Politics

Dissident dies, tanks roll

January 20, 2012

Orlando Luis Pardo tweeted there was movement of tanks via rail from Via Blanca (Paso Superior) on the outskirts of Havana. Is this movement in response to yesterday’s death of dissident Wilman Villar Mendoza after his hunger strike? The same occurred when dissident Orlando Zapata Tamayo death was announced in 2010.

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Cuba’s ranking in EIU’s Democracy Index

December 16, 2011

Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) just released its report Democracy Index 2011: Democracy Under Stress. Per the report: “The index provides a snapshot of the state of democracy worldwide for 165 independent states and two territories—this covers almost the entire population of the world and the vast majority of the world’s independent states (micro states are [...]

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New Cuban political elite

December 4, 2011

Eusebio Mujal-León, professor and former chair of the Department of Government at Georgetown University and the director of the Cuba XXI Project, has written an excellent article (published in the Journal of International Affairs’ Fall/Winter ’11 issue on the authoritarian state) analyzing the new Cuban political elite and exploring how power is distributed between the country’s military [...]

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Cuban-American among top global thinkers

November 30, 2011

Foreign Policy magazine has selected the top 100 global thinkers in its December 2011 issue. Yoani Sanchez from Cuba ranked 81st among the top 100. However, Cuban-American Carlos Pascual was also ranked 23rd among a group of U.S. diplomats. The Harvard graduate was a controversial ambassador to Mexico, who wrote cables noting the Mexican government’s “inability [...]

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Cuba in 2012

November 30, 2011

I received today The Economist‘s The World in 2012 issue, whereby it forecasts the following for Cuba: Market forces and private enterprise will take on a greater role in the economy, under the strict guidance of Cuba’s Communist Party. It aims to shift 1m workers off state payrolls over the coming years, phase out rationing [...]

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Preconditions for political violence in Cuba

November 17, 2011

Three months ago, the Canadian government’s Economic & Political Intelligence Centre at Export Development Canada—EDC (Canada’s export credit agency, which helps Canadian exporters and investors expand their international business) issued its political outlook on Cuba: Raúl Castro’s pragmatism has resulted in investment and cooperation agreements with a variety of countries. Companies from several countries are also building [...]

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