Cubaverdad

Cuba's smoke-and-mirror reforms
Posted By José R. Cárdenas Monday, November 7, 2011

The Castro regime's announcement that for the first time Cuban citizens
will be able to buy and sell their own homes has spurred an outpouring
of irrational exuberance that real change is finally coming to the
island-prison of Dr. Castro. "To say that it's huge is an
understatement," one interested observer told the New York Times. "This
is the foundation, this is how you build capitalism, by allowing the
free trade of property."

Another told Reuters, "The ability to sell houses means instant capital
formation for Cuban families … It is a big sign of the government
letting go." Still another writes in the Christian Science Monitor that
these are "incredibly meaningful changes."

Such optimism is ill-founded. In fact, it is indicative only of one of
two things: either it betrays a brazen political objective (Time
magazine: "Why the U.S. Should Drop the Embargo and Prop Up Cuban
Homeowners") or it demonstrates just how low the bar of expectation has
been placed for what the Cuban people need and deserve that we must
celebrate mere crumbs tossed their way by the Castro dictatorship.

Indeed, sweep away the hype and all you see are daunting hurdles as to
how this announcement will change in any way the regime's suffocating
control of the Cuban population. The new order restricts people to
"ownership" of one permanent residence and one vacation home (as if the
average Cuban is in any position to own a second home); all transactions
must be approved by the State; no explanation is given on how you grant
titles to homes that either have been confiscated from their rightful
owners, have been swapped multiple times in the underground economy, or
which house multiple families because of the severe shortage of
available housing; the construction industry remains state-controlled;
and the regime itself admits this order reflects no backsliding on the
preeminence of the State in controlling the country's economic and
political systems.

Beyond these challenges, however, is the fundamental fact that you
cannot conjure private property rights, let alone the free trade in
property, out of thin air. Those rights exist only where they are rooted
in a credible, impartial, and transparent legal superstructure that can
protect one's property, settle disputes, and guarantee transactions
against the predations of the State. Anything less is a rigged game
where the State is the dealer.

This is how the State Department's annual Human Rights Report
characterizes Cuba's judicial system: "While the constitution recognizes
the independence of the judiciary, the judiciary is subordinate to the
imperatives of the socialist state. The National Assembly appoints all
judges and can remove them at any time. Through the National Assembly,
the state exerted near-total influence over the courts and their rulings
… Civil courts, like all courts in the country, lack an independent or
impartial judiciary as well as effective procedural guarantees."

Translation: Cubans' ability to "own" property, trade, or leverage their
property to build capital will continue to exist at the sufferance of
the State. And what the State giveth, the State can taketh away. The
bottom line is that, ultimately, all Cubans will really own is a piece
of paper that says they own something.

Rather than empowering individual Cubans, the regime's goal in allowing
the open trade of houses is to hopefully siphon more Cuban American
money into the island's perennially bankrupt economy. With average
Cubans on the island too poor to buy or improve their dilapidated
dwellings, their hope is relatives in Miami and elsewhere will remit
even more cash to the island attempting to improve their relations'
situation. Indeed, the cynicism of relying on Cuban exiles to support
the Cuban economy has never bothered the Castro brothers in the slightest.

The Castro regime recognizes the increasing unrest among the repressed
and impoverished Cuban people for fundamental change, but they are
capable only of prescribing more painkillers rather than the radical
surgery that is needed to restore the nation's health. Pretending to
devolve more autonomy in individuals' lives is just one more cruelty
inflicted on the Cuban people over five decades of dictatorship, a
cruelty made worse by the cheerleading from abroad.

http://shadow.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/11/07/cubas_smoke_and_mirror_reforms