Cuban Economists on the Cuban Economy

4. Medium- and Long-Range Planning in Cuba: Historical Evolution and Future Prospects

4 Medium- and Long-Range Planning in Cuba Historical Evolution and Future Prospects Elena Álvarez González As Commander Ernesto “Ché” Guevara underscored more than forty years ago, “centralized planning is the way of being of a socialist society, its defining category and the point where man’s consciousness eventually manages to synthesize and channel the economy towards its goal: the full liberation of human beings in the frame of a communist society.”1 The objective of building a more developed society, and beyond that, one that is more just and oriented toward solidarity, necessarily entails a temporal horizon that transcends the short term. Many of these types of goals are attainable only in the medium term and after great effort. This fact lends special importance to medium- and long-range planning in socialism: a better future can be built only through systematic work beginning in the present. A medium- and long-term perspective is necessary for achieving dynamic development through identifying socioeconomic objectives that will remove thestructuraldeformationspresentintheeconomyandsociety.Suchaperspective makes it possible to foresee the multiple interrelations between, and consequences of, various decisions and hence to determine the appropriate means to reach specific objectives. This is particularly true for issues that change slowly over time, such as technology, the development of scientific capabilities, the environment, and many social problems. A long-range perspective is likewise necessary in order to take into consideration the continually changing environments in which socioeconomic development plans are executed. In examining the issue of medium- and long-range planning in revolutionary Cuba, it is important to stress that right from the beginning of the Revolution , strategic views for prospective development have always been present. This is true on both economic and social levels, whether or not these strategies were contained in formal medium- and long-range plans. For nearly fifty years strategic conceptualization has appeared in various long-range plans. Long- Medium- and Long-Range Planning in Cuba 115 term strategic commitments to education and health care have been essential pillars of Cuba’s socioeconomic development. The long-term prioritization and intense development of scientific-technical capabilities in general, and the fields of biotechnology and medical sciences in particular, have similarly been essential to Cuba’s social and economic transformations. Since 2000 a number of qualitatively more advanced new social development programs have been launched. These programs seek to further develop the human potential of Cuban citizens, building on the country’s prior achievements in this area. For these reasons medium- and long-range planning is critically important in the Cuban socioeconomic model. Background The initial attempts to take a prospective view of socioeconomic development in an independent Cuba are contained in such documents as “Algunos aspectos del desarrollo económico de Cuba” (Some Aspects of Cuba’s Economic Development), written in 1957 by Regino Boti and Felipe Pazos at the request of the leadership of the 26th of July Movement and released in 1959, and “Programa del Partido Socialista Popular” (Program of the People’s Socialist Party), published in early 1959.2 Then in the early months of 1959 the new revolutionary government requested that ECLAC dispatch a mission to Cuba, which arrived in May of that year. Led by the Mexican economist Juan F. Noyola, its objective was to analyze the economic situation and make projections that would form the basis of a comprehensive overview of the country’s economic development potential.3 Through his findings, Noyola, who decided to stay in Cuba after the ECLAC mission departed, made an important contribution to the prospective view of the country’s development potential at the beginning of the Revolution. The early years of the revolutionary process drew the attention of foreign specialists, who also opined on Cuba’s economic prospects. A well-known example is the Polish economist Michal Kalecki, who in 1960 drew up a global projection of Cuba’s development for 1961–65. Kalecki provided, albeit at a highly aggregated level, a complete model of economic development. Another example from this period is the agricultural studies of the Chilean Jacques Chonchol. In 1961 the Central Planning Board (JUCEPLAN) began drawing up the economic plan for 1962 and the projection for the four-year period from 1962 to 1965. This became the first attempt at prospective planning by the thenincipient national planning system. The JUCEPLAN economists and Professor Charles Bettelheim independently prepared similar economic projections, 116 Elena Álvarez González with greater...