stage opened in the work ers! struggle in Spain. Since then, almost without interruption, a whole series of actions have been conducted by the Spanish workers in pursuit of their demands,
In 1963 the Asturian miners -- in the vanguard of the present battles -- again went on strike and held out for two months against all kinds of pressure from the bourgeoisie, who resorted to violent repressive measures, arresting and torturing miners, inflicting. cruel reprisals on their wives, etc. [See World Outlook October 4 and November. 8, | — "
In recent weeks a new series of struggles has taken place, worthy of serious analysis. In fact, in Mieres (Asturias) as well as in Rio Tinto (Andalusia) and in Madrid, at the time of the demonstration at the headquarters of the "trade unions" during their congress, the Spanish workers energetically demanded trade-union free~ dom -~ the right to organize. themselves in class trade unions, For the first time, it should be noted, a thousand Madrilenos "descended" on the huge building of the Falangist trade~union bureaucracy to shout in the faces of the “leaders" and the "delegates": "You dontt represent anything!!" "We want free trade unions!!" When the demonstrators were arrested, the Madrid factory, Pegaso, staged a solidarity strike in behalf of those taken into custody.
Of oourse, this is a democratic demand with which not only Communists, Socialists, Anarchists and, naturally, revolutionary Marx~ ists are in agreement, but also certain sectors of the Catholic church, which is preparing to organize a Christian trade union on the basis of the present fraternal organizations for. Catholic youth and. adult workers. Even a number of “neocapitalists," having in mind the politico~esonomic evolution which they would like to bring about in Spain, think that corporatist and ultrareformist unions, well integrated in the capitalist system, could be more useful than the present vertical unions (employers, staff and workers in the same union). This holds all the more in view of the fact that the enormous bureau. cratic apparatus of the present unions still constitutes an instrument of pressure in the hands of the Falange, of this Falange which the "neocapitalists" would like to crush politically because, in defense of the interests of certain middle layers, it seeks to oppose the domination of the monopolies and integration into Europe,
But this is only one aspect of the question, even though it is very impurtant and must be constantly borne in mind, compelling genuinely revolutionary groups to make more precise the content of the demand: for. freedom of the trade unions. Just as important, if not more so,.is the following aspect of the question: The Spanish
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working olass has succeeded, through numerous struggles and despite the absence of a consistently revolutionary leadership (which it has always. lacked), in imposing strikes as a means of struggle under the Franco. distatorship, although strikes are legally banned and equated to a subversive and even insurrectional movement, Strikes in Spain still remain illegal, But the Spanish workers have succeeded in imposing them de facto on the government and the capitalists, who find themselves obliged today to recognize strikes. This viotory barely having been gained, the workers have taken up a new objeotive --~ trade-union freedom, an open struggle against the vertical Falangist "trade unions,"
This struggle, which has just begun, found its echo in the recent student demonstrations in Madrid, Barcelona, Seville, Saragossa, etc., against the SEU [Syndicato Espafiola Universitario, - the compulsory Falangist organization]. It is interesting to note that in their leaflets the students expressed solidarity with the workers in their common struggle for trade-union freedom, ~
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It is necessary to state that once more in the history of the > workers! movement of our country, the Spanish workers, in this new stage of their struggle which holds such enormous revolutionary pos-~ sibilities, remain divided and confused in their struggle, without a powerful revolutionary organization capable of heading the movement and guiding it to the conquest of -power,
This is just what is posed, In face of the evolution of Spanish capitalism toward the monopolistic concentration that is underway, despite the many conflicts and the friction among the bourgeoisie itself, there is only one rovolutioneary alternative -- the taking of power by the industrial proletariat and. the peasantry, the proletarian revolution. It seems necessary, unfortunately, to state certain elementary truths to combat the myths that have flourished in the soil of opportunism and political confusion.
While the leaderships of the Communist party and the Partido Socialista Obrero de Fspana advocate struggling for democracy; that is, continuing capitalist domination under new forms(1)3; other groups, without analyzing in the least the politico-economic reality of Spain, are advocates -- above all in. words -- of armed struggle to overthrow Franco, In the final analysis, both currents, despite the insults which they throw at each other, are in agreement on the ultimate objective: the overthrow of Franco and in disagreement only
(Tin this regard it is interesting to compare the statements made by Tierno Galvan, published in the Paris daily Le Figaro [see World Outlook March 20], with the article by Juan Goytisolo which appeared in the April 2 iasue of the French liberal weekly L'Express, Both are advocates of the “opening toward Europe" in the name of the opposition of the Spanish "left,"
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on the means for achieving this, Neither of them are capable of. working out genuinely revolutionary. strategy and. tactics linking the struggles of today against the economic and political structures of. Francoism with the général struggle against capitalism . and for ‘the. conquest of power. |
There exists among certain groups of young people ~- and some not so young -~ an idealistic vision of the revolution, according to which a few small groups, armed and resolute, can succeed in _ seizing power through audacious actions,
The reformism and immobility of the traditional parties, even more than their own inexperience, drives these young people to search for other roads of action, and they sometimes tend to conclude that patterns of struggle, often ill-studied and ill-assimilated, can be successfully applied in Spain without taking into account certain fundamental differences in the situations. A mechanical analogy is thus often made between Franco's Spain and Batista's Cuba,
Most certainly, the revolution will not be made "peacefully," and not thanks to a hypothetical vote in a hypothetical parliamens. But small "Blanquist" groups will not make it either, It will be the working class, the industrial proletariat closely allied with the agricultural workers and the poor peasants, the armed and organized workers, who will make the revolution in Spain,.
This poses two problems, The first one, the gravest, the most urgent, concerns organizing a revolutionary party of the proletar~ iat, a party that does not exist at present.
The second problem involves revolutionary strategy, With regard to this, to elaborate a strategy that is genuinely revolutionary <= and not just phraseology -- it is necessary to begin with what actually exists. It is necessary to begin with the workers! movement that is struggling for its demands, This spontaneous and sketchily organized movement has already imposed the strike weapon as a means of struggle against the dictatorship and has deepened and widened the content of its demands to include, as we have noted, trade-union freedom, Certainly, the joint efforts of the bourgeoisie and the reformists in the workers! movement can limit these struggles ~- for a period at least -- within the framework of economic demands and "democratic" rights, But it is here, within the workers! movement that the decisive battles must be fought and not in foreign capitals through the blows of press conferences and demagogic appeals to an armed struggle that would not seek to go beyond "overthrowing the dictatorship and returning to the republican legal framework of 1936," even if this hazy objective is enveloped in pseudo-revolution- “ary phraseology. The liberal republic of 1931-36 is completely anachronistic in our days. Nobody wants it and it is doubtful that anyone would take up arms to impose it.on the country. Not the proletariat in | any case, — 7
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. It is neoessary, then, to begin with this workers' movement now being reborn from the ashes, after, we could almost say, "fascism had passed like a terrific tank over the workers! skulls and spines," .to.paraphrase Trotsky, It is necessary to carry on a relentless battles within the workers! movement, against reformism, to win leadership. and take the movement out of the "democratic" rut where it risks becoming stuck, It is necessary to elaborate and to apply a revolutionary strategy capable of linking the struggles of today with those of tomorrow, the economic and democratic demands with the revoluticnary struggle for power,
This is not. simple, Above all in the current ideological soonfusion. Admittedly, the reformism of the Communist party has given rise to a profound crisis in that party and the birth of at least three "pro-Chinese" groups; but for the moment, these groups are debating in the greatest confusion, from the viewpoint of both organization and theory,
In the Socialist party, too, a orisis is developing, although less sharp up to now than the one in the Communist party. This crisis is due to the projected collaboration of the Socialist leaders with the bourgeoisie in the "Europeanization" of the regime, which has justifiably aroused indignation among many young socialists,
The main problem on the agenda is to work out and put in practice an over~all effective revolutionary political platform, Ele- ‘ments of such a platform have begun to appear little by little, The Frente de Liberacién Popular, for instance, an organization that appears to be seeking to seriously orient toward revolutionary Marxism, has launched the slogan for Workers and Peasants Committees of Struggle, not as mere organs of “esonomic" struggle -- in the style of the Communist party with its teleguided Trade Union Opposition -but. as basic fighting organs in the class struggle in all its forms. In the present situation, the formation of such committees would be a big step forward in the necessary organization of the worker and peasant masses, Naturally, this is not enough. First of all, the committees must really be organized, It is next necessary to co-ordinate them on a national level and above all orient them politically.
A whole series of urgent questions faces the Spanish working class to which answers must be found in action. In the trade-union question, for example, which is on the agenda today, is it necessary to fight for legalization of the old federations, the UGT and CNT [the social-democratic Unién General de Trabajedores and the anarchosyndicalist Confederacién Nacional del Trabajo] (to which will doubtless be added a Catholic federation)? And on what bases? More and more of the opposition movements are coming out in favor of a single federation, This seems positive to us, but the difficulties of realizing it must not be underestimated, -
But this is only one of the problems which the workers! struggle
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poses at the moment in Spain. In reality, the problem, we repeat, is to work out conorete slogans, forms of action, and the politioal platform required to transform the spontaneous and potentially revo~ lutionary movement of today into a conscious, socialist, revolutionary movement capable of carrying the struggle against capitalism, For successful guidance in such a transformation, it appears to us, © a vanguard workers! party is required. Thus the problem of the. | revolutionary party is still problem No. L Tor the Spanish revolution today. , ;
In our opinion, this party can be formed only through the collaboration at first and then the fusion of the revolutionary. Marxist groups that are scattered today as minorities in various organizations. ne
THE LESSON OF BRAZIL
By Manolo Sarmiento
_ MEXICO crry -~ The coup at état organized by the "gorillas" [reactionary militarists] in Brazil is the logical continuation of the coups d! état which have occurred in a number of countries in Latin America, This one, however, is of much greater significance than all those in Argentina, Ecuador, Peru, El Salvador, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic put together,
Goulart stood in the -center of the Latin-American nationalist stream, His efforts to resolve: the burning problems of his country were sincere =-+ insofar as his nationalism permitted him to move. In addition Goulart was practically the only Latin-American leader who considered the Alliance. for Progress to be something more than subject matter for speeches, The reforms he sought were all oute lined in the Punta del Este Charter. These included a timid expropriation that did not involve more than five per cent of the-land in the -hands of the latifundists, a timid control of rents in Rio de Janeiro, the expropriation of a few oil refineries, and the extension of the right to vote to illiterate citizens.
This touched off a violent reaction among the ruling classes, who supposedly support the Alliance for Progress. They unleashed a campaign in which they identified Goulart!s moderate nationalism with "communism," :
_ One. of the outstanding features of the events in Brazil was the clarity with which it showed the depth of the revolutionary situation in Latin America and -- the crying need for revolutionary Marxist leadership, By supporting Goulart as a nationalistic, reformist, progressive bourgeois, the leftist circles around the Communist party led by Luis Carlos Prestes, proved how blind they
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were to the reality in Brazil and what criminal misleadership they offered, To place confidence in Goulart as a leader of the Brazilian bourgeoisie, or at least that sector that stood for the "structural reforms" needed by Brazil, signified playing into the hands of reaction,
The catastrophe in Brazil was prepared by illusions sowed among the masses by the petty-bourgeois nationalists and the Khrushchevists, As they depicted it, the problem in Brazil was to struggle only against the "feudalistic landlords" who constitute the main obstacle to development, The way to fight imperialism, according to this school, is "democratically," “with a nationalist struggle," by no means deepening the struggle to an anticapitalist level, since this would alienate the national bourgeoisie, the important ally for this "stage," .
One of the crimes of Latin-American reformism is precisely to advocate this profoundly mistaken and antiscientific concept of a revolution in sealed~off stages; that is, first against "feudalism" and then -- we will see, ,
In Brazil two per cent of the population controls eighty per cent of the arable land, The struggle against this "feudal" struo~ ture, according to the reformists, thus involves the urban bourgeoisie as an extremely important element. The reformists placed all their cards on this nationalist, allegedly antifeudal bourgeoisie.
Even a brief indication of the facts will show how erroneous this view is, The development of Brazilian industry, above all in the south, in the Sao Paulo region, is due primarily to the dollars obtained from agricultural exports like sugar, cocoa, cotton, tropical fruits and above all coffee, In Brazil, a most common phenomenon is the urban industrialist who has his cattle ranch or coffee plantation, -
This production of raw materials is directly linked to tho world capitalist market, With the money received, the Brazilian landholder, in aocordance with the times, was sooner or later coi pelled to begin investing as a capitalist. In feudal days it was quite different, but as in the rest of Latin America, the landlord of today is not a feudal lord but the descendant of feudalists. A big sector of the Latin-American bourgeoisie developed out of this lended. aristocracy.
Maridtegui, Peru's great revolutionary Marxist theoretician, writes in his Seven Essays: "Thus it was that this caste [the landholding aristocracy], was forced by its economic role to assume in Peru the function of a bourgeois class, although without losing its aristocratic colonial vices and prejudices,”
The’ Brazilian landholder, like his kind in Peru, does not view his land as a feudal estate provided with serfs but rather as a
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capitalist enterprise producing for the market, although there are notorious similarities between the European feudalists and the. Amer-. . ican latifundists. Maridtegui says again:. "Along the.coast, the. latifundist has reached a more or less advanced level of capitalist technique, although exploitation still rests on feudal practices and principles, The organization of the production of cotton and sugar cane is in correspondence with the capitalist system, Considerable capital is involved and the land is worked with. machines and modern methods," | . . ;
The Brazilian plantation owner, on receiving his profit in dol- — lars, cannot accumulate them by simply storing them in his mattress, He has to invest. The enormous growth of exports and the consequent rate of import of dollars is evident in the rise of the banks and gigantic financial enterprises of Sao Paulo. This, then, is the origin of the finance capital of that city.
In view of its own origin, its present relations and its posi-. tion (the most important in the country), this bourgeoisie is not against the status quo in the countryside. On,.the contrary. The composition of this bourgeoisie, its multiple links with landholding families, as well as the control of the banks by the big exporters, show how utopian (and therefore criminal). it is to advocate making a "revolutionary" alliance with it,
Brizzola and Goulart are representatives of a tiny nationalist bourgeois sector that wants to avoid a revolutionary storm through reforms, But their bourgeois lucidity is such that an abyss exists between what they preach and what they do, They appealed for "structural reforms," but when the time came to act, they saw that the only forces that were. with them were the popular masses and” that their own class, as a whole, had abandoned them, |
Goulart!s aim was to save the bourgeoisie from a socialist. revolution, not to build a bridge toward it. In announcing his reforms and appealing to. the masses, he remained highly conscious of his role as a bourgeois leader, He refused to follow the example of the sorcerer's apprentice. He understood perfectly that the forces unleashed by "structural reforms" -- under circumstances requiring a mass struggle against his own class -- could not be. con~ fined to reformist channels but would burst over everything, opening up the process of permanent revolution and paving the way for the establishment of a proletarian power. Before this perspective, Goulart preferred to look like a demagogue who was really only intorested, in maintaining himself in power. In that way he helped to. ‘Keep the lock on. the flood-gates: of social revolution, |
The Bragilian ‘bourgeoisie ruled out even the smallest reforms” proposed by Goulart, immediately cancelling the minor measures he had taken. Is any better indication needed of its real position in Brazil? Its resistance to reforms, even those completely within the limits of the Alliance for Progress, shows what a profoundly conservative force it is,
The role of imperialism, utterly in contradiction with the objectives outlined in its own Alliance for Progress, shows once again what a farce this program is, What North American imperialism is interested in is the $1,500,000,000 invested in Brazil.
‘The scandalous and shameful events in Brazil show that Trotsky's words in 1938 are as timely as when they were first uttered: "The crisis now facing humanity is the crisis of the leadership of the proletariat, n
THE "CUTBACK" IN NUCLEAR PRODUCTION
The simultaneous announcement by Johnson and Khrushchev April 20 that the world's two major nuclear powers have decided to