Marifeli Pérez-Stable

Professor of Sociology, FIU and Vice President for Democratic Governance, IAD

"Raúl's Cuba: Domestic and International Challenges"

Thursday, April 3, 2008
4:15 pm - C103 Hesburgh Center

Abstract

In February 2008, Raúl Castro assumed the presidencies of the Cuban councils of state and ministries, choosing hard-liner José Ramón Machado Ventura as first vice president of both councils.  In his inaugural speech, Raúl announced a restructuring of the state administration, hinted at economic reforms, and said he would delay naming ministers until the end of 2008.

Internationally, Cuba enjoys the most auspicious ambience since the end of the Cold War. The new populism in Latin America gives Cuba more friends than the old strategy of promoting revolution did; Venezuela supplies the country with oil.  Cuba has close ties with Iran, Russia, Vietnam, and China. For the time being, Spain, the European Union, Mexico, and Brazil give Raúl the benefit of the doubt; only the United States continues to follow a policy of embargo and isolation.

Raúl’s principal domestic challenges are to maintain political control and improve living standards. His international obstacles include improving relations with the US, and maintaining positive relations with Hugo Chávez, while lessening Cuban dependence on Venezuelan oil.

Biography

Marifeli Pérez-Stable is vice president for democratic governance at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, DC, and a professor of sociology at Miami’s Florida International University. She is also the director of “National Dialogues on Democracy in Latin America,” a project sponsored by the Inter-American Dialogue with the cooperation of the Organization of American States. Pérez-Stable chaired the Task Force on Memory, Truth, and Justice, which culminated in the report Cuban National Reconciliation (http://memoria.fiu.edu, 2003). She is an editorial contributor to the Miami Herald, author of The Cuban Revolution: Origins, Course, and Legacy (Oxford University Press, 1993, 1999), and editor of Looking Forward: Comparative Perspectives on Cuba’s Transition (University of Notre Dame Press, 2007). A visiting fellow at the Kellogg Institute in 2003, Pérez-Stable is currently working on “Intimate Enemies,” a book about the United States and Cuba after the Cold War.