Imperialism and the Transition to Socialism in Cuba

The function of imperialism in the world economic system is to transfer wealth produced by the workers of the Periphery to the capitalists in the Core. From this, it follows that for all countries in the Periphery, (1) imperialism impedes their economic and social development and (2) imperialism will intervene to reduce any limitations on its desired process of exploitation. These explain the nature of the Core’s relation with the majority of the countries of the Periphery, which are capitalist. By officially deciding in 1961 to pursue a non-capitalist path of development, Cuba (1) completely ended the ability of the Core to exploit its workers and (2) (much more problematic for the Core) threatened to set an example other countries might reproduce. The second part of this chapter briefly reviews the often-documented aggression by the Core against Cuba, and the third part reflects on the less-reflected-on issue of the effect of that aggression on Cuba’s project to build socialism.