State and Revolution in Cuba

State and Revolution in Cuba
Author: Robert Whitney
Publisher: UNC Press Books
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2017-11-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1469621568

Between 1920 and 1940, Cuba underwent a remarkable transition, moving from oligarchic rule to a nominal constitutional democracy. The events of this period are crucial to a full understanding of the nation's political evolution, yet they are often glossed over in accounts that focus more heavily on the revolution of 1959. With this book, Robert Whitney accords much-needed attention to a critical stage in Cuban history. Closely examining the upheavals of the period, which included a social revolution in 1933 and a military coup led by Fulgencio Batista one year later, Whitney argues that the eventual rise of a more democratic form of government came about primarily because of the mass mobilization by the popular classes against oligarchic capitalism, which was based on historically elite status rather than on a modern sense of nation. Although from the 1920s to the 1940s politicians and political activists were bitterly divided over what "popular" and "modern" state power meant, this new generation of politicians shared the idea that a modern state should produce a new and democratic Cuba.

Revolutions in Mexico

Revolutions in Mexico
Author: United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Foreign Relations
Publisher:
Total Pages: 938
Release: 1913
Genre: Corporations
ISBN:

How the Workers’ Parliaments Saved the Cuban Revolution

How the Workers’ Parliaments Saved the Cuban Revolution
Author: Pedro Ross
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 184
Release: 2022-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 1583679782

A first hand account of a society mobilized from below at a critical time in its history How the Workers’ Parliaments Saved the Cuban Revolution brings us to the heart of one of the most precarious and transformational moments in Cuba’s evolution. As the Soviet Union fell to pieces in the 1990s, Cuba managed to evade the fate of its primary trading ally. How was this possible, especially as Cuba endured relentless attacks from the capitalist behemoth directly to its north? As the GDP plunged by over a third, and the Cuban people endured brutal food shortages— a time of crisis known as the “Special Period”— the country embarked upon a remarkable collective effort to cope with its dire circumstances and escaped the starvation, disease, death, and violence that often plague poor countries facing similar conditions. Not only did Cuba manage to evade collapse, it maintained its high life expectancy, low infant mortality, and universal access to health and education, preserving many of the gains of the revolution. At the center of this collective effort were lifelong revolutionaries like Pedro Ross, construction worker, literacy educator, and labor activist. As head of Cuba’s labor federation throughout the “Special Period,” Ross developed a nationwide series of “Labor Parliaments” which turned the country into an immense school of economics and politics. Over a 45-day span in 1993, women’s rights activists, farmers' organizations, youth movements, and academic associations came together for tens of thousands of meetings, successfully restored the production cycle, and ultimately revolutionized nearly every aspect of life in Cuba. Singularly positioned to write this seminal account of those days, Ross has given us a rare, moving, on-the-ground account of a society mobilized from below, buttressing the Revolution when it was under maximum stress.

Adiós Muchachos

Adiós Muchachos
Author: Sergio Ramírez
Publisher: Duke University Press Books
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2011-10-21
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780822350873

Adiós Muchachos is a candid insider’s account of the leftist Sandinista revolution in Nicaragua. During the 1970s, Sergio Ramírez led prominent intellectuals, priests, and business leaders to support the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), against Anastasio Somoza’s dictatorship. After the Sandinistas overthrew the Somoza regime in 1979, Ramírez served as vice-president under Daniel Ortega from 1985 until 1990, when the FSLN lost power in a national election. Disillusioned by his former comrades’ increasing intolerance of dissent and resistance to democratization, Ramírez defected from the Sandinistas in 1995 and founded the Sandinista Renovation Movement. In Adiós Muchachos, he describes the utopian aspirations for liberation and reform that motivated the Sandinista revolution against the Somoza regime, as well as the triumphs and shortcomings of the movement’s leadership as it struggled to turn an insurrection into a government, reconstruct a country beset by poverty and internal conflict, and defend the revolution against the Contras, an armed counterinsurgency supported by the United States. Adiós Muchachos was first published in 1999. Based on a later edition, this translation includes Ramírez’s thoughts on more recent developments, including the re-election of Daniel Ortega as president in 2006.

The Revolution from Within

The Revolution from Within
Author: Michael J. Bustamante
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 230
Release: 2019-02-14
Genre: History
ISBN: 1478004320

What does the Cuban Revolution look like “from within?" This volume proposes that scholars and observers of Cuba have too long looked elsewhere—from the United States to the Soviet Union—to write the island's post-1959 history. Drawing on previously unexamined archives, the contributors explore the dynamics of sociopolitical inclusion and exclusion during the Revolution's first two decades. They foreground the experiences of Cubans of all walks of life, from ordinary citizens and bureaucrats to artists and political leaders, in their interactions with and contributions to the emerging revolutionary state. In essays on agrarian reform, the environment, dance, fashion, and more, contributors enrich our understanding of the period beginning with the utopic mobilizations of the early 1960s and ending with the 1980 Mariel boatlift. In so doing, they offer new perspectives on the Revolution that are fundamentally driven by developments on the island. Bringing together new historical research with comparative and methodological reflections on the challenges of writing about the Revolution, The Revolution from Within highlights the political stakes attached to Cuban history after 1959. Contributors. Michael J. Bustamante, María A. Cabrera Arús, María del Pilar Díaz Castañón, Ada Ferrer, Alejandro de la Fuente, Reinaldo Funes Monzote, Lillian Guerra, Jennifer L. Lambe, Jorge Macle Cruz, Christabelle Peters, Rafael Rojas, Elizabeth Schwall, Abel Sierra Madero

Catarino Garza's Revolution on the Texas-Mexico Border

Catarino Garza's Revolution on the Texas-Mexico Border
Author: Elliott Young
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 428
Release: 2004-07-26
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780822333203

DIVUses the Garza rebellion on the Texas-Mexico border to analyze economic and social change in this region, internationalizing U.S. history with its examination of a transborder area within the larger histories of Mexico and the United States./div

Ni OS de La Guerrilla

Ni OS de La Guerrilla
Author: Jose Cruz
Publisher: Palibrio
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2012-10
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 146333334X

NIÑOS DE LA GUERRILLA (Ak'alab' reche le guerrilla). Es la historia que nos revela como la tranquilidad, la paz, y la armonía de las comunidades campesinas, repentinamente fue arrebatada con violencia incendiaria; al irrumpir en esas pacíficas comunidades el fuego destructor del comunismo internacional. Y cómo esa impactante violencia vino a destruir las familias y los poblados; arrasando no solamente con los míseros valores materiales sino también con todos los valores familiares; hasta con la identidad, la espiritualidad y el misticismo de los pueblos mayas, con toda aquella horrible destrucción y muerte. Esta desgraciada experiencia se agigantó dolorosamente cuando recayó en niños inocentes, imberbes, y analfabetas; que fueron arrastrados violentamente desde sus comunidades hasta cruzar por las montañas y los ríos, la frontera del vecino país. Para cumplir con los planes estratégicos y políticos de la guerrilla. Esta no es la historia del inmigrante común, que con natural entusiasmo anhela alcanzar "El Sueño Americano". Esta es la historia de los niños que espantados ante la violencia y el secuestro; aún en sus míseras condiciones escapan y luchan por alejarse de aquellas organizaciones de terror que solamente les mostró una violencia que nunca habían conocido; cuyo fin único era transformarlos en niños guerrilleros. Es la transformación total de su pacifica vida desde el seno familiar. Desde la tranquilidad del campo hasta el infierno de la violencia en las acciones de guerra, la soledad y el abandono en un país extraño. La fuga de Atanasio Pu de los solapados campos de concentración en México, dirigidos por el Comunismo Internacional. El sentimiento de persecución que siempre lo atormentó. Su desastrosa infancia, sin familia, sin amigos, en la más triste y aberrante miseria. Encarna el sufrimiento al cual fueron sometidas esas familias guatemaltecas especialmente las familias mayas. Todo esto constituye sin duda un trauma familiar y social que lamentablemente atormentará a esas comunidades y a los guatemaltecos por muchos años más.

Visions of Power in Cuba

Visions of Power in Cuba
Author: Lillian Guerra
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Total Pages: 489
Release: 2012
Genre: History
ISBN: 0807835633

In the tumultuous first decade of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro and other leaders saturated the media with altruistic images of themselves in a campaign to win the hearts of Cuba's six million citizens. In Visions of Power in Cuba, Lillian Gue