One of the distinctive characteristics of the Eastern European transition process is that GDP has behaved like a “V” since the beginning of the reform process.1 This peculiar behavior reflects the fall in production experienced during the first years of transition, followed by a recovery that seems to be permanent. Although it is impossible to […]

In 1990, in an attempt to deal with the devastating impact the collapse of the Soviet bloc inflicted on the Cuban economy, Cuban authorities announced the start of “the special period in time of peace,” an economic adjustment program. The following year the Fourth Communist Party Congress ratified the program and spelled out its main […]

Uno de los dichos más repetidos en La Habana hace referencia a dos de las características más salientes del régimen de Fidel Castro: “Esto no hay quien lo tumbe, pero tampoco hay quien lo arregle.” Efectivamente, en contra de las previsiones apresuradas de los sovietólogos, el castrismo resistió al efecto dominó que dio en tierra […]

Notes1 The Cuban exodus is now over 41 years old and has brought close to a million Cuban immigrants to American soil — about 12 percent of the Cuban population. That exodus harbors distinct waves of immigrants, alike only in their final rejection of Cuba. The focus of this paper is on the exodus of […]

It is generally concluded that Cuba’s poor performance in the agricultural sector since the early 1990s is the result of two primary, complementary reasons. Cuban agricultural production has faltered because of: • a dearth of agricultural inputs since the collapse of the socialist world, and • the adverse impact of economic policies that interfere with […]