INTRODUCTION

In several research works carried out during the last three decades on Cuban journalism, the contradictory presence between, as a rule, a high vocation for public service, and a divergent and limited autonomy have been verified (Elizalde, 2014; Estrada, 1996; García, 2013; García, 2018; Natvig, 2019; Oller, Olivera, Hernández, & Argüelles, 2016; Pérez, 2006; Somohano et al., 2019).

Among the most used factors to explain this behavior, are the ideology and the Sovietization of the press model in the 1970s (García, 2013; García, 2017), censorship practices, the economic organization of the media (Elizalde, 2014; Franco, 2016; Terrero, 2018), the historical tradition (Arencibia, 2017; Salazar, 2017), the communicative inflection of the US political conflict against Cuba whose effects have been associated with the notion of "state of siege” (González, Sierra, & Vallejo, 2017; Vidal, Sierra, & Vallejo, 2017), the quality of university education, the socializing role of politics (Estrada, 1996) and associationism (Oller et al., 2016), generational differences (Natvig, 2019), the accumulation of unfulfilled expectations concerning the transformation of the media system (García, 2013), among others.

The legally instituted Cuban media establish a univocal relationship with the political system, so that "they do not constitute a system in themselves since they do not have the capacity for interdependence or self-referential link" (García, 2013, p. 141). In correspondence with this, it has been found that in journalistic practice a loyal-facilitator role predominates (Olivera & Torres, 2017), although ideals closer to civic and service roles are shared among journalists (Veliz, 2018; ) (Somohano et al., 2019).

During the years that coincide with the presidency of Raúl Castro (2006-2018), the media system continued to be characterized by the same features since the 20^th century: predominance of public-state media outlets (only legal ones), direct and centralized political-partisan-state intervention, subsidy as the main form of financing, the preponderance of the informative-propagandist, and educational-cultural function, as well as the defensive-reactive character in the face of external aggression. However, as an expression of, and in relation to, the ongoing transformations in Cuban society since the end of the 20^th century as a result of the effects of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and with the increase in Internet access and global flows of information, the “limits” of the media system are being reconstituted, as a diffuse conceptual space, not territorially bounded, transnational, multi-intended, and multi-regulated (Hallin, 2020; Olivera & Maio, 2021).

Journalism is linked to a global community, and there are prescriptions-marked fundamentally by the liberal conception of the media-; however, the truth is that journalistic cultures vary significantly, in correspondence with the characteristics of the political, economic, and cultural environments (Esser & Pfetsch, 2020; Voltmer, 2013).

Journalistic professionalism is an interconnected process, among other elements, "with the constitution of a particular conception of what the public really is" (Hallin and Mancini, 2012, p. 292); and with competitive values ​​such as freedom of the press, national security, privacy, stability, consensus, among others. Thus, the meaning of "professionalism" differs between societies (Hallin and Mancini, 2012, p. 290), in practice, and perceptions (Roudakova, 2012). While in some countries greater relevance is attributed to autonomy, in others it is to formal higher education, or normative prescriptions (Mellado, Hellmueller, & Donsbach, 2017).

In previous studies on media systems in (ex, post) communist countries (Voltmer, 2013), journalistic professionalism seems to emphasize more the conception of a public service vocation than autonomy (Lehmann, 2017; Zhao, 2012), university education, or the consistency of the rules (Lehmann, 2017).

However, the nature, social structure, dynamics, and duration over time of the political conflicts in society shape the pluralism and political action of the media (Hallin & Mancini, 2008; Voltmer, 2013), which in the Cuban context goes through taking into account the US conflict against the country, and associated with it, migration and transnational information flows (Cearns, 2021).

Around the world, political, economic, and technological disruptions have become opportunities to reinterpret the limits of journalism and the logic of appropriation that emerge from the interrelation between internal and external agents of this social institution (Hanitzsch et al., 2019). The context of changes and inflection of the informative and cultural hegemony of Cuban society offers a framework of analysis to understand the journalistic culture of this country —whose media model is atypical at the continental level—, its relations with the structures of the media system, and how its agents conceive professionalism.

OBJECTIVES

Describe the relationships between the components of the media system that define Cuban journalistic professionalism during the Presidency of Raúl Castro (2006-2018).

METHODOLOGY

The selected theoretical-methodological approach is qualitative, from an epistemological perspective that emphasizes the context and sociohistory (Powers & Vera-Zambrano, 2018). The relationship between journalistic professionalism and other components of the Cuban media system, including media policy, is argued based on the links identified between the dimensions a) State-media relationship, b) political articulation of the media, c) development of the media industry and d) professionalization of journalism, which were defined based on the critical review and (re)conceptualization of the classic categories of Hallin and Mancini (2008, 2017) (see Table 1).

Source: Own elaboration

For this, 21 in-depth interviews were applied to experts in Political and Communication Sciences about Cuba (see Table 2). Additionally, content analysis was used on primary documents (10 government programs, 21 legal regulations, 10 political speeches, 19 press articles, 2 study plans) and secondary documents (57 academic publications and 60 theses). Furthermore, as part of the documentary sample, the audios of the interviews applied to Cuban journalists were accessed by two research included in the sample, which addressed elements of ideology and professional culture ( ; Veliz, 2018) (Hernández, 2011).

Source: Own elaboration

The in-depth interviews were conducted between February 2017 and January 2019, 15 were conducted face-to-face and six were conducted online. Subsequently, the information was transcribed and processed with the support of NVivo 12. The coding similarity made it possible to identify the group of topics that tended to be mentioned jointly by the interviewees. Thus, a Jaccard coefficient> 0.7 signified a high degree of similarity between two codes, and their grouping using dendrograms contributed to identifying three relationship patterns (Olivera & Maio, 2021), of which, for this article, the one referring to the relationship between media policy projection and journalistic culture was selected (see Table 3).

Source : Own elaboration.

The relationship between both constructs, and its in-depth analysis, was argued through the review of 11 research works on journalistic cultures in Cuba developed during the last three decades, content analysis, reflexive contextualization, and reinterpretation of empirical information.

RESULTS

The Cuban media scenario during the presidency of Raúl Castro (2006-2018) has been characterized by the loss of the state-partisan monopoly and the decentralization in the production and distribution of communication (personal interview, July 12^th, 2018); as well as changes in the content production capacity, citizen participation, and information consumption of the audiences (personal interview, February 20^th, 21^st, 2017). To account for both processes, a transnational understanding of information flows is necessary (Cearns, 2021) and operations of the media system within the framework of the nation-state, given by the intervention of factors such as the development of the Internet, migration, disconnection between the social-political project and individual and family projects (Espina, 2009), among others ¹ .

The media system would be constituted centrally by state-owned or socially-owned media, governed by the information policy of the Communist Party of Cuba (PCC by its acronym in Spanish). But also by the foreign correspondents whose political operation and audiences make them relevant to understand the flows of information on the Island; the emerging-independent media (non-state, non-legal, created during the last decade), which with a vocation for public service operate through networks of collaborators inside and outside the country; and the media that, within this spectrum, act as political opposition actors with strong ties to Cuban migrant communities, and in many cases financially and editorially backed by the policies of the US Government against Cuba (personal interview, February 8^th, March 23^rd, 31^st, 2017).

Regardless of geographical latitude, political alignment, or the legal framework of action, multiple transactions are recorded between the different media institutions through thematic agendas, mutual complaints, learning by imitation and competition, and circulation of personnel. Consequently, it is impossible to understand the existence of some without taking into account the others, and it is necessary to "de-ideologize" how the Cuban media system has been conceived (personal interview, March 9^th, 2017).

In the broad framework of understanding the identities and limits of the media system, as well as its transformations and continuities during the period under study, the relationships by the similarity of the codes applied to the in-depth interviews suggest a reciprocal and multilevel pattern between the projection of media policy and journalistic culture (Figure 1). This is structured given the interaction between the indicators: a) journalistic roles and definition of public service; and b) autonomy and functions of the media aimed at reinforcing nationalism and national defense.

Complementarily, a relationship was also found between journalistic culture, university education, and migratory flows, which allows a broader understanding of the normative role of professional education and the expression of external diversity that has begun to characterize the media system. In general, such relationships contribute to proposing a definition of journalistic professionalism in dialogue with the universal ideals of journalism and correspondence with the contradictions and challenges of the Cuban cultural, political, and economic context.

Source: Own elaboration.

1   Journalistic roles, university education, and conception of public service

In studies on professional cultures that have been carried out from the 1990s to the present, Cuban journalists, journalism students, and even media managers, without exception, show a strong orientation towards civic-citizen and vigilante-investigative roles (Estrada, 1996; Pérez, 2006; Estenoz and Martínez, 2006; Hernández, 2011; Franco, 2016; Oliva, 2016; Oller et al, 2016; Olivera and Torres, 2017; Terrero, 2018; Veliz, 2018; Somohano et al, 2019) (Estenoz & Martínez, 2006; Estrada, 1996; Franco, 2016; Hernández, 2011; Oliva, 2016; Olivera & Torres, 2017; Oller et al., 2016; Pérez, 2006; Somohano et al., 2019; Terrero, 2018).

Estrada (1996) indicated among the roles assumed by Cuban journalists are the "defender of the rights of the population" and the "educator of the audience" (p. 25). A decade later,Pérez (2006) stated that 'the people' was a “fundamental notion of the professional ideology of this journalist” (p. 249). More recently,Hernández (2011) referred, among the functions associated with journalism shared by his interviewees, "informing, analyzing, interpreting, and giving an opinion on reality", "mediating between the state and the public", and "criticizing, educating, and serving society ” (p. 83); while Veliz et. al (2019) maintain that the professionals interviewed belonging to both partisan-state and emerging media (legal or not) "conceive the population not as consumers but as citizens" (p. 303).

However, the notions of the population, the town, the people, the citizen, is a "discursive territory in dispute" (Pérez, 2006, p. 249), where a certain declarative distance coexists in regard to the sensationalist functions of journalism - not so of entertainment– (Veliz et. al, 2019, p. 303-304), with significant, but in a certain way neglected, practices of bonds with citizens, socio-political mediation, and control of the public function. For example, the Acknowledgment of Receipt section in Juventud Rebelde, the Alta Tensión program in the CMHW radio station, the deliberative spaces through discussion forums with users in Cubadebate, the recent investigative work by Periodismo de Barrio, the exceptional journalistic work by leaders of the guild such as Guillermo Cabrera Álvarez, the consolidation of the audiences of critically oriented media projects such as OnCuba, El Toque, among others, stand out.

With more than 20 years of difference, the research ofEstrada (1996) and Veliz (2018) also agree that the roles of vigilante and denunciation are shared by their interviewed journalists, from a vision of defense of citizens and control of power. Furthermore, they agree that the conception of these roles mediates an idea of ​​the functionality of journalism in the political system and an 'aspirational' expression, of what should be. However, in the emerging non-state media –a reality that, as has been pointed out, is recent-, “although a position of confrontation with the powers was not identified, the notion of journalism as a social watchdog is widely considered” (Veliz et al., 2019, p.302); while in the political opposition media, adversarial and denunciatory roles tend to be the most common (personal interview, March 23^rd, 2017). The contrast in levels and direction of the propagandistic, vigilante, and militant models in Cuban journalism has also been found in other recent studies (Celecia, 2020).

Likewise, these results, which show the predominance of civic and vigilante roles among the professional perceptions of journalists in Cuba, are in line with the findings of studies that have focused on university students in this career.Estenoz and Martínez (2006) argue that the professional ideal is that of "a press based on the people, that alerts and denounces social ills", and "a journalism that is humanistic, ethical, reflective, participatory, critical, revolutionary, that reflects reality by nature” (p. 124); while Somohano et al. (2019)Somohano et al. (2019) explains this behavior based on the importance that students give to the functions of "educating, informing, and motivating citizens to participate in public discussions", the motivation they express for "participating and influencing public affairs”, and the possibility of “specializing in the informative area related to politics” (p. 325-326).

The perception around these roles coexists with "the socializing influence of the political leadership" on the media (Estrada, 1996, p. 22), which is manifested in the importance given by the interviewees to the loyal-facilitator role at different historical times, as well as in the hierarchy that political commitment and social responsibility have among their professional values ​​ (Hernández, 2011). Furthermore, in the journalistic performance of the partisan-state media, the loyal-facilitator journalistic role predominates, with a strong structural behavior in its relationship with the elites regarding the promotion of the positive image of the country (Olivera & Torres, 2017).

The instrumental political relationship between the PCC, the State, and the media (García, 2013) has reinforced a culture focused on obeying (personal interview, March 31^st, 2017) and a journalistic practice little accustomed to contrasting sources of information and points of view, which to a certain extent is also manifested in the “unofficial” media (personal interview, March 20^th, 2018).

However, several interviewees (personal interview, February 17^th, March 31^st, September 12^th, 2017) acknowledge that journalists from emerging media position themselves at a greater distance from the powers constituted around the Cuban State, but also from the sanctions and regime-change policies of the US Government, a critical balance that is not usually appreciated in the political opposition media. All of the above confirms the "conflictive and non-homogeneous nature of the cultures of journalism on the Island" (Somohano, 2020, p. 323).

This behavior is usually understood in the logic that the public service vocation comes before, with different levels of contrast, the loyal-facilitator role in its propagandistic expression (Veliz et. al, 2019), which marks a tension shared by professionals and students between the ideal of journalism and its real practice (Estenoz & Martínez, 2006; Oliva, 2016; Somohano et al., 2019). But at the same time, the media policy and other instances of cultural reproduction of the media system (e.g. university education and professional associations) have established, in the opposite direction, a political profile and social commitment that has led to the configuration of this vocation of public service (Oller et al., 2016).

During the last three decades, the definition of the journalist model elaborated by the Cuban academy evolved towards the conception of a professional of social communication and politics with a marked vocation of service to society, so that the notion of journalist-humanist has served as a platform for action and horizon for the successive cloisters of this career (Arencibia & López, 2016).

Professional education is not totally independent of partisan-state intervention, but unlike in other communist and/or ex-communist countries (Mancini, 2015a), in Cuba, a process of professionalization of journalism has been evidenced as a result of the consolidation of social and cognitive institutionalization of investigative, educational, and knowledge-application practices in the field of social communication (Saladrigas & Olivera, 2016).

The curriculum and an environment of relative freedom and political tolerance (Pérez, 2006), favor the development of analytical and critical capacity, as well as the construction of socio-cognitive schemes and normative standards, which enable cultural changes in the profession (interview staff, January 31^st, 2018). However, it is not enough to address contemporary journalism with a generalized sense (personal interview, March 10^th, 2017), nor the tension between the preparation received and the "dysfunctional" dynamics of management and production of the media (García, 2016, pp. 131-132).

On the other hand, the Union of Journalists of Cuba (UPEC), a unitary professional association, has supported functions associated with the loyal-facilitator and civic roles such as defending the Revolution, supporting the Party, informing, guiding, and educating public opinion. Furthermore, it has been a leading actor in separating, not always successfully, journalism from marketing, advertising, and propaganda (Oller et al., 2016).

However, the interviewees insist on emphasizing that "the academic world is unequivocally a source of change" (personal interview, January 21^st, 2018) and that the quality of journalistic training affects both partisan and emerging media, and even opposition media (personal interview, January 26^th, February 17^th, 20^th, 21^st, 27^th, March 29^th, 31^st, September 12^th, 2017, January 21^st, June 25^th, 2018). One of them synthesizes the contradiction that occurs between the culture (re)created in the university and the structures of the legally instituted media system: "We are training professionals who are 15 years ahead of our media" (personal interview, February 27^th, 2017).

On the other hand, in the Social Communication Policy of the Cuban State and Government (PCC, 2019), a document that synthesizes and updates the -unwritten- media policy that has governed since the second half of the 1960s, a notion of statist-official-governmental public service is proposed, in opposition to the capture of the media by private and market interests in capitalist societies. However, in this policy, and the recently approved Constitution of the Republic of Cuba (Asamblea Nacional del Poder Popular, 2019), freedom of the press is limited to the purposes of society and by subsequent regulations of a lower rank.

Such a conception constitutes an identity mark of the political process of the Cuban Revolution (Cubaperiodistas, 2018; Díaz-Canel, 2018). On the one hand, a broad definition is established, where "the mass media, in any format or technological support, constitute a public good and service" (PCC, 2019). On the other hand, a distinction between public and state media is not provided, "prevailing, not officially, but informally, the idea of ​​a 'party press'" (personal interview, July 12^th, 2018).

The public media in Cuba were born with the Revolution, in a context where the State-government dilemmas, content definition, and financing were surpassed by a political practice that denied all the previous status (Elizalde, 2018). At present, the forms of ownership of the media are not a sufficient criterion to guarantee the representation of social diversity and the common good of society. In this direction, it has been pointed out that "the professional practice of the media today does not contribute effectively to the general social interest or the continuity of the emancipatory project of the Revolution" (Vidal, 2017, p. 224).

In this way, journalism has been displaced by political propaganda, it suffers from autonomy (Terrero, 2018), plural visions (personal interview, March 23^rd, 2017), and there is a notable consensus in the professional sector regarding the need to rescue, in paper and the actual operation, that the media be public (personal interview, February 8^th, 27^th, March 23^rd, 28^th, 2017, March 20^th, 2018).

Cuba has had a public communication system that would make it possible to "consider a new professionalism" (Estrada, 1996, p. 31), even in the complex and fluctuating margins of the critical relationship of journalism with the project of the Cuban Revolution and radical nationalism. Furthermore, in this context, unlike in other ex-communist countries (Voltmer, 2013), objectivity was never ruled out as a journalistic value, although a high degree of interventionism and opinion was observed in professional practice (Olivera & Torres, 2017).

But, "although there are signs of shared essential values, such as patriotism, social justice, or dignity" (García, 2018, p. 146), the contradictions that exist when balancing the political project and the roles of journalism generate frustration and facilitate decision-making in terms of professional mobility (emerging media, entertainment industry, political activism, reorientation-improvement, etc.). All this, moreover, seems to strongly support the thesis on how "national, generational, or professional identities are becoming more relevant than political ideology" (Pérez, 2006, p. 260); and awareness of the deep contradictions between the State and the public (personal interview, February 17^th, March 10^th, 2017, March 20^th, June 25^th, and July 12^th, 2018).

The previous results, in any case, corroborate that the aspirational values ​​of the political project of the Cuban Revolution, together with socializing instances such as media policy and university education, persist in modeling a journalistic identity anchored in ideals of public service. At the same time, they indicate that the sense of what is public has been based on universal values ​​such as social responsibility, dignity, justice, and freedom but also particular political notions such as citizen participation, the socialization of power, popular control, and national sovereignty.

The projection of media policy aimed at building an alternative media system to the liberal model, however, has not created a strategically sustainable press model (García, 2013) and has co-opted the monitoring function of the media in society. With this, it has limited the options to materialize in the institutional framework of the country's practices closer to the ideals shared by journalists (Vasallo, 2020), and the search for these options has been promoted in transnational, emerging, and political opposition media projects.

CONCLUSIONS

The meaning of Cuban journalistic professionalism during the period of the Presidency of Raúl Castro is more associated with a notion of public service that favors nationalist values, social justice, citizen participation, political commitment, and national sovereignty, and a training model of a humanistic and critical journalist; than to the autonomy or consistency of the rules with which the media system operates.

Media policy, university education, and associationism constitute socializing instances that shape journalistic identity in a context where professional articulations materialize, fundamentally, through multi-situated logics of political power (national and global) and opposition relative to the market.

Cuban journalists show a strong orientation towards the civic-citizen and vigilante-investigative roles, which are placed before and/or complement, with different levels of contrast, the loyal-facilitator role in its hypertrophied propaganda form. In turn, autonomy is limited by the intervention of the Party-State in editorial and economic-financial terms, the deregulated and/or regulated environment based on informal rules, and the inflection in professional and institutional decision-making of variables such as national defense and the political-editorial orientation of the media, both based on the historical nature of the US political conflict against Cuba.

The dichotomies of State vs. market or Politics vs. professionalization, lack explanatory potential to understand the relationship between journalistic culture and the media system given the multi-causality and interrelation of the constructs vocation for public service and journalistic autonomy.

Even so, the positioning of journalists from normative and discursive codes, and institutions or segments of the media system that operate according to different logics, reaffirms the conclusion ofElizalde (2014) regarding the correlation between the external regulation of the Cuban press and the loss of the professional culture of the sector, which is understood as political instrumentation of public communication (García, 2013). Furthermore, it allows identifying patterns consistent with those registered in other communist countries such as China (Repnikova, 2017).

In Cuban journalism, a dynamic of tensions coexists between the high political -and economic- instrumentalization, and the nature of its professionalization, constituted by journalism with a strong vocation for public service, and by journalists who develop strategies aimed at seeking greater conceptual and structural autonomy. In a certain way, these tensions are based on the contrast between a model that tends toward homogeneity, centralization, and diffusionism, and another that persists in diversity, decentralization, and participation/interaction.

REFERENCES