Cuba after Fidel Castro
In a recent interview with the US socialist magazine Against the Current, exiled Cuban Trotskyist Sam Farber details the indications that after Fidel Castro's death Cuba may follow the path towards the world capitalist market initiated by Deng Xiaoping in China.
Farber reports that Raul Castro (Fidel's presumed successor) has praised the "Chinese model", and notes "the role of the Cuban army, Raul's stronghold, as a big player in joint enterprises, including the tourist industry.
"You have a number of army officers who are businessmen in uniform... I see the impetus towards authoritarian capitalism coming from people in the army and outside civilians who are engaged in joint-venture capitalism... I must caution that there are elements of speculation in all these things".
In the interview, Farber also presents a criticism of the views argued by Celia Hart, daughter of famous figures from the 1959 Cuban revolution, who now calls herself a "Trotskyist". "Her 'Trotskyism' is a peculiar sort... [in fact] she's projecting the line of a more militant Stalinism as opposed to the Popular Front kind".
"There's another interesting group of people in Cuba who aren't well known... who have written in journals such as Temas... Writers like Ariel Dacal, who have written about Trotsky - and they don't say a word about Cuba... But you can tell they're really writing about Cuba although they don't mention it... They're serious and far more relevant to our democratic revolutionary point of view".
Other relevant articles by Sam Farber include:
Cuba’s likely transition and its politics
Fidel Castro's political testament
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Sam Farber and Trotskyism
I've met Sam Farber. His writings are quite useful. But it isn't correct to call him a Trotskyist. He was once in the International Socialists-U.S., which was essentially Trotskyist in the way that the AWL is Trotskyist. But as should be obvious from reading his book Before Stalinism (Verso, 1990), he is very critical of what he sees as the unnecessary authoritarianism of the pre-Stalin Bolshevik regime in Russia and no longer considers himself Leninist/Trotskyist. He is, of course, still an avowed Marxist and is not given to demonizing Lenin and/or Trotsky.