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Agrees and disagrees with Lamrani’s article

(This note is in response to the article, "The role of the alternative media: A wall against the manipulation of reality," by Salim Lamrani which appeared two weeks ago in Progreso Weekly.)

I found the article both informative and provocative. I generally agree with the main thrust of many of the central points including a general misreading of Cuban immigration statistics in the U.S. and an ideological manipulation of immigration in the Cuban case to serve U.S. geo-political interests. I also agree that Cuba gets too much attention in reaction to its migration relative to other countries that send many more migrants such as the Dominican Republic and Haiti.

However, I think the author goes a bit too far in a number of places. First of all, no numeric comparison can be made between Cuban migration to the U.S. before 1959 and after. Yes, there was a significant migration to the U.S. from Cuba going back at least to 1850 and the dictatorships of Machado and Batista generated substantial migration from Cuba in the 30s, 40s, and 50s. But all of that was but prelude to the hundreds of thousands of migrants who have come since 1959. Revolutions by their nature turn society upside down and alienate those in past positions of power, others benefit. Those who lose out seek to change the system or leave or both – the case of the Cuban exile community. 

There were perhaps 30,000 Cubans in the U.S. in 1959, now there are over 1 million. I agree that many of these migrants (especially the ones since 1990) are more accurately described as economic migrants than political refugees, but the numbers are clear. Also, it is quite difficult to determine in any blanket way if an individual immigrant is an immigrant or a refugee. Your point is that the U.S. calls them all “refugees from communism” for its own political reasons. I agree. However, given the extent to which politics and economics are unified in state socialist regimes such as Cuba, there are few decisions (especially that of emigration) which are not at least partly political. 

It is true that U.S. policy continues to (cynically) grant special treatment to Cuban immigrants under the 1966 Cuban Adjustment Act acting as a huge magnet for potential immigrants. However, the original purpose of that legislation was more about granting a legal status to those who had originally expected to return quickly to Cuba (after the U.S. overthrew Castro). They are still waiting. The U.S. manipulation of migration and the Cuban Adjustment Act loophole, however, do not mean that Cuba produces no refugees. All Cuban migrants are not refugees as the U.S. would have it, but neither are they all economic migrants as Cuba would argue.

Furthermore, major immigration from places like China and India did not begin until 1965 so it is misleading to compare them to Cuba in the 1950s period. 

Finally, the numbers cited for the 1990s up to 2003 for Cuban immigration to the U.S. are inaccurate.  Only a portion of the real numbers are shown. Due to the migration accords of 1994-1995, more than 20,000 Cubans have come to the U.S. each year since 1995 – more than 250,000 since 1995. I agree that this is not automatic "proof" of the repressive nature of the Cuban government since the U.S. does continue to grant Cuban immigrants virtual automatic acceptance under the 1966 Cuban Adjustment Act.  However, the numbers are much larger than cited in the article. 

Finally, BOTH the U.S. and Cuba have a long history of manipulating migration and the media for political purposes. Yes, the mainstream media in the U.S. serves many of the nefarious purposes you mention in the article (due to the concentration of money and power and to political interests). But what is “mainstream media” anyway – the New York Times, Fox, CNN, the Washington Post? Do they all work together to serve Uncle Sam? Yes, they are all businesses and like all business have (and serve) the bottom line. But surely you don’t mean that they are all the same. Finally, if you want an example of a media that censors, manipulates, and distorts information to serve political and power interests (with no competitors or “alternative media” allowed) you need to look no further than Granma.

For updated numbers and analysis of Cuban Immigration since 1995, I refer you to my recent article entitled, "Balseros, Boteros and El Bombo: Cuban Migration to the U.S. since the 1995 Accords and the Persistence of Special Treatment." Published both in Latino Studies (in English) and in Encuentro de la cultura cubana (en Español).

Ted Henken, Ph.D.

Baruch College, CUNY

New York City