Between April 10-13, 200 Cuban-American students and recently minted professionals gathered at Duke University for the annual meeting of Raíces de Esperanza. Older folks like me also participated in what has become a spring rite of conversations about Cuba. In its fifth year, Roots of Hope is now firmly grounded.
I was part of a panel on the force of myths in Cuban history. Nations and myths go together like a horse and carriage, so Cuba isn't exceptional in that regard. Our myths, however, haunt us still because we haven't yet settled our life together on common ground.
We have always expected greatness of Cuba. No other Caribbean or Central American country -- our natural points of reference even if we've resisted the comparisons -- set such a high bar. Only Cubans have dreamed beyond the possible, which isn't necessarily bad except that we've never been good at reality checks. Instead of adjusting our expectations, we have upped the ante for the next go around of getting Cuba right. We never have, at least not for long.
Let's look at two moments in our history.
The Constitution of 1940 laid the foundations for a new Cuba.
• The Platt Amendment, which had sanctioned U.S. intervention in our affairs, no longer burdened our sovereignty.
• The new charter -- in effect a compact for social peace after the revolutionary upheavals of the 1930s -- gave the state broader charges for the well-being of ordinary Cubans.
• With promises of greater gender and racial inclusion, liberal democracy was reinforced.
On March 10, 1952, Fulgencio Batista carried out a coup d'état. By then, the hopes of 1940 had long been dissipated by widespread corruption, factional violence and clientelistic politics. Even if democracy itself was cherished, neither the deposed president nor the citizenry stood up to uphold the Constitution.
Fast forward to 1959 and the victorious revolution. While restoring the Constitution of 1940 had been the rallying cry against Batista, the revolutionary government would soon trample on civil liberties, eliminate the right to private property and forge an alliance with Moscow. Most Cubans still embraced the revolution, certain that, this time, a better Cuba would truly come to pass.
In the end, it didn't. Never before has Cuba been so pauperized or Cubans there so dispirited. No other government in our history has taken so many lives, imprisoned tens of thousands and forced hundreds of thousands into the longest of exiles.
Its most recent affront -- dragging the Damas de Blanco from the Plaza of the Revolution on April 21 -- may look like a show of force, but it isn't. Feeling threatened by 10 women dressed in white demanding the release of their imprisoned loved ones only shows the regime's weakness masked as brutishness. Active since the Black Spring of 2003 when the government cracked down on 75 peaceful opponents, the ladies power on with right and courage on their side.
When we might finally get Cuba right is anyone's guess. Though but a drop in the bucket of what Cuba needs, Raúl Castro's recent measures shouldn't be dismissed offhand. At the same time, a wait-and-see attitude on the economy shouldn't keep anyone -- individuals or foreign governments -- from condemning Havana's continued violation of human rights.
At Duke two weeks ago I concluded my remarks to the Raíces group with the following. For nearly 50 years, Cubans of good will have confronted one another in defense of a nationalist social revolution or a democratic redemption. We should strive to understand why -- that is, put ourselves in the shoes of the decent people on the other side.
If we all assume responsibility for our own failings instead of blaming others -- the United States, the former Soviet Union, Zapatero's Spain, the pro-embargo or the anti-embargo forces in the U.S. Congress -- maybe, just maybe, we'll find sufficient common ground to sustain a democratic Cuba that tends to social justice and the national interest.
Greatness is unlikely to be ours but then at least we'd be living in peace.
Marifeli Pérez-Stable is vice president for democratic governance at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, D.C., and a professor at Florida International University.
