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Scottish Debate | Home | News | Donate | Join The Scottish debateParty, Programme, Reformism and the InternationalThe Question of CubaThe political retreat of the comrades on issues pertaining to Scotland is matched by their effective abandonment of long-held Committee for a Workers' International positions on international questions, particularly Cuba. The comrades state that "We believe there is a genuine discussion to be had on the character of Cuba, given that it has stood against the tide of capitalist restoration over the past ten years, despite losing the mammoth subsidies from the Soviet Union" (paragraph 251). They also write, "We have no definite position on the nature of the Cuban State, our exact demands etc." (paragraph 260). Well, the Committee for a Workers' International does have a long held position on Cuba. However, at both at the Scottish Socialist Party conference and in their document the comrades put a position that is in opposition to this. Our position is quite distinct from that of others, such as the USFI, which believes that Cuba is a workers' state with "deformations". Like the Democratic Socialist Party in Australia today, they maintain that the regime of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara was comparable with that of Lenin and Trotsky in the period of 1917 to 1923. After all, didn't Lenin describe the Bolshevik regime at that time as a "workers' state with bureaucratic deformations"? The International Socialist Movement PC hint that this is now their position. There were those like the Posadists and other Trotskyists' who took a completely ultra-left position towards the Cuban regime and the leaders of the revolution. We opposed them. We implacably supported the revolution against the attempts of US imperialism to overthrow and then economically sabotage the government of Castro, and continue to do so. There was nothing in the socialist and Marxist textbooks - of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Luxemburg or even Trotsky - which fully prepared Marxists for what happened In Cuba. It is true that in his last writings, Trotsky gave some indication of the processes which later developed in the Cuban Revolution. He pointed out that leaders from a non-Marxist, middle-class background could, in conditions of extreme social crisis, be pushed much further than they originally intended into breaking with capitalism. We were also better prepared for events in Cuba. This was because of the analysis which had been made by the British Trotskyists of the Chinese Revolution of 1944-49 and the processes in the post-war period which developed in the neo-colonial world. Yet even the best theory is not able to fully anticipate how a revolution will actually unfold We recognised that the Cuban Revolution, which was led by Fidel Castro and Che Guevara and the 26th July Movement, originated outside of the Stalinist tradition. This regime was enormously popular. In its first phase there was mass involvement and participation, including elements of workers' control and of 'popular power'. A planned economy had been established; and Castro proclaimed Cuba as a 'socialist republic' in April 1960. In this situation many, including the USFI and other Marxists and Trotskyists, were, in our opinion, swept off their feet. They replaced a balanced Marxist appraisal - support for the revolution but linking this to proposals for establishing workers' democracy in Cuba - with impressionism. This did involve comparing the government and the state in Cuba with that of the Bolsheviks in the first period after 1917. The Scottish comrades are making the same mistake today but with much less justification than when the revolution first triumphed. Russia was, under the rule of the Bolsheviks, a healthy workers' state but with certain 'bureaucratic deformations'. These 'deformations' arose from the isolation of the Russian Revolution, which resulted from the betrayal of the revolutionary wave in Western Europe above all by the leaders of the social democratic organisations. From a Marxist standpoint a healthy workers' state with 'bureaucratic deformations' is entirely different to a 'bureaucratically deformed workers state'. A healthy workers' state with 'bureaucratic' deformations and a deformed workers' state is the difference between a wart and a monstrous ulcer, an incubus, which threatens to consume the 'body', the planned economy. Where we have a healthy workers' state with 'bureaucratic deformations' (the regime of Lenin and Trotsky) it is necessary to correct this through 'reforms', through increased workers' control and management, and the spread of the revolution on the international plane. In a bureaucratically deformed workers' state, a bureaucratic caste has separated itself from the control of the masses. What is therefore required to establish a healthy workers' state is not 'reform' but the establishment of workers' democracy. This is only possible through a complete change of political regime which in turn requires a political revolution. However, we never at any time adopted the ultra-left position of the Cuban 'Trotskyists'. They characterised Castro and Guevara as 'petit bourgeois' opportunists and called for their overthrow. This at a time when millions of people filled Havana and other cities of Cuba in support of the regime and the revolution! We supported all progressive measures of the government, the agrarian reform, nationalisation of industry and the beginnings of the organisation of a plan. At the same time we accompanied this with calls for the full implementation of workers' control and management of the state and society through committees of workers and peasants. We also put forward the demands, which Trotsky had worked out for Russia, adapted to the Cuban situation, for election of officials, right of recall, etc. The comrades are quite wrong when they delve into the history of the Committee for a Workers' International in order to justify their position. They write:
It is unbelievable that anyone with any history in our organisation could describe our position in these terms. At no time have we described the Cuban regime as a crude copy of 'Honecker's East Germany', nor Fidel Castro as a 'Cuban Stalin'. We reply to some of these points more fully in the Committee for a Workers' International's recent book, 'Cuba - Socialism and Democracy'. In Peter Taaffe's original articles on Cuba there was some loose phraseology on the character of the state, it is true. A number of comrades, including Ted Grant, pointed to this, and in the subsequently produced pamphlet a few lines were changed. There was never any doubt about our concept of the character of the Cuban state. Our leading comrades at that time, including Ted Grant and Peter Taaffe, argued against the characterisation of Cuba defended by the USFI. This was done at the USFI World Congress in 1965. They claimed it was a "workers' state with bureaucratic deformations". We said in our introduction to our pamphlet on Cuba: "Some minor alterations have been added in order to render the analysis of the Cuban revolution more precise". This was a question of the clarification of formulations not of a substantive political difference. We were able to reproduce the three articles with literally a few words changed. The overall content of these articles was that a revolution had taken place in Cuba and a workers' state had been established. However, this was a deformed workers' state, albeit with a much greater popular base than the Stalinist regimes of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. The implication in the comrades' statements is that Peter Taaffe and Ted Grant had different positions on Cuba when in reality there was none, either in 1978 or in 1959-60. There was a fundamental agreement on our analysis of the new phenomenon of the Cuban Revolution. The current controversy in the Scottish Socialist Party over Cuba arose because of the resolution from Pollok submitted to the Scottish Socialist Party conference. This short resolution reads in full:
To say the least this resolution represents a major retreat from the accepted position of the Committee for a Workers' International on Cuba. To the criticism that it is wrong to describe Cuba as "the socialist republic of Cuba" the comrades in effect argue that they are just using the terminology of the Cuban regime. But the comrades are adding the term "socialist", the country's official name is "The Republic of Cuba". However, in the second sentence they themselves use the term "socialist Cuba", which is absolutely impermissible from a Marxist point of view. This is the language used by the friends of the Soviet Union' about Russia and Eastern Europe in the past. Cuba remains a planned economy but it is not Socialist' and it is entirely wrong to dignify it in this way. It is an essentially planned economy but it has a one-party totalitarian regime. The developments in the last ten years have not altered the class character of the Castro regime despite the huge inroads made by the market. It is true that Cuba has managed to hold out despite the sabotage of the ex-bureaucrats turned capitalists in the former Soviet Union. An important factor in this is a huge increase in tourism as well as the maintenance of a planned economy. This has allowed Cuba to painfully crawl out of the abyss. However, it would be wrong for us to conclude that there is no longer a danger of capitalist restoration. The concessions made by Castro are opening the door more and more to the Market'. The outcome of the struggle over the Cuban boy Elian Gonzalez represented a severe defeat for the rabid Cuban Miami right-wing refugees. The intervention of the Clinton administration is also recognition by the decisive sections of US imperialism that the continuation of its previous policies, of boycott and isolation of Cuba, is playing into the hands of its imperialist rivals. They have moved in and bought up Cuban assets. The central point of our analysis on Cuba in the present situation should be that only workers' democracy is a guarantee that the gains of the revolution will be preserved. It is not sufficient to say, "Conference deserves the right to disagree" without explaining that our main Disagreement' is that workers' democracy does not exist in Cuba. The comrades also say that they defend the "ideals, advances and the rights of the Cuban people". What ideals, which "rights" are the comrades talking about? There is no democracy in Cuba in the sense of a healthy workers' state. To use this language is to give entirely unwarranted support, by Trotskyists, for the Castro government and its regime. It is entirely wrong also to imply as the comrades do, that in the "present international climate" we should merely call for the defence of Cuba from the embargo by US imperialism with muted implied criticisms of the Cuban regime. The analogy that they draw with 1980s miners' strike is false. They say that to criticise Castro or the present regime will be the equivalent of criticising Arthur Scargill during the miners' strike. Quite frankly we were astonished when we read these lines. We did make criticisms of Arthur Scargill during the miners' strike and in 1992 but not in the manner of the ultra-lefts nor in a direct fashion. We put forward demands at each stage for the success of the strike. At times these were at variance with the position of Arthur Scargill. In 1992 we quite explicitly criticised the involvement of the CBI and called for Arthur Scargill to name a date for a one-day strike, which he stubbornly refused to do. However, we never engaged in ultra-left insults nor do we in the case of Cuba or towards Fidel Castro adopt this kind of position. We call for workers' democracy, with a series of demands which is explained in our material. If Castro supports these measures, which is extremely unlikely to say the least, then all well and good. If he doesn't then he will be seen as a representative of the privileged layers that dominate Cuban society. It is a complete evasion for the comrades to say:
On this basis Cuban Marxists would not call for 'socialist democracy' in Cuba. They would have no role at the present time except to wait for the revolutions in Latin America and the establishment of "socialist democracy" there first. Apart from being completely mechanical this leaves open the question of what exactly the 'repercussions' in Cuba itself would be. The clear implication is that all that is required is the 'reform' of a few 'deformations' in Cuba itself. In reality, while most of the basic elements of a planned economy still exist, although severely weakened, the Cuban state and society is controlled by an undemocratic elite. A section of them are already looking for an accommodation with imperialism and a possible return back to capitalism. The complicating factor in the case of Cuba, as opposed to the USSR and Eastern Europe, is the existence of the Miami refugees. If they return triumphant they will unleash a bloody reign of terror against Castro, his supporters and significant sections of the Cuban bureaucracy. A proletarian revolution in Latin America, particularly in the key urbanised areas of Brazil or Argentina, Chile etc., will have a decisive effect on Cuba. What would these effects be? It would rekindle the original liberating aspirations of the Cuban revolution with mass pressure for workers' democracy. What would this workers' democracy constitute if not a 'new revolution' in Cuba? The Committee for a Workers' International is quite prepared to open up a "genuine discussion" on the character of Cuba. We believe this will demonstrate that our long-held view, which has been restated a number of times recently, will vindicate the analysis that we have made. Scottish Debate | Home | News | Donate | Join
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