JILAR – Journal of Iberian and Latin American Research, 15:2, December 2009 65 Abstract Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the Cuban government has sought to diversify its foreign economic partnerships. Cooperation with China has emerged as a critical avenue of trade and investment in conventional sectors like nickel and tourism, but also in more innovative operations like the domestic assembly of vehicles and electronic consumer goods. Designed and implemented through governmental channels rather than the private sector, these initiatives relect unconventionally long-term economic goals and a broadly conceived plan of inter-industry coordination. While collaboration with China has improved certain aspects of daily life in Cuba such as access to public transport and electrodomestic products, critics argue that neither country, whether independently or in league, suficiently exercises good governance and transparency in political and economic affairs. Drawing on data gathered during three years of research in Cuba and one year in China, the article suggests that international advocates of good governance face two challenges: irst, to reduce local suspicions that their efforts are politically self-serving, and second, to develop conceptions of governance and transparency that are nuanced enough to accommodate the unconventional characteristics of Sino-Cuban collaboration. ∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞∞ Between 2000 and 2008 Cuba’s bilateral trade with China grew by 700 percent, from $313.94 million to $2.2 billion. 1 From oil exploration to electronics manufacturing, projects have been implemented through direct state-to-state channels, permitting an unusual degree of coordination, planning, and integration. The scale and depth of Sino-Cuban cooperation are set to grow, raising questions about how resulting initiatives are administrated and governed. Some of these questions relate to the integrity of bilateral commitments to egalitarian revolutionary principles: for instance, do the impacts and beneits of Sino-Cuban initiatives extend beyond conventional market outcomes? Other questions stem from the contention of international observers that neither country has developed credible approaches to Cuba and China: Governance and Industrial Collaboration Adrian H. Hearn University of Sydney