On the issue of the severity of Castro's rule, other analysts argue that its repressive character was there from the beginning. While not discounting the idea of it as a product of his relations with the USA, they emphasize that stern control was regarded by Castro as essential to the effective government of Cuba (see Source J).
SOURCE J
Excerpt from Cuba: Order and Revolution by Jorge Dominguez, published by Belknap Press, USA, 1978, pp. 260-61.
In revolutionary Cuba, all levels of the mass organizations, the subordinate units of the party, and all elections lack important aspects of political autonomy and are subject to externally imposed restraints on the selection of leaders, election procedures and policy making. The fact of dependence remains constant.
The revolution and its leaders legitimate the Constitution, the courts, the administration, the party, the mass organizations, and the elections - and not vice versa. Elections are deliberately set up to be unrepresentative politically in order to facilitate the routinization of Fidel Castro's charisma by bringing forth as candidates people who are said to resemble him in some way.
Social historian Dayan Jayatilleka, in Fidel's Ethics ofViolence (2007), also regards Castro's repressive approach to politics as defining his rule. Since Castro believed that his authority was basically for the good of the Cuban people, he felt entitled to use force and repression to maintain his authority. The end justified the means.
World History
