Whose News? Cuba’s 'Prensa Latina' News Agency and the Cold War Contest over Information

• In Event: Violence, Press and Politics in Latin America: the Public Sphere in Slavery and Cold War

Abstract

This presentation is an in-depth study of Cuba’s revolutionary news agency, Prensa Latina. It analyzes Prensa Latina’s controversial creation, international reception, and significance. The presentation draws on a wide variety of archival and published sources, including Cuban media and memoirs, declassified intelligence reports, State Department records, and newspaper articles from across Latin America. It argues that Prensa Latina was a powerful weapon in Fidel Castro’s revolutionary arsenal because it provided a way for the Cuban government to both gather and shape information and garner international support.

The story of Prensa Latina sheds light on the barriers that less powerful countries face—and occasionally surmount—in trying to change entrenched modes of information production. Examining the debates over Prensa Latina’s involvement in Cuban espionage also expands a literature on intelligence work that has predominantly focused on the United States and Europe, and raises important questions about the porous divide between the acts of reporting, propagandizing, and spying. Uncovering the role that Prensa Latina played in Cuban propaganda efforts helps us better understand the technologies and strategies of insurgency that allowed the Cuban Revolution to become influential on a global scale. On the whole, studying the little-known history of Prensa Latina provides new insight into the production, circulation, reception, restriction, and manipulation of information during the Cold War.

Author

• Renata Nicole Keller, University of Nevada, Reno