Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

Judi Lynn

(160,219 posts)
Mon Apr 22, 2019, 10:57 PM Apr 2019

It's Official: Monroe Doctrine Is Back To Serve The Neoliberal Order - Analysis



The Monroe Doctrine: A satirical political cartoon reflecting America's imperial ambitions following quick and total victory in the Spanish American War of 1898. Credit: Cornell University: Persuasive Cartography: The PJ Mode Collection, Wikimedia Commons.

April 21, 2019 COHA

. . .

- snip -

Putting things in context
The historical context in Cuba provides the perfect illustration of this tendency. As the 1950s drew to a close, the Batista dictatorship had tightened its grip on power and was ruling with an iron fist. And in addition to the suffering caused by many of the pathologies typical to Latin American countries of the time (and in many cases continuing to this day) – the rampant poverty and inequality,23 the tragic rates of illiteracy,24 and the widespread lack of access to even basic public services25 – Cuba had the added pathology of mob infiltration into myriad spheres of the island’s economy and wider society.26 As historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wrote at the time: “The corruption of the Government, the brutality of the police, the government’s indifference to the needs of the people for education, medical care, housing, for social justice and economic justice… is an open invitation to revolution.”27 Naturally, none of this mattered to Washington, which strenuously backed the Batista dictatorship since it was obediently obeying orders and creating a favorable business environment for powerful US multinational corporations.28

Though such a reality does not necessarily justify the nature or the extent of the expropriation process that took place in the early days of the revolution, it does highlight the fact that the distribution of wealth and resources in Cuban society was far from beyond moral reevaluation before the revolution either. Indeed, such political and philosophical questions surrounding the concepts of property ownership and wealth distribution are – and ought to be – constantly subjected to debate and readjustment in all societies. The 20th Century saw a huge divergence in the paths that different countries took on these matters – on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Obviously the Eastern Bloc countries moved toward the highly state-led “command economies” that came to characterize the Soviet system. And as much as post-Cold War propaganda says otherwise, this system did have some benefits,29 especially when contrasted with the disastrous consequences of the transition to neoliberalism that has taken place in post-Soviet Eastern Europe.30 But even within the borders of many US Western European allies there has been considerable diversity. Social democratic governments experimented with differing configurations of state and private ownership for the various sectors of the economy. Even the trenchant US ally, Great Britain, brought sectors such as transport, electricity, water, telecommunications, mining and even some heavy industry into public ownership in the post-war period.31 And of course, like every other Western European country,32 Britain also established a publicly administered universal healthcare system33 and brought a significant proportion of its housing stock into public ownership too.34

The so-called “free” market neoliberal path taken by the United States, especially since the late 1970s, and subsequently adopted across large swaths of the world, hardly compares favorably to either Western European countries under social democracy or even to post-1959 Cuba. Whereas in the United States (the wealthiest country in the world, lest we forget) empty homes outnumber homeless people by six to one,35 in Cuba homelessness is virtually nonexistent.36 Similarly, whereas in the United States several tens of thousands of people die every year due to a lack of access to healthcare,37 Cuba’s universal system is free-at-the-point-of-service and leaves no one without care.38 Remember that on both counts Cuba has a superior record despite being a much poorer country, which furthermore has suffered for decades under an economic blockade from the world’s superpower that, according to the UN, has cost its economy over $100 billion dollars throughout the decades.39 Such comparisons again expose the inherent contradictions and inhumanity of neoliberal ideology.

Separating fact from fiction
It must also be remembered that the realities of the process of expropriation in Cuba have been heavily distorted by the historical fictions that make up Cuban-American exile mythology. According to this belief system, the tyrannical Fidel Castro seized for himself everything from everyone so that all but he might be equal. The reality is far more nuanced than this picture suggests. For one thing, the Cuban exiles who left in the early days of the revolution abandoned their properties as they fled for Yankee shores. (And many of them did so long before the country officially embraced communism in late 1965 – almost six years after Castro seized power from Batista.) So they could not have reasonably expected to have them returned to them no matter what political and economic system Cuba eventually adopted. Furthermore, Fidel Castro made clear that expropriation would apply to everyone, including him and his cadre of revolutionaries themselves. Indeed, one of the very first things that his government nationalized after the revolution was his own family farm in the island’s Oriente province.40

More:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/21042019-its-official-monroe-doctrine-is-back-to-serve-the-neoliberal-order-analysis/


So glad to see an article, again, bearing truthful information to compare against the pure calculated spin which has been jammed down the public's throats for decades. Anyone taking the time to start researching, doing that overlooked homework, will start seeing the truth looming into view, finally! Better late than never.

Also posted in Editorials and other articles:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/1016230724
1 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
It's Official: Monroe Doctrine Is Back To Serve The Neoliberal Order - Analysis (Original Post) Judi Lynn Apr 2019 OP
:) Ghost Dog Apr 2019 #1
Latest Discussions»Region Forums»Latin America»It's Official: Monroe Doc...