{"id":250600,"date":"2022-03-20T04:00:50","date_gmt":"2022-03-20T08:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/?p=250600"},"modified":"2022-03-19T13:06:15","modified_gmt":"2022-03-19T17:06:15","slug":"cuba-and-its-youth-the-generational-challenge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/cuba\/cuba-and-its-youth-the-generational-challenge\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuba and its youth: the generational challenge"},"content":{"rendered":"

On February 2, President Miguel D\u00edaz-Canel Berm\u00fadez <\/span>met<\/span><\/a> with experts from the Academy of Sciences to discuss what he described as \u201cthe generational challenge within our revolutionary project.\u201d The concerns that he raised with the meeting participants that day could be summed up in one question: what can be done so that Cuba does not continue to lose its youth?<\/span><\/p>\n

It is universally recognized that young people fulfill three vital functions in every society: they ensure biological reproduction; the reproduction of knowledge and spiritual values; and they produce material goods. And in today\u2019s Cuba, these functions are compromised.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the midst of the profound crisis that the island is facing, once again, various factors come into play. The tightening of the U.S. blockade since the Trump era and the virtual collapse of the Venezuelan economy ended up being the backdrop for the economic measures of the <\/span>Reorganization<\/span><\/a> and its most sensitive sequel in the eyes (and pockets) of ordinary Cubans: inflation. Two years after the start of the <\/span>pandemic<\/span><\/a>, with dollarization reaching even the most remote spaces, inequalities and discouragement have spread through the Cuban social fabric.<\/span><\/p>\n

In this scenario, the balance for the new generations is not favorable.<\/span><\/p>\n

In concrete terms, this population sector on the island is made up of all those between 14 and 30 years of age. As <\/span>explained<\/span><\/a> by Dr. Mar\u00eda Isabel Dom\u00ednguez, from the Center for Psychological and Sociological Research of the University of Havana, this age range includes what is known as \u201cearly youth\u201d (14-17 years), the \u201cmiddle\u201d (18-24 years) and the \u201cmature\u201d or \u201clate\u201d (25-30 years).<\/span><\/p>\n

The common factor to all of them is the fact that they are people who were born after the 1990s. They are Cubans who did not experience the prosperity or the opportunities of the previous decades. Their contextual references are the consecutive stages of crisis in recent decades and the increasingly widespread influence of \u201cWestern paradigms,\u201d whose impact on youth has definitely increased with access to the Internet.<\/span><\/p>\n

Pobreza y (des)amparo en \u201cla coyuntura\u201d cubana<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n