Havana Times
Havana Times ( HavanaTimes.org ) is a left-wing , independent Cuban blog . The editorial office is based in Nicaragua , but the majority of the authors and photographers live in Cuba. It is published in English and Spanish .
Havana Times was founded in October 2008 by the American Circles Robinson . He had lived in Cuba since 2001 and worked for the Prensa Latina news agency and the state translation agency ESTI, which is why he was accused of conducting Cuban government propaganda with his web project. As the publication of a website critical of the government was incompatible with his job and because Robinson had officially put numerous obstacles in the way of the Havana Times, he left Cuba again in 2009 and went back to Nicaragua, where he had previously lived for 17 years. Initially, the articles appeared exclusively in English, translated by volunteers in the USA. The Spanish-language version was added after less than a year. Today (as of May 2015) the website has 7500 articles and 3000 visits daily .
When asked what “independent” meant to him, founder Robinson said: “Independent of both the Cuban and the US government as well as Cuban groups in exile in Miami and all programs that are directly or indirectly supported by them. Independent of any political party , organization or movement. ”However, maintaining this independence is a real challenge“ in a country where working for an independent digital medium is recognized as a taboo for the government and most of the residents ”. Anyone who wants to take part in this project must "be ready to take the risk of persecution in their personal and professional lives."
Numerous young authors write critically about Cuban politics and society from a socialist and left- democratic perspective. You write about daily life in Cuba as well as about the politics of the country. In addition to these young authors, there are some older writers who deal with the country from a left-critical point of view, but who have a stronger orthodox-Marxist background. The most important among them is likely to be the retired Cuban diplomat Pedro Campos Santos . The contributions of the older colleagues are usually described as being much more detailed and well-founded than those of the younger colleagues.
Web links
- Havana Times homepage
- Ted A. Henken: A Bloggers' Polemic: Debating Independent Cuban Blogger Projects in a Polarized Political Context. (PDF), in: Cuba in Transition Vol. 21, Association for the Study of the Cuban Economy (ASCE), Bethesda 2011 (English)
- Ted A. Henken and Sjamme van de Voort: From Cyberspace to Public Space? The Emergent Blogosphere and Cuban Civil Society. (PDF), in: A Contemporary Cuba Reader: The Revolution under Raúl Castro. Edited by Philip Brenner et al., Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham 2014 (2nd edition) (English)
- Dmitri Prieto Samsonov: Un reflejo de Cuba en el ciberespacio. (PDF), in: Espacio Laical No. 142 from September 2011 (Spanish)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Clifford L. Staten: The History of Cuba , ABC-CLIO, 2015, p. 187 (English)
- ↑ a b Ted Henken, Sjamme van de Voort: From Cyberspace to Public Space? in: Philip Brenner et al. (Ed.): A Contemporary Cuba Reader: The Revolution under Raúl Castro , Rowman & Littlefield, 2014, p. 102 (English)
- ↑ Havana Times - HavanaTimes.org is pure Cuban government propaganda , Havana Journal from May 19, 2011 (English)
- ↑ Circles Robinson: “Cuba Expert” Slurs Havana Times , Havana Times of December 17, 2008 (English)
- ↑ Havana Times publisher Circles Robinson loses job and leaves Cuba , Havana Journal from October 15, 2009 (English)
- ↑ Circles Robinson: About us , Havana Times, 2015, accessed May 8, 2015
- ^ Samuel Farber : Cuba Since the Revolution of 1959: A Critical Assessment , Haymarket Books, 2001, p. 259 (English)