Love, Law, and Leninism: Same-Sex Marriage and the Politics of Subjectivity in China vs. Cuba

Abstract This article compares the prc ’s first Civil Code of 2021 and Cuba’s Families Code of 2022 on the question of same-sex marriage. Both serve as inroads to understanding statist conceptions of freedom in Leninist modernity. Empirically, I ask: Why—with a common Marxist-Leninist heritage and history of persecution of the same-sex attracted—did sex-neutral marriage pass in Cuba while same-sex marriage was denied in China during roughly the same period? Normatively, I argue that, given the prerogatives of the ccp , Cuban statist thought—in contrast to political liberalism—may provide a more realizable vision for greater relative protection of the dignity of sexual minorities in China. In turn, examining these two real world case studies is fruitful for political theorists in reconsidering the possibilities for tolerance and certain narrow freedoms in illiberal states, while also illustrating the price paid for the same.