Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The study of nationalism is an unusually promising venue for the testing of social mechanisms approaches to the explanation of social phenomena. In this paper, I attempt to construct a social mechanisms explanation for the unusual reluctance of Cuban elites to join the cause of independence from Spain. Drawing on Benedict Anderson's description of creole nationalism in the new world, the Cuban case seems to defy our expectations, since most of the variables Anderson identifies are represented in the Cuban case, yet creoles did not support the war for independence. My claim is that the historically specific pattern of race relations in Cuba altered the preferences of Cuba's creole elite, and encouraged them to withhold their support for the cause of independence.