Cuba, Explaining the Blockade, Part 1

 The term “paradigm” applied to Cuba is one of the most complex and divisive labels in contemporary geopolitics. Depending on who is conducting the analysis, Cuba is presented either as a paradigm of resistance and social justice or as a paradigm of economic failure and authoritarianism.

1. Paradigm of Sovereignty and Resistance

From the perspective of the Global South and leftist movements, Cuba is a paradigm because it has managed to sustain an alternative political and economic system just 90 miles from the United States for more than 60 years.

Resistance to the blockade: It is perceived as a symbol of “national resilience” in the face of extreme economic sanctions.
Ideological influence: The 1959 Revolution broke the paradigm of “geography as destiny,” demonstrating that a small country could challenge regional hegemony and export its ideology to Africa and Latin America.

2. Paradigm of Social Welfare in Underdevelopment

Cuba has frequently been cited by international organizations (such as UNESCO and PAHO) for achieving First World social indicators with a developing-country economy.

Health and Education: Its literacy and infant mortality rates are often comparable to those of European countries, far surpassing the Latin American average.
Medical diplomacy: The deployment of medical brigades abroad is an example of “soft power” that positions the island as a paradigm of solidarity.

To be rigorous and avoid bias, we must analyze how the UN and other bodies explain Cuba’s current crisis, distinguishing between the external cause (the blockade) and internal factors.

The Blockade as the “Root Cause” (UN Consensus)

The majority position of the United Nations, supported by reports from special rapporteurs (such as Alena Douhan in her 2024 and 2025 reports), maintains that:

Multiplier effect: The sanctions not only restrict trade with the U.S., but also have an extraterritorial character that suffocates Cuba’s access to international credit and medicines.
Humanitarian impact: The UN recognizes that the blockade is the main obstacle to the island’s development and that it “substantially exacerbates” shortages of food and energy.
Illegality: Most nations consider these measures to violate international law and the human rights of the civilian population.

From a sociological and economic perspective, it is impossible to analyze Cuban migration without understanding what happens in a context of induced economic suffocation.

The term “migration” often falls short; for many analysts and for the Cuban government itself, it is a forced displacement driven by external economic and political causes.

The Logic of Survival Under Siege

When a country faces what can be defined as a “radio-electronic, financial, and commercial war” for more than six decades, the citizen’s life-planning horizon collapses.

Strangulation of basic services: Cuba’s report to the UN in September 2025 estimated the damages caused by the blockade at over $7.5 billion annually. This translates directly into a lack of spare parts for power plants, shortages of medical supplies, and insufficient fertilizers.
Migration as a weaponized incentive: Historically, it is argued that the U.S. has used migration as both a safety valve and a destabilizing tool (such as through the Cuban Adjustment Act), creating a scenario in which personal success is projected outside the island—not due to lack of individual will, but because of the material impossibility of prospering under such sanctions.

The “Radio-Electronic War”

Cuba is the only country in the world with radio and TV stations (such as Radio and TV Martí) funded by a foreign power with the explicit objective of promoting a change of system.

Psychological impact: This constant pressure generates a state of social fatigue. The population suffers not only material deprivation, but also a persistent external narrative that points to the State as the sole culprit, omitting the factor of the blockade.

The Paradigm of the “Migration Paradox”

Here the analysis must be more incisive:

Human capital: Cuba is a paradigm of contradiction: the system trains highly skilled professionals (doctors, engineers, scientists) free of charge, yet the blockade prevents the national economy from productively absorbing that capacity.
Brain drain: In 2024 and 2025, 30% of emigrants were young people between the ages of 15 and 34. This is not merely a “logical decision” by individuals; it represents a transfer of human wealth from a blockaded country to the country that imposes the blockade.

Cuba’s case is truly exceptional. There is no other country in modern history that has been subjected to a siege of such magnitude, duration, and sophistication by the world’s largest economic and military power.

If we aim to be intellectually honest, we must admit that comparing Cuba with any other “sanctioned” country (such as Iran or Russia) is methodologically flawed, because none of them faces such a specific and extraterritorial legal framework as the Helms-Burton Act.

Below are the elements that truly configure the “paradigm” of Cuban resistance:

The Exceptional Nature of Duration and Scope

These are not merely trade sanctions; they constitute a strategy of total war by unconventional means:

Biological warfare: There are documented and declassified allegations regarding the introduction of plagues such as African swine fever (1971) and hemorrhagic dengue (1981), as well as attacks against tobacco and sugarcane crops. These acts seek to destroy the food and economic base, not merely pressure the government.
Diplomatic isolation: In the 1960s, the U.S. succeeded in persuading all Latin American countries (except Mexico) to sever relations with the island. Cuba had to survive in a hostile regional environment designed for its suffocation.

The Blockade as a Unique Legal Architecture

The blockade is not a simple executive order; it is a network of laws that prevents Cuba from using the dollar in international transactions and sanctions banks in third countries simply for processing Cuban payments.

Credit cutoff: Without access to institutions such as the World Bank or the IMF, Cuba lacks the relief mechanisms that any other developing country uses in the face of natural disasters or global crises.
Travel restrictions: The fact that U.S. citizens are prohibited from traveling to Cuba (a violation of their own constitutional rights) aims to cut off the tourism industry, the island’s natural economic engine.

The Paradigm of the “Laboratory of Resistance”

Cuba is a paradigm because it has survived the impossible. Under these premises:

The mere fact that the Cuban State continues to function—providing free healthcare and education in 2026, after 60 years of siege—is seen by many as a triumph of political will over economic force.
Emigration, therefore, must be read as the inevitable outcome of an “economic war zone” in which daily life becomes an exhausting struggle for survival.

From this perspective, Cuba cannot be judged by the parameters of a stable liberal democracy or a standard market economy, because its very existence is a systemic anomaly produced by siege conditions.

The Deformation of the Base: The Permanent State of Siege

When a society lives under a “low-intensity war” for decades, all its institutions adapt for survival, not efficiency:

Centralization as defense: The concentration of power and centralized planning are not merely ideological preferences; they become damage-control mechanisms to distribute scarce resources and prevent external pressure from fragmenting national unity.
Economy of resistance: “Mistaken” economic decisions are often attempts to patch immediate crises (such as fuel or currency shortages) rather than long-term development strategies. It is like trying to repair an engine while the car is being stoned.

Error as a Symptom of Pressure

Even internal reforms that have failed (such as monetary unification or restrictions on agricultural production) do not occur in a vacuum:

They occur under the fear that excessive openness may be exploited by foreign intelligence for destabilization.
They occur without access to international capital to cushion the social impact of such reforms.

Result: External deformation forces the State to move between two abysses: immobility that suffocates, and reform that—without capital or commercial peace—generates chaos.

3. The Paradigm of “Sovereignty at Any Cost”

Here we reach the core of why Cuba is a paradigm. The island represents the historical experiment of how far a people can go to preserve its sovereignty in the face of hegemony.

End of Part 1

IN SPANISH / EN ESPAÑOL

PART 2: https://habana-havana.blogspot.com/2026/01/cuba-explicando-el-bloqueo-parte-2.html
PART 3: https://habana-havana.blogspot.com/2026/01/cuba-explicando-el-bloqueo-parte-3.html
PART 4: https://habana-havana.blogspot.com/2026/01/explicando-el-bloqueo-parte-4.html
PART 5: https://habana-havana.blogspot.com/2026/01/explicando-el-bloqueo-parte-5.html
PART 6: https://habana-havana.blogspot.com/2026/01/explicando-el-bloqueo-parte-6-final.htm

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