Remodelación en la Habana Vieja: El Plan Maestro para lograr una resiliencia equitativa

• Author: Maureen M. Donaghy, Tara Carr-Lemke
• Position: Associate Professor Department of Political Science Rutgers University, Camden, United States/Department of Public Policy and Administration Rutgers University, Camden, United States
• Pages: 118-135

Estudios del Desarrollo Social: Cuba y América Latina

www.revflacso.uh.cu

Estudios del Desarrollo Social: Cuba y América Latina

RPNS 2346 ISSN 2308-0132

Vol. 8, No. Especial, 2020

Redevelopment in Old Havana: The Master Plan and Achieving Equitable

Resilience

Remodelación en la Habana Vieja: El Plan Maestro para lograr una

resiliencia equitativa

Maureen M. Donaghy

Associate Professor

Department of Political Science

Rutgers University, Camden, United States

0000-0002-9205-4414

mmd184@camden.rutgers.edu

Tara Carr-Lemke, Ph.D. Candidate

Department of Public Policy and Administration

Rutgers University, Camden, United States

0000-0002-8573-7102 Fecha de enviado: 25/02/2020

tara.carrlemke@rutgers.edu Fecha de aprobado: 25/06/2020

ABSTRACT: Old Havana has faced daunting economic, social, and political challenges, including most

recently during the Special Period of the 1990s. These challenges have included addressing the needs of

vulnerable populations, the precarity of the building stock, and sustainable economic development

concerns, while maintaining a commitment to historic preservation and the Cuban political project. W e

argue that the Master Plan of the Office of the Historian of the City of Havana was designed to address

acute threats and lead to resilience in what may be considered a gold standard for redevelopment efforts.

This paper presents Old Havana’s socioeconomic context and assesses its ability, through th e Master

Plan, to achieve equitable resilience. We argue that the successes of the Master Plan have led to new

challenges and that renewed strategies are needed to support ongoing equitable resilience.

KEYWORDS: equitable resilience; Old Havana; Master Plan; Office of the Historian of the City of Havana.

RESUMEN: La Habana Vieja ha enfrentado enormes desafíos económicos, sociales y políticos, incluido

el más reciente durante el Período Especial de la década de los 1990s. Estos desafíos han incluido

abordar las necesidades de las poblaciones vulnerables, la precariedad de los edificios y las

preocupaciones del desarrollo económico sostenible, al tiempo que se mantiene un compromiso con la

preservación histórica y el proyecto político cubano. Argumentamos que el Plan Maestro de la Oficina del

Historiador de la Ciudad de La Habana fue diseñado para abordar am enazas agudas y conducir a la

resiliencia en lo que puede considerarse un estándar de oro para los esfuerzos de reurbanización. Este

artículo presenta el contexto socioeconómico de La Habana Vieja y evalúa su capacidad, a través del

Plan Maestro, para lograr una resiliencia equitativa. Argumentamos que los éxitos del Plan Maestro han

llevado a nuevos desafíos y que se necesitan estrategias renovadas para apoyar la resiliencia equitativa.

PALABRAS CLAVE: resiliencia equitativa, Habana Vieja, Plan Maestro, Oficina del Historiador de la

Ciudad de la Habana.

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Redevelopment in Old Havana: The Master Plan and Achieving Equitable Resil ience pp. 118-135

Maureen M. Donaghy, Tara Carr-Lemke

Estudios del Desarrollo Social: Cuba y América Latina

RPNS 2346 ISSN 2308-0132 Vol. 8, No. Especial, 2020

«Cubans are a resilient people». This is a

refrain you often hear from Cubans who have lived

through decades of change, particularly since the

Special Period following the collapse of the Soviet

Union and in light of the ongoing challenges posed

by the Unites States’ embargo. With increasing

openness to foreign trade and tourism, Cuba is

now in the midst of a new period of questioning

the future of economic policy and the political

regime. In this context, the City of Havana lies at

the center of the negotiation between preserving

the legacy of the 1959 revolution and a future in

which Cuba must find its place in the global

economy. Cubans, again, are faced with the task

of navigating new challenges, drawing on the

powers of resilience gained over a lifetime of

uncertainty.

Managing this balance between economic

change and cultural preservation, for over two

decades Havana’s Office of the Historian of the

City of Havana (OHCH) has directed a process of

rehabilitation in the historic center of Old Havana

through its Master Plan. Like many colonial city

centers in Latin America, Old Havana contains

historic churches, wide plazas, and ornate

architecture. But, unlike many others, Old Havana

also contains a dense and diverse population of

residents, many of whom have lived in their

apartments as designated by the state since at

least 1959. The decades-long process of

redevelopment, following great decay, has

brought innumerable changes to the

neighborhood in terms of economic opportunity

and increasing tourism, but the Master Plan has

also established social projects that aim to protect

and improve the lives of existing residents.

The experience of Old Havana provides new

evidence for the debate on how to elicit

redevelopment without engendering the

challenges that come from gentrification.

Understanding the best ways to implement

redevelopment projects to protect and improve the

lives of current residents is increasingly vital as

cities across the Global South and North seek to

maximize the use of space and economic

opportunity for growing populations. In this paper,

we argue that the concept of «resilience»

encapsulates the goal of reinvigorating a

community post-degradation or devastation to not

only bounce back, but to thrive. The focus on

resilience as the objective of redevelopment

allows us to think holistically about how people are

prepared for and experience change, and

emphasizes the potential of communities for

adaptability and transformation. Moreover, the

goal of equitable resilience identifies the changes

in governance, access to opportunities, and

resources that should enable urban communities

to thrive while minimizing the negative effects of

gentrification, such as displacement and cultural

marginalization. Further, the goal of equitable

resilience seems particularly relevant in the case

of Old Havana, where residents have long

maximized their capacity to weather change within

a socioeconomic contest that emphasizes equality

of opportunity, wealth, and status.

Though the concept of resilience has most

often been applied to post-disaster

redevelopment, this paper seeks to apply the

concept to the long-term urban redevelopment of

one neighborhood in response to deterioration in

infrastructure, housing, and government services.

The designers of the redevelopment project in Old

Havana were cognizant of the benefits and

problems that might ensue for residents with

increasing investment and change, and as such

designed a Master Plan to prioritize cultural

preservation and socioeconomic development

while also encouraging tourism and private

enterprise. As a center of foreign investment in the

country, once long in decline, Old Havana would