Cuba is currently facing intensifying economic hardships and political strain. Debates over the beleaguered nation’s future have grown within the global left and inside U.S. policy circles. Trump has signaled a return to hardline sanctions and “maximum pressure,” while Marco Rubio continues to champion extreme measures aimed at undermining the Cuban government. Washington has once again warned of regime change over political engagement.

In this exclusive interview for FPIF, Daniel Falcone interviews Adrian H. Hearn, professor of Spanish and Latin American Studies at the University of Melbourne. He is author of Cuba: Religion, Social Capital, and Development (Duke University Press, 2008), Diaspora and Trust: Cuba, Mexico, and the Rise of China (Duke University Press, 2016), and Food System Intermediaries: Bonding and Bridging in China and Latin America (MIT Press 2025). Hearn explains how Cuban civil society interacts with the state within a complex field of interdependence shaped by revolutionary history. Cuba’s sovereignty hangs in the balance, but so does a deeper question about what the revolution’s legacy represents.

Daniel Falcone: How do you define “civil society,” particularly in the context of Cuba and how do you approach writing about Cuban civil society in your research?

Adrian Hearn: I recognize that Cuba’s civil society is mixed rather than dualistic. Political reality in Cuba does not reflect a dualistic social structure characterized by autonomous groups on one hand and robust state institutions on the other. Rather, it shows an interpenetration of state authority and independent action in a civil sphere that is more mixed than elsewhere. My approach to defining civil society in Cuba therefore departs from mainstream models that treat civil society as inherently separate from the state.

Drawing on the theoretical work of Cuban political scientist Rafael Hernández, who in turn draws on Antonio Gramsci, I find that Cuban schools, workplaces, and most other organizations on the island operate to some extent under state hegemony as vehicles of popular education and production. In the case of a socialist society like Cuba, many organizations are found not in the private but in the state sector, yet they are increasingly spaces of debate and contestation where cultural and ideological identities evolve.

This recognition shapes my research methodology. Rather than examining civil society’s independence from the state, I focus on processes of interdependence, exchange, and counterpoint. I study the “meeting........

© Eurasia Review