Horowitz: After Fidel

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Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Rob Horowitz, GoLocalWorcester MINDSETTER™

Fidel Castro’s death this past Friday at 90 comes at a potentially pivotal time for US-Cuba relations. President-elect Trump will  soon decide whether he will continue the Obama approach of normalizing relations or adhere to his combative campaign rhetoric designed to appeal to older Cuban immigrants in Florida and return to a failed policy of attempting to diplomatically and economically isolate the island nation 90 miles off our coast.

While Fidel Castro gave up power in 2006, due to ill-health, turning the reins over to his brother, Raul, who is more of a pragmatist, the symbolic impact of his death may provide the President-elect with more political room to continue to move forward to a new era of US-Cuban relations. The celebrations of his death in Miami’s Little Havana this past weekend drive home the point that Fidel was the leader correctly most associated with the Cuban Revolution and its brutal treatment of any dissent and forcible taking of private property.

The harsh criticism of Fidel before his body was even cold and the continuing attacks on the current regime for its repression of dissent are certainly merited.  But that doesn’t mean it makes any sense to return, as some Republicans seemed to advocate for on the Sunday shows, to an outdated policy with a record of abject failure.

The official restoration of diplomatic relations this past year, marked by the unfurling of the American Flag on a restored American Embassy—upgraded from a diplomatic mission-- marked the end of 54 years of a failed and outdated policy of attempting to isolate the Communist state. During that time period we normalized relations with other Communist nations, including China and Vietnam, but our policy from Cuba, a vestige of the Cold War, which ended more than 25 years ago, remained in place largely because of the disproportionate influence of the first generation of Cuban Americans who fled Cuba in the wake of the revolution and settled in large numbers in South Florida .

 Fiercely anti-Castro, strategically located in an important swing state, historically overwhelmingly Republican in voting preference and always willing to contribute in large amounts to favored candidates and causes, this resourceful, entrepreneurial and successful generation of Cuban immigrants  amassed political power far exceeding their small share of the overall US population.

As a second generation of Cubans mainly born in the United States, however, comes of age and mortality takes its inevitable toll on the founding generation, attitudes in the Cuban community have shifted markedly.  This created the political opening ably seized by President Obama to go in a new more positive direction—one that merits President Trump continuing and expanding upon. This new direction is supported by the overwhelming majority of the American people and by even larger majorities in Latin America, according to public opinion polling.

 Our new policy towards Cuba is already achieving results, beginning to widen the Cuban private sector and bringing about an increase in online connectivity.  Productive investments by American businesses are already well-underway—ones that are wins for both nations

Even if President-elect Trump continues along this forward path, it will in all likelihood be an uneven process with set-backs along the way. But it is a better path—one that is over time likely to bring major positive changes to Cuba.  

Fidel Castro’s death may soften some of the opposition to this new era of diplomatic relations, especially if the Cuban government takes even some baby steps in the direction of opening up their political system. It is in the Cuban government’s interest during this Presidential transition time in the United States to seize this opening and announce the release of some dissidents and incremental steps on opening up freedom of expression. 

But for President-elect Trump, building on the hard-won progress made by President Obama in this area is in the best interests of both nations. And it sure beats returning to the failed policies of the past.

 

Rob Horowitz is a strategic and communications consultant who provides general consulting, public relations, direct mail services and polling for national and state issue organizations, various non-profits and elected officials and candidates. He is an Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Rhode Island.

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