Why Congress must rethink sanctions on Cuba

Why Congress must rethink sanctions on Cuba

By Reihan Salam APRIL 11, 2014



Alan Gross, the 64-year-old American who has been imprisoned by Cuban

authorities since 2009, is an unremarkable man on the surface. He could

be a friend or colleague, or an uncle you've been meaning to call.



Yet what distinguishes Gross from most of the rest of us, myself

included, is his courage. As a sub-contractor for the U.S. Agency for

International Development, Gross traveled to Cuba to help private

citizens gain access to the Internet, and thus to news and information

not managed or manufactured by the Cuban government. Gross likely knew

that his work was dangerous, but he may have underestimated the risk he

was taking. In a heartbreaking letter to President Obama, Gross

recounted the many ways his wife and daughters have suffered in his

absence. He beseeched the president to intervene in his case.



And so Gross, a husband and father from Maryland who seems to want

nothing more than to be reunited with his family, has reignited the

decades-long debate over how the United States should deal with Cuba, a

rogue state that continues to adhere to Marxist-Leninist one-party rule

long after the collapse of its Soviet patron.



While some lawmakers, including Cuban-American Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL)

and Robert Menendez (D-NJ), have urged the Obama administration not to

negotiate — but instead to demand Gross's unconditional release — Sen.

Patrick Leahy (D-VT) has led the chorus of those calling for the

president to play ball with Cuba's rulers, or rather to "not shrink from

the obligation to negotiate for his freedom."



What the Cuban government wants most is a relaxation of the economic

sanctions the U.S. government first imposed on the island nation in

1963, when it became clear that Fidel Castro intended to align his new

regime with the Soviet Union and to have Cuba serve as a staging ground

for armed insurgencies throughout Latin America.



In the decades since then, the sanctions regime has evolved in various

ways. There are now a number of licensed exemptions that allow Americans

to provide humanitarian assistance in Cuba, or that allow academic

researchers to travel there. Cuban households receive $2.6 billion in

remittances from Cuban immigrants and people of Cuban origin living

abroad, most of which comes from the United States. And as Emily Parker

observed earlier this week, for example, the Obama administration made

it somewhat easier for U.S. telecom providers to do business with Cuba

in 2009, in an effort to encourage the free flow of information in and

out of the country.



So should the U.S. government ease economic sanctions even further? The

plight of Alan Gross represents an opportunity to rethink the sanctions

regime. One widely held view is that U.S. sanctions actually serve to

entrench the current Cuban government, as they allow Cuba's rulers to

tightly control the flow of resources in and out of the island, and also

to blame the United States for the poverty and deprivation that plagues

Cuban society. The problem with this line of thinking, as Mauricio

Claver-Carone, director of Cuba Democracy Advocates and a proponent of

sanctions, notes, is that foreign trade and investment in Cuba is the

exclusive domain of the state.



Whereas the Chinese government offers wide latitude to private

enterprises, both domestic and foreign-owned, to operate on Chinese

soil, the Cuban government severely limits the scope for private

economic activity. This is one reason why China "feels" like a freer

society than Cuba, despite the fact that the Chinese government

maintains a large and expensive repressive apparatus. To grow the

Chinese economy, China's rulers have had little choice but to relax

their grip on investment and entrepreneurship.



In recent years, the Cuban government has allowed for the emergence of a

small-scale "self-employment" sector. Yet this sector shouldn't be

mistaken for private enterprise, as self-employed individuals are barred

from building their own independent businesses. If sanctions are lifted

without conditions, it seems more likely than not that the Cuban

government would insist that all U.S. trade and investment be channeled

through state-owned entities. Given Cuba's parlous fiscal state, this

would be an enormous boon.



Rather than lift sanctions unilaterally, the U.S. ought to consider

modifying the approach it has taken since passage of the Helms-Burton

Act of 1996. Under Helms-Burton, the U.S. is prepared to lift sanctions

if and when Cuba releases political prisoners and allows for the

inspection of its prison facilities, legalizes political activity and

opposition parties, and abolishes its secret police. Essentially, the

law insists on immediate regime change, and it is easy to see why Cuba's

rulers find its conditions unacceptable.



Congress ought to consider a new approach: the U.S. will relax sanctions

if Cuba allows its citizens greater scope to build their own private

businesses, which will have the right to engage in foreign trade,

receive foreign investment, and employ workers. The Cuban government

will, of course, be allowed to tax and regulate these private

businesses, but it will have to offer its citizens at least some

economic liberty, so that an influx of U.S. trade and investment won't

simply bolster the Cuban state and Cuba's repressive apparatus.



Yes, Cuba's propagandists will characterize this deal as yet another

example of Yankee meddling. It is also true, however, that this approach

would offer Cuba's rulers a meaningful alternative to Regime Change Now

while also allaying the concerns of Americans who fear that easing

sanctions might strengthen the current regime. And by loosening the

economic stranglehold of Cuba's state-owned monopolies, we can give

Cubans the breathing room they need to start building a free society.



Source: Why Congress must rethink sanctions on Cuba | Reihan Salam -

http://blogs.reuters.com/reihan-salam/2014/04/11/congress-sanctions/