Professor Martin Carnoy suggests that changes in U.S.-Cuba relations might result in well-trained Cuban doctors and teachers invigorating the medical and teaching corps of its neighbors in Central and South America.
Washington has systematically pushed to ostracize Cuba from the rest of Latin America years after the policy has become anachronistic. By focusing so completely on the “bad” Cuba of authoritarian government and human-rights abuses, the United States has been missing a big opportunity to work with the “good” Cuba on core development problems in Latin America and Africa, such as improving education and healthcare.
President Barack Obama mentioned one possibility in his Dec. 17 announcement on restoring full diplomatic relations with Cuba. Cuba, he pointed out, has more healthcare workers in Africa fighting the Ebola epidemic than any other country. U.S.-Cuba cooperation could go far in combating the disease and finding solutions to this and other major public-health problems in Africa, where Cuban doctors have been active for more than 30 years.
Most Americans may still view Cuba as largely a sugar producer. But the new reality is that Cuba’s principal export is human capital — doctors and teachers.
Read the full story at Reuters.
Martin Carnoy is the Vida Jacks Professor of Education at the Stanford Graduate School of Education.
