IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 5 ENGLISH | Page 76

Deliberative
Democracy
Fernando Palacio Mogár
President, Cuban Liberal Solidarity Party
Havana, Cuba

T

here are a number of projects
and organizations in Cuba that
anchor their work in interaction
and direct contact with the citizenry,
among them the Plataforma Femenina
Nuevo País [Nuevo País Women’s Platform] (PFNP), the Comité Ciudadano
por la Integración Racial [Citizens’
Committee for Racial Integration (CIR),
the Centro de Estudio Liderazgo y Desarrollo [Center the Study of Leadership and Development (CELIDE), and
the Proyecto Nuevo País [Nuevo País
Project](PNP)

These projects, and others, are reaching
the most isolated communities in Cuba
through workshops, meetings, film discussions, surveys and other participatory methods; they are empowering citizens, and also visualizing, shaping and
training community leaders who will
later become resources, and also help
examine their community’s problems,
and work together to resolve or mitigate
them.

“DELIBERATIVE DEMOCRACY” came to mind for me, and although I thought
about it, I was able to change my way of visualizing and understanding it only after
March 1st, 2015, when I participated in a workshop at Florida International University
(FIU). I was invited to participate by the Plataforma de Integración Cubana [Platform
of Cuban Integration] (PIC) and Carnegie Mellon University’s Program for Deliberative
Democracy.

Deliberating about Democracy (Cuba and Latin America, March 1st, 2015)

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