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The Cuban Economy in a New Era

The Cuban Economy in a New Era

An Agenda for Change toward Durable Development

Edited by Jorge I. Domínguez, Omar Everleny Pérez Villanueva, and Lorena Barberia

ISBN 9780674980358

Publication date: 01/08/2018

Cuba’s economy has grown hardly at all during Raúl Castro’s presidency (beginning in 2006), hit by the economic collapse of its Venezuelan partner and burdened by a legacy of decayed infrastructure, a bankrupt sugar industry, and stagnant agriculture.

The Cuban Economy in ​a New Era diagnoses the ills that afflict Cuba’s economy and examines possible economic policy changes in seven areas: macroeconomic policy, central planning, small and medium private enterprises, nonagricultural cooperatives, financing options for the new private sector, state enterprise management, and relations with international financial institutions. Cuban economists have contributed these seven chapters, and the combined import is further considered in introductory and concluding chapters. The book is the culmination of over a decade of scholarly collaboration with Harvard scholars, anchored in a series of workshops held over several years in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Havana.

Praise

  • With the passing of Fidel Castro and the reestablishment of U.S.–Cuban relations, Cuba is poised for major change—but towards what? In The Cuban Economy in a New Era, we get a rare glimpse from the inside. Ten leading scholars from the island discuss critical factors in that transformation, including the major economic reforms to date, the key players (from new cooperatives to the emerging private sector), and the role of the formal financial sector and the challenges of innovation and planning. In the process, we get an invaluable first-hand view of how the Cuban economy really functions. To cap it all, as bookends, two long-time Cuban analysts, Harvard’s acclaimed Jorge Domínguez and Lorena Barberia of the Universidade de São Paulo, put this in perspective for us. This book is a key contribution, at precisely the right time.

    —Michael Chu, Harvard Business School, and Managing Director and Co-Founder, IGNIA Partners

Authors

  • Jorge I. Domínguez is Antonio Medero Professor of Mexican and Latin American Politics and Economics at Harvard University.
  • Omar Everleny Pérez Villanueva is Professor in the Department of Economics and a Researcher at the Center for the Study of the Cuban Economy at the University of Havana.
  • Lorena Barberia is Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of São Paulo.

Book Details

  • 182 pages
  • 6 x 9 inches
  • David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies

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