Cuba’s powerful Communist Party on Thursday approved an emergency economic package that opens wider space for private enterprise, greater autonomy for municipalities and state-owned companies, and more foreign investment, all under the pressure of sanctions, protests and a system that still keeps decisions at the top. The document has not yet been made public, but it will be submitted Thursday to Cuba’s National Assembly, where the machinery of rule is set to debate a plan already shaped behind closed doors.
Who Decides, Who Pays
The package was approved by Cuba’s powerful Communist Party, not by the residents dealing with the consequences of power outages and economic strain. In recent days, residents in several Havana neighborhoods staged protests, banging pots and pans as outages spread across the island. That is the sound of people at the bottom of the hierarchy making themselves heard while the apparatus above them drafts emergency measures in private.
The policy document was prepared by the Communist Party’s Central Committee and will be submitted to the National Assembly for debate during a special session that, like the recent party meeting, was convened without prior public notice. The structure is familiar: decisions first, public notice later, if at all.
Pressure From Above, Squeeze From Below
The announcement comes after months of increasing pressure from the U.S. and high-level talks between the two countries that have included Raúl Castro’s grandson, Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro. The U.S. has levied numerous sanctions against Cuba and has indicted Raúl Castro in connection with the 1996 downing of two civilian planes operated by Miami exiles.
U.S. Vice President JD Vance said at a White House press briefing that the administration is watching the island’s actions to determine how to respond. “We’re going to see what they do. And obviously, if they do one thing, we’re going to do something,” Vance said. “If they make smart decisions, we’re going to have a much better relationship with that island.” The language is blunt: the island is being watched, judged, and threatened from the center of imperial power.
Pressure from the European Union also ratcheted up Thursday, with lawmakers passing a resolution condemning “the systematic repression” by the Cuban government and demanding “profound economic and political change.” The resolution also called for EU sanctions targeting Díaz-Canel and the leadership of Grupo de Administración Empresarial S.A. (GAESA), a business conglomerate operated by the Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces. Both have already been sanctioned by the U.S.
Market Reform Under One-Party Rule
Díaz-Canel said the emergency plan and the policy document prepared by the Communist Party’s Central Committee were shaped by the experiences of China and Vietnam, two communist countries that have introduced market-oriented economic reforms while maintaining one-party rule. The model on offer is not freedom from domination, but a rearrangement of it: more market mechanisms, the same political monopoly.
“Cuba resists heroically and creatively, but has endured for too long a barbaric, undeserved and unbearable punishment, to which is now added the threat of military aggression,” Díaz-Canel said late Wednesday in the closing speech of the Communist Party session. The speech was published Thursday. His words frame the crisis as endurance under punishment, even as the party moves to open the economy further to private enterprise and foreign investment, including from Cubans abroad.
The document envisions expanding opportunities for private enterprise, greater autonomy for municipalities and state-owned companies, and measures to attract additional foreign investment. But the plan remains inside the same political structure that convened its meetings without prior public notice and will now send the package to the National Assembly for debate. The people banging pots and pans in Havana neighborhoods are not the authors of this emergency; they are the ones living through it.