Ramonet: We Must Always Return to Fidel's Legacy

The prominent Spanish-French intellectual Ignacio Ramonet returns once again to Havana, to the Book Fair, this time as a special guest of the First Meeting of Theoretical Publications of Leftist Parties and Movements, summoned and organized by Cuba Socialista Magazine and the Cuban Communist Party.

As the second special moment of his presence at the Meeting, this Saturday Ramonet presents La Era del Conspiracionismo. Trump, el culto a la mentira y el Asalto al Capitolio. On the characteristics and challenges of the world today for the leftist forces that seek to transform reality, he spoke briefly with CubaSí:

"Unfortunately, there are many challenges. We are experiencing a very complex moment that some analysts call the polycrisis, which manifests itself in at least six key elements.

First, the effects of Covid: this world cannot escape unscathed from something that has killed almost nine million people, and has sickened more than a billion. This is a crisis like the world had never known before, and it will have psychological and all kinds of consequences, in addition to material, economic, and family consequences.

Second, the war in Ukraine and what that entails, that is, what’s at stake at the level of imperialism, because it’s a global war, the theater of war is local, but the ripples are global, and we’ve seen them, a soar in food prices, fuels, fertilizers, which the United States also obviously uses to weaken the European Union on the one hand, and Russia on the other, and also China; it is an extremely skillful game of imperialism that we are going to see how it ends or we don’t know if it ends in the worst case scenario, which is with a nuclear war.

Third, the crisis of the International System: the United Nations is not functional, it must be reformed, this is no walk in the park, with a Security Council that doesn’t work either, and that at this moment one of the main countries on that Council, Russia, is engaged in a war. And the United States, France, and the United Kingdom, also members, are attacking Russia from NATO. They are all implicated in the world's most important conflict of the last 60 years.

Fourth, there’s a fundamental problem: in addition to nuclear war, as Fidel said, there’s the environmental crisis, climate change cannot be solved by any country alone, it’s a decision of the planet and therefore an agreement must be reached.

Fifth, the phenomenon of migration, I have insisted for a long time that it’s very important; migrations today have apocalyptic proportions, there has never been a migratory flow of such dimensions in history, millions of people are on the move, for thousands of reasons, climatic, political, economic, and this is changing the demographic, ethnic balance of many countries.

And sixth, the problem of New Technologies, they are moving so fast, we are using a series of technologies that we don’t know exactly what their dimensions are, and this is only the beginning, Artificial Intelligence, quantum math... and we could even add a seventh, which is the demographic problem. The most developed countries in the world are all aging at a high speed, and soon they are going to have enormous problems. In the midst of all these global problems, finding a key that allows you to understand and balance the world is complicated."

And in this context, how do you see the new scenario that is opening in Latin America? Do you see it with optimism?

You always have to have hope. In Latin America right now, left-wing governments are coming to power democratically, when the world is so complex and the opposite is happening. And it’s not the same economic moment as when they came into power in 2000. Today, one of the great rules of what’s happening is that the situation is so complicated that all those who govern lose the elections. So I say, is the left coming because it wins, or is it coming because those who governed lost?

Meanwhile, Cuba continues to withstand the imperial offensive...

For Cuba, its main problem continues to be the blockade, there’s no doubt that it’s the issue that touches everything and it was what we were talking about before, about how this Biden Administration has continued with the extension of Donald Trump's policy, when the natural course of actions would have been to break with Obama's line. And although in the case of Cuba it has been verified that almost always Democrats are not better than Republicans, the great openings have been with the Democrats, it happened with Carter, with Clinton, with Obama. With the Democrats there’s always more hope and therefore more disappointment.

Faced with so much uncertainty, digital and real fascism, systemic crisis, you yourself proposed it: one must always return to Fidel's legacy. And I ask a speculative question, how would the Commander have reacted to the scenario you’ve described?

Fidel was always an analyst who placed Cuba in the international context and who analyzed the international context based on Cuba. Take, for example, the lucidity of Fidel to discover before anyone else the importance of Hugo Chávez, when no leader of the left had seen him, on the contrary, the leaders of the left criticized him. Fidel knew how to see him, and at what a crucial moment, when Cuba was alone, alone in the world. And he created a bridge with Venezuela that was saving, thanks to a personality like Chávez, who was also expanded by contact and conversations with Fidel. One must always return to his legacy.