Quick peeks into life on the island

This weekend, the department of sociology at Queen’s University in Ontario, Canada hosted a conference called “The Measure of a Revolution: Cuba 1959-2009.” Today was the close of the conference, which was rare and interesting not because it sought to analyze the successes and failures of the Cuban Revolution at 50 years—indeed, this has been the recent project of many who have an interest in Cuba—but that it invited and gained the participation of a number of prominent Cubans, in addition to Canadians, Americans and others.

Little information has yet been forthcoming from the weekend of discussions, but it looks like at least a few valuable insights will come of it. Thus far, we’ve heard reports on statements by Mariela Castro, Raúl’s outspoken daughter who has been director of Cuba’s National Center for Sex Education (CENESEX) for nearly a decade; and by Ricardo Alarcón, President of the National Assembly of Cuba. Both were enlightening.

Mariela Castro issued a statement saying that CENESEX was successfully expanding and revolutionizing sex education in Cuba, but that her one frustration has been her failure to convince Raúl to denounce and eliminate the unwritten rule not to accept homosexuals into the Cuban military, a rule by which the upper echelons operate. Read details here (Spanish).

Ricardo Alarcón, meanwhile, issued a strong statement with respect to the United States: the “democratic changes” hoped for by the Obama administration, if they meant a change of government, would not happen because a shift to representative democracy would be a step backwards. Read details here (Spanish).

Both contribute another detail in the quest to understand what is happening with government and the state in Cuba, a challenging endeavor not without its share of guessing games…