This study, by three economists at the Center for the Study of the Americas in Havana, has played a pivotal role in the ongoing discussion in Cuba about how to restructure the system of economic management and production while still retaining the revolution’s goals of economic and social justice. This is the first English translation of this important work, published in Spanish in 1995 and revised in 1996. The study includes an analysis of the internal, as well as the external, structural constraints on the Cuban economy in the 1990s, detailed analysis of the options for monetary and fiscal reform and proposals for the development of what might be termed a mixed economy, organized according to socialist principles. There is also a chapter discussing some of the responses, both from within Cuba and from abroad, to the original publication. The introduction by Ruth Pearson discusses the significance of this book for the economic and political debates currently facing Cuba. Julio Carranza Valdez and Pedro Monreal Gonzàlez are researchers at the Centro De Estudios de la Economía Internacional, Universidad de la Habana, and Luis Gutiérrez Urdaneta still works at the Centro de Estudios sobre América in Havana, Cuba. Ruth Pearson is a senior lecturer in development studies at the University of East Anglia and professor of women and development at the Institute of Social Studies, the Hague.
