ABSTRACT
This chapter adopts a historically-grounded approach to analyzing the policies that have been implemented by the US government toward those seeking to leave Cuba. It begins by tracing how the United States gradually began to shift its migration policies for strategic reasons during the period between the Cuban revolution in 1959 and the onset of the “special period” in Cuba following the collapse of Cuba’s trade with the Soviet bloc. The chapter analyzes the migration policies implemented by the United States. It argues that there has been a great deal of continuity in the post-Cold War era with respect to the US migration policies toward Cuba that were adopted in the 1980s. The chapter illustrates how domestic and foreign policy considerations influenced US migration policy. The United States began to adopt restrictive policies in the 1980s as its strategic interests shifted and it sought to weaken Cuba’s unilateral power to set US immigration policy.
