Why Cuban Dissidents Aren’t the Future of Cuba

In early July, the Cuban government announced it would be releasing 52 of the imprisoned Cubans whom many call “political prisoners,” in a deal brokered by Spain and the Cuban Catholic church. It’s been an eventful month-or-so since then. Twenty-six of the prisoners have already been released (most of them have resettled in Spain) and the rest are expected to be freed in the coming months. And now, the United States may be reciprocating what it sees as an olive branch — U.S. government sources told the New York Times last month that they may ease travel restrictions to Cuba.

When the releases are complete, 52 of Cuba’s 53 confirmed “prisoners of conscience” will be free, according to Amnesty International. Spain’s foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos heralded the releases in July, calling them the beginning of “a new era in Cuba … with the desire to definitively resolve the question of political prisoners." Shortly thereafter, Cuban National Assembly Ricardo Alarcon claimed that the government intended to release all political prisoners.

But not everyone was enthusiastic. “I don’t think anything will change,” one released dissident said. "There is no opening up. The regime is just looking to gain time as the brutal repression dissidents continue to suffer in Cuba shows." A Miami Herald editorial last week claimed, “The thugs who do the regime's dirty work conduct business as usual.”

But this could signal an open window for improvement in U.S.-Cuban relations. In the politically influential Cuban exile community, a generational shift is taking place. Young Cuban-Americans haven’t inherited the hard-line attitudes of their parents and grandparents, and it’s had an effect: in 2008, a Florida International University poll found that, for the first time, a majority of Cuban-Americans are opposed to the U.S. embargo on Cuba. Other Americans are changing their attitudes too: A majority of Americans have favored reestablishing diplomatic relations with Cuba ever since 1999. The time for changing policy on U.S.-Cuban relations is long overdue.

But the media narrative around the release of the dissidents lacks key context, leaving out crucial elements of the picture of Cuban society and culture. On July 8, the Washington Post printed a 990-word page story under the title “Cuba to release 52 political prisoners, Catholic Church says.” It’s indicative of the way U.S. reporting on Cuban dissidents is done. The story cataloged the negotiations that led up to the releases, included analysis from Cuban dissidents and Human Rights Watch, and recounted a “history of prisoners” in Cuba. What the story didn’t do was note that the dissidents are relatively unknown on the actual island of Cuba.

And more important, the only discussion of the relationship between Cuban dissidents and the United States government was this sentence: “The Cuban government calls [the prisoners] common criminals or "mercenaries" working for U.S. intelligence services.”

Saul Landau, a professor emeritus at California State University–Pomona, says “The impact in Cuba of the release of these people called dissidents is minimal, since almost nobody knew who they were when they were arrested, or since they were arrested.”

Landau, who has made four documentary films about Fidel Castro, says that the dissident movement lacks a coherent platform for how the island should be governed. Therefore, the dissident movement has little appeal to most Cubans. “They’re basically unknown. They don’t have a following,” he says, and therefore, “they’re not relevant inside the island.”

Gerardo Ducos, Caribbean researcher at Amnesty International, says “In the political space [the dissidents are] actually nonexistent.” However, Ducos suggests it’s because they’ve been blacklisted by Cuban state media, and therefore don’t have any means of reaching Cuba's people with their message.

“One of the dissident members wanted to actually run for local government [in elections earlier this year],” Ducos says. “The electoral system is open to anyone. You could actually be a candidate …  if you get enough backing.” The dissident running for local office wanted to gather the signatures required to get on the ballot, but he wasn’t able to muster enough support. “That shows you, I think, an example of how little-known the dissident movement is.”

It’s usually left out of the North American media narrative, but the dissidents currently being released — all of whom were arrested in Cuba’s infamous 2003 “Black Spring” sweep in which 75 dissidents were imprisoned — also have contentious ties to the United States.

“The Cuban government … makes a point of publicizing the fact that the United States is spending millions and millions of dollars in support of Cuban dissidents,” says William LeoGrande, Cuba scholar and dean of American University’s School of Public Affairs.

The United States has been a consistent and sometimes violent foe of Cuban Revolution over the course of its 51-year life. The United States supported an invasion of the island in 1961, authored a campaign of sabotage and violence in the 1960s known as Operation Mongoose, and maintains an economic embargo that continues today.

The dissidents arrested in 2003 “were charged with violating two laws,” says LeoGrande, “both of which essentially made it a crime to accept material support from the United States either for the purpose of implementing the Helms-Burton regulation [a 1996 US law that intensified the embargo against Cuba], or giving support for U.S. policy.”

“In effect, they were convicted for being agents of the United States,” LeoGrande says. “But they hadn’t engaged in any kind of violence, and it was clear that they were singled out specifically because they were dissidents.”

Landau also objects to the notion that the dissidents were imprisoned for their political stances. “They were imprisoned because they were tried and convicted,” he says. He says that the groups had been infiltrated by moles from Cuban state security, who documented that the dissidents were receiving items like laptops, cell phones, and groceries from the United States; for each of the 2003 convicts, there was direct testimony, written record, or photographic record that they accepted U.S. goods.

 “Goods and services and money, that’s what they got,” he says. “And that’s what was proven against them in the trials.”

Wayne Smith,  a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and former head of the United States Interests Section in Havana under presidents Carter and Reagan calls the releases “a welcome step.” But on the phone with Campus Progress, he also criticizes U.S. policy towards the Cuban dissidents.

“If you’re giving money and support to dissidents who are indeed calling for the — not necessarily overthrow, that may not be the word to use — but for the downfall of the government, for the replacement of the existing government, then that puts them in the position of being paid agents of a foreign power, and that’s not the way to operate. It’s not helpful,” he says.

Ducos argues that while the dissidents were convicted for receiving support from the United States, the evidence presented in some cases was suspect. “When you look at the sentences, the court documents,” he says, “the evidence is quite thin in most of the cases.” He says that in one case the Cuban court considered receiving a yellow envelope from a U.S. official to be proof of guilt, and passing information to Amnesty International was considered proof in another.

Moreover Ducos says, “Irrespective of whether they received or not economic support or material support from the US government, or any other government, the activities they were carrying out were totally legitimate, they were actually just promoting human rights.” Ducos adds that Amnesty International doesn’t defend viewpoints of individuals; it defends their rights.

Landau says that the release of these prisoners will have “zero” impact on Cuba’s internal politics, since Cubans are uninterested in the dissident movement.

LeoGrande says that it’s “too early to know” whether the releases will have an impact, but “if the releases are a signal that the government is going to reduce its traditional harassment of people who have tried to organize to express dissident views, that could change political discourse.”

It remains to be seen what will happen to Cuba’s revolution in the years to come, but change is looming. After all, president Raúl Castro is 79 years old, and Fidel Castro — who stepped down from the presidency in 2006 — is 84.

It’s not that dissent doesn’t exist in Cuba. Landau cites dissent within the Communist Party, and the “passive dissent” of Cubans frustrated with the shortfalls of their government. But this dissent comes from everyday folks, not the “dissidents.” If the North American media wants to understand a changing Cuba, they may have to not just change the way they cover the Cuban dissident movement, but broaden their horizons beyond it. Americans today are buying newspapers that depicted a Cuban politics imagined, not real.

William LeoGrande says that it’s more likely change on the island will be brought by “people who are currently part of the government, or at least people who are not active dissidents.”

“I don’t think the dissidents are going to decide the future of Cuba,” he says.

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