La Revolución Sigue Adelante Cuban State Discourse in Granma in the ‘Special Period’ and the post-Castro Era.

On 11 July 2021 some thousand protesters hit the streets around Cuba. The protests were triggered by food and medicine shortages and by discontent with how the government handled the COVID-19 pandemic. It was the largest protest since Cuba’s 1959 Revolution but not the only one, as in 1994 some hundred protesters took to the street in Cuba’s Capital Havana to demand the possibility to leave the country. These two protests were the result of more widely felt popular dissatisfaction in two periods of crisis: the ‘Special Period’ (1991-1999) and the post-Castro era (2018-present). This thesis analyses the discourse of the Cuban state in its official newspaper Granma and asks how the Cuban state has legitimised its power discursively in these periods of crisis. This research is theoretically underlined by the idea that (state) power is inherently unstable and always needs to legitimise itself to function and maintain itself. In periods of crisis there is a greater need for legitimacy. By comparing the two periods, this research finds that there is little difference in the content of the state discourse. The same legitimising claims are present in both periods. The main legitimising claims are the emphasis on the achievements of the Cuban revolution – therefore of socialism – and the emphasis on the US and the US embargo as the cause of economic problems in Cuba. Partly corresponding with these claims, this thesis analyses the Cuban state discourse surrounding five extracted dominant themes: Fidel Castro, the mobilisation of history, the United States and its embargo, the achievements of the revolution and protest/dissidence. This research concludes that contrary to the similarities in the content of the discourse in the two periods, there are fundamental differences in the tone and form of the discourse between the two periods. The tone of the discourse is more aggressive, bitter, negative, and insecure the post-Castro era. An example of the aggressive tone in the post- Castro era is that the US embargo is described as ‘genocidal’ in this period. When it comes ii to form, there is an increase in legitimising claims in the post-Castro era: more articles are attributed to legitimise aspects of the state’s project instead on reporting on events. It appears that the state is in more need of legitimisation. This change in tone and form of the discourse in the post-Castro era is described with the introduced concept of ‘overlegitimisation’, in this case defined as the state feels contested by the growing emergence of alternative discourses. To counter this, the state is clinging desperately to its older discourse, and is trying to push this through more forcefully, for example by using more aggressive and argumentative language and by the endless repetition of legitimising claims. This research further explores the social context of the analysed periods and finds that, in the post-Castro era, there is a growing discrepancy between the discursive content of legitimising claims and the social context wherein they gain their meaning. Ultimately, this thesis explores theory on the effect of alternative discourses on dominant discourses. Next to the primary source Granma itself, there is also evidence found in theory for the concept of ‘overlegitimisation’.