Atlas / Organisations / Castroism

Castroism

Cuban Communism · 1959– · Cuba · Communist · Held state power · coding confidence high

−09ECcollective
−01CUpluralist
+09AUmonist
+09SCcentral
00IDbalanced
+07CHcoercive

Each axis runs from −10 to +10, with zero a genuine mixed or balanced position rather than an absence of opinion. A score describes a stated position and a governing record; it is not a judgement of merit. What each score means →

Core principles

Anti-imperial national sovereignty plus socialist transformation, led by a guerrilla-derived party-state.

Economic model

State ownership of nearly all production, universal free health care and education, rationing, limited private licences since 2011.

Organisation of powers

Single legal party, no independent press or unions, elections without competing parties.

Reading note

Rates far higher on social provision and far higher on political monopoly than almost any democratic left party — two facts routinely used to prove opposite conclusions.

Check a claim about Castroism. The interactive atlas measures the distance between any two organisations across all six axes and shows which ones carry the disagreement.

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The evidence for every score

All six cells are sourced. A rationale explains what the score is measuring and each artefact is something a third party can check without taking anyone's word for it.

EC · Economic organisation · scored −09

Coded −9: state ownership of nearly all production with limited private licences since 2011.

  • Documented act or statuteAround 500 categories of self-employment were legalised from 2011 and expanded in 2021.

CU · Social and cultural order · scored −01

Coded −1: universal education and health alongside decades of persecution of homosexuals, later reversed.

  • Documented act or statuteGay men were sent to UMAP labour camps in the 1960s; same-sex marriage was legalised by referendum in 2022.

AU · Organisation of power · scored +09

Coded +9: a single legal party with no competing candidates.

  • Documented act or statuteThe constitution names the Communist Party the superior guiding force of society and the state.

SC · Scale of decision · scored +09

Coded +9: unitary central planning with provincial administration.

  • Documented act or statuteProvincial assemblies execute national plans and have no independent revenue.

ID · Rule of membership · scored 00

Coded at zero: explicit internationalism and anti-racism doctrine with a Cuban national frame.

  • Documented act or statuteSent hundreds of thousands of troops and medical personnel to Africa and Latin America from 1963.

CH · Method and tempo · scored +07

Coded +7: power won by guerrilla insurrection.

  • Documented act or statuteThe government was overthrown by armed struggle in January 1959.

Nearest organisations by measured distance

Straight-line separation across all six axes, out of a maximum of 49.0. Proximity means similarity of stated position, not endorsement and not resemblance in outcome.

Countries

Cuba

Cite this page

Scores are revised on evidence, so a citation should carry the version it refers to. Version 4.3.1 is current; the revision log records every change.

McGrath, K. (2026). Castroism. The Political Atlas, version 4.2. https://thepoliticalatlas.com/organisations/castroism/ (accessed 2026-08-01).

Free to quote and reproduce with attribution. This is a synthesis rather than a peer-reviewed dataset — where an authoritative figure is needed, cite the Chapel Hill Expert Survey, the Manifesto Project or V-Dem.