In 1980, the Cuban port of Mariel witnessed the departure of 100,000 state-approved émigrés fleeing towards the United States. More than 30 years later, the island’s government hopes to see an influx of foreign capital flow in through the port town, which will soon be the home of a new free-trade district. Once again, Mariel serves as a problem-solver for the Communist government. This time, instead of using its port to get rid of “undesirables,” the Castro regime has started developing a 180-square-mile special economic zone where foreign companies will be able to invest and set up shop without the Cuban state impeding their operations. By following China’s market-oriented reforms in the 1980’s, Raul Castro hopes that the port of Mariel will provide a reprieve from overstaffed and stagnant state industries, widespread poverty and an ailing economy.
The Mariel zone–which has already attracted the attention of investors in several countries–is the most recent of Raul Castro’s reforms aimed at revitalizing Cuba. Fidel’s younger sibling has dedicated the last several years to slowly liberalizing the island’s strict Communist regime, which will ostensibly lead to more freedom of travel for Cuban citizens and athletes, a new unified currency (the island currently has two), and greater opportunities for homegrown entrepreneurs to create and own small businesses and run cooperatives.
The new market zone might prove to be a symbol of how these seemingly positive reforms will play out in practice. Like Raul’s other projects, the port of Mariel will see its ambitions curtailed by the U.S.’s antagonistic foreign policy, and by Cuba’s own bureaucratic recalcitrance, unless both countries are willing to reform their antiquated political regimes.
The first barrier to a successful globalized market zone in Cuba is the U.S. embargo against the island. America currently imposes hefty fines on companies that trade with Cuba, and trade ships that dock at the island cannot make port in the U.S. for six months afterward. Castro will have a hard time convincing foreign investors that results will be worth the trouble, despite generous profit repatriation agreements and no tax responsibilities for the first ten years of operation at Mariel. This is also partly due to the high labor costs established by the state and the relative inexperience of Cuban workers, who have little training in technologically advanced manufacturing. Many Cubans that do boast specialized skills are contributing to the U.S. economy as refugees instead. Also, the Cuban government’s policy of forcing companies to employ workers through a state agency that receives their wages and pays them only a fraction of the money means that Cubans will not have much incentive to work at Mariel, unless the foreign companies make a habit of paying them extra on the side.
The Mariel experiment, like other reforms, is in essence a good idea, but it will only come to fruition if these obstacles are dealt with. America must end decades of predatory foreign policies and dispense with the nonsensical trade embargo. Also, the right of expat Cubans to gain refugee status just be getting to the U.S. should be repealed, since this contributes to Cuba’s brain drain and weakens the island’s prospects for economic growth.
Mariel also shows the fraying fabric of an ideologically unyielding regime coming to terms with the fact that its economic policies are unsustainable. Rhetorical condemnation of more private entrepreneurship and a dedication to the spirit of Revolution might be comforting in the face of difficulty, but if Castro wants to raise his country out of poverty and maintain its celebrated health and educational systems, it is time to change the politics of the regime. The Cuban government will have to soften its ideological hard line against “personal enrichment” if it wants workers and budding entrepreneurs to make use of the new opportunities it promises. More importantly, it will need to stop relying on bureaucratic red tape to keep the country in line and start working for the poor, the desperate, and the dispossessed, which every day face adversities created by the party that claims to represent them.
Mr. Torres’ article hits on several issues and in an accurate form. However, overcoming 150 years of a history in which the U.S. has sought to dominate Cuba’s future will require more from the U.S. side of the spectrum than the Cuban side from my perspective. Starting with the Platt Amendment and running through the Cuban Five, the arrogance of U.S. foreign policy toward a sovereign Cuba (one we cannot control) must change! I have been traveling to Cuba for over 20 years including teaching at a Cuban university, living with Cuban families and getting in touch with the real Cuba, something “armchair academic Cuban specialist” might need to consider doing.
Thanks for your comment Edward! I agree that the U.S. needs to pick up a large share of the responsibility due to its influence as a world power and the devastating effect that it’s laws have on the sovereign state of Cuba. I hope I haven’t come off as too much of an “armchair academic.” As a pro-independence Puerto Rican, I’ve marched against neocolonialist U.S. policies and in support of both Puerto Rican and Cuban political prisoners. I plan on travelling to Cuba this Spring, so hopefully I’ll soon have a more nuanced opinion about the issues that the island faces now.