Calling a Bluff

The President proclaimed this past Wednesday, May 21, to be a Day of Solidarity with the Cuban People, and so he gave a speech in which he reminded his audience of the struggle for human rights on the island and highlighted the hypocrisy of the Cuban regime's recently announced reforms "permitting Cubans to own products that virtually none of them can afford" (read full text here). The President seemingly sought to call out Raul Castro's bluff by announcing that Americans would now be allowed to send mobile phones to their families in Cuba.

While news of the original reforms have been viewed by some in the media as an encouraging sign of openness by the "new" regime (see here: Guardian Article), this should not be viewed as anything like a Cuban Glasnost, but rather as another method by which the Cuban state can extract hard currency from the Cuban Citizenry and its American and European benefactors. Even if the Cuban regime allows these transfers (and it must have anticipated such a move by the US), it still requires that Cubans purchase a special $65 phone chip and pay $120 to activate service and must then use the state mobile phone monopoly, Cubacel, which charges around 50 cents per minute for phone calls. Charging 9.5 times the average monthly salary to be able to use a mobile phone, even before the first call is made, is not a way to encourage its use, but a way to fund state coffers (as well as Telecom Italia's, which is a big investor in Cubacel). There's probably no doubt that phone calls from this system will also be susceptible to eavesdropping and will be subject to other measures of control (e.g. disrupting the system or a local transmission tower should the state want to stop mobile phone usage and the possibility of news leaking out, or any type of civic mobilization, in the event of a major protest, etc.).

So while I envision the gifting of mobile phones as having less of an impact than the Administration might (outside of the immediate monetary benefits the Cuban state will reap), it does bring up an interesting possibility. Should the Cuban regime maintain these type of "reforms", rather than reversing them after the public relations benefit has subsided, and thereby legalizing and keeping a whole range of consumer items and conveniences available, while ordinary Cubans remain unable to afford them outside of those who receive sizable remittances or operate in the underground economy, might this lead to enlarging the schism of the haves (such as high-ranking government officials and other elites) and the have-nots (the great majority of the Cuban public)? Would this not accentuate the fundamental hypocrisy of Cuba's un-egalitarian society?

Alternatively, suspend disbelief for a moment, and imagine if mobile phone usage were somehow allowed to become widespread, it could possibly allow for a democratic, if limited, dissemination of information, the whole concept of which is anathema to the state and its controlled media. Other technologies that have been legalized (although practically unaffordable), such as DVD players and personal computers, or hoped for, such as widespread internet access, can potentially be even more destabilizing, as information can become democratized and harder for the authorities to restrict.

For these reasons, I believe that Cuba's authoritarian regime, whose primary interest is its own survival, will probably reverse these "reforms" and restrict other disruptive technologies before any real democratic progress can begin to take shape. However, I still foresee the Cuban regime announcing additional measures, disguised in the rhetoric of reform and openness, to extract hard currency as transport and global food prices continue to rise, since Cuba imports just over 80% of its basic food products.

But in the end, the bluff will be revealed and short-sighted Cuba watchers will once again be disappointed as the same, tired song and dance of tidbit reform followed by complete reversal unfolds, yet again, as Cuba attempts to stave off economic collapse in every way except then only viable one -- by permanently moving from a Marxist to a Market Economy. We all wish it were different this time, but the only song that comes to mind is The Who's "We Won't Get Fooled Again."