Economic and media war against socialist societies: The case of US–Cuban relations

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/intejcubastud.14.2.0272
• Pages: 272-308
• Published date: 20 January 2023
• Date: 20 January 2023
• Author: Mark Ginsburg
• Subject Matter: Cuba,sanctions,economic war,media,media war,blockade

InternatIonal Journal of Cuban StudIeS 14.2 WInter 2022

ACADEMIC ARTICLE

ECONOMIC AND MEDIA WAR AGAINST

SOCIALIST SOCIETIES: THE CASE OF

US–CUBAN RELATIONS

Mark Ginsburg1

University of Maryland

Abstract

This article examines the US’s use of sanctions or unilateral coercive measures

(economic war) and the US’s support for propaganda communicated through its own

organised mass media and the supposedly “independent,” corporate mass media as

well as through social media to instigate anti-government sentiment and action (media

war). The US’s economic war against Cuba began soon after Cuba’s 1959 revolution,

although the US’s hostile actions as well as desires and efforts to shape Cuban society

go back to the 19th century. This economic war has had tremendous negative impact

on Cuba’s economy and the daily life of Cubans. In terms of the media war, this article

focuses on how propaganda distributed through mass, corporate media as well as

social media, often paid for by the US government, was directed at misleading Cubans

and others, including those in the US, about the situation in Cuba. Such distortions were

1 Mark Ginsburg is a Visiting Scholar in the International Education Policy program

at University of Maryland (USA). Although he is now retired, he continues to work

with graduate students on their research. He has also served on the faculty at the

University of Aston (Birmingham, England); University of Houston; University of

Pittsburgh; University of Oslo (Norway); Teachers College, Columbia University;

Kobe University (Japan); George Washington University; and Universidad de

Ciencias Pedagógicas “Enrique José Varona” (Cuba). Previously, he was president of

the Comparative and International Education Society (CIES, 1991–2) and coeditor

of the Comparative Education Review (2003–13). He has (co)authored or (co)edited

eight books, six special issues of journals, and over 150 journal articles and book

chapters.

DOI:10.13169/intejcubastud.14.2.0272

ECONOMIC AND MEDIA WAR AGAINST SOCIALIST SOCIETIES 273

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designed to provoke alienation and anti-government action by Cubans in general and,

in more recent years, particular subgroups of artists, musicians, Afro-Cubans, and youth.

And while some successes can be noted (specifically the sparking and broadcasting of

protests on 11 July 2021), more generally the media war has failed in its goal of regime

change. The non-event of 15 November 2021 is a clear example of this.

Key words: Cuba, sanctions, economic war, media, media war, blockade

Introduction

Peace educators generally agree that peace is a broader concept than the absence

of war. They recognise that there are other forms of violence besides macro-level

physical or direct violence (e.g. international military engagement), such as

micro-level physical violence (i.e. beating of spouses or individuals who are dif-

ferent in terms of race ethnicity or sexual orientation) and macro-level structural

or indirect violence (i.e. governmental or other institutional policies and prac-

tices that within a given society create or perpetuate illiteracy, poverty, ill health,

shortened life span and environmental degradation) (e.g. see Brock-Utne 1985;

Reardon 1988). What has less often been highlighted is how at the international

level countries can engage in structural violence.

In this article I will examine the use of structural violence in US–Cuba rela-

tions, specifically looking at the US’s use of sanctions or unilateral coercive

measures (economic warfare) and the US’s support for propaganda communi-

cated through its own organised mass media and the supposedly “independent,”

corporate mass media as well as through social media to instigate anti-

government sentiment and action (media war).2 One could also discuss these

phenomena in relation to US actions toward other “socialist” countries in Latin

America, Nicaragua (e.g. Goett 2019) and Venezuela (e.g. Emersberger and

Podur 2021; Vaz 2022), but the case of Cuba as an example of 21st-century

socialism (Ginsburg 2021) will suffice for purposes here, because of the 60+-year

history of US government hostile actions toward Cuba. As Bolender (2010: 3)

observes, the United States “continues to hold Cuba up for special punishment.

The travel restrictions, the economic blockade, the propaganda war and the

2 Pasqualina (2021) labels this a “multidimensional war against Cuba”, in which

she also includes the diplomatic dimension, mentioning how the US has used the

Organization of American States to delegitimize the Cuban Revolution (see also

Díaz-Canel 2022). Our focus here, of course, does not include another dimension of

the US’s hostile actions towards Cuba – the US military base in Cuba’s Guantánamo

province and its “controversial detainment facility … that U.N. experts and other

analysts want shuttered immediately” (O’Connor 2022).

274 ACADEMIC ARTICLE – MARK GINSBURG

InternatIonal Journal of Cuban StudIeS 14.2 WInter 2022

terrorist acts3 have persisted against this small island nation” (see also Bolender

2019; de los Santos & Prashad 2021a; Pérez 2015).4

Lamrani (2013: 74) reports that, since Cuba’s revolution in 1959:

The diplomatic rhetoric used to justify US hostility toward Cuba has changed over

time. Initially, nationalization and compensation constituted the bone of

3 Bolender (2010: 1–2) observes that “for half a century the Cuban people have endured

almost every conceivable form of terrorism. The bombs that have destroyed depart-

ment stores, hotel lobbies, theaters, famous restaurants and bars … The second worst

act of air terrorism in the Americas [in 1976], resulting in the deaths of 73 civilians.

An exploding ship in Havana Harbor [French freighter, La Coubre, in 1960], kill-

ing and injuring hundreds. Attacks on defenseless villages. Teenagers tortured and

murdered for teaching farmers to read and write [during the Literacy Campaign

in 1961]. Biological terrorism causing the deaths of more than 100 children. The

psychological horror that drove thousands of parents to willingly send their children

to an unknown fate in a foreign country [i.e., Operation Peter Pan, through which

14,000 Cuban children were sent to the US, due to fear instigated by the Catholic

Church that the Cuban revolutionary government would take their kids away]. …

The accused have been primarily Cuban American counter-revolutionaries – many

allegedly trained, financed and supported by various American government agencies.

… The [Cuban] government has documented approximately 800 terrorist acts inside

Cuba since 1960 – hundreds more have occurred against officials and commercial

operations outside the country. … The personal toll has been calculated at 3,478

dead and 2,099 injured” (see also de los Santos & Prashad 2021b). Furthermore,

Bolender (2010: 14) notes that Cuba’s legitimate and necessary responses to “these

terrorists” would be seen “as paranoia, totalitarian and evidence of the repressive-

ness of Fidel’s regime”.

4 Pérez (2019) argues that the US’s relationship with Cuba “is a complex mat-

ter.The subject of Cuba has rarely been a topic of reasoned disquisition. It defies

facile explanation, and certainly cannot be understood solely – or even principally

– within the logic of the policy calculus that otherwise serves to inform US foreign

relations, mostly because it is not logical.” And Chomsky (2010: viii–ix) com-

ments that “perhaps the most striking feature of Washington’s war against Cuba

since it dared to liberate itself at last in 1959 has been the frenzy with which it has

been waged. … Robert Kennedy, who was assigned the task of coordinating the

massive campaign of state-directed international terrorism, repeatedly declared

that overthrowing the government of Cuba was ‘the top priority of the United

States Government – all else is secondary – no time, money, effort, or manpower

is to be spared.’ … The terrorist war against Cuba peaked again in the late 1970s.

[Ironically, in the 1980s,] the Reagan administration … add[ed] Cuba to the list

of states that sponsor terror.”