Laboring for the State

Abstract

In the late 1980s, thirty years after the Revolution had come to power, Cuban obstetrician Celestino Álvarez Lajonchere recalled the government's early efforts to improve maternal health. In an article for the International Journal of Gynecology & Obstetrics, he wrote that the revolutionary government's goals were "to reduce home births and the dependence on traditional birth attendants (recogedoras)." To accomplish these goals, it established "a Statistical Department . . . to train staff located in the relevant areas of each hospital unit . . . to obtain on-going, comprehensive vital statistics." 1 Lajonchere's unembellished account of the implementation of maternal health programs belies the expansiveness of the projects to which he alluded. Indeed, the government's creation of maternity homes (hogares maternos) for pregnant women and the placement of physicians in rural areas (campo) occurred in the context of broader public health reforms implemented by the Revolution. As for the collection of patient data, that too corresponded with larger efforts to count and categorizethrough censuses and birth recordsboth the bodies and the behavior of Cuban citizens.Targeted processes such as these highlight the Revolution's centralization of medical and state authority as well as its rejection of medical plurality, including the expertise of midwives, Santería priests (santeros), and others. While the introduction of community-based primary care was unquestionably beneficial to the Cuban population as a wholeparticularly for the many Cubans without adequate medical care prior to 1959this

Confronting Bolivia's "Lack of Demographic Capacity": Protonatalism in Post-Revolutionary Bolivia, 1950s-1970s

“…33 Post-revolutionary policies promoted the idea of the "New Family": a legally married couple in a socialist nuclear family with a male breadwinner and a woman whose reproduction followed state directives. 34 Contrary to U.S. activities elsewhere, the 1961 embargo actually reduced access to contraception in Cuba, which increased women's use of abortions to control pregnancy. Despite the state's wish to decrease abortions, the procedure was decriminalized in 1965 and a 1979 law increased its accessibility.…”

“…Despite the state's wish to decrease abortions, the procedure was decriminalized in 1965 and a 1979 law increased its accessibility. 35 Popular demand and external population control advocates eventually increased access to family planning services. Cuba began to import contraceptives from Chile and the USSR in the 1970s, joined the UN Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) in 1974, and in 1975 began receiving contraceptives from the International Planned Parenthood Federation.…”

Indonesian Cultural Diplomacy and the First International Gamelan Festival and Symposium at Expo 86

“…91 Hynson notes that by tuning the bamboo Angklung to Western diatonic scales, "angklung does become more accessible, and as a hybrid of Indonesian and Western elements, it has the unique ability to connect people from all over the world." 92 Similarly, the hybrids proposed by both Indonesian and non-Indonesian gamelans at Expo 86 facilitated the diplomatic goals of the Festival and Symposium's organizers.…”