User:Bijou tine/Racism in Cuba

The article on Wikipedia: Racism in Cuba

Racism in Cuba refers to racial discrimination in Cuba. In Cuba, Afro-Cubans who are dark skinned and the only group on the island referred to as black and mulatos who are mixed race, have lighter skin and are most often not characterized as “black.” Race conceptions in Cuba are unique because of its long history of racial mixing and appeals to a "raceless" society. The Cuban census reports that 65% of the population is white while foreign figures report an estimate of the number of whites at anywhere from 40 to 45 percent.[1] This is likely due to the self-identifying mulatos who are sometimes designated officially as white.[2] Many Cubans argue that every Cuban has at least some African ancestry. Several pivotal events have impacted race relations on the island. Using the historic race-blind nationalism first established around the time of independence, Cuba has navigated the abolition of slavery, the suppression of black clubs and political parties, the revolution and its aftermath, and the current economic decline.

History Slavery and independence According to Voyages – The Transatlantic Slave Trade Database,[3] about 900,000 Africans were brought to Cuba as slaves. To compare, some 470,000 Africans were brought to what is now the United States, and 5,500,000 to the much vaster region of what is now Brazil. As slavery was abolished or restricted in other areas of the Americas during the 19th century, the Cuban slave trade grew dramatically. Just between 1790 and 1820, 325,000 Africans were brought to Cuba, quadruple the number from the people brought in the last 30 years.[4] The abolition of slavery was a gradual process that began during the first war for independence. On October 10, 1868, Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, a plantation owner, freed all of his slaves and asked them to join him in liberating Cuba from Spanish occupation.[5] There were many small rebellions in the next several decades which led Spain to counteract. Spanish propaganda convinced white Cubans that independence would only pave the way for a race war; That Afro-Cubans would take their revenge and conquer the island. At this time, many white colonists were terrified that the Haitian revolution would occur elsewhere, like in Cuba.[5][6][7] This fear of a black revolt painted perceptions about racial justice and stalled progress in race relations for the next several decades, if not still prevalent today.

In order to refute this claim, anti-racism activists and politicians of the time created the image of the loyal black soldier who existed only to serve the independence movement. This conception that painted Cubans of color as obedient, and single-mindedly in favor of independence was the opposite of the savage, sexually aggressive stereotype of Spanish propaganda. After this, whites were persuaded to think that because the independence movements helped to end slavery, that there was no reason for a black revolt; black people ought to be thankful for their freedom. And further, race was an invented obstacle according to the influential thinkers of the day. It was in these years that the ideas of Jose Martí or the words of General Antonio Maceo, “no whites nor blacks, but only Cubans” took hold on the island.[5][6] These two iconic figures represented black and white cooperation, and raceless Cuban patriotism. To this day, many Cubans argue that race as a concept only exists to divide; it isn't real.[8] Following the abolition of slavery, Afro-Cubans joined the armed forces in droves to fight against the colonial occupation of Spain. At least half of all soldiers who fought in the wars for independence were Afro-Cuban.[9]

Cuban Revolution

The revolution of 1959 changed race relations drastically. Institutionally speaking, Cubans of Color benefited disproportionately from revolutionary reform. After the overthrow of the Batista regime, Fidel Castro established racism as one of the central battles of the revolution.[13] Though Cuba never had formal, state sanctioned segregation, privatization disenfranchised Cubans of color specifically.[12] Previously white only private pools, beaches, and schools were made public, free, and opened up to Cubans of all races and classes. Because much of the Afro-Cuban population on the island was impoverished before the revolution, they benefited widely from the policies for affordable housing, the literacy program, universal free education in general, and healthcare.[14] But above all, Castro insisted that the greatest obstacle for Cubans of color was access to employment. By the mid 1980s racial inequality on paper was virtually nonexistent. Cubans of color graduated at the same (or higher) rate as white Cubans. The races had an equal life expectancy and were equally represented in the professional arena.[12][15]

When Fidel Castro seized power of Cuba in 1959, his administration quickly got to work. They passed more than 1500 legislative pieces during the first 30 months. These laws included priorities such as education, poverty, land distribution, and race. However, Castro’s approach to race and eliminating racial divides was to make Cuba a raceless nation, rather focusing on people’s Cuban identity and eliminating the perception of race all together. It was an anti-discrimination campaign in it’s purest form, there could be no discrimination of races if there was a raceless country, just Cubans.

The revolutionary regime aligned itself with the race-blind narrative historically embedded in Cuba's race relations. And because of this, Castro refused to enact laws that directly addressed and condemned race based persecution because he considered them unnecessary or even anti-Cuban. Instead, he believed that fixing economic structures for a better distribution of wealth would end racism. Castro's revolution also employed the use of the loyal black soldier of the independence days in order to curb white resistance to the new policies.[12] Scholars argue that raceless rhetoric left Cuba unprepared to address the deep-seated culture of racism on the island. Two years after his 1959 speech at the Havana Labor Rally, Castro declared that the age of racism and discrimination was over. In a speech given at the Confederation of Cuban Workers in observance of May Day, Castro declared that the "just laws of the Revolution ended unemployment, put an end to villages without hospitals and schools, enacted laws which ended discrimination, control by monopolies, humiliation, and the suffering of the people."[16] After this announcement, any attempt by Afro-Cubans to open up discussion on race again was met with great resistance. If the regime claimed that racism was gone, an attempt to reignite the conversation on race was thus counterrevolutionary.

Though Castro’s vision for Cuba was to not see color, a concept which many today view as futile, he addressed racial discrimination and inopportunity by converting previously segregated and “white only” spaces to integrated spaces. Black Cubans and mulatos got access to opportunities not possible under Bautista. There was education and employment opportunities, even gaining access to recreational facilities and beaches. [17]

The changements I made on the article



Racism in Cuba refers to racial discrimination in Cuba. Although foreign figures state that the estimated number of whites on the island can be anywhere between 40 to 45 percent[1], while others 2 say that they make up one third of the population, the Cuban census reported, in 2012, that around 65% of the Cuban population is white. Within the remaining 35 to 60% we can find dark-skinned Afro-Cubans, also referred to as “black”, who make up approximately 9.3% of the population and mixed-raced Afro-Cuban, who tend to have lighter skin, referred to as “mulatos”, who make up 26.6%. Cuba is known for its unique race conceptions because of its long history of racial mixing and appeals to a “raceless” society, given that the self-identifying mulatos are sometimes designated officially as white.3 Thus, many Cubans argue that every Cuban has at least some African ancestry, due to the rapid growth of slavery during the later years of the 16th and the 19th century.4 During that time, several pivotal events have impacted race relations on the island. Using the historic race-blind nationalism first established around the time of independence, Cuba has navigated the abolition of slavery, the suppression of black clubs and political parties, the revolution and its aftermath, and the current economic decline.



History Slavery and independence According to Voyages – The Transatlantic Slave Trade Database,[4] about 900,000 Africans were brought to Cuba as slaves. To compare, some 470,000 Africans were brought to what is now the United States, and 5,500,000 to the much vaster region of what is now Brazil. As slavery was abolished or restricted in other areas of the Americas during the 19th century, the Cuban slave trade grew dramatically. From the year 1790 to the year 1820, the number of African slaves brought into the Island went up 325, 000, meaning, in only 30 years, the number of African forced into slavery in Cuba quadrupled.[5] Although very late, the abolition of slavery was a gradual process, which first took place during the first war of independence. During that time, many small rebellions were taking place, such as Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, a plantation owner, freeing his slaves demanding them to join him in liberating Cuba from the Spanish Occupation.[6] During the next decades, countless other revolts happened on the Island, which required Spain to counteract. To maintain its advantage, Spanish propaganda persuaded white Cubans that independence would only pave the way for a race war; that Afro-Cubans would take their revenge and conquer the island. After that it was only a question of timing as the Spanish used the best propaganda to scare the white Cubans and to make sure they took action because Haitian revolution occurred not too long before. 7 8 9 This fear of a black revolt painted perceptions about racial justice and stalled progress in race relations for the next several decades.



Cuban Revolution

The Cuban revolution of 1959 radically transformed race relations on the Island, and ultimately benefited Afro-Cubans as discrimination in the legal system 28 and public racism29 were prohibited. Knowing the history of the different races on the Island4, as black people were owned by whither people, when the Fidel Castro government overthrew Fulgencio Batista a military dictator and the previous Cuban president, who was endorsed by the American government, Castro established racial discrimination as one of the central battles of the revolution.[15] Because much of the Afro-Cuban population on the island was impoverished before the revolution, they benefited widely from the policies for affordable housing, the literacy program, universal free education in general, and healthcare.[16] But above all, Castro insisted that the greatest obstacle for Cubans of color was access to employment. By the mid 1980s racial inequality on paper was virtually nonexistent. Cubans of color graduated at the same (or higher) rate as white Cubans. The races had an equal life expectancy and were equally represented in the professional arena.[14][17] When Fidel Castro seized power of Cuba in 1959, and Batista fled to the U.S, in search of protection, Castro’s administration quickly got to work. Because the country was at its lowest point, during the beginning years of the revolution, the new president authorised more than 1500 legislative pieces during the first 30 months, including 31 limits on the land people could possess restructuring the education and health care systems, priorities such as education, poverty, land distribution, and race. The new dictator also supported many different guerillas in Africa and Latin America, with arms and funds. When dealing with the problem of discrimination based on one’s race, Castro’s aim was to completely eliminate the differentiation regarding to ones identity. The final goal was to have a country populated by Cuban, and not “Afro-cubans,” and “whites”. It was an anti-discrimination campaign in it’s purest form, there could be no discrimination of races if there was a raceless country, just Cubans.

The revolutionary regime aligned itself with the race-blind narrative historically embedded in Cuba's race relations. And because of this, Castro refused to enact laws that directly addressed and condemned race based persecution because he considered them unnecessary or even anti-Cuban. As a socialist prime minister, Castro deemed it more important to disperse wealth, to make every Cuban equal, and therefore, racial discrimination would end. Castro's revolution also employed the use of the loyal black soldier of the independence days in order to curb white resistance to the new policies.[14] Although the intentions were to end the problems of racial discrimination in the country, many scholars insist on the fact that, the need of a raceless society only brought a deeper problem in Cuba, which is that Cuba was unprepared to address the deep-seated culture of racism on the island. Two years after his 1959 speech at the Havana Labor Rally, Castro declared that the age of racism and discrimination was over. In a speech given at the Confederation of Cuban Workers in observance of May Day, Castro declared that the "just laws of the Revolution ended unemployment, put an end to villages without hospitals and schools, enacted laws which ended discrimination, control by monopolies, humiliation, and the suffering of the people."[18] Thus, this brough a situation where race had to be out of any discussion because Castro’s regime proclaimed to end racism. Therefore, to talk about this non-existent problem, because it was solved by the revolution would go against the revolution.

Although Castro’s concept of one unified country would not see the light of the day, he impacted in many ways the lives of the multiracial and multi-colored community that Cuba was. He clarified what racial segregation was and opened people’s eyes on the disadvantaged lives non-whites where forced into during Batista’s dictatorship such as converting “white only” spaces into open spaces. Education was more accessible and there were more possibilities in employment for Black Cubans and mulatos.19

References:

1.	 Carlos Moore. "Why Cuba's white leaders feel threatened by Obama".

2.	“Afro-Cubans.” Minority rights group report, https://minorityrights.org/minorities/afro-cubans/

3.	Schmidt, Jalane D. (2008). "Locked Together: The Culture and Politics of 'Blackness' in Cuba". Transforming Anthropology. 16 (2): 160–164. doi:10.1111/j.1548-7466.2008.00023.x. ISSN 1051-0559.

4.	Klein, Hebert S. “The Cuban Slave Trade in a Period of 1790 - 1843”. Outre-Mers. Revue d'histoire. Pp 67-69.

5.	 Voyages – The Transatlantic Slave Trade DatabaseArchived 2013-10-27 at the Wayback Machine

6.	 Ferrer, Ada (2008). "Cuban Slavery and Atlantic Antislavery". Fernand Braudel Center Review. 31: 267–295 – via JSTOR.

7.	 Ferrer, Ada (1999). Insurgent Cuba: Race, Nation, and Revolution, 1868-1898. The University of North Carolina Press.

8.	Torre, Miguel A. De La (2018-05-04). "Castro's Negra/os". Black Theology. 16 (2): 95–109. doi:10.1080/14769948.2018.1460545. ISSN 1476-9948.

9.	 Ravsberg, Fernando (2014). "Cuba's Pending Racial Debate". Afro-Hispanic Review. 33 (1): 203–204. ISSN 0278-8969.

10.	 Benson, Devyn Spence (2016-04-25). Antiracism in Cuba. University of North Carolina Press. ISBN 978-1-4696-2672-7.

11.	 Pérez, Louis A. (1986). "Politics, Peasants, and People of Color: The 1912 "Race War" in Cuba Reconsidered". The Hispanic American Historical Review. 66 (3): 509–539. doi:10.2307/2515461. ISSN 0018-2168.

12.	Helg, Aline (2009-04-20), "Cuba, Anti-Racist Movement and the Partido Independiente de Color", The International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest, Oxford, UK: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, pp. 1–5, ISBN 978-1-4051-9807-3, retrieved 2020-11-22

13.	^ Eastman, Alexander Sotelo (2019-02-23). "The Neglected Narratives of Cuba's Partido Independiente de Color: Civil Rights, Popular Politics, and Emancipatory Reading Practices". The Americas. 76 (1): 41–76. ISSN 1533-6247.

14.	 Benson, Devyn Spence (2017-01-02). "Conflicting Legacies of Antiracism in Cuba". NACLA Report on the Americas. 49 (1): 48–55. doi:10.1080/10714839.2017.1298245. ISSN 1071-4839. 15.	^ Jump up to:a b de la Fuente, Alejandro (2001). "Building a Nation for All". A Nation for All: Race, Inequality, and Politics in Twentieth-century Cuba. The University of North Carolina Press. pp. 259–316. ISBN 978-0-8078-9876-5.

16.	^ Perez, Louis A.: Cuba: Between Reform and Revolution, New York, NY. 2006, p. 326

17.	^ Weinreb, Amelia Rosenberg (2008). "Race,Fé(Faith) and Cuba's Future". Transforming Anthropology. 16 (2): 168–172. doi:10.1111/j.1548-7466.2008.00025.x. ISSN 1051-0559.

18.	^ Speech given by Fidel Castro on April 8, 1961. Text provided by Havana FIEL Network

19.	^ Benson, Devyn Spence (2016). ""Not Blacks, But Citizens": Race and Revolution in Cuba". World Policy Journal. 33 (1): 23–29. ISSN 1936-0924.

20.	^ de la Fuente, Alejandro (1995-01-01). "Race and Inequality in Cuba, 1899-1981". Journal of Contemporary History. 30 (1): 131–168. doi:10.1177/002200949503000106. ISSN 0022-0094.

21.	^ Sawyer, pp. 130–131

22.	^ de la Fuente, Alejandro (1995). "Race and Inequality in Cuba, 1899-1981". Journal of Contemporary History. 30 (1): 131–168. ISSN 0022-0094.

23.	^ Jump up to:a b Lusane, Clarence (2003). "From Black Cuban to Afro‐Cuban:Researching Race in Cuba". Souls. 1 (2): 73–79. doi:10.1080/10999949909362164. ISSN 1099-9949.

24.	^ Mark Sawyer. Racial Politics in Post-Revolutionary Cuba.

25.	^ Jump up to:a b c "A barrier for Cuba's blacks". Miami Herald.

26.	^ de la Fuente, Alejandro (2011). "The New Afro-Cuban Cultural Movement and the Debate on Race in Contemporary Cuba". Journal of Latin American Studies. 40 (4): 697–720. doi:10.1017/s0022216x08004720. ISSN 0022-216X.

27.	Glassman, Naomi. “Revolutionary racism: Afro-Cubans in an era of economic change.” Cetri, Southern Social Movement Newswire, 22 June. 2011, https://www.cetri.be/Revolutionary-Racism-Afro%E2%80%91Cubans?lang=fr

28.	Taylor, Frank F. “ Revolution, Race and some aspects of foreign relations in Cuba since 1959.” Cuban Studies Vol. 18 (1988), pp. 19-41 (23 pages). JTSOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/24486953?seq=1

29.	“Batista forced out by Castro-led revolution.” History, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/batista-forced-out-by-castro-led-revolution

30.	“Fidel Castro.” History, https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/fidel-castro#section_4