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interested in such benefit. It comes to
tone the piece "Do we know how to
carry out a transition?" by Manuel
Cuesta Morúa, with essential ideas and
concepts to conceive and achieve the
transition process starting from a
paradox: Knowing the transition is
impossible, but it is possible to do
it. Knowing is always important, no
matter
if the
knowledge
is
comprehensive or limited. What seems
claimed by those who try to participate
in transition processes is that knowing
the transitions is key to guide our own
transition in our rightful time and place.
Knowing transition is critical, because
from any perspective we could never
get rid of some knowledge of the past,
present or future —what we call
prospective knowledge— in order to
work for democratic changes.
To this end, Cuesta Morúa proposes,
while analyzing it, the text "Democratic
Transitions: conversations with world
leaders." It deals with the living and
lived experience of those who built their
leadership
through
democratic
transitions by learning on the go, or put
their leadership in favor of democracy.
In connection herewith arise the efforts
by the Table of Constitutional Initiative
(MICs) in Cuba and the projects carried
forward, for several years, by
the Platform
for
Cuban
Integration and New Country, together
with CIR, the Solidarity Cuban Liberal
Party and Constitutional Consensus, an
d with the Department of Deliberative
Democracy at the Carnegie Mellon
University (Pittsburgh, PA).
These projects materialized in two
events in Pittsburgh, one in Miami and
another one in San Juan of Puerto Rico,
which laid the foundation for a fifth
event sponsored by the NGO Public
Agenda and the participation of other
Cuban
organizations:
Somos Más,
Table of United Democratic Action,
Citizen Platform Otro 18 and the
LGTBI group Afromás.
About all the above, José Hugo

Fernandez’s "A light from the depths
of the tunnel." It stresses an expression
that any Cuban lover of freedom and
progress
could
miss: Deliberative
Democracy. Its precepts are no longer
an encouraging promise, but an
essential tool for the most advanced
segments of the civil society and the
peaceful opposition.
This detailed and fruitful article delves
into the work done in Cuba and in the
international events. It’s particularly
important for the Cubans, hit by
systemic and cyclic crises, for
continuously weaving the fabric of
democracy with tools that lead us to
move towards freedom and progress.
One fundamental tool is the exercise of
deliberative democracy; its ideas,
principles and precepts are key features
of the MICs.
As part of the historical account, the
author emphasizes his own experience
in San Juan de Puerto Rico: "From this
meeting I left with the certainty that the
model entered in a fermentation stage
among Cubans [and so] the regime has
met it match.” Then comes the fifth
meeting, held in Miami between
September 29 and October 2, 2016.
The activists from Cuba gave a touch of
distinction in a close exchange with the
organizers in the US. During their
interventions, both responses and new
projects were emerging before each
question addressed by the Working
Group. The author concludes: "The fifth
meeting provided the expectant children
of Cuba with the strong conviction that
finally a light deep in the tunnel
becomes visible. At the same time, the
event presented to the world the
evidence that not everything is lost for
Cubans, if we can make that
experiences like this happens."
This edition also addresses the situation
of African descent in the Latin
American context with the works
“Afro-Argentines and the State
violence
(19731983)” and "Rethinking the Argentine

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