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I know that Raul's speech at the National Assembly is long. Quite unusual for him. Nonetheless, it is the most important political speech from the Cuban central leaders for quite a few years and the best available explanation and defense of the changes that are partly underway and those that are proposed. It deserves close study by everyone interested in the future of the Cuban revolution. The speech and addenda are available, among other places, in the translation by Marce Cameron, on the invaluable Cuba's Socialist Renewal website. I am going to make a number of loosely-connected points on this. Forgive the unsystematic form. For me study and thought about this are still in progress, although I have been roughly following the initial discussions and steps for several years, and have tended throughout to identify with Raul's views. Far from being primarily a retreat from policies directed toward socialism and adoption of policies directed (whether intentionally or not, necessarily or not) toward capitalism, the changes represent a concerted attempt to advance socialist perspectives and methods under fire. In the United States, the layoffs in Cuba are most often presented as though they were primarily aimed at industrial workers, at their jobs, and at reducing their real wages, and their social wage through a desperate competition for jobs among the workers. It is pretty natural for people in the US (and Canada) to view them that way. The Cuban leaders deny this. They insist that their goal is to raise wages and preserve the social wage while increasing the surplus produced by the working class well above the current level. They say the workers affected will go into other jobs, or establish independent self-employed operations. And the state recognizes its obligation to organize and otherwise aid this shift. Raul is insistent that tbe working class and the peasantry need to produce more surplus than they have been doing. Of course, at the word "surplus," theoreticians of state capitalism will raise the cry of "intensified exploitation." The only beneficiaries, they insist, can only be the section of the bureaucrats that support these measures. The only system in which this would not be true, they seem to me to argue, would be one based on workers' committees in the factories (and, in fact, ONLY workers' committees in the factories - everything else dilutes pure worker power). The reference to increasing the surplus simply means that workers and peasants have an obligation to not only provide for themselves and their families, but to increase the common wealth of society. In fact, I think the opposition to the new course is strongly rooted in the bureaucracy, among those who have done alright in the past period and see no reason to change anything except maybe for more moral exhortation and more use of the police to enforce legal norms. That is certainly indicated in Raul's speech. As for the workers, the changes have not been sprung on them suddenly. A long period of discussion and debate was organized around the proposals for layoffs and self-employment by the trade union federation. After weeks of discussion in factories and workplaces across Cuba, the federation felt on strong enough footing to take on the task of announcing the changes in its own name. From what I can tell from reports, the mood of the most workers about the new course seems to be one of cautious optimism. I only note here Raul (and Fidel's) constant insistence that Cuba's socialism is not just a moral ideal or the interests of the workers, but the ONLY way to preserve Cuba's independence and sovereignty. Raul also reaffirms that the long-term solution to Cuba's problems lies along the road of internationalism, and particularly efforts to advance toward a Latin Anerican and Caribbean economic union, and stresses the importance of ALBA in this context. I see no evidence that any substantial section of the state apparatus -- any substantial faction, tendency or trend -- advocates remodeling Cuba along the lines followed by China since the mid-1970s. That is, a massive opening of the economy to imperialist capital, privatization of large sectors of industry, free buying and selling of land in the countryside and cities, and the abolition of free medical care and education which had been at least formally guaranteed before the mid-70s. Under the concrete conditions that Cuba faces (which are far different from those confronting China in the past or today) this would lead to much deeper divisions among the people, the collapse of the revolution, and the re-subjection of Cuba to US domination We should also keep in mind the old Bolshevik slogan, which was aimed at rallying the working class during the civil war: Those who will not work also will not eat. The Cubans are nowhere close to those straits now and no slogan this radical is put forward by Raul, but we should remember this when ultralefts and social democrats try to portray this as a general US-style assault on the workers. Let's definitely not get caught up in the word "austerity" and assume that since Raul calls for austerity in no uncertain terms, what is involved must be austerity in the style of Britain and/or Obama's deficit commission. Given the US embargo and its vast international ramifications, Cuba's limited support from abroad, Cuba's limited domestic resources, and the worldwide imperialist economic difficulties, the people must have austerity to survive. In this context, austerity is quite defensible. Is Cuba on the verge of dumping free mediral care or free education through universities for the masses? I see no basis for interpreting Raul's comments about free medical care or education for those who "need" them as establishing the kind of humiliating, anti-worker means-test s testing that takes place in the United States. (I recently went through a nightmarish experience trying to get Food Stamps in Newark which was resolved favorably only when I took steps to get a free lawyer. I don't think what Castro projects is the extension of this to Cuba.) I think what is involved is imposing the "need" standard on the privileged, the new rich who already exist or may come into existence because of the potentialities of some of the present proposals. I don't think that this is intended at all for the working people or the unemployed. And I find it justifiable under conditions that bar free spending and require austerity. Fred ________________________________________________ Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com