From north to south, Havana to Santiago de Cuba, amidst the decaying buildings, propagandizing billboards and food stores with empty shelves there are two things in Cuba which are always in full supply: prostitutes and sex tourists. In a country with few employment options that offer enough upon which to subsist and an embargo that contributes to substandard living conditions for the majority of the population, women and girls flock to densely populated Havana in search of sexual employment in hotels, bars, restaurants and on the streets.
Sex tourists flock to Havana and other cities in search of a form of escapism that is cheap, safe and exotic. In Cuba, foreign men can command Cuban women and girls with the same ease used to order cocktails.
Cuba's current tourism boom is one not seen since the s, when under former dictator Fulgencio Batista, the island lured tourists with promises of cheap cigars, rum, casinos and prostitutes. Cuba's current leader, Fidel Castro, led the Cuban Revolution in , promising to free Cuba of its servitude to the rich and famous Americans and Europeans. The post Cuban state tried to outlaw prostitution and attempted to remedy the conditions which created a supply of sex workers.
Objectives of Castro's revolution included initiatives aimed at opening doors to women's reintegration into the country's socioeconomic life in terms of education, healthcare, employment and attaining overall full gender equality.
His attempts in achieving these goals had been somewhat successful until the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe. With the demise of the Soviet Union, Cuba lost much of its aid and investment as well as its ability to survive without compromising some of its revolutionary ideals. The country was forced to develop a new economic strategy and as a result adopted tourism as a basic pillar.
