For July and early August 2020, and in the run up to the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy (ASCE) conference From the Castros to COVID: An ASCE Virtual Conference (13-15 August 2020; Concept Note HERE), ASCE will be organizing a series of interviews of individuals who will be participating in the upcoming conference.

The interviews will explore in more detail some of the issues that will be presented at the Conference and also will introduce some of ASCE’s key actors. The object is to get to know us better as well as to begin to engage in some of the more important issues facing Cuba, Cuba-US relations, and the regional situation in the Caribbean.  Larry Catá Backer hosts the interviews. All interviews may be accessed free of charge.  They are posted to the ASCE YouTube Channel, and may be accessed as well on the Coalition for Peace and Ethics YouTube Channel. They may also be accessed by scanning the QR Codeon your mobile phone or other device.

Our first interview is with the youngest member of the ASCE Board.  Frank Carlos Martinez is a recent graduate of the University of Havana and now studying in the US.  Please enjoy the interview with Larry Catá Backer. Frank’s short bio follows below. Sneak Peak may be accessed HERE. 

ASCE 2020 Virtual Conference Interview Frank Carlos Martinez may be accessed HERE.

Frank Martínez studied Macro and Micro Economic Theory, Advanced Econometrics, International Trade and Finance, Analysis of Financial Statements, and other subjects at the University of Havana. There, he participated as ambassador student at the Model United Nations and, for three terms, at the International Summer School Conference in Economics and Management (ISSEM and ICEM) organized by the university Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and the University of Havana. In 2015, he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Economics (five-year program) after writing the thesis: “Modeling Client Satisfaction: The Tropicana Case”. He was awarded a 2015 Summer graduate fellowship at Georgetown University in Washington DC, when he first came to the United States. Currently, he is a Master’s degree candidate in International Relations at the University of Rhode Island and is serving a first term on ASCE’ Board during the period 2018-2020.