Cuba's Path to Transition: Civil Society's Blueprint for Sustaining Change

CiberCuba investigates | Second of four parts

The initial segment of this investigation revealed that Cuba's independent civil society has not only envisioned a future democratic Cuba but has also contemplated the various pathways to reach that goal: from plebiscite and negotiation to rupture, "law to law" transitions, provisional governments, constituent processes, and hybrid solutions.

The current question is more specific: should any of these scenarios initiate a transition, what actions are necessary to maintain state functionality while constructing a new order?

CiberCuba has analyzed political proposals, legal projects, economic studies, and sector-specific works developed by organizations, think tanks, jurists, economists, and independent civil society experts. While these do not form a singular program, they do collectively offer a substantial array of responses to many challenges likely to arise during a transition.

This is the second of four installments. The first explored paths to change; this one examines proposals for governance and reconstruction. The third will address the gap between this knowledge and a political alternative capable of wielding power, and the fourth will study the international support available and what Cuba's transition may require.

The Challenge of Authority During Transition

A transition cannot simply declare the end of a previous regime; someone must ensure continuity of public services, security, courts, and administration during this interim phase.

The Cuban American Bar Association (CABA) has long focused on this issue. Their Fundamental Law for the Transition of the Republic of Cuba offers a legal framework for the period between the current system's end and the establishment of a democratic government.

The proposal outlines a two-year transitional period, addressing public authorities, judicial power, territorial defense, political reform, and provisional arrangements. One explicit goal is to prevent chaos that may result from a leadership vacuum by maintaining laws and institutions that do not conflict with democratic principles until they can be replaced by the transitional government.

In June 2026, CABA and organizations linked to the Liberation Agreement re-circulated this work, recruiting lawyers, judges, academics, and law students to prepare the rules and institutions potentially needed for political change.

A Provisional Government with Defined Roles

The Liberation Agreement, signed in March by Steps of Change and the Assembly of the Cuban Resistance along with over 50 organizations, takes an additional step by directly proposing a provisional transitional government.

This government would have a limited mandate to address humanitarian emergencies, restore basic services, ensure fundamental rights, release political prisoners, and prepare for free, fair, and multi-party elections.

The agreement divides the transition into three phases: Liberation; Stabilization and Reconstruction; and Democratization. For the initial stage, it establishes specialized commissions on humanitarian emergencies, public security and order, economic recovery, social development and infrastructure, health, education, legislative affairs, justice, constitution, and exile reunification.

Beyond merely a sectoral program, the document seeks to address a functional question: who does what when current institutions cease to respond and no elected government exists yet.

Cuba Próxima: Prioritizing Institutions Over Improvisation

Cuba Próxima's proposal stems from a different transition model based on negotiation and verifiable agreements, yet it also dedicates significant focus to institutional challenges.

Its Agreed Opening proposes a Political Negotiation Table and, during initial phases, economic stabilization measures, food and medicine aid, an emergency energy plan, and legal guarantees for investment.

Facing future elections, it suggests a provisional constitutional framework, immediate necessity laws, a law regulating the election of a Constituent Assembly, and a constitutional transition law.

The document also refers to a repository of specific proposals on elections, the constitution, the constituent process, legislative function, judiciary, municipalities, businesses, and commerce.

This approach aims to ensure that the transition does not rely solely on temporary political agreements: it requires clarity on which rules and institutions should be activated at each stage.

Transitional Justice: Addressing Repressive Apparatus

Institutional reconstruction must extend beyond merely changing laws. Cubalex warns that the downfall or transformation of a regime does not automatically guarantee democracy. A transition can lead to new forms of power concentration without guarantees in place from the outset.

Their 2026 proposal establishes a minimum baseline involving the release of political prisoners, decriminalizing dissent, judicial independence, due process, prohibiting torture, protecting vulnerable groups, transitional justice, reparations, and non-repetition guarantees.

The organization underscores an important distinction: while political organizations prepare governance programs, human rights entities must retain their capacity to monitor and limit any government, even one emerging from the opposition.

Transitional justice is also discussed by the Center for Coexistence Studies, CTDC, Programa Cuba, Estado de Sats, and other initiatives. There is no single formula for responsibilities, amnesties, truth, or reparations, but there is a well-developed conversation on preventing transition from becoming revenge or impunity.

Military and Security Concerns

This is one of the areas where proposals are less uniform. The Liberation Agreement dedicates a specific commission to security, defense, and public order, advocating for the demilitarization of political power. CABA incorporates territorial defense within its transitional law.

Other projects and legal efforts address the subordination of the armed forces and security bodies to civilian authorities, though this corpus is less precise than constitutional or economic matters.

The issue is critical: a transition must maintain public order while preventing the coercive structures of the old regime from retaining the ability to obstruct change.

Determining who commands, over whom, with what legal authority, and under what civil control mechanisms remains a question needing further development.

Stabilizing the Economy Before Rebuilding

The economic dimension is likely the most thoroughly explored. The Cuban American National Foundation (FNCA) outlines a 13-pillar roadmap including private property, legal security, tax reform, banking, credit, entrepreneurship, investment, commerce, infrastructure, education, healthcare, and social protection.

The proposal aims to establish institutional conditions for private capital entry into Cuba and for Cubans to also participate as owners.

The Cuba Transformation project, developed in 2026 by renowned Cuban economists, proposes a clear sequence of stabilization, recovery, and development. The document is presented as an open framework subject to revisions, not a closed program.

The Cuba Study Group has supported this effort with specific works on halting economic deterioration, defining stabilization priorities, transformation principles, and the relationship between social market economy and democratic rule of law.

The Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy (ASCE) maintains a 2026 research agenda including economic stabilization, structural reform, infrastructure and energy, governance, security, and international investment.

Therefore, while there isn't a singular economic formula, there is a considerable volume of work on what should be stabilized first and how to transition to a functional economy thereafter.

Property, Investment, and Business Creation

This area likely poses one of the greatest challenges for any transition: shifting from a state-controlled economy to one based on property rights without causing unmanageable property conflicts.

The FNCA roadmap suggests incentivizing businesses with Cuban capital participation and protecting minority shareholders.

Cuba Próxima proposes institutionalizing the business and commercial sector, offering specific proposals on companies and trade.

The Center for Coexistence Studies (CEC) has focused on property and economy, while the Cuba Study Group has advocated since 2006 for microcredit programs and support for small entrepreneurs as a means of generating domestic capital.

The issue of confiscated properties, state assets, and property claims is more complex and lacks a consensus solution. It is likely one of the problems requiring more legal engineering than any other transitional chapter.

Essential Services: Keeping the Nation Functional

Major roadmaps agree that reconstruction cannot wait for a new constitution to be established. The CEC has dedicated specific works to infrastructure. Their 17th Report proposes setting priorities, diversifying investment sources, attracting foreign capital, promoting extraordinary financing, and organizing working tables between the government, civil society, and the diaspora. It even suggests an international investment comparable, in conceptual scale, to a "Marshall Plan."

In February, the "Cuba: The Day After Tomorrow" conference at Florida International University gathered over 75 academics, specialists, activists, and students in 23 panels. One central space was titled "From a Transition Roadmap to Reconstruction," addressing constitutional transition, transitional justice, and reconstruction.

In July, the American Museum of the Cuban Diaspora hosted the "Initiative for a Democratic and Economic Alternative for Cuba," a forum specifically focused on infrastructure reconstruction. Experts from FIU, the University of Miami, and the University of Texas Energy Institute, among others, discussed transportation, tourism, water, and sewage.

Here we witness an important evolution: the conversation is shifting from "we need to rebuild" to questions of cost, sector priorities, potential actors, and timelines.

Health, Education, and Social Protection

Reconstruction is not viewed solely as economic liberalization. The CEC has specific proposals on education and health, alongside reports on aging, social inclusion, and governance. Their catalog includes works ranging from economy, agriculture, and legal frameworks to media, governance, and elderly care.

The FNCA suggests voucher systems for education and healthcare, combining public funding with a diversity of providers.

Estado de Sats included education, health, pensions, and social security in its 2018 transition program.

Programa Cuba has compiled proposals from specialists on education, pensions, aging, and other social welfare components.

The common goal is not merely dismantling the state system but addressing a more urgent question: how to ensure essential services during a period when the state is under extraordinary pressure.

Governance: Connecting the Dots

The Center for Coexistence Studies (CEC) likely provides the most explicit attempt to link various state functions. Its thought itinerary includes a specific report on "Governance and Governance in the Future of Cuba" and others on economy, legal framework, health, education, agriculture, media, security, international relations, and diaspora.

The center defines itself as a laboratory for thought, strategic foresight, and proposals for a democracy with good governance.

This perspective is vital because a transition cannot be sustained solely by a correct constitution. It requires capable administrations, officials, budgets, information, functioning municipalities, control systems, clear rules, and a civil society capable of monitoring the government.

Here the question shifts from purely political to administrative.

The Diaspora's Role in Reconstruction

Nearly all recent economic proposals assign some role to Cubans abroad. The FNCA directly advocates for capital, knowledge, and business involvement. The CEC has developed specific proposals on the diaspora's contribution to national reconstruction.

Cuba Próxima includes diaspora participation within its institutional design. Cuba11J advocated for participation rights for Cubans residing outside the island.

Convivencia's infrastructure reconstruction efforts explicitly suggest inviting the diaspora to working tables, investment conferences, and projects funded by their businesses.

Thus, the diaspora appears not only as a source of remittances or investment but as a reserve of human, business, technical, and professional capital.

Assessing the Preparedness for Transition

The corpus balance is uneven. In legal, rights, economic, and sectoral reconstruction, there is a considerable body of work accumulated over years and notably expanded in 2026. In infrastructure, even technical calculations and financing proposals are emerging. In provisional government, concrete designs exist, particularly in CABA, Cuba Próxima, and the Liberation Agreement.

In transitional justice, there is a developed discussion, though not complete consensus. In health, education, agriculture, aging, and social protection, there is a broad repertoire of sectoral proposals.

Where the landscape is clearly less developed is in the final operational mile: who executes decisions, who controls security structures, how various authorities coordinate, how political actors resolve disputes, how property is protected during transit, and who manages large emergency funds.

This distinction is significant.

Having a plan for rebuilding the electrical system does not equate to having an authority capable of contracting, financing, and supervising the reconstruction of the electrical system.

A Nation with Proposals, Still Lacking an Alternative Government System

Reviewing this second set of documents leads to a conclusion similar to the first installment, albeit at a different level. Cuba does not start from scratch in terms of what needs to be done. Proposals exist to preserve institutional continuity, create a provisional government, release prisoners, ensure rights, reorganize justice, stabilize the economy, attract capital, rebuild infrastructures, recover energy, reorganize health and education, and hold elections.

Some proposals are compatible; others reflect different political and economic models. But the problem arises where the paper ends.

Who turns these proposals into decisions? Who forms the provisional government? Who has the authority to execute them? Who selects the heads of each area? Who keeps security forces under civilian control? Who manages reconstruction funds? Who represents the transition to the United States, Europe, and financial organizations?

Here lies the boundary between knowing how to govern a transition and being truly prepared to govern it.

The third installment of this investigation will focus on this gap: what is needed to transform the existing corpus of proposals, experts, and capacities into a recognizable, legitimate, and operational political alternative.

One central question will also be who might provide the necessary resources to make that leap from thought and documents to real governing capacity.