Introduction and Purpose

New Cuba Coalition (NCC) was founded in  Arlington, Virginia,in December 1989, as a non-profit organization aimed at producing detailed studies on how Cuba is to reconstruct itself after the economic and human debacle of the Castro era, and to help find and allocate means for that reconstruction.

Our purpose is to help in the establishment of a pluralistic political system and a free-market economy, in the wake of the catastrophe wrought to the republic by more than four decades of Castro's totalitarian adventurism.

Though Cuba's economic reconstruction will be an imposing task, we find that the political transition also offers demanding challenges. The best-conceived economic program can only be developed in the proper political environment, and with a legal structure that complements it. A system of laws, from the very beginning of the transition, is an essential point of departure. That is why the prospects for political readjustment and legislative reform are central to our attention. The data we have received on economic plans, from studies here in the US and from independent research in Cuba, have been a great help in assessing the political and legal requirements for a transition to pluralistic democracy and a market economy.

We at New Cuba Coalition (NCC) want to get acquainted with institutions and individuals willing to participate in our efforts to help the Cuban people build their future after Castro's political demise. Through participating in the Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy (ASCE) and other study groups in Washington, DC and elsewhere, we have been offering ideas and working to identify resources that Cuba will need for its reconstruction.

A major part of our endeavors is to establish, maintain and broaden relations with Cubans living in Cuba as well as outside—all belonging to the same people—who might wish to take part in the country's rescue. These people will be the decisive factor in the approaching changes—entrepreneurs, professionals, officials, workers, professors, students, peasants, members and veterans of the armed and security forces, altruistic and heroic dissidents, and all those who, regardless of their position or militancy, have understood from their own situations that the Cuban people have no hope of recovery as long as Fidel Castro stays in power.

Of the hundreds of thousands that, for one motive or another, will not go back to live in Cuba, we have ample reason to think that they will be an important factor in its reconstruction. Their experience, resources, relations developed in the most varied activities, industrial, commercial, professional and financial, will be advantageous at the time when links are established with the new Cuba. Those outside Cuba will profit from Cuba's reconstruction, just as people on the island will; and they will find that when Castro disappears the skill and enterprise of every Cuban can be applied for the good of all.

We are keenly aware of how misleading images are presented about Cuba, by people who are either partial or antagonistic to Castro. Those distortions do not help the Cuban people. We prefer to offer facts, interpretations and comments that can survive scrutiny. At the same time, we make it known that we are not neutral, that we think Cuba's and Castro's interests are antagonistic, and that Castro's prolonged rule has become Cuba's collective failure, resulting in a bankrupt economy, a rent social fabric, and a collective mentality of skepticism and hopelessness. We firmly believe that the people of Cuba have a second opportunity—and we are working for it.

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New Cuba Coalition
P. O. Box 14077
Washington, D. C. 20044-4077
Dr. Emilio-Adolfo Rivero — President
Ernesto Díaz-Rodríguez — Vice President
e-mail: Cuba@newcubacoalition.org