This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Tuesday, February 26, 2008.

I'm Caleb Brown. In Cuba, meet the new boss, but is Raoul Castro same as the old boss, Big Brother

Fidel.

Juan Carlos Hidalgo, Project Coordinator for Latin America

at the Cato Institute's Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity,

offers his thoughts.

Well, Raoul Castro has been the number two in the Cuba's regime for much of the

revolutionary period. He's been the Vice President of Cuba and the head of the armed forces.

And until June 2006, he held his post, and after that he became the temporary president of Cuba when

Fidel stepped down due to his illness.

There are conflicting storylines about what is about to happen in Cuba.

There is the tightening of the grip of the military on the civilian infrastructure of Cuba

and more reforms are supposedly coming.

Most people expect that Raoul is going to take,

embark on a pragmatic approach to governing Cuba.

He's being regarded as a pragmatic person, unlike his brother, who is an

ideologue. So we should expect some reforms taking place. However, as long as Fidel is alive, I don't think we should expect much things going on, much

reform, more openness.

Fidel has already said that Cuba won't change his system and that communism will still be

the norm in the island. So as long as he's alive, I don't think that Raoul would want to contradict

his brother. We've seen several instances in the last months where Raoul has hinted his desire for reforms only to have Fidel contradicting in public a few days later.

So I think that change in Cuba is going to take a long time being some years.

...