The Cuban Revolution shattered some of the most important policy formulations by which the United States had traditionally defined its place and defended its interests in the western hemisphere, for which Fidel Castro has been inalterably held responsible. Much of US policy towards Cuba during the past forty years has been driven by a determination to punish Cuba for the transgressions of Fidel Castro and a determination to resist a modus vivendi with Cuba as long as he remains in power.

In 1933 the US ambassador to Cuba, Sumner Welles, overthrew President Machado, Cuba's first dictator, with the threat, but not the use, of US force. This diplomatic achievement was unprecedented in Cuban history. Under cover of mediation Welles had encouraged disaffection among politicians and army officers. Machado then succumbed to a popular uprising brought on by a decade of depression and oppression. The insubordination of the officers, however, soon led to a mutiny of the soldiers, whose leader, Fulgencio Batista, eventually seized the presidency and was recognised by the United States.

The Hotel Nacional battle occurred during the decisive 1933 revolution, when the siege of the deposed military reached its bloody finale. Overall, historians have downplayed the incident or disagreed about the details and its significance. Such neglect and disagreement can be explained by contemporary confusion and the urge of those subsequently seeking to legitimise the revolution to hide the unpalatable and rewrite history. However, the siege may in fact have decisively changed moderate left political opinion, thus shaping the character of post-1934 politics by contributing to Batista's subsequent rise to power.

Information on Cuban immigrants from the recent ‘Measuring Cuban Opinion Project’ survey is used to determine the extent to which race matters. We use multivariate binomial logistic regression models to determine if race can be predicted by key demographic and economic characteristics of the respondents, their use of mass media outlets in Cuba, their evaluation of and integration to the Cuban state and their participation in the dissidence in the island. The conclusion is reached that race cannot be predicted because these immigrants are, in general terms, very similar. However, some racial differences in mode of immigration and likelihood of immigration were found.

Since the colonial era Cuba has been the paradigmatic case of a monocultural export economy, dependent upon the production of one primary commodity – sugar – for sale to one principal trade partner. Overcoming dependency was a high priority for Fidel Castro in 1959, yet despite a promising start, his efforts proved ultimately unsuccessful. Only the collapse of communism in Europe freed Cuba from dependent trade relations with the Soviet Union – albeit at the cost of enormous economic disruption. This article examines Cuba's post-1959 pursuit of economic independence, first to explain why the government's initial successes proved unsustainable in the 1980s, and then to examine Cuba's attempt to reinsert its economy into the global market in the aftermath of the Cold War.

Where is the Cuban economy heading? The economy has been recovering at an average rate of four per cent per year since 1994 (after GDP declined by 35 per cent between 1989 and 1993). Many reforms have been undertaken in the direction of a market economy, but it is far from clear what kind of economy the Cuban ruling party has in mind after recovery. This article discusses the successes and shortcomings of the reform process in Cuba since the downfall of communism in Europe and the Soviet Union. It also addresses the salient issues in what appears to be a new development strategy in Cuba, and what could be said about the reforms and the strategy in the light of the debate on transition ‘ten years after’.