Posted by The passing of Fidel Castro two days ago has all the armchair pundits pontificating their own moral superiority. From anti-Castro Cuban exiles dancing in the streets of Miami to our left-wing loonie Prime Minister Trudeau (Justin, or as I prefer to call him, Junior) calling Fidel the best thing since sliced bread… well, maybe he actually said, “[Castro was a] legendary revolutionary and orator… My father was very proud to call him a friend”.
While I am happy that the internet is excoriating Junior (mainly because I think he’s an underqualified, selfie-addicted narcissist, spoiled trust fund brat who fortunately happened to have the right family name); most are doing it for the wrong reasons. Fidel Castro was a dictator. Probably not the most vile in history as some would try to paint him, but a dictator nonetheless replete with the usual human rights violations that title entails.
But to make it sound like Cuba is hell on earth because of him is a massive over simplification. Lets look at GDP first. Cuba (2011) was at US$6,051 per capita. The other four big Caribbean countries, Dominican Republic (US$5,879), Puerto Rico (US$28,529), Haiti (US$820), and Jamaica (US$5,290). Puerto Rico stands out because they are a US protectorate. Unfortunately, they are also bankrupt and everyone is fleeing to the mainland because they have US passports.
Haiti is a complete basket case which leaves the Dominican Republic and Jamaica as comparables. In this light, Cuba actually doesn’t look too bad. Life expectancy is 79 years, higher than even the US and higher than the 73 years in the Dominican Republic and Jamaica and much higher than Haiti at 63 years. Cuba’s homicide rate of 4.2/100,000 is a far cry from the 22.1 in the Dominican Republic and the 45 in Jamaica which is one of the highest in the world.
I have gone to Cuba every year since retiring back to Canada in 2010. I love Cuba. I love the food. I love the culture. I love the people. I especially love the fact I don’t have to fight through a million American tourists. The people may be poor but basic needs such as food, shelter, clothing, medical care and even employment are taken care of. It is also very safe unlike many of its drug-fuelled, crime infested neighbors. While it may not be a democracy, it is hard to see how Cuba would have been better off if Castro had not disposed of former US-backed dictator Batista. Proof of this can be seen in the fact that the average citizen in neighboring (ostensibly free and democratic) Jamaica and the Dominican Republic are not necessarily better off than their Cuban counterparts.
The idea that a free, liberal, democracy is the pinnacle of human society and thus everyone should have it is a conceit of the Western world. I used to believe that the most efficient form of government was a benign dictatorship. I am increasingly revising that view to think that in many cases and in many places, even a bad dictatorship is preferable to the alternatives. The Arab Spring comes to mind. If you are really honest, can you really say that the average man on the street in Iraq is better off today than under Saddam Hussein? Egyptians, who voted in a theocracy under the Muslim Brotherhood which had to be overthrown by a military junta are better off than when Hosni Mubarak was running the show? Libya, in the middle of a civil war as well, is better off now than under Muammar Gaddafi? Most egregious of all is Syria, ISIS, civil war, refugees and all. How is the average Syrian even remotely in a better position then when Bashar al-Assad was in firm control?
Dictatorships are almost never nice; not even one that is ostensibly for the people like a communist dictatorship of the proletariat is supposed to be. I personally wouldn’t want to be permanently trapped in one even though I have lived in one. But to pontificate that it is completely evil and must be eliminated ignores the fact that reality tells us that the alternatives are not necessarily better and often times much worse. Fidel Castro was a dictator and not the benign kind at that. Nonetheless, he was certainly not the worst one in history despite how some smart asses would like to depict him now that he’s gone. But to make the claim that Cubans would have been much better off without him is an outright intellectual conceit and lie. One only has to look at Cuba’s neighbors in the Caribbean to see what the likely outcome would have been if Castro had not come along.