The planned utopian community of...Cuba?

Guantanamo money, mo' problems

Capitalism: your mum does the washing. You pay her a dollar. You get her to do your mate’s washing. Your mate pays you fifty dollars.

Communism: your mum does the washing. You do the washing. Every night you salute a picture of your dad.

Socialism: your mum does the washing. You do the cooking. Everybody is happy – in theory.

Joshua Idehen, Mum Does the Washing

***

There was no official religion, no plan for the economy, and the government – that was the most revolutionary aspect. Compared to most of the world, the government barely existed. 

The people worked for each other. They worked not for money, but for the joy of working. Exploitation was no longer a concern; alienation was a tougher challenge, but the people were not alienated from their labor.

It was a utopian community called Los Horcones, established in 1973 in Mexico. It was based on the principles of behavior analysis and termed a “Walden Two Community.” It still exists in 2025.

***

Cuba was not a utopian community based on Walden Two, according to Wikipedia. During the first half of the 20th century, it was largely subject to corrupt democratic politics, with the years 1952-1959 under the rule of a corrupt military dictatorship. In 1959 it was overthrown by the Marxist-Leninist forces of Fidel Castro. Since 1959, Cuba has been a Marxist-Lenninst country.

Cuba is…complicated. It was never perfect, and never will be. No country is. 

But due to being founded in the modern era, there is considerable documentation of how it tried to be perfect. For this and other reasons, it attracted some attention from behaviorists. In fact, nearly a dozen behaviorists traveled to Cuba.

And mostly, they liked it.

***

The first reference to Cuba we can find in behavior analysis comes from our friend JG Holland. In 1978 he traveled to Cuba for five weeks with the Venceremos Brigade. This is, more or less, a state-sponsored visit for Americans who are interested in communism. They tour Cuba, but also take part in civic works; Holland helped build apartments for factory workers.

The fact that it is a state-sponsored trip is made clear in Holland’s credulous prose:

But a few things stand out. Holland notes the progress in training doctors and in opening clinics across the country. Indeed, Cuba has been well-regarded for these efforts, which began in the early 1970s. Around 2010, Cuba had more doctors per capita than the United States, as well as a similar life expectancy and a lower infant mortality rate despite a GDP of approximately 10% the size (it is difficult to estimate salaries in Cuba). 

Cuba was also engaged in a successful effort to increase literacy. In 1961, an enormous multi-year campaign sent tutors throughout the rural areas of the country, leading to a virtual eradication of illiteracy. 

Here was a country that, just two decades past a revolution, immensely increased the quality of life – by some measures. 

The events of 1978 were complicated by the events of 1980.

***

In April 1980, just two years after Holland’s opus, around 10,000 Cubans attempted to flee by occupying the Peruvian embassy. In response, Castro declared that Cubans were free to leave the country. America in turn announced it would accept political prisoners and up to 3,500 refugees.

Within six months, nearly 125,000 Cubans had arrived in Florida.

Cubans were encouraged to leave by Castro in an almost sarcastic sense; Castro implied that the Marielitos were traitors and criminals (language echoed by President Carter). Americans saw overcrowded boats arriving every day, with the Orange Bowl used as a temporary shelter.

There was a backlash in both countries. Cuba ended the boatlift in September. They must have sensed that this was a political debacle: too many people wanted to leave. America, whose initial acceptance of migrants appeared to be an attempt to undermine Cuba, found themselves with a real white elephant: their decisive political victory was made of people.

The population of Cuba in 1980 was approximately 9.8 million. In six months, about 1% of the total population fled. 

In the literature, there is a brief pause in behaviorist interest in Cuba.

***

In 1984, P.A. Lamal wrote Contingency Management in the People’s Republic of China in The Behavior Analyst. Lamal comments somewhat favorably on socialist states. As for the reason why, from his conclusion:

This seems to have inspired, at least in part, a rejoinder from Richard Rakos. Rakos, a notable name in behavior analysis and former editor of the journal Behavior Analysts and Social Action, is still publishing great work to this day. His 1988 article Capitalism, Socialism, and Behavioral Theory is...not that.

Holland seemed enamored with Cuba because of the planned societal changes, but neglected the lived experience of everyday Cubans. Rakos focuses on the citizens he observes in socialist countries that border capitalist countries, without much consideration for their politics. His observations (socialists seem bummed out) lead him to believe that socialism is incompatible with “human nature.” Capitalism, he thinks, seems to work better.

Jerome Ulman, who has written at length about the connections between behaviorism/behaviorology and Marxism, quickly wrote Just Say No to Commodity Fetishism: A Reply to Rakos, and while the title might sound dismissive, the text of the article dutifully considers Rakos’ arguments. Well…mostly:

Ulman has, if we may editorialize here, the more convincing argument: human nature is a matter of cultural selection, and it is not perfectly analogous to operant selection in an individual. “Human nature,” e.g. culture, is not monolithic, and it can and does change. Ulman also correctly recognizes that the survival of the human race has been predicated on cooperation and altruism.

As for what Rakos saw – people having a bad time – Ulman explains that there are parasitic metacontingencies, wherein bureaucrats use their position to engage in corrupt practices. This might read as a weak excuse, a sort of no true Scotsman argument common in these defenses of socialism/communism (though later Ulman has only good things to say about Cuba – the one true Scotsman?). Sometimes, in response to economic weakness, socialist governments begin to abandon moral principles for capitalist reforms, like the Soviet Union, then undergoing a campaign of perestroika. 

But Cuba, Ulman claims, tried their own perestroika – and abandoned it before it destroyed socialism. For a few years, Fidel Castro allowed certain capitalist activities, such as permitting some freelance work for pay. Then there was an official program initiated in 1986, called rectification, to reverse the capitalist reforms. Rectification aimed to replace material incentives with “moral” incentives, in part by eliminating layers of bureaucracy. Ulman sees rectification as a possible blueprint for societal change.

And, Ulman argues, capitalism is anti-social and coercive: the profit motive is concentrated at the top to the detriment of everyone else, and people continue to work only for fear of losing all employment.

The year prior, in Is Socialism Flawed?, Joe Morrow, the first editor of the journal Behaviorists for Social Action, takes a gentler tone in replying to Rakos, and he even accepts that some socialist countries may adopt capitalist systems such as allowing freelance work – something Ulman is strongly against. But his conclusion is ultimately not far from Ulman’s. Flaws can be corrected.

Even if socialism, communism, Marxism, etc. aren’t better than capitalism, why defend capitalism at all? Is it easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism?

***

Rakos returned in 1989 with Socialism, Behavioral Theory, and the Egalitarian Society. Perhaps spurred by the criticism of Ulman and Morrow, Rakos sharpens his argument considerably. 

Socialism is based, in part, on “moral incentives” – which are delayed. To overcome more immediate contingencies, the leaders rely on rules. However, in an open system, this may not be realistic. After all, even in 1989, a Cuban could listen to the radio, watch television, or just observe tourists, and they would see the material goods that exist in capitalist systems.

We’re behaviorists – we understand the value of immediate material reinforcers. 

Rakos briefly touches on another point that, while complex, is rather important. The Soviet Union was supporting (some might say “propping up”) Cuba, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars per year. On the one hand, this is not exactly inspiring; you too can have a socialist paradise (if you have a rich uncle). On the other hand, perhaps this would not have been necessary without the aggressive blockading of Cuba by the United States.

Ulman had a lot to say in reply. And it wasn’t going to wait until 1990.

***

In Beyond the Carrot and the Stick: A Behaviorological Rejoinder to Rakos, Ulman is…aggressive. Perhaps too aggressive. While he notes that Rakos is surely not malicious, he goes on to explain that Rakos does not understand the science of behavior, probably because of his bourgeois capitalist upbringing. 

Ulman makes some interesting points. Perhaps the strongest point is the power of rules to overcome direct contingencies. While immediate reinforcers exert a strong influence on behavior, rules – morality, social pressures, laws, etc. – can be ever stronger. An obvious example of our own would be the hunger strike, where people sometimes die due to voluntarily refusing to eat. For better and for worse, rules can overcome direct contingencies in humans.

Anyway, Cuba.

As quoted by Ulman, Castro admits two mistakes: initially refusing to use any material incentives, and then overcorrecting by allowing too many. Again, during this time Cuba was engaged in rectification, an attempt to replace economic incentives with moral incentives. 

This discussion of the new man would appear in the final issue of Behavior Analysis and Social Action. Future issues would appear under a new name, Behavior and Social Issues, nearly 2 years later in 1991.

Rakos and Ulman would continue sniping at each other in the very first issue.

***

Ulman publishes Toward a Synthesis of Marx and Skinner, while Rakos writes at length about perestroika in the Soviet Union. In a brief article, Rakos appears to pointedly refrain from mentioning Ulman. Nobody mentions Cuba.

In the following issue, Bobby Newman publishes Only Empiricism is Compatible with Behavior Analysis: A Response to the Socialism and Behaviorism Debate, which asserts that in the Ulman, Morrow, and Rakos debate, everyone is wrong.

Newman makes the reasonable point that perhaps no single system of governance could be a solution for every situation the world over. According to Newman, pragmatism dictates a contextual analysis of each problem. Newman goes on to –

Well, anyway. In the same issue, Newman wrote a half-correct article about behaviorism in A Clockwork Orange, so he’s at least consistently half-correct.

The second issue in 1992 features 5 of 6 articles about Cuba or Marxism. But it wasn’t Newman’s fault – 11 behaviorists took a trip to Cuba in 1991. And:

The second issue of Behavior and Social Issues proceeds as such:

Reflections of Cuba by Boyle & Shanley presents a thoughtful but short portrait of Cuba. It could be summed up as: Cuba is both better and worse than America. 

Designing a Humanitarian Culture: An Analysis of the Cuban Experiment by Maria Malott comes to similar conclusions as Boyle & Shanley, though is more in-depth. She begins by noting success in medicine and education in Cuba. Later she describes both her fascination and surprise at the positive aspects of her visit, as well as her fascination and surprise at the negative aspects (long lines, rationing, lack of services). 

Malott approaches her article from an OBM perspective. Cuba has arranged moral incentives, but she notes that they can be quite weak on a day-to-day basis. Her visit was about 32 years after the revolution; sometimes “working for the good of humanity” was going to lose out to “not working today.” Cuba handled this in 1971 by passing a law that made work compulsory, with consequences including deprivation of certain benefits, loss of vacation, and ultimately transfer to work camps. Malott labels this “performance management.” Omelette, eggs, etc.

Malott admits that the unpaid work of mini-brigades, groups tasked with civic works, is probably maintained by negative reinforcement in the form of escape from criticism. However, she notes that paid work is often similar – you don’t work on Monday for a paycheck on Friday, but rather to avoid being fired and losing the opportunity to earn money.

Ironically, Guevara and Castro agreed that people could not be immediately ready to abandon material incentives for moral ones, so they initially implemented a material incentive system throughout the nation. It was piloted in a few industries, and rolled out nationwide by 1961 and judged a success based on increases in work output. By 1966 there were concerns about the amount of incentives used, and incentives were entirely eliminated in 1967. This backfired: absenteeism rose, work output declined, and the incentive system was later re-implemented.

Malott concludes her article noting that many of the performance pay systems were abused. As we might expect, people became adept at gaming the system, and over 95% of workers exceeded standards set for their work. Still, deliberately designing culture, as opposed to letting it form accidentally, clearly appeals to Malott. 

Combining Moral and Material Incentives in Cuba by Linger gives a more detailed and nuanced picture of the mini-brigades, which we have so far simplified. She makes a great point that successful social action is virtually never possible when done for money – it is typically driven by values. Nevertheless, the day-to-day functioning of Cuban society relies on an interplay of moral and material incentives. As Linger notes, the moral incentives – supposedly a replacement for material incentives – do in fact tie into a lottery-like system of material incentives.

Linger concludes that Cuba, due to sociopolitical factors, will likely need to open itself to some type of globalization. Given their history, how will the people react?

P.A. Lamal, our friend who wrote about communist China, writes Observations on Malott and Linger. He praises the scope and detail in their work, particularly Malott, but he clearly stands on the other side of this debate – strange, given his stance on China. When it comes to Cuba, he thinks “others” (one has to think of Ulman) have been “uncritical, if not naive.”

Lamal’s article is short, but he points out that moral incentives are not clearly superior to material incentives, and in fact were removed and reinstated in both China and Cuba. He also notes that Malott and Linger did not set out to write about human rights, but that Cuba has a record of committing critics to asylums under false pretenses.

Unsurprisingly, Ulman would have the last word with Observations on Lamal. Ulman notes that he has visited Cuba twice, while Lamal has apparently never been, and the hardships there are in part due to the American embargo. All families have a ration book – an identical one, no matter their status; they share the hardships equally.

As for human rights, Ulman (perhaps naively!) accepts the Cuban government’s explanation of incarcerating or committing citizens based solely on behavior rather than political beliefs. 

This flurry of activity about Cuba seems to end here.

***

Did behaviorists lose interest in Cuba after 1992? 

Perhaps yes, because Cuba entered a period of severe economic decline in 1991, which lasted until the late 1990s, due to the breakup of the Soviet Union. While healthcare, education, and housing were largely maintained, enormous cuts were undertaken throughout the government. Rationing and shortages were more severe. 

It was suddenly much more challenging to argue that Cuba was a success.

***

Cuba is still here with us, nearly 35 years after their catastrophic “Special Period,” in essentially the same form. 

All this raises a challenging question: is Cuba a success?

Cuba is better. It’s also worse.