Spanish Transition: A True and Irreversible Model for Cuba

Some time ago, I penned an article about Spain's Transition, arguing that it should serve as a blueprint for Cuba. I still firmly believe that we ought to learn from Spain's pivotal historical moment.

Since then, I've often heard that because I once praised that transition, I should now accept "forgiveness without vengeance" in Cuba. This notion suggests that admiring the Spanish model obligates me to accept anything disguised under that label here. Let me be clear and put it in writing.

Many exiles and Cubans living outside the island, including myself, are open to a Spanish-style transition. Dialogue and reconciliation do not intimidate us. However, we refuse to accept a facade, a false promise.

The Reality of Spain's Transition

To understand what a true Spanish transition entails, we must recall how it unfolded. The term "transition" is often misused. In Spain, the transition wasn't a precursor to reform; the laws themselves were the transition.

Following Franco's death in 1975, the regime's apparatus enacted the Law for Political Reform in 1976. The very Cortes, unelected and composed of the regime's men, voted to dismantle the system they were part of. This is encapsulated by the phrase, "from law to law."

What followed was crucial:

• Legalization of political parties, including the Communist Party, a historical enemy of the regime.
• Free and competitive elections in 1977.
• The 1978 Constitution.

The ruling power of four decades relinquished control, subjected itself to the vote, and accepted potential defeat.

Cuba's Offer Falls Short

In Cuba, nothing of this sort has transpired, and that's no accident. Instead, we've witnessed power transfers within the same dictatorship. Fidel passed the baton to Raul, who handed the presidency to Díaz-Canel but retained control of the Party. Eventually, even the Party leadership was passed on. While names changed, the power dynamics remained the same.

When the regime has altered laws, it has taken steps contrary to Spain's path. The 2019 Constitution didn't open the system; it fortified it. It declared socialism "irrevocable" and cemented the Communist Party as the sole ruling force. While Spain's government used its legal framework to unlock the cage, Cuba's dictatorship wielded theirs to seal it shut.

Now, economic reforms, small businesses, private banking, and exiled investments are being touted as signs of change. But let's look closely at what shifts and what doesn't. The economy is opening while political power stays firmly in the hands of the same military-business complex.

The emerging model isn't Spanish; it's Chinese or Vietnamese, where markets open, but the single-party system continues its repression—no elections, no free press, no legal opposition. The ruling elite transforms into owners of the new economy, now shielded by foreign capital invested in preserving the political status quo.

Forgiveness Requires Genuine Change

Here's the crux of the matter, stated plainly. Forgiveness is contingent on change. Without change, there's no forgiveness. This isn't about revenge.

The distinction between justice and revenge is crucial, and that’s precisely why we demand justice. Revenge is punishment for its own sake. Justice calls for those who have held power for over six decades to acknowledge the harm they caused, cease causing it, and ensure it doesn’t happen again. In any sincere reconciliation process, this is called truth, recognition, and guarantees of non-repetition. It’s not bitterness; it’s the bare minimum for forgiveness to hold any meaning.

Forgiving a regime that continues its oppressive actions, and has not admitted any wrongdoing, would be empty forgiveness. It would falsely declare a wound healed while the perpetrator keeps it open intentionally.

Thus, those accusing us of being vengeful invert the burden. They ask us, the victims, to forgive first as a precondition, while those responsible for 67 years of oppression haven't moved a finger. The initial step doesn't belong to the victim but to those in power who caused the harm. This is how it happened in Spain: the gesture of openness came from those in command. Forgiveness followed, never the other way around.

We demand from the Cuban regime exactly what Franco's regime did in 1976: to admit that what they built is harmful. To acknowledge that the Cuban political system is flawed, undemocratic, and denies rights to Cubans. And it should be the regime itself—just as it was in Spain—that creates the laws to dismantle itself: legalizing parties, including the opposition and exile platforms; calling for free and competitive elections; releasing political prisoners; opening up the press; and erasing that deceitful word, "irrevocable," from the Constitution.

Cosmetic Changes Aren't a True Transition

This is why we reject what's being offered today. Cosmetic changes are unacceptable because they are not permanent; they're optional. They can be reversed at the regime’s whim, as has always been the case.

The Cuban regime has opened and closed its grip so many times that we know the drill. They decriminalize the dollar and then persecute it. They allow a market space and then suffocate it. They provide a pressure valve and then close it once the pressure subsides. Every concession is reversible because none is secured by a law outside their control. That’s the point: as long as power remains concentrated in the same hands, any opening is a loan, not a right. What is lent can be taken back.

A true transition is defined by its irreversibility. It relocates power to a place where those currently in command cannot reclaim it at will.

That’s what Spain achieved when it subjected Francoism to the vote and embraced alternation in power. What Cuba offers is the opposite: changes dependent on the goodwill of those who have spent 67 years proving they lack it, retaining the right to reverse them whenever they choose.

Our Willingness for Genuine Change

Let it be clear, we are not closed to dialogue. We don't seek bloodshed, revenge, or a Cuba divided into winners and losers. We are open to reconciliation and a Spanish-style transition. We envision a new Cuba where everyone participates, including those currently on the other side.

Critics may claim that demanding change first condemns the transition to never happening, as the elite will never repent voluntarily. But we’re not asking for sentimental repentance, tears, or confessions over coffee. We seek a concrete legal gesture, akin to the 1976 Law for Political Reform: an irreversible legal act that opens the system. If that gesture doesn’t come, the issue isn't our demands but the lack of willingness from those who prefer to maintain control rather than return the country to its people. Let them not accuse us of blocking a transition that they, and only they, refuse to initiate.

Everything else—economic facelifts, reversible openings, the "let’s look forward" attitude that skips acknowledging guilt—isn't a transition. It’s the old dictatorship with a new, more investor-friendly vocabulary. And to that, with all due respect and willingness to dialogue, we cannot agree.

Because forgiving without change isn’t generosity; it’s surrender. We don't seek revenge. We simply ask for the regime that struck us for 67 years to finally admit its wrongs and prove it by relinquishing power. The day that happens, we’ll have a transition. And on that day, we’ll gladly talk about forgiveness.