization might disappear before the system here in Cuba does.

Read more from Cuba here on Havana Times.