Tasks of Spanish revolutionists not say, that in the context of a worldwide crisis of overproduction, no amount of presents from the state can induce the capitalists to invest to expand production and create jobs. In fact, an overwhelming victory in the recent elections. the new Premier Felipe Gonzalez promises only a 0.5% reduction in the already disastrous rate of unemployment for the
That at best offers a pretty thin hope for a country where the population in whole regions such as Andalusia is not only
Boyer has made it clear what the economic orientation of the suffering a declining living standard but is on the verge of country than following a policy of austerity. Any attempt to Nonetheless, the victory of the PSOE has created large expec stimulate an immediate upturn without first straightening out tations among the workers and poor masses in the Spanish state,
. will only delay the day of reckoning... as well as increased uneasiness among the capitalists and the
"Our priority is not to increase domestic demand, because right, which were already this would only upset our balance of payments, as the French toward strongarm methods of dealing with the population in a example shows. We have first to restimulate investment, then period when the economic situation can be expected to get exports. And to accomplish this, there is only one road. It is necessary that the profit accruing from increased productivity Therefore, the political and social situation in Spain is now in remain in the hands of the directors of the businesses so that the melting pot, and it is difficult to predict how it will develop.
they will decide to invest it. For the time being, the workers will The Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist have to be satisfied with maintaining their League (LCR), Spanish section of the Fourth International, adopted the following set of orientations on November 28 to
Of course the French example also shows, which Boyer did begin to deal with the new situation.
new government will be: the economy We have to take advantage of the desire for change and of the hope the masses have now of getting a whole series of elementary demands to promote mass mobilizations. This is the only way to assure real advances. We have to take advantage of the partial gains that can be made to strengthen the organization, the consciousness, and the combativity of the mass movement, to encourage it to take
Nothing can substitute for an analysis of the concrete situation opening up and for learning by experience how to deal with that situation. But we think that the following general criteria will prove useful in this work.
1. Build Mass Mobilizations to Win the Most Urgent Demands
The fundamental task is to promote the mobilization of sections of masses. To accomplish this it is essential to wage an intense campaign of agitation around the demands that large section of the mass movement consider important and pressing. Such demands can be the basis for initiatives in action involving both the radicalized sectors that already distrust the policy of the PSOE, as well as broad sectors of the masses that still have confidence in the SP government.
Following the elections, the conditions are better for building such mobilizations. But because they must involve new layers and because they are going to be built under a PSOE government, the demands around which they will be built cannot be exactly the same as those that served as a basis for the agitiation and propaganda of the period of the Counter-Reform * 20 in new situation worse and worse.
Of course, some demands that served as the basis for mobilizations in the past will continue to be used (for example, opposition to layoffs). But we are going to see new themes arise around which real mobilizations can develop (such as in education and public administration). And we will see other demands reformulated in accordance with the modifications that will be introduced by actions of the PSOE government and by the campaign of harassment that will be
There is no point now in trying to draw up a list of such urgent demands. They will depend on the way the economic situation evolves and on what happens in the mass movement. Revolutionists will need to demonstrate a great capacity for initiative and flexibility. The important thing to be stressed is simply that these will be basic demands that will make it possible to translate into mass mobilizations the feeling that the promised change has got to start having some effects in real life, that things have got to start happening differently in practice, that the legacy of the Counter-Reform has to be thrown out. And getting rid of the Counter-Reform will mean ending practices that developed facto (torture, incorporation in NATO) and the laws that were actually passed (such as the law limiting autonomy for oppressed nationalities, LOAPA).
2. Put Forward a Revolutionary
Alternative
However, the tasks of revolutionaries cannot be limited to building mobilizashowing an inclination to move tions for immediate demands. It is also necessary to lay the groundwork for carrying the mobilizations further, for the next step forward of the mass movement. They have to lay out a revolutionary alternative that can offer perspectives and coherence to the present struggles. Today these tasks are more important than ever. In fact, while it is true that the mass mobilizations will begin on the basis of elementary demands, it is also true that extend and consolidate gains is going to run up against such formidable obstacles as the armed forces and the state apparaincludes an Article 8 that excludes the right of self-determination of the nationalities, a constitution that enshrines the market economy.
It is necessary to begin today to prepare the mass movement by propaganda and agitation to remove the obstacles to winning these demands. It is also essential to make it clear that the only way to assure full satisfaction of these vital demands is to take the revolutionary road leading to socialism, breaking definitively with the limits imposed by capitalist property, the bourgeois state, and imperialism.
3. Our Attitude to the PSOE
Government
It is clear that the PSOE government is not proposing a revolutionary road, such as that outlined above. Its entire policy is based on adjusting possible reforms to * This refers to the government takebacks after the ebb of the upsurge following Franco's death.
OTAN de entrada win the agreement of the capitalists, the state apparatus, and the imperialists. This is why we do not believe that this government is going to meet the deeply felt demands of the masses and why we think that it will even let important parts of its stated program be blocked.
We revolutionists do not identify with this government, nor are we going to support it politically. But we have to take te escuchen into account that the workers look at this government in a fundamentally different way than they do to a bourgeois one. The workers voted en masse for the PSOE government, and they expect it to act as their ally against the bosses, the right, and against the putschist elements in the armed forces.
All this means that very broad sectors of the masses are waiting to see what measures the government may take. Others are ready to mobilize in support of some of its measures. And still others are ready to mobilize to press it to act. But those sectors that look with distrust on the government at the start represent a very small minority.
The task of revolutionists must be to deepen this distrust and extend it to new sectors of the masses so that the perspective of an alternative revolutionary road can gradually gain an audience. But in order to carry out this task effectively, it is necessary to focus the attention of people on mobilization as the effective way to win demands, even the most elementary ones. It is necessary to point up the need for building mobilizations, regardless of the different ways people see the government. This is possible because the point of departure for the mobilizations has to be attacking right and reaction.
As for the government, we will support its progressive measures; and we will not hesitate to mobilize against any attempt to overthrow it by the right and the reactionaries. But we will not hesitate either to criticize it severely and publicly when it makes clear compromises with the right, with "the powers that be," and with imperialism, concrete compromises that harm the interests of the workers. Unfortunately, we think that there is going to be no lack of occasions for that. In fact, in a more advanced phase of the process, mobilizations confronting the government may be indispensable. The condition for this is that they be seen clearly by the masses to be necessary to defend the interests of the workers against the capitalists and the reactionaries and to press demands that the government act in a more determined way.
4. A United-Front Orientation
Impelled by the Active Sectors of the Mass Movement
The only way to achieve mass mobilizations for the most urgent demands is through initiatives in action based on the active sectors of the movement, the same sectors that played the key role in the mobilizations throughout the period of the Counter-Reform. In a section of this layer, a justified political distrust of the PSOE can lead at times to ultraleftist and sectarian reactions that can get in the way of a real orientation for mobilizing the
But this fact cannot alter our determination to encourage initiatives by these active sectors in accordance with a united front line directed toward those sectors of the masses that still have confidence in the PSOE. In fact, we are certain that we can convince a good part of these comrades that initiatives of this kind are a prerequisite both to revive the mass movement and to widen distrust of the PSOE's reformism. And we are convinced that the great majority of the initiatives in action are going to have to originate in these active sectors.
5. A Diversified and Flexible United-
Front Policy
This is another prerequisite for the success of the initiatives in action that we propose. It is necessary to take into account the diversity of the political currents that influence these combative sectors of the mass movement, as well as the novelty and diversity of the situations that we are going to encounter. We think that it is important to take account of the following aspects in pursuing a unitedfront policy.
- First of all, we have to take into consideration the new perspectives that may open up for tendency activity in the Workers Commissions (the union in which the CP has been dominant) where a large and militant left wing has been present for some time.
- Secondly, there will continue to be a need for building unity in action of a broad spectrum of groups around specific projects and themes. This has been done in many places by the anti-NATO movement, and laid the ground work for the anti-NATO committees that have begun
- Thirdly, we think that it will continue to be very useful to build action fronts on the basis of long-term unity in action around a platform of demands, such as the Esquerra Unida del Pais referéndum
PSOE
PSOE poster 'No entry into NATO' (DR) Valencia and the Bloque de la Izquierda
It is true the vote that these fronts got in the recent elections did not put much wind in the sails of these projects. Moreover, the new political situation poses in a different way the themes on which there is an experience of unity. Nonetheless, it is also true that this kind of unity is more than ever necessary to be effective in action. And the coming elections for the municipal governments and the parliaments of the nationalities make it urgent to maintain this unity, so that the fighting left can present a visible alternative in the electoral arena and get some higher votes than in the elections that have just taken place.
In elections at the city and town level, the revolutionaries will have more electoral credibility, and the argument that you have to use your ballot to back people who can win will not have so much force now that the PSOE has a majority at the all-Spain level. So, we think that in and towns the conditions exist for building action fronts that can run united-front slates in the coming elec-
6. Asserting the Political Identity of the LCR
Our determination to achieve unity within the mass movement and with other revolutionary currents must be combined with an effort to propagate as widely as possible our own proposals for action, our own political ideas, and our conception of the revolutionary road for achieving socialism. In the process of reflection that the PSOE victory opened up, we strongly believe that we have important contributions to make, both as regards the present tasks of the mass movement and the task of building an alternative revolutionary leadership.
Rooting ourselves more deeply in the mass organizations will no doubt help us assure that our proposals are fully appropriate to the situation and to the mood of the masses, as well as to establish a more profound dialogue with the vanguard sec tions of the working class.
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