So you would not consider Cuba, China, NK to be socialist? What are they then?
Transitionary states developing their productive forces. Cuba might be close or was close, but they don’t have the technology or even the scale to develop them.
To either socialism or capitalism. Cuba was close in as much, as labor is/was roughly equally distributed and everyone enjoys the fruits of said labor, with workers having a lot of say in how their work and governance is organized.
So what would socialism look like once Cuba is fully transitioned to it?
Wouldn't really be possible as Cuba still relies on tons of imports. There isn't a USSR to trade with anymore so they have to get those imports from capitalists most of the time.
Cuba's version of socialism seems to be heavily focused on development of health infrastructure as their land isn't very rich in natural resources. Socialism in one country is moderately possible, but communism in one country is not. Communism must be global liberation.
It cannot be done in small nation, at best (and what they have) is advanced and fair, but slightly technologically older society. If they fully transition to socialism, meaning they’ll get cool new machinery available to capitalists, I guess they can cut their working hours significantly, and get interconnected modern communication tech. Nobody knows tbh what people would want, in ussr people were bored out of their minds and attracted to shiny, so something has to exist to occupy people imagination, like popularizing arts or dunno.
Until it doesn't have to be, yes. Only way to safeguard the revolution.
Why does state ownership safeguard the revolution? What would happen if the state is taken over by capitalist elements?
They'd privatize ownership. There isn't really an in-between option. Skipping straight to communism isn't possible as long as there is capitalist imperial hegemony as the workers would become disorganized without a state and unable to resist colonization.
The state is a tool to be wielded either by workers or capitalists, one day that contradiction will be resolved and what comes after will look a lot different as both capitalists and proles will cease to exist as classes.
So is capitalism defined by something other than mere ownership? What could that something be?