AFTER THE ELECTIONS
We are publishing below extracts from the resolution of the executive committee of the
Liga Comunista Internacionalista (LCI — Internationa list Communist League, sympathizing organization of the Fourth International in Portugal) analyzing the political signif-
PORTUGAL icance of the April 25 elections. An electoral victory for the parties that affirm the need for socialism - that is the primary meaning of the elections to the constituent assembly -The dominant features of the evolution of the situation since April 25, 1974, are these: the forward development of struggles; the strengthening of the workers organizations; the weakness of the political parties of the bourgeoisie, which, because of their traditions, experiences, and implantation, can offer no immediate solution to the crisis of polifical leadership opened by the fall of the dictatorship. The workers movement, atomized and weakened by the dictatorship, did not possess any experience in political confrontation or in mobilization of the workers' forces within the framework of a class response against capital. Nevertheless, the workers movement has rapidly acquired a new capacity for confrontation (which is on the rise today) in various ways: through very advanced forms of struggle (self-management, strikes with occupations, democratic organization of strikes, election of workers commissions by general assemblies); through the generalization of demands responding to attacks on the buying power of the workers, to unemployment; and, finally and above all, on the basis of the rapid and determined response in the streets on September 28, 1974, and March 11, 1975. The strengthening of the reformist parties (those on which the bourgeoisie counts to contain, paralyze, and channel mass struggles as much as possible so as to reconstruct capitalism) and of the revolutionary organizations is an especially threatening danger oros corte the wor a theli own strength (a confidence achieved on the basis of the new relationship of forces imposed on March 11) and, even more important, the workers' understanding of the need to break with the bourgeoisie. From this point on, the struggle is no longer mere ly one against the individual employer in the factory or against the industrialist who is organizing economic sabotage; rather, it is against the whole employing class and its parties. 12
For the bourgeoisie, it is no longer simply a matter of reorganizing its forces, solidifying its political apparatus of rule, reconstructing a reactionary current linked to the military hierarchy, and trying to impose sacrifices on the workers movement that would enable the bourgeoisie to increase its profits. In order to resolve the serious economic and polítical crisis, the bourgeoisie has to immediately begin preparing for a political confrontation with the proletariat and its organizations so as to subject them to a significant defeat that would allow for the estabfishment of a strong state, put an end to class collaboration with the reformists, and restrict the economic, political, and trade-union rights that have been won by the workers. In making these attacks, the bourgeoisie will take account of the lessons it learned on September 28 and March 11. The pact that has been proposed by the Armed Forces Movement (MFA) directly reflects the marginalization of the Spinolist elements. But these elements have not been eliminated; they still hold important positions. The institutionalization of the MFA, the intervention of the Council of the Revolution, and the colaboration that has been agreed to both by the parties of the right and the far right (with the exception of one bourgeois grouplet: the Popular Monarchist party) and by the major workers parties and the FSP (People's Socialist Front) are strengthening the MFA as the center of political power. This is occurring under the cover of defending democracy, but in reality, it is the only solution for a bourgeoisie that found itself compelled to accept this solution or risk the loss of a good part of its social base before the elections. Obviously, the strength of the reformist elements within the MEA cannot be overlooked. It was even decisive in accelerating the process of institutionalization and in working out the pact. In the immediate sense, these measures also serve the reformists of the Portuguese CP, who although they are a minority in the constituent assembly are assured of not being left out of the government and will be able to continue their policy of class collaboration in the name of peaceful reforms, the partial conquest of the state apparatus, and socialism without revolution. But what is more significant is that the MFA
has not ceased to be a fraction of the state apparatus, or more precisely, of the army. The perpetuation of the MA's intervention and, especially, the guarantee that it will have the last word - which is assured by the pact - signifies the opening of the road to strengthening of the right, allowing growing institutional control by the bourgeoisie, and preventing the workers struggles from being complemented by proletarian class consciousness, a break with the bourgeoisie, ceaseless struggle for socialism, and, in the final analysis, an understanding of the need to take power and destroy the bourgeois state. In this context, the nationalizations are not solely the reflection of the mass movement or the conquests of the mass movement. They can also represent measures enabling the MFA to base itself on the petty bourgeoisie of the cities and countryside by extending aid to the small and medium-sized enterprises and by taking initial measures of agrarian reform. The nationalizations do not completely dismantle the power of big capital, and they can be coopted into the framework of the capitalist system; but they do limit that power and, in view of their relation to the rise of the mass movement, they nevertheless create a dynamic that is dangerous for the bourgeoisie and they open the road to the strengthening of the anticapitalist struggle of the masses. The elections were supposed to allow for the reinforcing and reorganization of the capitalist right. The events of March 11, the emergence of a prerevolutionary situation, and the deepening of the anticapitalist and class conscious mobilizations of the proletariat profoundly altered the relationship of forces between the classes. Thrown onto the defensive, the bourgeoisie agreed to both the institutionalization of the MFA and the nationalizations. It now finds itself compelled to try to reorganize a reactionary current within the army, to strengthen its parties, to institute a strategy whose target dates are very different from those initially foreseen on the basis of hypothetical election results. The elections that have just occurred can in no way modify the relationship of forces between the classes. In the immediate future economic sabotage, the attacks of the far right, and the anticommunist campaign will furnish the bourgeoisie its weapons for generating political and economic instability and for seeking to win large sections of the petty bourgeoisie and the peasantry to the capitalist parties. The next elections (in October) will take place in a quite different context. The political confrontations will be much more violent. The decisive factor in determining whether or not the proletariat will intensify its initiatives and win massive support among the soldiers, peasants, and significant sectors of the petty bourgeoisie will in the final analysis lie in its ability to coordinate and centralize all its actions, setting this central objective: the struggle for a workers government, for the ousting from the government of Spínola's lieutenants in the counterrevolutionary attempts, of the parties of the bourgeoisie, and of all the capitalist ministers. The present crisis of the bourgeoisie and the current relationship of forces could not but be reflected in the elections to the constituent assembly. Nevertheless, many observers, especially bourgeois commentators, were surprised at the results. The large electoral majority won by the workers parties confirms both the enormous confidence of the workers in their own strength and combativity and the absence of a bourgeois alternative. But the victory of the Socialist party is contradictory. A reformist party with a workers base but a bourgeois political leadership (a bourgeois workers party, to use Lenin's definition), the SP achieved an electoral score that does not correspond to its real capacity for mobilizing and controlling the workers whose support it won on the electoral field. The political Function of the SP is obviously to contain the workers struggles, to implement a policy of class collaboration, to gain an influence over important sectors of the state apparatus, and to offer an alternative loyal administration for capitalism. The party's links with European Social Democracy strengthen this policy, although Soares repeats that "Social Democracy does not have any breathing space in Portugal." But to interpret the SP vote as an anticommunist and bourgeois vote as do the centrists (the MES - Left Socialist Movement - and the FSP) would be on error that would disarm revolutionaries. But above all, the electoral results reflect the convergence of two decisive factors: a) The political backwardness of the Portuguese workers movement. The explosion of workers struggles and the massive radicalization of the workers naturally develop at very different rates, both in regard to the forms of struggle utilized to win demands and in regard to the consciousness of various layers of workers. In the absence of a revolutionary party coordinating the struggles, unifying all the workers' experiences, and providing an overall political outlet for each movement for specific demands, the reformists of the CP and especially of the SP will be able to play on this political backwardness and win over sectors that are combative but lack a permanent experience of struggle and organization. b) The new relationship of forces between the bour-
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PORTUGAL geoisie and the proletariat. The vote for the SP is the most immediate expression of this relationship of forces, which means that the bourgeois parties find themselves in a situation of great weakness in face of the workers and their parties. The vote for the SP also expresses the will of broad layers of workers to struggle against the exploitation to which they are subject. Nevertheless, the bourgeois policy of the SP leadership, which often takes on the aspect of anticommunism, also allows it to attract important sectors of the petty and middle bourgeoisie. In this context, even though it will not abandon its policy of class collaboration nor even the prospect of conjunctural alliances with the bourgeois parties, the leadership of the SP, particularly in view of the pressure from its own rank and file, will find itself compelled to pursue a policy of unity with the CP and to seek to organize its own forces for work in the trade unions and the factories, thus seeking to contest the Stalinists for leadership of some sectors of the workers movement. The "electoral marginalization" of the CP (which was in any case predictable) and the rout of the MDP (Portuguese Democratic Movement, closely allied with the CP) will compel the Stalinists to maintain a high level of mass mobilization in order to exert pressure on the bourgeois state apparatus, to gain ground, to strengthen their influence within the MEA, to maintain a government of class collaboration, and to appear as the leadership of the workers movement and as the strongest and most structured party. But a policy of alliance with the SP is necessary to attain this goal, although this policy could easily be overtaken by mass mobilizations. As for the MDP, it will be able to present itself as a body lending civilion support to the MFA. Its limited strength will make it appear even more strongly as an instrument of the CP. It will have to limit itself to being used as an instrument to penetrate the most isolated villages as well as key posts in the ministries, an area in which it has already demonstrated its utility -for the CP. It is in this context that the contradictory significance and character of the vote for the SP and the weakness of the vote for the CP must be understood. The
SP accumulated a lesser-evil vote against communism from broad layers of the petty and middle bourgeoisie. It also harvested the politica fruit of the radicalization of backward layers of the proletariat, and also got the votes of many workers who want to struggle for socialism.
As for the CP, its results do not correspond to its capacity for mobilization and its political strength.
Its electoral weakness is the product of its inability to develop a class policy, of its liquidation of many struggles in the name of the policy of class collabora-
14 tion, of its subordination of any unity in action with other workers parties to the immediate possibility of putting pressure on the state apparatus, and, finally, of its refusal to orient itself toward a policy of political unification of the working class against capitalism. More fundamentally, the leadership of the SP, within which contradictions may develop, will command a greater maneuvering room in bringing pressure on the MFA in order to win recognition as the essential interlocutor and to strengthen the currents within the MFA that support Social Democratic positions. The electoral results thus entail contradictory effects: *On the one hand, insofar as broad layers of workers see these elections as a victory, the results will increase the confidence of the toiling masses and intensify the rank-and-file pressure within the SP and the CP toward unity against the bourgeoisie and its parties. *On the other hand, there will inevitably be some disillusionment and demora lization among some layers of the proletariat that, under the impact of the triumphalist and electoralist campaign of the CP, did not expect the CP to get such a low percentage of the vote. The leadership of the CP has more than once paid dearly for the illusions it has spread among the working class. And the workers have more than once paid for the errors committed by the reformist leaderships, especially the CP. It is important to draw a fundamental conclusion from all this: Either the development of workers struggles will take place through the deepening of mobilizations, the rejection of electoralism, and the independence of the proletariat in its struggle against the bourgeoisie and will thus move toward the emergence of a revolutionary situation and toward the creation of a revolutionary party with a strong base that is capable of mobilizing the masses around revolutionary objectives; or, on the contrary, because of the lack of an alternative and because of the traitorous policy of the reformist leaderships, the anticapitalist potential of the workers struggles will be paralyzed.
The recomposition of the workers movement has resulted in both a restructuring within some far-left currents (especially within the Maoist current, where a whole wing of the PUP — Party of People's Unity
- has gone over to the UDP - People's Democratic Union) and a modification of the relations among various components of the revolutionary left. The results obtained by all the far-left organizations were rather indicative of their implantation and political influence. This is seen particularly in the districts with the highest concentrations of workers
(Lisbon, Porto, Setübal), where the vote received by the far left was significant in comparison with the CP's vote. April 27, 1975
MIANO COMUNIS I The fourteenth congress of the Partito Comunista Italiano (PC| - Italian Communist party) was held March 18-23 amidst great fanfare aimed at highlighting the strength and effectiveness of the organization. But it must be said that there was no need to resort to gimmicks to draw general attention to the congress. Whatever orientation it may have decided on for the present, the Italian bourgeoisie is perfectly aware of the great weight the PCI has in Italian political struggles and of the possibility that the PCI's attitude may at some point become decisive in avoiding o crisis with an uncontrollable dynamic for the regime. Thus, the entire press and all political observers followed the work of the congress with the greatest interest and analyzed all its possible implications. The historic compromise reaffirmed There was no reason to have doubts about what would be formally ratified by the congress. The strategy of the so-called historic compromise, the essential terms of which were defined in autumn 1973 immediately after the fall of Allende, was accepted nearly unanimously, although there were some partial differences in interpretation and emphasis. Once again the PCI demonstrated that it is for and away the most cohesive and effective political force in the country and that it is in process of further enlarging its influence and further strengthening its