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U.S. POLICY TOWARD CUBA.   Term Paper ID:26068 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Examines effects of political, economic, ideological & legislative forces in 20th Cent., emphasizing Castro era.... More...

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Paper Abstract: Examines effects of political, economic, ideological & legislative forces in 20th Cent., emphasizing Castro era. Paper Introduction: Cuba: Below the Economic Radar? American official influence in other countries is formally directed from Washington. In reality, though all the usual instruments of international diplomacy, suasion, and threat are exercised through external agencies such as NATO, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization (WTO). In addition, it is generally accepted that the United States has two other powerful instruments of influence abroad, economic influence and cultural influence, or what may be expressed in shorthand form as Wall Street and Hollywood. Where Washington leaves off and Wall Street or Hollywood begin, in the projection of American influence, can be ambiguous. U.S. business interests speak with a loud voice in Washington, with considerable power to shape official policy toward their own Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. "Washington wire" column. Cuba: Below the Economic Radar? market by the embargo, the Cuban economy entered a stateof crisis (Schwab, 1999, p. By the 199 s, Cuba itself was interested in tourism asa source of foreign exchange (Espino, 1994, pp. 1). American official influence in other countries is formally directedfrom Washington. This dominant influence was not limited to sugar. But duringthis same period, growth of Cuba's nontraditional exports grew at a rateover four times that of Costa Rica, the next-ranking performer in a groupof Caribbean and Central American countries (Zimbalist, 1988, p. 15). Some evidence suggest that by the early 198 s,the Cuban economy was doing better than other Latin American economies. No Department of Culture works formally inWashington to further this influence, but Hollywood itself is also abusiness interest, and can gain official support for policies aimed, forexample, at pressuring other countries to allow wide distribution ofAmerican entertainment products. The so-calledPlatt Amendment and Permanent Treaty of 19 3 established a dominant U.S.political and economic role in Cuba (Ibarra, 1998, p. It had also long become clear that Soviet Communism wasstagnated, at least in economic terms. economy ensures that these interests have a substantial worldwideinfluence. pp. 1). However, this essay will set aside culturalinfluence, for the most part, to examine the interaction of political andeconomic influence. Jesse Helms and Re. Hollywood's influence - that is, theinfluence of American popular culture - is doughtless present in Cuba aswell, though embodied most conspicuously by major-league baseball than byHollywood in the narrow sense. If Cuba were a larger potential market, Wall Street might well havelobbied hard against Helms-Burton. It is true that Chinahas ceased to be "Communist" in any real sense, whereas Castro seems toremain genuinely committed to his ideology, yet it is difficult to believethat business interests would allow that to get in the way of profitpotentials. Helms and Burton are prominent in Americandomestic politics mainly as conservative ideologues, not primarily asdefenders of business interests as such - they have been prominentopponents of "normalization" with China. market (Ibarra, 1998, p. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. By the 195 s, U.S.investment in the Cuban sugar industry was also said to be in "fullretreat" (Ibarra, 1998, p. It might well be hoped thatCastro could be brought swiftly to his knees and overthrown. (1994). (April 16, 1999). The course ofthe Cuban economy since that time is difficult to determine; as one authorfrankly admits, "much of the extant literature is characterized byideological dogmatism, from either end of the political spectrum"(Zimbalist, 1998, p. 2). Where Washington leaves off and Wall Street or Hollywood begin, inthe projection of American influence, can be ambiguous. xi). However, rather than liberating the Cuban economy from U.S.dominance, the overall effect of Castro communism and the embargo were tothrust it into a comparable dependency on the Soviet Union. At the beginning, both may have worked hand in hand. Espino, M.D. In reality, though all the usual instruments ofinternational diplomacy, suasion, and threat are exercised through externalagencies such as NATO, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization(WTO). economy. In addition, it is generally accepted that the United States hastwo other powerful instruments of influence abroad, economic influence andcultural influence, or what may be expressed in shorthand form as WallStreet and Hollywood. With respect to American relations with andinfluence upon Cuba (or the lack thereof), Wall Street has in effectdismissed this one-time economic colony as not worth recolonizing. Yet in 1996, the U.S.passed the Helms-Burton Act, using those old expropriations as pretext toallow former owners to sue third-country firms doing business in Cuba - ameasure that, at least potentially, threatens US relations with majortrading partners in Europe and Asia (Schwab, 1999, p. If it did not, the probable reason isthat Cuba is simply not a large enough potential market to engage businessinterests in a vigorous way. A partial trade embargowas imposed in 196 , soon after Fidel Castro came to power; it was madenearly total in 1962, and further extended to food and medicine bylicensing regulations in 1964 (Schwab, 1999, p. (1998). The closeness of Cuba was also an economic reality. The year 1996 was a presidentialelection year, and at a time when Cuban-Americans, an important voting blocin a key electoral state, had shown signs of drifting somewhat away fromtheir traditional strong Republican identification. A1. The key to this riddle is perhaps offered by the chief sponsors ofthe Helms-Burton Act, Sen. business interests arenot at all averse to broadening economic relations with a normallyCommunist state; indeed, they exert strong pressure toward greaternormalization with China (Washington wire, 1999). This state of affairs contrasts profoundly with that which existedbefore 1958. 8). With the collapse of the SovietUnion, Communism could hardly be viewed as a threat to a capitalist worldorder in any sense. 15). Schwab, P. Dan Burton, and by the dateof its enactment, 1996. Bereft of Soviet support, and still cutoff from the U.S. Zimbalist, A. businessinterests speak with a loud voice in Washington, with considerable power toshape official policy toward their own ends, while the sheer size of theU.S. Prologue to Revolution: Cuba, 1898-1958. Boulder, CO: Westview. The figures are, however, subject to the usual,ideologically-influenced dispute (Zimbalist, 1988, pp. The influence of Hollywood is more indirect, working byexporting American popular culture, and therefore American attitudes, tothe rest of the world. 147-66. Perez-Lopes. However, by the 195 s there were some signs of aloosening of the U.S economic domination. (199 ). (ed.) (1988). MarjorieMoore, trans. Long before 199 , however, it was clear that the embargo would notbring Castro down. Journal. The remainder of this essay explores the combined influence ofWashington and Wall Street in Cuba. It is also implausible that business interests, even those that oncehad investments in Cuba that were expropriated, still harbor dreams ofrecovering those investments after four decades, during which they wouldhave long since been depreciated and written off. Anyone who watches re-runs of the "I Love Lucy" show becomesaware that, in terms of the popular cultural, Cuba was not at all onanother planet in the 195 s. 1). Helms-Burton, thus emerges not as an instrument of Wall Street, but asa political instrument designed to reinforce the traditional sympathies ofa Republican voting group and to put a Democratic president in an awkwardspot. This in turn came to an abrupt end when the Soviet Unioncollapsed at the end of the 198 s. Sugar, Cuba'smain export, was formally bound to the U.S. 2-3). 147ff), and it couldplausibly be argued that American tourists and their dollars wouldundermine Castro's control, culturally and economically. Nevertheless, US imports, which hadaveraged 62.8 percent of the Cuban market in the period 19 -1934,increased to 76.5 percent of the Cuban market in the period 1934-1958(Ibarra, 1998, p.18). New York: St.Martin's. 17). In198 -85, a period in which the overall Latin American economy (19countries, not including Cuba) declined by 1.7 percent, Cuba's ownstatistics indicate that its economy grew at an annual rate of 6.7 percent(Zimbalist, 1988, p. In the two decadesafter 19 , for example, capital in Cuban railways - then the chief elementof economic infrastructure - passed largely form Spanish or domestic Cubanhands into American (and to a lesser degree British hands, as the followingfigures, in millions of pesos, show (Ibarra, 1998, p. Granted that Lucy's television (and real-life) husband was a Cuban, the show did not treat this as freakish orparticularly exotic. 9).| |British |US |Spanish-Cuban ||19 | .926 | .246 | .888 ||1911 |1.926 |1.14 | .495 ||192 |1.824 |1.88 | .64 | Treaty changes in 1934 made the American economic grip tighter still(Ibarra, 1998, p. 15). Extensive U.S.economic holdings in Cuba and been expropriated by the Castro government,and a U.S.-dominated export market threatened. In 1925, deposits in Cuban-ownedbanks totaled about 6 percent of Cuban deposits in foreign (mainly U.S)banks; by 1955, deposits in Cuban banks were half again larger than Cubandeposits in foreign banks (Ibarra, 1998, p. 15). in then-accepted measuresof industrial muscle such as steel production; the Soviets were winning thespace race; Communism seemed on the march in the Third World. Recent experience with China shows that U.S. Moreover, inthe years around 196 the Communist economic threat to capitalism seemedreal. Since that time, Cubahas been nearly on another planet so far as economic relations with theUnited States were concerned. Since the early 196 s, Wall Street's influence in Cuba has existedonly in a negative sense, in that trade embargoes have almost entirely cutoff Cuba from interaction with the U.S. Embargo. References Ibarra, J. Cuba Political Economy: Controversies inCubanology. All this ended abruptly with Castro and the embargo. Cuba at a Crossroads: Politics andEconomics after the Fourth Party Congress. U.S. Wall St. "In aquantitative sense Cuba's economy is certainly as dependent on the SovietUnion in the 198 s as it was on the United States in the 195 s" (Zimbalist,1988, p. The Soviet Union was overtaking the U.S. From the time ofthe Spanish-American War in 1898, Cuba passed in effect from being a formalcolony of Spain to an economic colony of the United States. Cuba: Confronting the U.S. "Tourism in Cuba: A Development Strategy for the199 s?" In Jorge F. Gainsville: University ofFlorida. The question now arises whether this state of affairs, which hasexisted since about 196 , has been driven by Washington, or Wall Street, orboth? 6). p. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.