Accumulation of Power

Accumulation of Power / Fernando Damaso
Posted on July 8, 2013

When authoritarian, centralized and vertical power has been exercised
for such a long time and without any opposing counterpart, where
decisions are taking and implemented from above to below, without
effective citizen participation, as it is not in their compliance and
enforcement, it's tremendously difficult to set aside these habits and
to think and act in a democratic way.

In the case of Cuba, this is what has happened. As a result,
institutions and organizations created with the objective of offering
the world a "light" image of the Cuban "model," have not been able to
change anything, because they are simple bureaucratic constructs, where
everything is determined beforehand, both with regards to its selective
composition as well as for the issues authorized to be addressed and the
decisions taken.

Neither the National Assembly nor the Central Workers Union of Cuba, nor
any of the existing organizations (UNEAC, ANAP, FMC, FEU, FEEM, etc.)
respond to the interests of their members; rather they are no more than
chains of transmission of government policy, used to control and
manipulate the population.

As long as they don't produce economic, political and real social
changes, with laws and regulations that are legally binding on all
social subjects and, mainly, on the State and its institutions,
everything is simple words that blow away in the wind, whether or not
those who utter them are sincere or not.

This country, to save itself, needs a complete turnaround, that doesn't
necessarily have to be violent, but it has to be deep. The patches,
re-soles and mends are ineffective, and instead of solving problems,
they extend them and in time complicate them. Understanding this is not
that hard!

4 July 2013

Source: "Accumulation of Power / Fernando Damaso | Translating Cuba" -
http://translatingcuba.com/accumulation-of-power-fernando-damaso/