English

Abstract

On the 19th February 2008, Fidel Castro announces to his compatriots through the press that he will not aspire to a new mandate. A few days later, Raúl Castro is elected as President of the State Council of the Republic of Cuba. The terms « mandate » and « republic » seem to go against the image that has been engraved in the French collective imaginary of the largest Caribbean island. The terms contrast with the "castroist dictatorship" and with the "transition" highlighted by the French metropolitan press. This article offers therefore an analysis of the perspective on Cuba, its political organization and Fidel Castro, in this period in the French press, with the purpose of highlighting prejudices largely spread in France about the Island, but also to understand how stereotypes can be engraved in the collective unconscious.