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Punching above its Weight: Cuba's use of sportfor South–South co-operationRobert Huish aa Department of International Development Studies , Dalhousie University ,307-A, Henry Hicks Building, 6299 South Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 4H4,CanadaPublished online: 20 May 2011.

To cite this article: Robert Huish (2011) Punching above its Weight: Cuba's use of sport for South–South co-operation, Third World Quarterly, 32:3, 417-433, DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2011.573938

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Punching above its Weight: Cuba’suse of sport for South–Southco-operation

ROBERT HUISH

ABSTRACT While known for training world-class athletes to compete inprestigious international competitions, Cuba is also educating 983 coaches fromvulnerable communities in 53 countries at its Escuela Internacional deEducacion Fısica y Deporte (EIEFD). These athletes are bound not necessarilyfor the Olympic podium, but for marginalised communities where they areexpected to develop sport and recreation programmes. While Cuba hasgarnered hard currency by training athletes from other countries, the EIEFD isfunded entirely by the state under the auspices of South–South co-operation.Why would Cuba, a resource-poor country, commit to training foreign coaches?This paper argues that Cuba’s sport internationalism is grounded in complexand historical notions of co-operation with other countries in the global South.Through a critical analysis of state policy, and the goals of current initiativeslike the EIEFD, it argues that, while nationalism and foreign remuneration are afactor, the commitment to sport and development may be tied to broader goalsof counter-hegemonic development. For scholars interested in Sport forDevelopment and Peace Cuba’s use of sport is noteworthy as it is notnecessarily a means to development as much as a result of international socialdevelopment.

Contrasting the Cuban epistemology of sport internationalism againstcurrent initiatives in Sport for Development and Peace (SDP), this paperpresents a series of questions worthy of further analysis. By discussing thenationalist historical origins of Cuba’s commitment to sport, its pledge toboth elite performance and populism in sport, and the right to sport throughinternationalism, I argue that Cuban sport programmes are not necessarilyvehicles to development, but may be interpreted as part of developmentthrough a broader historical framework and project of transformativeSouth–South co-operation.1 Cuban co-operative efforts involve economic,health, education, artistic and sport projects as a total package of its ongoing

Robert Huish is in the Department of International Development Studies, Dalhousie University, 307-A,

Henry Hicks Building, 6299 South Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 4H4 Canada. Email: huish@dal.ca

Third World Quarterly, Vol. 32, No. 3, 2011, pp 417–433

ISSN 0143-6597 print/ISSN 1360-2241 online/11/030417–17

� 2011 Southseries Inc., www.thirdworldquarterly.com

DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2011.573938 417

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foreign policy aimed at overcoming poverty through investments in humancapital in the global South. (The latter is a politically complex term thatemphasises the organisation of solidarity and resistance to neoliberalismrather than the physical division of the Earth into hemispheres.) This may beimportant to researchers working in the SDP movement who have come tointerpret development through sport as relying too heavily on individualismand elite competition as measures of success.2 Positioning Cuban sport co-operation as part of an extensive transformative development project mayhelp to inform current debates on how counter-hegemonic processes can betied to, and emerge from, sport for development. To understand thehistorical and current place of sport in Cuba’s foreign policy, the article isorganised in five parts. First, it chronicles the development of sport in Cuba.Second, it discusses questions about the role of states in the SDP movement.The third section emphasises the importance of nationalist culture in Cuba’ssport internationalism. The article then considers the role of elite achieve-ment in national sport programmes and how this complements sportprogrammes aimed at popular participation. The final section of the articleraises specific questions about the significance of Cuba’s current sportprogrammes on an international scale.

Cuba in historical context

It is August 1991. The Berlin Wall has been down for nearly two years andthe USSR is three months away from breaking into pieces. Refugees fromEastern Europe are coming west, economies in the Eastern Bloc are tumblinginto chaos, and newly established democracies are disorganised andstruggling with too few resources and too much poverty. Yet in Havanathe Pan American games are in full swing. Teams from 26 countries havecome to Cuba to compete in newly constructed stadiums and freshly dugswimming pools. It is a time for Cuba to showcase its athletic power and tobuild warmer relations with countries in the hemisphere that haveinterminably denied it access to the Organization of American States.3

This event is all the more striking because the 1991 Cuban economy wasgravely affected by the collapse of the Eastern Bloc. In 1992, after the USSRdissolved into the Commonwealth of Independent States, Cuba’s preferredtrading privileges ended. Whereas the country had garnered wealth throughenormous sugar exports to the USSR at preferred prices, the new economywould afford no such protection. As a result, Cuba’s exports dropped by 87per cent in a year.4 Its GDP plummeted by 35 per cent in just 12 months.5

Resource shortages crippled the nation as cars and busses could no longerrun without imported petrol. Food rations depleted, and Havana descendedinto perpetual rolling blackouts.It was no surprise in Cuba that the country would be hit hard by the

collapse of the USSR. In the early 1980s economists at the University ofHavana, government officials and leaders of the Communist Party acknowl-edged the numerous inefficiencies of the economy, and many foresaw animpending crisis without drastic internal reforms.6 Critics in the global North

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anticipated Cuba’s social demise as a result of the economic calamity. NewYork Times reporter Michael Janofsky wrote in January 1991: ‘why would acountry with so many obvious economic needs continue such massive effortsto organize an event of the magnitude of the Pan American Games?’.7

Despite the obvious economic peril, and even with the wide internal andexternal criticism of the state of the country’s economy, Cuba hosted the PanAmerican games with fully operational facilities and services for athletes. Thecountry even managed to top the gold medal table (with 140 to the US’s 130).Electricity was sparse, resources few and food was in short supply.Neverthtless, the Cuban government did not close a single school orhospital.8 Once the games had concluded and the economic crisis, officiallyentitled the Special Period in the Time of Peace, was in full swing, Cubamaintained its elite sports training programmes along with thousands ofparticipatory community-level sports programmes.9

The immediate question for many scholars is why a country so strappedfor resources would undertake such investments in one of the worst economiccrises of the 20th century. Pettavino and Pye acknowledge that ‘the cost ofdeveloping the sports program has been high. Sacrifices had to be made inother areas of society.’10 The country’s ability to emerge out of this economiccrisis boasting top tier athletes, mass participation in community andcompetitive sports, improved health indicators, and the ability to offerinternational co-operation assistance and expertise to other countries in theglobal South, suggests that the Cuban government had negotiated challen-ging economic circumstances against mainstream economic logic.Carter argues that Cuba’s principle concern with sport is to use it as a

moneymaking machine that would subscribe to neoliberal doctrine.Perceiving international Cuban sport initiatives merely as a means to earnhard currency, Carter suggests that: ‘in effect, the state became a sportsagency, representing both athletes and coaches to potential overseasclients’.11 Carter, and also Pettavino and Pye, suggest that the commitmentto develop sport was, in addition to earning hard currency, a means ofproducing symbolic capital to legitimise the state.12 However, whileremuneration and nationalism do factor into Cuba’s sports programmes,the origins and purpose of sport may be more complex and historicallysignificant than just economic compensation and nationalist celebration.Cuba’s pursuit of sport for the moral strength of society and for the earningof hard currency is not necessarily a contradiction. Taken together it ispossible to interpret both pursuits as intrinsic to the overarchingtransformative development that the country has famously pursued in theglobal South.As for many of its other international pursuits, many scholars have

illuminated the moneymaking potential of Cuban co-operation.13 WhileCuba did contract baseball players and coaches to Japan,14 boxing coaches tothe Indian army, and softball coaches to Argentina for handsomeremuneration, the Instituto Nacional de Deportes, Educacion Fısica yRecreacion (INDER) also has co-operative agreements with desperately poorcountries around the world.15 Countries like Paraguay, The Gambia,

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Suriname, the Philippines and dozens of others offer very little financialreward to Cuba for its support in the development of their sportprogrammes. Cuban coaches have co-operated with over 100 countriesaround the world. Many have assisted in the development of community-based sports programmes in addition to elite performance training. Beyondsport Cuba employs similar co-operative efforts in health, education,agriculture, science, and infrastructure capacity building, operating in 53African countries in addition to dozens more around the world.16

It is true that 36 Cuban coaches participated in the 2000 Sydney Olympicswith teams from other nations, for which coaches and INDER would havereceived significant remuneration. Cuba has contracted some of its bestplayers to the Japanese baseball league for handsome remuneration, with thestate taking up to 80 per cent of the players’ salary.17 However, a country likeThe Gambia, where the economy is paltry and most GDP comes from foreignremittances and modest agricultural production,18 has little capacity to offerhard currency to the three Cuban coaches or to the 145 Cuban doctorsworking there.19 While The Gambian government covers the living expensesof Cuban professionals, and offers a monthly salary of around US$200 (sixtimes the amount that would be earned in Cuba),20 the Cuban governmentreceives little more from The Gambia beyond lobbying support for inclusionin regional economic accords.Moreover The Escuela Internacional de Educacion Fısica y Deporte

(EIEFD) offers free physical education scholarships to students around theworld. The school currently has 983 students from 53 countries, and since1999 has received students from a total of 82 countries. Since 2005 it hasgraduated 1386 students from 71 countries.21 Students from this programmeare expected to return to their home countries in order to set up community-based sports education programmes in co-operation with local govern-ments.22 Considering that many of the students who come to Cuba havestarted out in vulnerable communities, the EIEFD may be less about usingsport as a nationalistic symbolic gesture, and more concerned withcontributing to transformative development processes at the communitylevel in countries around the world.Since the majority of Cuban sport professionals abroad are working in

economically hobbled countries, and bearing in mind the growing role of theEIEFD in Cuban sport internationalism, it may be problematic to reduce theentirety of Cuba’s approach to sport to: 1) a means to economicremuneration; 2) the generation of international political capital; 3) thebuilding of domestic symbolic capital; or 4) the maintenance of moral valuesfrom the Soviet years. These four claims often overlook the role of co-operation in the strategic objectives of foreign policy, and the potential ofCuba’s development programmes as counter-hegemonic to neoliberalapproaches. Cuba is recognised as addressing poverty by investing in humancapital in areas ranging from health to technical assistance.23 Unlikemany SDP programmes that view sport as a unique and innovative toolfor development,24 Cuba’s sport initiatives are not singled out asstrategic vehicles for development; rather they are included as part of

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broader co-operative efforts that seek transformative progress in manysectors such as health, education, human security and individual well-being.

A role for the state in sport for development and peace?

One of the most distinctive features of the Cuban sports model is that it isentirely state-driven. Many countries facilitate their Official DevelopmentAssistance (ODA) initiatives through civil society organisations, and accord-ingly the state-centredmodel is seldom employed and ambiguously understoodwithin the SDPmovement. In 2003 theUNacknowledged that sport couldmakepositive contributions towards meeting development goals that relate tocommunities and individuals.25 The result has been the formation of hundredsof organisations employing sport as a development strategy to promotephysical activity, positive social change and empowerment of marginalisedcommunities.26 The positioning of SDP within frameworks of corporatephilanthropy and donor-driven charity can, according to Darnell, encompassmoral frameworks that embody Northern values, and with them hegemoniccoercion of communities to conform to such agendas.27 As Levermore argues,the pervasiveness of such values is growing as sport-focused programmesoperating throughout the global South have scaled up in both size and numberwithin the past decade.28 There are numerous reasons for this growth, rangingfrom increased investment from private philanthropy to support frominternational sports organisations like FIFA. Many of these programmes haveviewed sport as a mechanism to advance individual betterment out ofconditions of poverty and disadvantage. But as Darnell argues, ‘notions ofindividual responsibility, economic prosperity, personal esteem and success’are conducive to values of neoliberal hegemony that emphasise the role ofindividuals as the principal bearers of responsibility for overcoming theperils ofunderdevelopment.29 Themessage is that ‘Pele made it out of the slums, and socan you’. Such an ethos espouses inspirational messages without posing anydirect transformative threat to the nation-state or to an increasingly liberalisedmarket economy.Pele is not the norm; he is the exception. As Black notes, those who come to

development through the SDP prism have an advantage as latecomers.30 This islargely because experienced practitioners are used to seeing target-specificdevelopment interventions, from dam building to community educationprojects, falling short of their broader transformative objectives. The goals ofSDPprojects that see sport as an independentmeans to prosperous developmentand individual empowerment are likely to encounter thewell-known challengesof pursuing sweeping structural change through empowerment at theindividual level. Without broader, national-level socio-political support,constrained agency still undermines any project that aims to build leaders inimpoverished communities. Constrained agency can be understood as thehampered ability of individuals to pursue transformative change as a result ofstructural challenges stemming from poverty, inequality and discrimination.Far-reaching poverty, violence, illiteracy and poor health are pervasiveinfluences that will hinder most marginalised youth from obtaining, or even

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approaching, Pele’s level of success. And for those who do succeed, furtherchallenges of migration factor in as well. Just as many professionals trained inthe global South face comparatively lucrative options associated with out-migration, coaches and athletes from the South encounter the same moraldilemma. Should one stay to build sport-based community projects inunderdeveloped communities, or should one take the path of individualprosperity through migration and work opportunities in the global North?Kidd, Darnell and others point out that the inherently competitive nature

of SDP programmes may give certain individuals the chance for socialmobility in an aggressive global political economy.31 At the same time thisparadigm of individual success for SDP may do very little to complement orenhance capacity-building efforts in other areas of social development.32 AsKidd points out, even the competitive funding of SDP sees numerous NGOsclamouring for support for narrow, ‘hallmark’ projects rather than usingtheir collective strength and energy for broader social development. As henotes, ‘while there will always be a role for NGOs, government must take thelead. It is their obligation to do so, given their undertakings to provideopportunities for sport and physical activity as human rights, and theurgency of the education and health challenges that they face.’33

Based on the critiques presented by these scholars, Cuba’s state-leddevelopment would appear to have a role to play in showing how alternative,if not counter-hegemonic, sport and development projects can operate. Theneoliberal undertones from the SDP paradigm do not directly contest socialinequities often generated from free markets and compounded by theaenemic condition of many nation-states. The Cuban approach is under-explored, and it may serve as an important counter-project with transforma-tive implications in the global South. That said, there are two importantconsiderations to take from the Cuban approach. First, Cuban sportinternationalism is not a Soviet-era conception. Its origins extend well intothe 19th century, and it has flourished after 1990. This is significant, as thecommitment to sport should be thought of as grounded in a culture ofnationalism that can be seen in the development of sport in Cuba over thepast 150 years, rather than as a peculiarity of socialist ideology. Second, theend goals of Cuban co-operation movements are less clear-cut thanimmediate economic growth or visible development achievements. Unlikemany development projects that operate on four-year budgets and expect tomeasure quantifiable results, Cuban co-operation often operates with no suchlimited objective(s). The understanding is that development succeeds notthrough timelines but when individuals enjoy the rights to health, security,education and general well-being. The process can take decades, and the netgain during that transformative process may be little more than theacquisition of co-operation through allies and partners on a global scale.

Nacionalismo: the origins of Cuban sport internationalism.

Both Cuban foreign co-operation and domestic policy are ultimatelygovernment-run projects. However, these state policies are not solely

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grounded in high-handed leadership or bureaucracy. These initiatives havegained popular support through a pervasive culture of nationalism. Taking ahistorical view of Cuba’s twofold objective of achieving elite performanceand mass participation in sport, there is much to suggest that sportinternationalism is not based solely on socialist theory, but more on viewsabout cultures and nationalism and the country’s role in the hemisphere thathave their origins before the 1959 Revolution. Before the Revolution, just asit is today, baseball was the nation’s sport. Baseball is often thought of as anAmerican import to the Caribbean that the US marines taught to locals.However, baseball came to Cuba as early as the 1830s, well before any USintervention, and throughout the 19th century Cuban players, like EstebanBellan, joined professional leagues in the US.34 The first baseball clubsestablished in Mexico, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico were notestablished by American enthusiasts, but by Cuban sugar plantation owners,tobacco plantation owners and rum barons, who were expanding theiroperations to other parts of the Caribbean.35

In the 19th century baseball was just as much Cuban as it was American.In the years leading up to ‘The Second War of Cuban Independence’ againstSpain in 1895 (‘The First War of Independence’ was between 1868 and 1878)Cuban baseball games were used as nationalist rallying points to raise fundsand support for the war movement led by Cuba’s national hero Jose Martı,Dominican General Maximo Gomez and Cuban-born General AntonioMaceo.36 While in exile in the US, Martı, referred to as the mentor of theCuban nation, wrote prolifically about baseball, not necessarily as a tool ofCuban nationalism, but in terms of its ability to evenly match players fromdifferent social classes together on a single field.37 Within Cuba manylandowners and workers had sympathy for the nationalist movement andembraced baseball as a rallying point that broke many of the archaichierarchies and traditions imposed from Spain.After the Spanish were ousted from Cuba in 1898, US forces claimed

victory and nationalists were left on the margins. Washington took directcontrol over the affairs of the Cuban government, and North Americancapital began to flood into the island, developing infrastructure in Havanaand modernising sugar plantations across the country. The US influence wasso strong that schools in Havana were training students in English ratherthan Spanish, the US dollar was the preferred currency, and Cuba becameawash with US imports.38 Many intellectuals who in the 19th centurysupported US co-operation and intervention began to resent the overt USimperialist presence. Poverty and inequality worsened in Cuba during theearly 20th century and religious and class tensions in Havana becameexplosive. The Cuban presidents of the early 20th century proved to bepatsies to US interests, as the Cuban economy was systematically opened upto US concerns, while inequality, even between affluent Latinos and NorthAmericans, worsened.39

Some scholars have argued that baseball was also a mechanism ofimperialism in Cuba during this era but, as Gems’ work shows, baseball wasa form of popular resistance against the new imperial power.40 While US

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philanthropic societies established recreational clubs, and some expensiveprivate clubs were established on the island with the intention ofstrengthening the bonds between Cubans and Americans, the result wasnot co-operation, but resistance.Baseball had been at the heart of Cuba’s 19th century nationalist

movement against Spanish imperialism and later its American variant.Cuban players were perceived as being of equal merit to their NorthAmerican counterparts.41 The University of Havana team often challengedthe YMCA league, which was made up mostly of North American Protestants(as the YMCA—the Young Men’s Christian Association—was notoriouslyunpopular and unwelcoming to Cuban Catholics in the early 20th century).42

In many of the scrimmages in baseball and basketball, the YMCA league oftendominated, according to Gems. In boxing, however, it was the Cuban fighterswho often prevailed. As Gems states, these were ‘forums of comparison,interaction and at times pressure cookers for racial and socio-economictensions’.43

In the years leading up to the Revolution sport remained a forum ofcomparison and resistance against yanqui domination of the island. Yet, bythe 1940s, there was a strong professional-league sport movement in Cubathat sought to tie Cuban clubs into the professional leagues in the US. Onehundred and thirty-five Cuban baseball players joined US major-leagueclubs, mostly between 1947 and 1961.44 In 1961, following the Revolution,the US imposed its embargo against Cuba, and the revolutionarygovernment banned professional sport clubs, while establishing INDER on 4February of that year. The connections between Cuban players and the USMajor Leagues were cut off until the 1990s. After the fall of the USSR,Cuba’s economy spun into a collapse that left many suffering from the effectsof severe resource shortages. Not surprisingly many of the country’s topathletes fled to the US in the hopes of gaining robust salaries. Rising starplayers, like Florida Marlins Pitcher Livan Hernandez and New Yankeesstarting pitcher Orlando Hernandez, caught the attention of US media, andCuba’s reputation for producing elite athletes grew.In the years following 1961 the culture of sport in Cuba took a turn

away from paid professionalism. This may be taken solely as a reflectionof the Marxist imperative of nationalising all businesses, but is betterunderstood as a more dynamic process. In the years leading up to theRevolution, Cuba had seen some of its top professional athletes leave forthe US, which was a massive blow to nationalists. While in the 19th andearly 20th century sport was used as a forum for national pride thathelped to generate resistance against imperialism, by the middle of the20th century, the drain of sports professionals from the country sent acompletely different message that to be successful was to leave Cuba. Inthe early stages of the revolution, when the country faced enormouseconomic and political challenges, Fidel Castro and other leaders believedthat professionalism in sport could be congruent with nationalism, andthat elite athletes could achieve moral and material compensation for theirachievements within the nation rather than abroad.45

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The government organised INDER so that elite performance could continuethrough the creation of new national sport leagues and the offering ofprestigious roles for top performers in the government ministry, all the whileexpanding resources to facilitate broad participation in community-basedsports and recreation programmes. The salaries for baseball players on teamslike the Havana Province Industriales would never come close to what couldbe offered to players in the New York Yankees, but in the Revolution’semerging economy INDER developed routes for upward mobility of athletesinto noteworthy political and nationally recognised roles. The intent was forsport to bring nationalist values and non-monetary reward together insupport of the development of the country.

Chronicles of elite achievement:

Pettavino and Pye suggest that attention to sport aided the revolutionarygovernment in developing and maintaining military preparedness.46 Whilephysical fitness could be an advantage to any army, there are, as theyacknowledge, benefits that sport lends to nation building, socialisation andpolitical integration that emerged from the populist approach to sport in thecountry. In the first decade of the Cuban revolution INDER balanced twoprinciple tasks of encouraging popular participation in sport, while retainingelite performance. Since the 1972 Olympics in Munich Cuba has won 195medals, including 67 Gold. At the International Baseball World Cup Cubaearned 30 medals, including 25 Gold, compared with the US, the runner up,with 15 medals and only four Gold. For a resource-poor country, Cubapunches well above its weight in terms of elite achievement in internationalforums. In recent Olympic standings Cuba has routinely matched or out-performed wealthy countries like Canada and the UK on the podium (seeTable 1).An important challenge to countries in the global South that want to

improve their elite performance is not just to allocate resources for top-tierathletes, but also to ensure popular accessibility to sport. Black argues thatanother key challenge ‘is to draw a more systematic link between majorsporting events and community-level needs and interests’.47 Pointing to the2010 FIFA world cup in South Africa, he argues that ‘there is evidence, forexample, that community-level sport and social development are beingcompromised by South Africa’s pursuit of the trappings of externally defined

TABLE 1. Cuba’s Olympic medal performance in selective comparison, 1992–2008

Canada UK Cuba

1992—Barcelona 11 (18 Medals) 13 (20 Medals) 5 (31 Medals)

1996—Atlanta 21 (22 Medals) 36 (15 Medals) 8 (25 Medals)

2000—Sydney 24 (14 Medals) 10 (29 Medals) 9 (29 Medals)

2004—Athens 21 (12 Medals) 10 (31 Medals) 11 (27 Medals)

2008—Beijing 19 (18 Medals) 4 (47 Medals) 28 (24 Medals)

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and validated modernity’.48 While Cuba has hosted massive internationalsporting events, and it continues to promote elite high performance, it hastraditionally encouraged broad-level participation as part of the elite trainingprocess.Balancing the nationalisation of professional sport in Cuba as a

mechanism of anti-imperialism with the goal of achieving elite success fornationalistic goals challenges the dominant trends of equating highachievement in sport with zealous individualism. This history shows thatcollective, nationalistic values other than competition and egoism areattached to sport for development in Cuba. Competition, success andreward are part of the picture in Cuba, but INDER’s incentives are all lodgedwithin the existing, and developing, structural fabric of Cuban society.Indeed, some Cuban athletes find INDER’s rewards unsatisfactory and doleave for opportunities abroad. For the many who stay to work within thesystem, however, there seems to be an alternative to the dominant sportingmodel at play. Specifically the Cuban approach implies that sport is notemployed as an instrument to achieve ends that are beyond the state. This initself presents a radical contrast between sport programmes in Cuba andsport for development projects in general, as many SDP programmesexplicitly state that their use of sport is aimed at obtaining grandaccomplishments that are currently unobtainable within many poorcountries.49 INDER’s state-driven organisation shows that, while broaderideological development goals may be pursued through sport, this pursuitcan be congruent with the realities and capabilities of the nation-state itself.

No net, no gloves, no shoes? No problem: populism of sport in Cuba

Cuba’s sport programmes for young people are largely based on participa-tion first, but within the hundreds of programmes there are chances foryoung athletes to be screened and selected for elite training. When youngpeople work under the mentorship of Cuban coaches, the training schedule isoften demanding and intense right down to regulated diets and structuredsocial activities. Young athletes en route to elite performance have access totop training facilities, but so do others who are not in elite programmes.Apart from certain athletic education centres, the public are able to accessstadiums, tracks and gyms just as their elite compatriots do. INDER has directrelations for programme developments with the Ministry of Education, andfrom its national office there is direct development of sports schools, thesports medicine institute, and Cuba Deportes (the organisation that makeshats, balls, uniforms and other sporting goods for retail sales). INDER alsohas offices at the provincial level that largely duplicate the national office’sorganisational schemes. At the municipal level it is sport that receivesorganisational input from local schools and mass organisations throughpopular participation programmes.50

Facilities are public and often lack structural and architectural splendour.Tennis courts without nets, football pitches that have been worn bare,baseball diamonds that lack bases and intermittent lighting for outdoor

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facilities are common and a contrast to the immaculate tennis courts thatoften lie idle in exclusive resort hotels. Nevertheless, public courts bustle asCubans bring their own home-made nets and ropes to set up for play. Cuba’sresource shortfalls affect sport programmes across the country, especially inrural areas of the island. In the US baseballs are prized souvenirs when theyget knocked foul. Not so in Cuba. When a batter hits a ball out of the park atleague baseball games it is quite common for children to run and collect theball to return it to the umpire, because the supply of balls is limited.Cuba’s resource shortfalls are abundant and obvious, even to the casual

tourist. What is perhaps less obvious, however, is that popular sportprogrammes involve the participation of practically every Cuban at somepoint in their lives.51 For street games and community baseball gamessometimes there are bats; at other times only pieces of wood. Sometimesthere are baseballs, but more often than not there are rubber balls. Even withresource shortfalls it is easy to find children engaged in sport in Cuba. Thesituation stands in contrast to the all-too common cultural norm of childrenspending their days at work rather than play—as with the child labourerswho have worked to stitch baseballs in Pakistan and Honduras forexample.52 In Cuba the state consciously protects children’s rights. It israrely assumed that all children in a resource-poor country could spend theirtime playing with balls rather than stitching them.53

The right to sport beyond borders: Cuban internationalism.

Carter argues that there are strategic reasons why Cuba engages ininternational co-operation through sport, but I suggest that there are alsomoral reasons.54 Cuba has succeeded in overcoming problems like childlabour and homelessness at home.55 The revolutionary government hasattempted to assist other countries in meeting these goals as well. When itcomes to Cuba’s internationalism, Carter, like Feinsilver, is correct inidentifying the symbolic capital that comes from international co-operationmovements.56 Yet there are also moral reasons to assist other countries inbuilding capacity for community-based sport and recreational programmes.The world’s largest donors of ODA fall well short of their stated goals. Rarelyhave countries in the North offered assistance to the South without securinglong-term investment relations in the poorer nation’s resources. For othercountries in the global South, including regional leaders like Brazil, buildingcapacity through co-operation is a desirable way to build security andpartnerships through soft-power initiatives.57

Cuba’s approach to co-operation through sport comes principally in theform of transformative development initiatives. Over 600 Cuban coaches andtrainers are working in 100 countries. Some have worked and continue towork on lucrative contracts, but many are working throughout the globalSouth on projects that generate little hard currency for the Cubangovernment. The outreach of Cuban sport personnel closely mirrors medicalinternationalism programmes that currently place 38 000 Cuban healthcareworkers in 76 countries around the world.58 In the areas of both health and

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sport Cuba goes beyond sending its own professionals to other countries inthe global South; it brings students from other countries to Cuba for freeprofessional training. Cuba’s Escuela Latinoamericana de Medicina (ELAM)has received over 15 500 students from 32 different countries since 1999.Students mostly come from poor and marginalised backgrounds in order toreceive a six-year medical education at no cost.59 The Cuban state only asksfor a commitment by students to return to their home communities topractice where they are needed the most. To date ELAM is the largest medicalschool in the world, having graduated close to 6000 doctors since 2005. It isan innovative approach to building global capacity for healthcare workers.After ELAM’s establishment in 1999, INDER decided to construct the EIEFD,

using the same principles of bringing students from vulnerable communitiesto Cuba in order to receive the skills necessary to return home to assist intransformative development.60 In the words of Fidel Castro: ‘we have thepotential, not just to contribute to the development of sport [for others inthe global South] with Cuban specialists, but we are seriously considering theestablishment of the EIEFD to train their own specialists who will pursue thisnoble and healthy activity’.61 By training hundreds of students with the skillsand ethics necessary to provide much-needed services in the global South,Cuban internationalism is building capacity on an enormous scale to giveyoung students the skills and ethics needed to address human needs.The school’s mission is to ‘train professionals who value solidarity and

who are willing and able to transform physical education and sport in theircountries’.62 The school does not claim that the mission will go beyondtransformative development in sport. It does not say that tangentialeconomic or social development effects will come from these students.Rather, the school’s mission is limited to focusing on transformative changein sport through co-operation as solidarity. Compare this to Right to Play’sgoal to ‘create a healthier and safer world through the power of sport andplay’.63 Even UNICEF hopes that through sport it will be able to ‘mobilizecommunities, and, most important, ensure the long-term development ofchildren, families and communities’.64 INDER and EIEFD make no such claimsbecause, through Cuba’s own development experience, it is understood thatno one development initiative can lead to broad, structural and transforma-tive change. Such change, it is believed, only occurs when a plethora ofprogrammes is embraced and enabled as a unified movement on a nationalscale.The EIEFD may be a coaching school with a social consciousness, but it is

first and foremost dedicated to training first-rate coaches and trainers,regardless of their final destination. Based on the goals of the school and itsprogramme operations, it is clear that while the school has high hopes for itsgraduates, it affords students the necessary skills to become professionaltrainers, not national saviours.The programme runs for five years and consists of both lecture and

practicum components. Since all classes run in Spanish, there is intensivelanguage training for students who come from non-Spanish speakingcountries or for those, like the Quechua in Ecuador, who speak indigenous

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languages. The first year of the programme sees the introduction offundamentals of philosophy and the history of sport and physical education.Throughout the program courses consist of:

. computer analysis;

. biological sciences;

. fundamentals of physical activity and education;

. prevention and therapeutic activities;

. teaching of physical education;

. physical recreation (with a focus on community participation);

. timing and scorekeeping;

. coordination of competitions;

. rules of sports and games;

. martial arts; and

. physical education practicum.

From this programme students can pursue various career paths, but there is aparticular emphasis on training teachers of physical education and sport,professional trainers, physical recreation co-ordinators and physical rehabi-litation and therapy practitioners.65 Considering the lack of educationalopportunities for students in the global South, and the prohibitive costs,Cuba’s commitment stands as a unique venture in building capacity on abroad scale.Although 600 coaches and trainers are currently working in 100 countries,

the media in the global North barely notices. The SDP literature issurprisingly vacant of analysis on the impacts these coaches and EIEFD

graduates are having in their home communities. While we are able to discerna unique approach taken by Cuba to sport and physical education, theimpact of these projects in other countries remains less than fully understood.What we do know comes from rather limited case studies of official South–South support for these Cuban-trained coaches.For example, the Paraguayan government has declared support for EIEFD

graduates who return home, as well as for Cuban coaches working in thatcountry, through a bilateral accord. The two countries intend to strengthentechnical co-operation, and exchange delegations, trainers, experts andspecialists in health and education. Currently 23 students from Paraguay arestudying at the EIEFD.66 In Suriname the government and media have praisedCuba for training committed coaches from the small South Americancountry, who are able to improvise teaching methods despite limitedequipment and resource-poor settings.67 In The Gambia the ministerresponsible for youth and sports declared that with Cuban co-operation itis possible to ‘develop other sporting disciplines alongside football so as toprovide the youth with diverse sporting opportunities’.68 In Manila theAmateur Boxing Association has relied on Cuban coaches, and hopes tocontinue co-operation in future training efforts.69 In Caracas, throughMisionBarrio Adentro Deportivo (a programme backed by the Venezuelangovernment) the effort of the Cuban coaches working there has been called

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an example ‘of how a country can grow to improve itself, and how agovernment can build up humanist and fair models [of sport]’.70 In all theseexamples there is state-to-state assistance that allows for the creation ofsupportive spaces for change. At no point do the partner governments claimthat sport will be a completely transformative project; rather they see theCuban effort as an essential attribute for strategic national development.And, as The Gambia highlights, the interventions are not aimed at any onesport. Boxing, football, baseball, gymnastics, tae-kwon-do and even chess areall highlighted examples of Cuban coaching efforts.

Concluding thoughts

SDP is largely approached as a vehicle for development. Programmes that arefocused on individualism, competitiveness and an athlete’s ascension withinthe global economy lend themselves well to the values of neoliberaldevelopment frameworks, as Levermore argues.71 Cuba is a leader in sportfor development with hundreds of its own coaches and trainers workingthroughout the global South, and with hundreds of scholarships for youth totrain as sporting professionals. The emphasis of these initiatives is to fill avoid through capacity building that brings sport, along with health andeducation through other programmes, to the poor and vulnerable of theglobal South as a transformative project of co-operation aimed atovercoming underdevelopment in the broadest sense.Cuba’s commitment to sport is historic and grounded in a culture of

nationalism dating from the 19th century. This history demonstrates howsport internationalism is not just about national unity, elitism or charitiesgiving children the chance to play. It is a strategic approach by the state toorganise sport as part of broader ideological development goals. Based onthe historical trajectory of sport in Cuba and the stated goals of INDER andthe EIEFD, it is reasonable to position it as a counter-hegemonic alternative tothe current, mainstream SDP paradigm. The Cuban approach is focused oncapacity building, nationalism and the integration of sport into co-operativeprogrammes that involve other areas such as health. The transformativegoals of mainstream SDP are often focused at the individual level and themeta-national level, superseding the structural limits of the state. Yet theseprogrammes, by and large, are not designed to address broader developmentdeficiencies within a society other than through the moral example set byathletes who emerge from them. Cuba’s sport internationalism may not fallinto this moral dilemma as its efforts are pursued in parallel with othertransformative co-operative efforts acting to create change as part of strategicgoals at the national and community levels.Further research is required to understand whether this historical trend,

along with current stated objectives, in fact lead to transformative impacts inthe South. What remains to be fully understood is whether EIEFD graduatesare able to build capacity for participatory sport education programmes intheir own countries, or whether broader structural challenges effectively

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replicate the hegemonic development processes that have framed many SDP

programmes.Certainly Cuban sport internationalism should be of interest to scholars of

the sociology of sport, as it is largely under-explored in the literature outsidethe lucrative contracts with countries like Japan and Korea. Not only do wenot know the extent of transformative impacts of South–South cooperation,we do not fully understand if, and how, such programmes might operate inother countries trying to overcome underdevelopment. There is of course themoral question of whether other countries should attempt similar sportdevelopment goals. Certainly these are also worthy questions for futureresearch. In the meantime, we can recognise the Cuban model as a uniqueand important example of an approach that conceives of sport as part ofbroader transformative projects aiming to enable economically hobbledcountries to overcome underdevelopment through solidarity and co-operation.

Notes

1 The term ‘South–South’ reflects the encompassing politics of the term ‘Global South’, which of coursereveals the North–South divide between wealthy and poorer nations. There are particular cautions thatshould be considered in referring to Cuban internationalism as South–South co-operation, namely, thatthere are several programmes in sport, health and technical assistance that see Cuba partner withwealthier nationswhowouldbe consideredpart of theNorth.And this shouldbe kept inmind consideringthat Cuba has collaborated with countries like Japan and South Korea for the training of eliteperformance athletes. However, Cuban institutions do employ the terms ‘South–South’ ‘solidarity’ and‘cooperation’ in their own foreign policy of international assistance to poor countries in Latin America,Africa and Asia. Such co-operation programmes, like the EIEFD and the Latin American School ofMedicine (ELAM),which is its equivalent in health, are not only aimed at poor countries, but specifically atthe vulnerable populations of those poor countries. While conscious that Cuban co-operation is morepolitically dynamic than amere geographical divide ofNorth andSouth, I employ the language of South–South cooperation as a means of identifying this unique policy strategy in the terms that Cubanstakeholders use, while remaining conscious of the messy political geography this language creates.

2 S Darnell, ‘Power, politics and ‘‘Sport for Development and Peace’’: investigating the utility of sportfor international development’, Sociology of Sport Journal, 27(1), 2010, pp 54–75; and B Kidd, ‘A newsocial movement: sport for development and peace’, Sport in Society, 11(4), 2008, pp 370–380.

3 HM Erisman & JM Kirk, Redefining Cuban Foreign Policy: The Impact of the ‘Special Period’,Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2006.

4 S Halebsky, JM. Kirk & C Bengelsdorf, Cuba in Transition: Crisis and Transformation, Boulder, CO:Westview Press, 1992.

5 K Cole, Cuba: From Revolution to Development, London: Pinter, 1998.6 D Machado Rodrıguez, ‘¿Hacia donde va la sociedad cubana? Cuba en el contexto latinoamericano’,Cuba Socialista: Revista Teorica y Polıtica, 2004, at http://www.cubasocialista.cu, accessed July 2010.

7 M Janofsky, ‘Pan American Games: Cuba puts it all on the 1991 Games’, New York Times, 20 January1991.

8 P De Vos, P Ordunez-Garcia, M Santos-Pena & P Van der Stuyft, ‘Public hospital management intimes of crisis: lessons learned from Cienfuegos, Cuba (1996–2008)’, Health Policy, 96(1), 2009, pp 64–71.

9 P Pettavino & G Pye, ‘Sport in Cuba’, in L Chalip, A Johnson & L Stachura (eds), National SportsPolicies, London: Greenwood Press, 1996.

10 Ibid, p 134.11 T Carter, ‘New rules to the old game: Cuban sport and state legitimacy in the post-Soviet era’,

Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, 15, 2008, p 196.12 Ibid; and Pettavino & Pye, ‘Sport in Cuba’.13 P Pettavino & G Pye, Sport in Cuba: The Diamond in the Rough, Pittsburgh, PA: University of

Pittsburgh Press, 1994; K Baird, ‘Cuban baseball: ideology, politics, and market forces’, Journal ofSport & Social Issues, 29(2), 2005, pp 164–183; and Carter, ‘New rules to the old game’.

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14 Baird, ‘Cuban baseball’.15 JS Jimenez Amarto, ‘La direccion y gestion en las organizaciones deportivas de los paıses del Sur–

Sur’, INDER—Portal Informacional Deporte Cubano, 2006, at http://portal.inder.cu, accessed July2010.

16 P Grogg, ‘Cuba–Africa: un compromiso historico’, available from Cubasolidaridad.org, accessed July2010.

17 Baird, ‘Cuban baseball’, p 180.18 A McKay, ‘Trade policy issues in a small African economy’, World Economy, 28(9), 2005, pp 1197–

1209.19 ‘Gambia receives seven Cuban coaches’, ThePoint, 9 March 2010, at http://thepoint.gm; and

Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Cuba, ‘Cooperation in the Gambia’, Cuban Embassy to GambiaWeb Portal, at http://emba.cubaminrex.cu, accessed July 2010.

20 Most Cuban physicians are paid between 900 and 1400 Cuban National Pesos (CNP) per month. TheNational Peso is currently pegged at 24 CNP to one Convertible Peso (CUC), which is valued around$1.08. While this can be interpreted as Cuban doctors making $1 a day, there are numerous subsidyand support mechanisms for goods on the CNP market that make them more affordable. Nevertheless,there are many goods and services in Cuba that can only be obtained with CUC, which can be difficultfor Cubans who have limited access to foreign exchange.

21 J Polo Vazquez, ‘Mensaje del rector’, Escuela Internacional de Educacion Fisica y Deporte de Cuba,2008, at http://www.eiefd.co.cu/, accessed July 2010.

22 Ibid.23 J Feinsilver, Healing the Masses: Cuban Health Politics at Home and Abroad, Berkeley, CA: University

of California Press, 1993; and I Saney, ‘Homeland of humanity: internationalism within the CubanRevolution’, Latin American Perspectives, 36(1), 2009, pp 111–123.

24 R Levermore, ‘Sport-in-international development: theoretical frameworks’, in R Levermore & ABeacom (eds), Sport and International Development, New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

25 F Coalter, ‘Sport-in-development: accountability or development?’, in Levermore & Beacom, Sportand International Development.

26 M Saaveda, ‘Dilemas and opportunities in gender and sport-in-development’, in Levermore & Beacom,Sport and International Development.

27 Darnell, ‘Power, politics and ‘‘Sport for Development and Peace’’’.28 Levermore, ‘Sport-in-international development’.29 Darnell, ‘Power, politics and ‘‘Sport for Development and Peace’’’, p 70.30 D Black, ‘The ambiguities of development: implications for ‘‘development through sport’’’, Sport in

Society, 13(1), 2010, pp 121–129.31 Kidd, ‘A new social movement’; and Darnell, ‘Power, politics and ‘‘Sport for Development and

Peace’’’. Levermore & Beacom, Sport and International Development.32 Kidd, ‘A new social movement’.33 Ibid.34 L Perez, ‘Between baseball and bullfighting: the quest for nationality in Cuba, 1868–1898’, Journal of

American History, 81(2), 1994, pp 493–517.35 R Gonzalez Echevarrıa, The Pride of Havana: A History of Cuban Baseball, New York: Oxford

University Press, 1999.36 H Thomas, Cuba, or, the Pursuit of Freedom, New York: Da Capo Press, 1998.37 J Martı, Obras Completas, Havana: Editorial Nacional de Cuba, 1963–1973.38 Thomas, Cuba, or, the Pursuit of Freedom.39 Ibid.40 G Gems, The Athletic Crusade: Sport and American Cultural Imperialism, Lincoln, NE: University of

Nebraska Press, 2006.41 Ibid.42 Ibid.43 Ibid.44 M Jamail, Full Count: Inside Cuban Baseball, Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University, 2000.45 R Pointu & R Fidani, Cuba: Sport en Revolution, Paris: Editeurs Francais Reunis, 1975.46 Pettavino & Pye, ‘Sport in Cuba’.47 Black, ‘The ambiguities of development’.48 Ibid, p 24.49 See UNICEF’s ‘Sport for Development campaign’, at http://www.unicef.org/sports/index_

23624.html, as well as the mission statement by Right to Play International: ‘To create a healthierand safer world through the power of sport and play’, at http://www.righttoplay.com/International/about-us/Pages/mission.aspx.

50 Pettavino & Pye, ‘Sport in Cuba’.

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51 P Pettavino & G Pye, ‘Sport in Cuba: Castro’s last stand’, in J Arbena & D LaFrance (eds), Sport inLatin America and the Caribbean, Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 2002.

52 United States Department of Labor, ‘Bureau of International Labor Affairs: Pakistan’, at http://www.dol.gov/ilab/media/reports/iclp/sweat/pakistan.htm, 2010, accessed July 2010.

53 Child Labour Watch, ‘Reports’, at http://www.chinalaborwatch.org/, accessed July 2010.54 Carter, ‘New rules to the old game’.55 UNICEF, ‘Country statistics: Cuba’, at http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/cuba_statistics.html.56 Feinsilver, Healing the Masses.57 ‘Speak softly and carry a blank cheque: Brazil’s foreign-aid programme’, The Economist, 12 July 2010.58 R Huish & JM Kirk, ‘Cuban medical internationalism and the development of the Latin American

School of Medicine’, Latin American Perspectives, 34(6), 2007, pp 77–92.59 R Huish, ‘Going where no doctor gas gone before: the role of Cuba’s Latin American School of

Medicine in meeting the needs of some of the world’s most vulnerable populations’, Public Health,122(6), 2008, pp 552–557.

60 BE Sanchez Mesa, ‘Historia de la EIEFD: antecedentes al surgimiento de la EIEFD’, at http://www.eiefd.co.cu/_pages/historia.htm, 2009, accessed July 2010.

61 F Castro, quoted in ibid.62 Sanchez Mesa, ‘Historia de la EIEFD’.63 Right to Play, ‘Mission, Vision and Values’, at http://www.righttoplay.com/International/about-us/

Pages/mission.aspx, 2010, accessed July 2010.64 UNICEF, ‘Sport for Development’, at http://www.unicef.org/sports/index_23625.html, 2010, accessed

July 2010.65 Polo Vazquez, ‘Mensaje del rector’.66 ‘Firman Cuba y Paraguay acuerdo de cooperacion deportiva’, Juventud Rebelde, 19 May 2010.67 MINREX, ‘Cooperacion: entrenadores deportivos cubanos desarrollan exitoso trabajo en Suriname’, at

http://www.cubaminrex.cu?Cooperacion/2010/0528_2.html, 28 May 2010, accessed July 2010.68 B Camara, ‘Gambia gets Cuban coaches’, Gambia Sports (online edition), 10 March 2010, at http://

www.gambiasports.gm/portal/mobile/news/1272/html, accessed July 2010.69 R Fernandez Liranza, ‘Cuban boxing coach arriving’, Manila Bulletin, 29 July 2005, at http://

www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-134594254.html, accessed July 2010.70 ‘Venezuela’s Chavez highlights contribution by Cuban coaches’, Prensa Latina, 1 August 2004, at

http://www.cubasource.org/publications/chronicles/coc200408fa_e.asp, accessed July 2010.71 Levermore, ‘Sport-in-international development’.

Note on contributor

Robert Huish is assistant professor in international development studies atDalhousie University. He has published several articles on Cuba’s foreignpolicy strategy. He has also published on issues of healthcare access in theSouth, soft power, human security and Cuban medical internationalism. Hecurrently teaches courses related to poverty and human rights, global healthand activism in social movements.

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