• Castro and the Cuban government took over ownership of all rental properties in Cuba

• They technically compensated landowners, but they did so through giving them state bonds redeemable in 20 years that had incredibly little value especially in comparison with the homes the state took

1960 Abolition of mortgages and housing market

• Selling property on the open housing market was banned

• Existing mortgages were canceled and future mortgages were banned

• This was meant to abolish the tenant-landowner relationship and make it easier for tenants to buy homes

• Castro would make tenants pay a significantly reduced rent for 10-20 years before the government gave them full ownership of their home

• Strength: Helped make it much easier for renting families to buy homes (over 85% of Cubans own the house that they live in) and made it much easier for poorer families to rent. This essentially eliminated homelessness in Cuba.

• Weaknesses: Harmed landowners monetarily.

Banning of Mortgages and Homes as assets

• This was also meant to abolish Cuban's debt and make owning a home easier

• This did successfully cut a lot of debt that Cuban's had, but it actually made buying a home harder as without a mortgage it was very difficult to save up the money required to purchase a home

• Abolishing homes as property did help more Cubans buy homes, but it eliminated their ability to profit off of their household, as it was now illegal to sell a property on the open market or use a house for business purposes

• Strengths: Cut significant debt among Cubans and helped some gain full ownership of properties they had a mortgage on

• Weaknesses: Made it harder for some first time owners to buy a house and eliminated people's ability to profit off of home ownership. Harmed economy

"Words to the Intellectuals" Speech (1961): In this speech, Castro articulated the principle: "Within the Revolution, everything; against the Revolution, nothing." This solidified state control over artistic and intellectual expression in Cuba.

Nationalization and Promotion of Arts: The government established institutions like the National Art Schools (Escuelas Nacionales de Arte) to provide free education in various art forms. This initiative aimed to democratize art education and cultivate a new generation of artists committed to revolutionary principles.

Censorship and Control: Castro exercised strict control over artistic content, suppressing works deemed counter-revolutionary. Notable incidents include the banning of the documentary "P.M." in 1961 and the arrest of poet Heberto Padilla in 1971, signaling a crackdown on dissenting artistic voices.

State support made art education and resources widely available, which allowed access across socioeconomic backgrounds. Additionally, the promotion of art that reflected Cuban themes strengthened national identity and pride.

Weaknesses:

Strict censorship over artistic content suppressed freedom of expression and marginalized dissenting voices. This requirement for art to align with revolutionary ideals led to a lack of diversity in artistic expression.

https://brooklynrail.org/contributor/Billie-Anania. “Art of the Cuban Revolution | the Brooklyn Rail.” Brooklynrail.org, The Brooklyn Rail, 30 July 2024, brooklynrail.org/2022/02/artseen/Art-of-the-Cuban-Revolution/.

mtorresyunda@ufl.edu. ““ART IS a WEAPON of the REVOLUTION.”” Cuban Studies, 14 Apr. 2024, cubanstudies.history.ufl.edu/special-period-in-a-time-of-peace/art-is-a-weapon-of-the-revolution/.

“This decree is a way of silencing any critical voices in Cuba, which may have existed after 62 years of communist rule,” Normando Hernandez, of the Cuban Institute for Freedom of Expression and the Press, told VOA. The Miami-based organization supports opposition media on the island.

Grein, John. “Recent Reforms in Cuban Housing Policy.” Law School International Immersion Program Papers, no. 7, 2015, chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1016&context=international_immersion_program_papers.

Hamberg, Jill. “Cuba Opens to Private Housing but Preserves Housing Rights.” Poverty & the Environment |, vol. 19, pp. 1–2012, www.friendsofrpe.org/files/19-1.hamberg.pdf. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

Kelly, William T. “Revolución Es Reconstruir: Housing, Everyday Life, and Revolution in Cuba, 1959-1988.” Rutgers.edu, 2021, rucore.libraries.rutgers.edu/rutgers-lib/66830/, https://doi.org/10.7282/t3-ecmf-s581. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

• MINSAP (Ministry of Public Health) was founded in 1961 to form a state-run healthcare system

• Polyclinics were established in the mid-1960s as a way to consolidate multiple healthcare requirements for outpatient care under one system 

  • GPs, Nurses, Pediatricians, OBGYNs, Social Workers, Dentistry

  • Polyclinics also did public outreach and carried out mass vaccination campaigns to help curb the spread of malaria dengue virus and others

    • Malaria was eradicated in 1967

    • “In 1962, 80 percent of all Cuban children under fifteen were vaccinated against polio in eleven days.”

  • Increasing access to basic healthcare, especially for people living in rural and more impoverished areas of Cuba. Widely expanded polyclinic and hospital networks to Eastern Cuba (Oriente) which is the most rural/least developed region in Cuba.

• Castro nationalized “mutualist” clinics, which were essentially private healthcare practices not run under MINSAP and were not part of the greater program of Polyclinics, eventually private practice in Cuba fully dissolved and became unified as part of the national system

Strengths:

• MINSAP has vastly broadened healthcare access for residents living in rural areas and for Black Cubans who previously did not receive equitable healthcare

• Vaccination programs have been very efficient and successful

• Centralization/Decentralization policy allows for there to be top-down and local control of health policy.

Weaknesses:

• No private healthcare sector

• Facilities often lack basic supplies, equipment, technology, etc

• Physicians and health professionals receive poor compensation for their contributions

• Near 100% literacy rate

• Free and universal access to education, even those in disadvantaged communities 

• Skilled workers 

• Higher percent of government expenditure and GDP used on education than the US (US is 15.5% and 5% in 2019)

• Gender disparity in education extremely low, rivaling the US for gender equality (hard to tell though, since both countries gender parity index hover at ~1%, but US does not have statistics on gender gap in upper secondary completion rate)

• Qualified teachers at every level of education

• Cuba is still making strides on improving their education system, with higher levels of proficiency for subjects and increased internet access over the last few years.

Weaknesses:

• Proficiency levels for mathematics and education are slightly worse than the US

• Completion rate for education is slightly worse than the US, with the US have between 90-100% for all levels of education (in 2019)

• Still adapting to modern day standards, having outdated technology and limited internet and computer accessibility, leading to low internet literacy. Seen in statistics for percentage of schools with access to basic services, where internet access reaches only 70% for even the highest level of education.

• Many jobs that require higher education actually make less money than some jobs due to being controlled by the government 

  • Ex: a taxi driver makes more than a doctor 

“Latin Lessons: What Can We Learn from the World’s Most Ambitious.” The Independent, 7 Nov. 2010, www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/latin-lessons-what-can-we-learn-from-the-world-rsquo-s-most-ambitious-literacy-campaign-2124433.html.

Rey, Kian Seara. “Rosa Hernández Acosta on the Cuban Literacy Campaign.” JSTOR Daily, 6 Feb. 2021, daily.jstor.org/rosa-hernandez-acosta-on-the-cuban-literacy-campaign/.

Unesco.org, 2021, sdg4-data.uis.unesco.org/.

The Castro regime constructed a $25 million Palace of Conventions in Havana to host international gatherings designed to focus on world opinion on specific issues or promote Cuban prestige. 

Radio Havana’s reporting on Peru’s Maoist Sendero Luminso guerilla group angered the Peruvian Government. Cuban interpretations of Belize’s history have caused local criticism of Havana’s anti-US and antireligous bias. 

Castro himself would sometimes visit the editorial offices of the party’s daily newspaper, Granma, late at night to review the next day’s edition or direct the exact placement of a story. Castro also would sometimes drop into the headquarters of Cuba’s international news agency, Prensa Latina, to make a statement that he wants disseminated abroad as a response to quick-breaking events. Granma would publish its daily paper in English, Spanish, and French for distribution abroad. He always tried to gain the maximum political benefit in the way news is presented. 

All Cuban propaganda is controlled and directed by the DOR which is responsible for formulating annual “theme plans” for the Cuban media. Additional plans are made up on an ad hoc basis. Past few years the “theme plans” have consisted of: 

• Emphasis on the values of socialism 

• Denigration of US foreign policy (the amount of stress on this theme fluctuates depending on the state of Cuban-US relations)

• Glorificaiton of the institution of “Polar Popular,” Cuba’s system of local, provincal, and national government administration

• Alleged religious freedom in Cuba

• Praise for Soviet efforts to maintain world peace 

• Defense of Soviet policies at all levels 
  

Propaganda Agencies: 

1. Executive Secretariat of the African, Asian, and Latin American Peoples Solidarity Organization (AALAPSO) founded in early 1966. This organization claims to be an independent international organization, but its staffing and activities over the years leave no doubt that the Secretariat is actually an agency of the Cuban Government who uses it as a outlet for propaganda aimed at strengthening Cuba’s links to revolutionary movements abroad and perpetuating the Che Guevara guerilla cult. AALAPSO is headquartered in Havana and is headed by Cuban Communist Party Central Committee member Melba Hernandez. 

2. Imprenta National de Cuba is a publishing house created to spearhead the new government’s propaganda efforts in the field of literature. Over the past 24 years, the publishing house has produced 17,000 titles and over 500 million copies of various kinds of books and pamphlets. One of the plants opened with equipment from East Germany in 1977 in Guantanamo. Another plant opened in Palma Soriano in early 1983.

3. The Latin America Federation of Journalists (FELAP), was formed as a result of vigorous Cuban lobbying with leftist journalists of the region to counter the influence of the independent Interamerican Press Association. FELAP has close links with many Soviet groups.

“Cuba: Fidel Castro’s Record of Repression.” Human Rights Watch, 26 Nov. 2016, www.hrw.org/news/2016/11/26/cuba-fidel-castros-record-repression.

“CUBA’S REPRESSIVE MACHINERY.” Www.hrw.org, www.hrw.org/reports/1999/cuba/Cuba996-03.htm.

“Cuba’s Repressive Machinery: Human Rights Forty Years after the Revolution.” Refworld, 1 June 1999, www.refworld.org/reference/countryrep/hrw/1999/en/71478.

Keeley, Graham. “Cyber Law Gives Cuba New Way to Silence Critics, Analysts Say.” Voice of America, Voice of America (VOA News), 27 Aug. 2021, www.voanews.com/a/press-freedom_cyber-law-gives-cuba-new-way-silence-critics-analysts-say/6210050.html. 

Londoño, Ernesto, and Daniel Politi. ““Terror”: Crackdown after Protests in Cuba Sends a Chilling Message.” The New York Times, 28 July 2021, www.nytimes.com/2021/07/28/world/americas/cuba-protests-crackdown-arrests.html.

“Women and men enjoy equal economic, political, cultural, social, and familial rights. The State guarantees that women will be offered the same opportunities and possibilities as men to achieve their full participation in the development of the country.”

The constitution gives women equal opportunities as men, but in practice, Cuban women spend almost three times as much time on household chores than men. They are also expected to care for children and elders, even while working a job. And only 39% of Cuban women are in the workforce, meaning that many are dependent on men as a source of income.

Additionally, despite making up 56% of the seats in parliament, Cuban women only make up 7% of the Cuban Communist Party, which holds the real lawmaking power.

In conclusion, the policies give equal rights and opportunities on paper, but fall short of these goals in practice.

Sources:

Rose, Keiko. Keiko Rose the University of Chicago Law School IIP Cuba Trip. University of Chicago Law School, 2015, chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1014&context=international_immersion_program_papers.

Wadley, Nicole. “The Truth about Gender Equality in Cuba.” Georgetown Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs, Georgetown University Berkley Center, 1 Oct. 2015, berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/posts/the-truth-about-gender-equality-in-cuba.

UN Women. “Country Fact Sheet | UN Women Data Hub.” Data.unwomen.org, UN Women, Feb. 2024, data.unwomen.org/country/cuba.

cubanews. “Cuban Communist Party Congress Starts in Havana - Cuban News Agency.” Cubanews.acn.cu, 16 Apr. 2021, www.cubanews.acn.cu/cuba/13322-cuban-communist-party-congress-starts-in-havana. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

Cuban Medical Internationalism:

• 50,000 Cuban medical professionals are working overseas in 67 different countries

• Form of medical diplomacy

• Starting in 1960 after a huge earthquake hit Chile, since then Cuba has been sending medical brigades all over South America, as well as parts of Europe and the Middle East

• Castro on the USA rejecting help from Cuba after Hurricane Katrina: “It hurts to think that maybe some of those desperate people, trapped by the water and at death’s door, could have been saved”

• The USA has harshly criticized this program and accused it of being not as altruistic as it seems, alleges human trafficking and equates the system of sending health professionals abroad to slavery

• By 2014, Cuban Professionals had performed 1.2 billion procedures overseas, helped in 2.2 million births, performed 8 million surgeries

Strengths:

• Improves relations with contracted countries

• Giving competent medical care to people without easy access

• Professionals have experience working in sub-optimal conditions and without a lot of materials/technology

Weaknesses:

• Criticized for having ulterior motives

• Outside countries are being encouraged to shut-down contracts with Cuba for medical aid by President Trump

Everybody has the right to health protection and care. The State guarantees this right;

• by providing free medical and hospital care by means of the installations of the rural medical service network, polyclinics, hospitals and preventive and specialist treatment centers;

• by providing free dental care

• by promoting the health publicity campaigns, health education, regular medical examinations, general vaccinations and other measures to prevent the outbreak of disease. All of the population cooperates in these activities and plans through the social and mass organizations.

Constitution of Cuba, Chapter VII, Article 50.

Strengths:

Castro's focus on healthcare has resulted in Cuba having the highest ratio of physicians per capita in the world (6.6/1000 at the end of Castro's rule in 2008). Cuba has been able to use its high number of physicians to send aid to other countries in South America, Europe, and the Middle East starting in 1960. Cuba has a very low infant mortality rate (fallen from 37.3 to 4.3 per 1000 live births since 1959, lower than the US's 5.8 per 1000).

Weaknesses:

Despite this, the best jobs on the island remain tour-guide and taxi driver positions that have access to tips from tourists in Convertible Cuban Pesos (CUCs).

Blumenthal, David. “Fidel Castro’s Health Care Legacy | Commonwealth Fund.” Commonwealthfund.org, commonwealthfund, 2019, www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2016/fidel-castros-health-care-legacy.

Bulletin of World Health Organization. “Cuba’s Primary Health Care Revolution: 30 Years On.” Bulletin of the World Health Organization, vol. 86, May 2008, pp. 327–329, www.scielosp.org/article/bwho/2008.v86n5/327-329/en/. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

Fitz, Don. “The Birth of the Cuban Polyclinic.” Monthly Review, June 2018, monthlyreview.org/2018/06/01/the-birth-of-the-cuban-polyclinic/. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

O’Hanlon, Claire E, and Melody Harvey. “Doing More with Less: Lessons from Cuba’s Health Care System.” Rand.org, Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, 6 Oct. 2017, www.rand.org/pubs/commentary/2017/10/doing-more-with-less-lessons-from-cubas-health-care.html. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

Washington, Val. Chicago Unbound Cuba’ S Healthcare Mandate: A Vision for the Future or Relic of a Socialist Past? Cuba’s Healthcare Mandate: A Vision for the Future or Relic of a Socialist Past?

“World Bank Open Data.” World Bank Open Data, 2025, data.worldbank.org/indicator/SH.MED.PHYS.ZS?end=2008&locations=CU&start=1960. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.

Yaffe, Helen. “Cuban Medical Internationalism: A Paradigm for South–South Cooperation.” The International Journal of Cuban Studies, vol. 15, no. 2, 1 Jan. 2023, https://doi.org/10.13169/intejcubastud.15.2.0203.

---. “The World Rediscovers Cuban Medical Internationalism.” LSE Latin America and Caribbean, 8 Apr. 2020, blogs.lse.ac.uk/latamcaribbean/2020/04/08/the-world-rediscovers-cuban-medical-internationalism/.

Cuban Women and Children, 1970. Depicts young children outdoors at a daycare that was adjoined to the workroom of a factory where their mothers worked.

Cuban women were guaranteed childcare so they could contribute to the economy by working. Many factories or workplaces had connected childcare facilities, allowing women to visit their children throughout the day.

Source:

Lillydahl, Sandy. “Cuban Woman and Children, 1970.” Umass.edu, 2025, credo.library.umass.edu/view/full/muph056-b001-i026. Accessed 6 Feb. 2025.