Cuba and socialist bloc II
Seeking a more just, democratic, sustainable, and prosperous world
During the last seven decades, the Third World nations plus China have been developing structures of cooperation that are alternatives to the structures of the Western-centered capitalist world-economy. I am calling the phenomenon “socialist bloc II,” based on my interpretation of it as a more advanced manifestation of the Soviet Union-centered socialist bloc of 1945 to 1990.
Both socialist blocs have been shaped by the leading roles played by one or two nations that declared for the construction of socialism in their particular nation. However, in the case of socialist bloc II, most nations have not declared for socialism; rather, most nations are allied with the vanguard socialist nations in the creation of structural alternatives to the capitalist world-economy, alternatives that would permit nations to freely decide for socialism.
Both socialist blocs have been presented by Western elites as authoritarian threats to Western democracy, distorting their actual chara…