Capitalism is a system in crisis. In the context of an urgent need for an alternative system, Cuba provides valuable lessons. The Cuban Revolution's unique features have allowed it to survive both the conditions that brought about the collapse of the Soviet model of socialism and the renewed assault of US imperialism. The Revolution also serves as an inspiration for developing countries seeking to escape the clutches of global capitalism. Henry Veltmeyer examines the Cuban Revolution from the perspective of socialist human development, critiquing of the notion of human development used by the United Nations Development Programme to rescue capitalism from its fundamental contradictions and give a human face to an exploitative and destructive development process. Veltmeyer's analysis shows the necessity to jettison a process designed to benefit the rich and powerful at an enormous social and environmental cost, one disproportionately borne by the working classes and the impoverished masses of the developing world.
About the Author: Dr. Veltmeyer lived and worked for six years in south America before coming to Canada to pursue a doctoral program in Political Science and subsequently (in 1976) beginning his academic career in the Sociology Department at St. Mary's University. He has participated in the university's Atlantic Canada Studies program and founded the program in International development in 1985. He also served for eight years as Coordinator of this program in addition to eight years as chair of the Sociology Department. Currently he has an academic appointment in the PhD program of Development Studies at the Autonomous University of Zacatecas, Mexico and annually engages in an extended program of research and public lectures across Latin America. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Journal of International Development Studies and serves on the editorial board of Studies in Political Economy and a number of international journals in his major field of research-the political economy of international development. Dr. Veltmeyer conducts research, writes and teaches about diverse issues related to the political economy and sociology of development, with a particular focus on issues of Latin American development, globalization processes, government policies, alternative models and approaches and social movements. Since 2000 he has authored/co-authored and edited 13 books and 25 scholarly refereed articles that have been published in Canada, the US, the UK, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil and Ecuador. Several of these books, written in English or Spanish, have received awards and have been translated into other languages - among them Portuguese, Italian, Tugalese and German. In addition to these scholarly books, several of which have achieved international recog-nition and/or special awards and distinctions, 25 of Dr. Veltmeyer's scholarly articles since 2000 have been published in some of the most prestigious academic journals in his field or by the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. Places of publication include Canada, the US, the UK, Australia, Argentina, Mexico, the Netherlands and Switzerland