Was Fidel Castro delusional about the success of free-market economics in developing countries?

I found this seldom-noticed quote by Fidel Castro in the early 1990s:
''They talk about the failure of socialism, but where is the success of capitalism in Africa, Latin America and Asia?''

Was Fidel Castro himself reluctant to accept the fact that Singapore became a prosperous country and vibrant hub of maritime commerce, while South Korea, South Africa, and Kenya have become prosperous societies and Chile has enjoyed economic growth since the early 1970s?

a reply to: Potlatch

I have no idea what his theory's were and am not a commie but any answer is in the name itself.

If you deregulate economics and create a FREE market society in which anything is for sale it will all end up in the hands of a tiny elite minority, the rest will become steadily more poor and eventually such a society will end in a revolt and begin all over again unless it is replaced with something more sustainable.


A REGULATED Market Economy one in which Monopolies are prevented NOT Discouraged but PREVENTED, in which the Elite are taxed to curtail there runaway profiteering (don't worry it's not about punishing the fact kid that ate all the cake it's about keeping his house from burning down) and that money then injected back into the economy at it's base, in which the the poor are not allowed to die of cold, hunger, starvation, bad or non existent medical care but are actively helped, rehabilitated or otherwise still treated as human being's rather than dogs in the gutter as so many vile people regard them.

Well that is the only way that a twenty first century top nation should go.

Except that instead they are slowly sinking, deregulation in the 80's and 90's has led to runaway economics in the west, this consolidation of power and wealth began even earlier in the US around the turn of the century were a minority started to take control of it all and left the American dream floundering in a drying up lake, that drying up lake representing the unconsolidated wealth and potential that the elite were trying to take all of for themselves, the vile mentality that paint's greed as good instead of share and love your neighbour as yourself.

So while I know he was an atheist and a bit of a prick although you know historically and factually MOST Cubans were worse off before he took over and for all it's failing's at least his leadership gave them medicine and education although like any commie dictatorship it also gave them the party a ruling group of gangsters that took everything they wanted from anyone they wanted it from.

Still both extremes are wrong, the extremes of Neoliberalism which is actually Unfettered free market economics' with no national borders under a one world rule which is of course a self contradiction as to rule someone has to have a monopoly on power so there goes the free market ideaology.

And Communism with it's atheist crap, replacing God with the Party and lying about socialism in order to run a big scam in which the party members get the big mansions (Datcha's) and everyone else get's a one room closet apartment with damp walls and bad food while being forced to work sixteen hour day's, well that's an equal failure but in fact worse.

The way to go I put it to you is neither but it is the WESTERN EUROPEAN moderate socialism that made Sweden the best country to live on earth for many decades until they opened there bordered to every arse hole willing to live free off there state and wreck it in the process, in which the UK was a great place to live except for the commies infiltrated our unions etc.

But NOT free market capitalism.

REGULATED SEMI-FREE yes but not FREE UNFETTERED, you see you NEED capitalism, you need the wealth incentive you just don't need it to be completely runaway and everything and everyone for sale as that is pointless idiocy that is like an idiot living in a tree house burning the very tree he is living in to warm his home and killing tomorrow because it is unsustainable.


As for Cuba, a poor man, poor even under Castro worked all his life to build a home for his family, he struggled, skimped, saved and worked his guts out even while working the job the state had given him and he built a palace, a local party member saw it and took it from him kicking him and his family out into a shack you would not put your dog's to live in taking it for himself or as he put it THE PEOPLE AKA THE PARTY AKA HIMSELF being a gangster in all but name as he was.

originally posted by: LABTECH767
a reply to: Potlatch

I have no idea what his theory's were and am not a commie but any answer is in the name itself.

If you deregulate economics and create a FREE market society in which anything is for sale it will all end up in the hands of a tiny elite minority, the rest will become steadily more poor and eventually such a society will end in a revolt and begin all over again unless it is replaced with something more sustainable.


A REGULATED Market Economy one in which Monopolies are prevented NOT Discouraged but PREVENTED, in which the Elite are taxed to curtail there runaway profiteering (don't worry it's not about punishing the fact kid that ate all the cake it's about keeping his house from burning down) and that money then injected back into the economy at it's base, in which the the poor are not allowed to die of cold, hunger, starvation, bad or non existent medical care but are actively helped, rehabilitated or otherwise still treated as human being's rather than dogs in the gutter as so many vile people regard them.

Well that is the only way that a twenty first century top nation should go.

Except that instead they are slowly sinking, deregulation in the 80's and 90's has led to runaway economics in the west, this consolidation of power and wealth began even earlier in the US around the turn of the century were a minority started to take control of it all and left the American dream floundering in a drying up lake, that drying up lake representing the unconsolidated wealth and potential that the elite were trying to take all of for themselves, the vile mentality that paint's greed as good instead of share and love your neighbour as yourself.

So while I know he was an atheist and a bit of a prick although you know historically and factually MOST Cubans were worse off before he took over and for all it's failing's at least his leadership gave them medicine and education although like any commie dictatorship it also gave them the party a ruling group of gangsters that took everything they wanted from anyone they wanted it from.

Still both extremes are wrong, the extremes of Neoliberalism which is actually Unfettered free market economics' with no national borders under a one world rule which is of course a self contradiction as to rule someone has to have a monopoly on power so there goes the free market ideaology.

And Communism with it's atheist crap, replacing God with the Party and lying about socialism in order to run a big scam in which the party members get the big mansions (Datcha's) and everyone else get's a one room closet apartment with damp walls and bad food while being forced to work sixteen hour day's, well that's an equal failure but in fact worse.

The way to go I put it to you is neither but it is the WESTERN EUROPEAN moderate socialism that made Sweden the best country to live on earth for many decades until they opened there bordered to every arse hole willing to live free off there state and wreck it in the process, in which the UK was a great place to live except for the commies infiltrated our unions etc.

But NOT free market capitalism.

REGULATED SEMI-FREE yes but not FREE UNFETTERED, you see you NEED capitalism, you need the wealth incentive you just don't need it to be completely runaway and everything and everyone for sale as that is pointless idiocy that is like an idiot living in a tree house burning the very tree he is living in to warm his home and killing tomorrow because it is unsustainable.


As for Cuba, a poor man, poor even under Castro worked all his life to build a home for his family, he struggled, skimped, saved and worked his guts out even while working the job the state had given him and he built a palace, a local party member saw it and took it from him kicking him and his family out into a shack you would not put your dog's to live in taking it for himself or as he put it THE PEOPLE AKA THE PARTY AKA HIMSELF being a gangster in all but name as he was.

I agree. The free market (i.e., unregulated Capitalism) has proven to be the most powerful engine for wealth creation we've ever known because it essentially harnesses the power of exponential growth. It has also proven to be a very strong engine for wealth inequality--right up there with absolute monarchy. Whenever some individual is the first successful mover in some emerging commercial field, it is easy for that individual to grow their wealth so much faster than everyone else that it becomes impossible for anyone else to catch up. That's why you have the Medicis, the Astors, the Carnegies, the Rockefellers, the Gates, the Musks, etc. Those individuals can quickly get to the point where they control all the opportunity and then all the peons realize they can no longer live on the scraps left over. Then the social contract breaks down and the peons rise up and overthrow the fat cats. This has happened many times throughout history and it looks to me like the US is heading in that direction again.

People like Marx and Engels recognized this pattern and confidently predicted that Capitalism would be replaced by something else. In my opinion, they made the logical mistake of thinking that if pure Capitalism was bad, it had to be totally replaced by its opposite--pure Communism. They asserted that this idea was scientific and therefore inevitable. This fallacy is based on their simplistic and ultimately erroneous concept of science in which only one thing can be true at a time and that if you have two competing forces, the only stable condition is if one of them wins and the other loses.

I think the reality is that pure Capitalism and pure Communism are BOTH unstable, but for different reasons.

Marx and Engels had never heard of the modern idea of dynamic equilibrium in which complex systems can be held at or near equilibrium via balanced feedback systems. I think some of the Western European countries do much better at balancing the competing impulses of Capitalism and Communism than the US does, for example, but I think there is still a way to go before they get their control algorithms tuned up.

It's very difficult to have this conversation in the US because most people can't hold two competing thoughts in mind at the same time. They think that if you argue that there should be some limits on Capitalism then you are automatically a Communist and want to send everyone to a collective farm.

a reply to: Potlatch

Rwanda embraced marxism. A case study.

In 1823 the Monroe doctrine was established, which barred any sort of colonial expansion into the "americas". Since then south America has been under the thumb of the USA...

Just some food for thought.

On the other hand,
We can see what fee markets have done
to natural resources as in the lumber
industry in south america, or with oil
and diamond trade, human trade, and
weapon and drug trade.
If you do not protect your own civilians
then you do not deserve to be a 'leader'
. . . reason u.s. is tanking.


________________

originally posted by: strongfp
a reply to: Potlatch

Rwanda embraced marxism. A case study.

In 1823 the Monroe doctrine was established, which barred any sort of colonial expansion into the "americas". Since then south America has been under the thumb of the USA...

Just some food for thought.

Rwanda never had any communist government during the Cold War, and the current ruling political party in the country, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, is a big tent political party. The Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Benin, and Mozambique were once ruled by communist governments, and Fidel Castro praised Mengistu Haile Mariam's social and agrarian reforms for benefitting all people in Ethiopia who were sick, illiterate, or homeless.

The Monroe Doctrine was definitely unintentionally used by the US to exert itself as a hegemon in Latin America in the name of the preventing European powers from interfering with Latin American affairs, because this foreign policy doctrine did not provide for the US to make Latin America its domain.

a reply to: Potlatch

"Black marxism" spread around Africa quite a bit, and in Rwandas case alot of the political leaders embraced the idea of conflict theory, and turned it into racial conflict theory.

As for the US in SA, they have muddled in pretty much every nation down there trying to not outright colonize the regions like they did with the Philippines, they just muddled in elections and sparked coups. Chile is a prime example.