Book review

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/intejcubastud.5.2.0202
• Published date: 01 October 2013
• Date: 01 October 2013
• Pages: 202288-204
• Author: David Grantham

I J  C S 5.2 S 2013

BOOK REVIEWS

Arnold August, Cuba and Its Neighbours: Democracy in Motion

(London: Zed Books, 2013) pb 288pp. ISBN: 9781848138667

Reviewed by David Grantham

‘It is my intention through this book’, author Arnold August writes, ‘to provide

readers with some tools for following the future situation independently, without

the blinders of preconceived notions’ (p. 232). For August, the future situation

is a rejuvenated Cuban Revolution, and the preconceived notions involve the

supposed superiority of United States democracy, which has jaded, even blinded,

its citizens against alternative versions of democracy. August aims to remove

those blinders through a systemic, comparative analysis of political practices

carried out in Cuba and other surrounding countries. However, comparing

governing strategies is no novel idea. Where August sets himself apart is in

reimagining the practice of democracy. In so doing, August redef‌ines Cuban

politics as a form of democracy. Part political science, part history, Democracy

in Motion is an intimate unveiling of Cuba’s political process designed to explore

the island nation’s ‘approach to democracy’ (p. xiii).

August states up front the need for ‘clarity and discussion’ concerning Cuba’s

political system and the idea of participation (p. xv). First, if public participation

is a precondition of democracy, evidence suggests Cuba is another form of

democracy. Historical records, along with August’s f‌irst-hand accounts of

government procedure and personal interviews, all point to Cuba’s astonishing

legacy of public participation, and thus democracy. Indeed, most readers will

be perplexed, if not shocked by the extent of democracy in Cuba and some

surrounding neighbours. August aims ‘to accompany the reader through a

variety of countries experiences in order to extrapolate and characterize certain

features of participatory democracy’ (p. 4).

The main thrust of the publication hinges on the comparison between U.S.

and Cuban ‘participatory process’ – democracy of private property versus a

democracy of the collective (p. 12). August contends that contrasting economic

and social principles separate a Cuban model based on ‘values of collectivity

and social consciousness’ from a United States model, which stands for the

‘unlimited accumulation of private property as the foundation of capitalism’

(p. 4). He suggests that frequent elections in the United States give the illusion

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