Are We In Transition?

Are We In Transition? / 14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez
Posted on July 9, 2014

Yoani Sánchez, Madrid, 9 July 2014 – Right now I am taking part, along
with several Cuban activists, in a seminar on the Spanish transition
being held in Madrid. Organized by the Association of Ibero-Americans
for Freedom and the Spanish Transition Foundation at the Casa de
America, the event includes the participation of nine activists from
within the Island from many different sectors, such as law, citizenship,
human rights and journalism. An opportunity for us to meet with each
other without the police cordons or acts of repudiation.

While I listened to several speakers, I remembered when, in 2011, I
watched the series The Transition, with the voice of Victoria Prego.
Coincidentally, the morning I started to watch the excellent scenes of
that documentary and the analysis that accompanied it, a friend from
Madrid visited me. She looked at the TV screen and said to me, "I
experienced many of those events, but at that time I didn't know we were
in transition." Her phrase has stayed with me as solace and hope all
these years. Today, in the Casa de America, I remembered it.

Are we Cubans living in the transition? Just asking this question is
enough to annoy some people and excite others. A transition – the
experts and analysts tell me – needs more political, social and economic
evidence. A word of such magnitude requires real substance, not just
desires, others warn me, also with very good arguments. If it turns out
that an irreversible and defining change has occurred within Cubans,
could we see that as the transition? In this case, the micro look beats
out the macro analysis.

Every day I meet more people who are no longer collaborating, who no
longer believe, who no longer support the system. I also stumble upon
people who aren't interested in watching official TV, or taking part in
official events, or accepting official perks. What do we call that? May
the transition theorists forgive me, but if that is not a change, what
is it? "Pre-transition" perhaps?

Source: Are We In Transition? / 14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez | Translating
Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/are-we-in-transition-14ymedio-yoani-sanchez/