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Armistice
A formal agreement between warring parties to stop fighting, often to create a temporary truce while a peace treaty is negotiated.
Censorship
Censorship in Cuba was a systematic government policy designed to eliminate dissent and control all forms of communication, including print, electronic media, arts, and academia.
Civil disobedience
The peaceful refusal to obey unjust laws as a form of protest.
Civil liberties
Civil liberties are individual freedoms protected by law.
Cold War
Political rivalry between the USA and the Soviet Union after WWII
Congress of People's Deputies
A new Soviet legislative body created in 1989 as part of Gorbachev's demokratizatsiya reforms. It featured partially competitive elections and became a platform for reformers and nationalists to challenge Communist Party authority publicly for the first time.
Containment
The strategy of stopping communist expansion through alliances, aid, and limited military action.
Counterculture
A social movement that rejects and opposes dominant cultural norms and values.
Five-Year Plans
Economic programs aimed at industrial and agricultural development through state-led planning.
Five-Year Plans
Government-led economic programs to boost industrial and agricultural growth.
Glasnost
Policy of openness that encouraged free discussion and criticism of government actions.
Gulag
The Main Administration of Camps, a vast Soviet network of forced labor camps where millions of political prisoners, criminals, and perceived enemies of the state were imprisoned. The Gulag served both as a tool of political repression and as a source of forced labor for economic projects.
ICAIC
The Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (Instituto Cubano del Arte e Industria Cinematograficos), established in March 1959. It was the first cultural institution created by the revolutionary government and served as both a promoter of Cuban cinema and a vehicle for revolutionary propaganda.
Inflation
General increase in prices and fall in purchasing power.
Infrastructure
The fundamental physical and organizational structures, such as transportation, communication, and energy systems, needed for a society’s economy to function effectively.
Land Reform
Government redistribution of agricultural land from large landowners to peasant farmers, often involving confiscation and political mobilisation of the rural population.
Lysenkoism
A pseudoscientific agricultural theory promoted by Soviet biologist Trofim Lysenko, rejecting genetics in favour of environmental conditioning of crops, adopted in Maoist China with disastrous consequences for food production.
Marxism-Leninism
Communist ideology emphasizing class struggle and revolution; Mao later adapted it to focus on peasants rather than industrial workers.
McCarthyism
The practice of accusing individuals of disloyalty or subversion without solid evidence, creating an atmosphere of fear.
Mutually Assured Destruction
Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) was a Cold War doctrine in which both the USA and USSR maintained large nuclear arsenals capable of completely destroying each other if either launched an attack.
The threat of total annihilation acted as a deterrent, preventing either side from initiating a nuclear war.
Nationalisation
Nationalisation is the process by which a government takes ownership and control of private industries, institutions or assets, bringing them under state management.
Nomenklatura
The Soviet system of Party-controlled appointments to all important positions in government, industry, and society. Under Stalin, it became a patronage network that rewarded loyalty over competence, creating a privileged ruling elite.
Perestroika
Economic reform policy designed to restructure the Soviet economy by introducing market-like changes.
Planned Economy
An economic system controlled by the government, which determines production and distribution of goods.