13. Bureaucracy and corruption: what way forward for Cuba?¶
Core Argument¶
This chapter confronts the deepening contradictions of the Cuban revolution, arguing that the absence of genuine workers’ democracy has created a fertile ground for bureaucratic corruption and capitalist restoration. The Cuban economy operates with the market as a junior partner to central planning, following the Seventh Party Congress’s approval of market socialism as Communist Party doctrine. The Chinese model is influential among Cuban bureaucrats, who focus on GDP growth and one-party rule while ignoring the social contradictions of capitalist restoration. Cuba faces a worsening economic situation as Venezuelan oil subsidies end, and Chinese investment and credit expand, though China will eventually demand debt repayment. Inequality is growing between those with access to privilege, dollars, or tourism work and the rest of the population.
The chapter argues that Cuba cannot emulate China’s economies of scale; a capitalist Cuba would resemble pre-1959 Nicaragua. The alternative is workers’ democracy and democratic planning, as argued by Trotsky. The absence of genuine workers’ democracy demoralises Cubans and, combined with visible corruption at the top and falling wages, becomes a counter-revolutionary threat. Many in the Cuban Communist Party fear sections of the bureaucracy will use popular discontent to restore capitalism, as in the USSR. A left alternative must offer practical answers: democratic debate in all popular organisations and pluralism within the PCC (excluding pro-capitalist parties). Removing bureaucratic control would allow local bodies to solve immediate problems, such as leaking water pipes that waste scarce water and breed mosquitoes during the worst drought in 115 years. Mass mobilisation on real problems would boost morale and demonstrate the power of state planning.
The chapter polemicises against the ‘Chinese way’ or ‘Vietnamese model’ advocated by Cuban economists, who propose expanding the private sector, enlarging the Mariel free trade zone, and increasing tax exemptions. It notes that Everleny was fired from his university post in 2016 for arguing that reform must include the rise of the market, while Julio Antonio Fernandez Estrada’s article calling for greater democracy and transparency about Party officials’ wealth led to his contract not being renewed. Esteban Morales, expelled from the PCC after linking corruption to bureaucracy, argued that counter-revolutionaries within the state are preparing to transfer state assets to private hands, as in the USSR. He was later re-admitted, reflecting Cuba’s contradictory and fluid situation.
The chapter insists that major economic institutions must remain in the state sector under workers’ control and subject to a national plan determined by soviet democracy. This requires independent trade unions and workers’ control. Rejecting socialism in one country, the task is to protect the existing workers’ state by combining revolutionary internationalism with domestic reforms. All officials should be elected and subject to recall, with wages no higher than a skilled worker’s. However, bureaucratic privilege historically came from perks, not salaries, so accountability and collective decision-making are vital; there is no bureaucratic solution to bureaucracy. The biggest incentive is workers’ sense of ownership over the state and economy, achieved only through popular power and accountable elected officials.