Notes1 For several years, Mexican-Cuban relations were regarded as the “exception that confirmed the rule” in the interamerican stage. Immediately after the victory of the Cuban Revolution in 1959 and during the next three decades, Mexico’s position regarding Cuba would often stand alone in the Western Hemisphere. The bilateral relationship of the two Latin American […]

Todo se prohibe pero todo se hace. (Everything is prohibited, but everything can be done.) —Saying on the street, Havana, 2004 By trying to control everything, the Government ends up controlling nothing. —Saying on the street, Havana, 2004 Various types of economic illegalities as well as underground economic activities occur in all countries. In Cuba, […]

Notes1 Cuba’s economy and infrastructure, in shambles following the economic crisis caused by the end of Soviet aid in 1991, improved somewhat after the government enacted a series of short-lived “market reforms” in 1993. The inevitable continuation of these free market policies, particularly in a future post-central planning system, would create substantial benefits and investment […]

Notes1 Americans are immigrants—people whose origins are various but whose destinies made them American. Immigration—voluntary or involuntary—is what created all multiracial and multicultural nations. The United States is a prime example. Sometimes the migrants moved freely from the area of origin to the area of destination. Such was the experience of the European immigrants. Sometimes […]

Cuba was the last country in our hemisphere to emerge from the Spanish colonial empire. As such, it was also the last country in our hemisphere where the application of Spanish laws prevailed, and—at least in some areas of the law—continued to prevail well into the Republican era. One of those laws, was the Spanish […]