Hegemony and power
THE leftwing Farabundo Marti National
Liberation Front (FMLN) of El Salvador is currently involved in negotiated attempts to end the civil war in that country. This process involves a programme of land redistribution and of a reorganization of the country's police and military forces, implicated in bloody attempts to suppress popular movements over past decades.
IV correspondent Eric Toussaint met Mario
Lopez, a leader of the FMLN in Europe last
October to talk about the progress of the reforms and the FMLN's view of their significance.
International Viewpoint #242 February 1993
INTERVIEW
C OULD you give us
your assessment of the agreement? The agreement has two main aspects: demilitarization and land dis-
On the first, the most significant element is that of the abolition of the National Guard and the Interior Ministry police, although many of the personnel have transferred to the National Police along with personnel from the elite battalions. The Public Security academy, the creation of the new Civil Police, has started to function. However, the matters relating to the purge of the armed forces have not been dealt
The other delicate aspect of the agreement is over land distribution. No satisfactory agreement has been reached on this and the two sides have returned to the UN Observer Mission in El Salvador (ONUSAL) to work on a compromise. This foresees a significant transfer of land. However, the available sums have been reduced while the fixed price per unit is way behind the real market price, being based on the price of the least productive land. There is a problem because the agreements themselves envisage the purchase at market prices and that the sale is voluntary.
In the irrigated zones, the prices demanded by the owners are significantly different from those envisaged by the UN and agreed to by both parties. The same kind of problem does not exist with regard to state land. 32
Is the United States ready to provide funds for land purchases?
It has expressed its determination to see these purchases carried through, but has not said that it will help. Furthermore, the donors such as the AID and the EEC have expressed their preference for transfer in individual lots, of an average of five manzanas according to the quality of the soil. If there is no reaction to this, the measures will increase the parcellization of land. Meanwhile the big properties, the latifundios, will be preserved, in particular owing to article 105 of the constitution which legalized land holdings of up to 245 hectares.
Thus the polarization of land holding into the very big and very small will be increased. There is a risk that the small lots will be bought up once again by the big owner. What is needed therefore is to find ways of going beyond survival to development.
How are these land holdings organized?
We need to see if it is possible to establish broader productive structures based on agreements between the beneficiaries of the transfers. The UN's proposals permit this. The key factor for the development of adequate forms of organization is the consciousness of the new owners.
If the money can be found, the amount of land to be transferred could allow positive developments. The agreements envisage an increase in the budget for agriculture and small and medium sized businesses.
Is there a danger that the death squads will reappear?
The agreement includes measures on demilitarization and civilian control over the military, but this remains a burning question. The far right is making provocative statements that have been swallowed by the government. The president's press officer has accused the FMLN of preparing a wave of attacks against private enterprises and members of the government, including against some of its own members.
These statements coincided with the appearance of far right publications and the reappearance of the Maximiliano Hernando Martinez squadron that was responsible for the assassination of FDR members. It remains to be seen if this death squad is linked to the armed forces or security forces.
Could this be a signal by a faction in the military?
A step up in the dirty war cannot be ruled out. There have already been attacks: a student, a former fighter of the FMLN, was captured, tortured and then abandoned on the outskirts of San Salvador.
At the same time, the government has tried to keep the Altlacal battalion in operation. This was responsible for crimes and should be dissolved. Its members have been
Government breaks agreement
ON December 15, 1992, the government of the Central American country of El
Salvador, headed by President Cristiani of the rightwing ARENA party and the
Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FLN) formally ended an armed conflict that started in the 1970s. On that day the FMLN's 8,875 guerilla fighters
International Viewpoint #242 February 1993
Just to mention some themes: the constitution leaves open a number of questions such as participatory democracy and forms of popular consultation such as referenda; the issue of Central American unity is not addressed.
officially laid down their arms. A cycle of the revolution has ended but the horizons are cloudy.
Some statements justifying the agreements barely hide the extreme difficulty in which the Salvadoran revolutionaries find themselves. While the FMLN has won significant concessions, the fact remains that the backbone of the dictatorship remains unbroken. An unfavourable international situation had a decisive impact on the FLN after the failure of its all-out offensive of November 1989.
Only two weeks after the disarmament, the FMLN found out that Cristiani had decided to postpone the completion of the most important concessions imposed on the government's army the purge promised for 1993 - until May
1994, two months after the March 1994 elections which the left hopes to win.
In fact, it appears that at the start of 1993 some nine high-ranking officers named by the UN report as implicated in crimes against civilians are to be promoted, while only two out of a total of 224 officially accused of serious human rights violations) are to go into retirement. The meaning is clear: if the left wins, the military hierarchy will be ready to intervene.
The FMLN's response was to halt the destruction of the anti-aircraft missiles still in its possession. At the same time, it has continued the negotiations, calling on the United Nations and the United States to put maximum pressure on Cristiani.
Critics on the left have questioned the fact that the FMLN is prepared to negotiate on the issue of the purge. The High Council of the Jesuit University (UCA) has criticized the FMLN for its willingness to negotiate on a matter which concerns the whole of the country's population, who have been victims of the army's systematic brutality for many decades.
While the end of the armed conflict has meant a lessening of repression, real changes have yet to occur and the main issue for most of the population is growing poverty, rising crime and mounting unemployment. The Salvadoran people cannot wait for a possible left election victory in March 1994; immediate measures to alleviate their sufferings are required.
The interview published here, which took place in October 1992, six weeks before the FMLN laid down its weapons, provides a wide-ranging view of the size of the difficulties and sets out a more more sober view of the effects of the agreement than are to be found in statements by such leaders of the FMLN as Ferman
Cienfuegos and Joaquim Villalobos - Eric Toussaint. * presented as national heroes and the government has halted the dissolution of this elite battalion. And the Belloso battalion which has been dissolved has reappeared in the
National Police.
In general there has been an attempt to criminalize FMLN cadres and we have to ask how far the Cristiani government has been implicated in this. There seem to be far right connections. Furthermore the vice-president has made clear his rejection of the new timetable. Is this the government's position or that of an opposition faction within it? In any case, opponents of the agreement have gained new confidence.
The 1994 elections have great importance for the FMLN. In a poll published in Envio, the far right Arena party would get a good score, since the agreements are seen as its victory, while the Christian Democrats will suffer. The FMLN would be the second largest group in parliament.
Our aim is clean and free elections. The 1994 elections will be the first after the civil war and will involve three votes: for local mayors and councillors, for parliament and for president.
We are taking the local elections very seriously. Local government is the closest to the masses. There are two opposing policies on offer here: that of the government, which wishes to introduce neo-liberal principles, and ours: we want local government marked by participation and a pro-development approach.
In the parliamentary elections, it would be a good thing if all the forces from the centre to the left win a majority in order to satisfy a number of popular demands. Coalitions could be formed to this end.
Another important question: article 105 of the constitution upholds the oligarchy's grip on the land and guarantees the existence of latifundios. A reform of this could be carried out in the assembly. We also need to take up the 92 laws affected by the peace agreement, those which remain to be negotiated and those that are insufficient. The assembly would thus face important legislati-
Strategy for the presidential elections has not yet been decided. In my view we should aim at a coalition between a number of oppo-
If we can do well in the local elections, if there is a centre left majority in the assembly and if the presidency is removed from the hands of ARENA we will have the conditions for consolidating the changes underway since the negotiations. But this is dangerous ground and a new challenge for the left in El
1 have just read an interview with an FMLN leader, Ferman
Cienfuegos where he talks of the first negotiated, orderly and planned revolution which will show the falsity of "European" schemas about the need to dismantle the state. What do you think?
This is in fact a revolution: it needs to be consolidated. It could on the other hand be stifled, go forward or back. We are in a period of conflict that will be decisive for the history of our country.
Why do you talk of a revolution rather than of a revolutionary process that remains unfinished?
This is a revolutionary process that has not been finished, but with a series of accumulated factors that stimulate further advance. I do not think that the revolution has already happened. On the contrary, I think that the present period is even more difficult than the war from the point of view of consolidating this revolution.
Why do I say that there are revolutionary changes? If we look at Salvadoran society we can see important changes, first of all on the ideological level. New values are being affirmed sometimes in contradiction to traditional values. Let me give some examples:
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International Viewpoint #242 February 1993 during the war political and ideological pluralism were practised. The unity of the FMLN itself is an expression of political pluralism; even if we sometimes thought that the FMLN was a monolithic bloc in political and ideological terms, in fact a convergence was taking place that established new rules of functioning. The FMLN's development was a rule-governed process including permanent debate.
If, furthermore, we look at the FDRFMLN alliance and the FMLN-Democratic Convergence alliance and other informal but real alliances of class and sectoral interests, we find a broad spectrum including participation by sectors of the church.
Another value is solidarity. Of course, this is less developed but it found embryonic organizational expression during the war. Examples are the forms of self-management developed in the refugee camps in Honduras and in the colonies for reintegrating returned refugees and displaced persons.
In opposition to this, the neo-liberal model emphasizes individualism. There is a struggle underway, but the principle of solidarity is gaining ground.
At the same time, there is the formation of COPPAZ, where all the political parties are represented in the Economic and Social Forum, or the opening up of the municipalities.
Nonetheless, Cienfuegos' assertion that it is not necessary to dismantle the state apparatus seems to overlook the lessons of experience that the state apparatus ensures the continuation of the capitalist system in El Salvador.
From the institutional point of view, we should note that some 92 laws are to be changed as a result of the peace agreement, including the electoral, labour and agricultural codes.
At the economic level, new relations of production have made an embryonic appearance, with elements of self-management and of a popular economy. One can say that the emergence of such a sector, surrounded by a capitalist economy, does not change much, but I see there the germ of something new. Let us not forget that about 10% of the national territory is to be transferred to the poor.
There also exists a significant social base that offers prospects for further advance. We have to find how to stabilize this and develop it.
In my view, the FMLN has to tackle three problems. The first is that of the transformation of the FMLN itself, which has now to do more than lead a war. 34
The second is to bring in the widest possible range of social sectors. The changing of the 92 laws cannot be the sole responsibility of COPPAZ or the Democratic Convergence's deputies. We need to bring in professional sectors, the universities and research centres. At the moment these sectors are totally absent from the political scene.
At the same time it is mainly leadership groups, not the rank-and-file whose interests are actually at stake, that have been involved in the Economic and Social Forum.
How do you explain this?
For the moment the media remains in the hands of the supporters of the old society. Our own media are very weak. The popular organizations have not yet got down to education. The University of Salvador remains lethargic.
The third and final range of problems is that of natural, human and financial means. First we have to properly manage the resources we have and put them to use in a coherent project, then we have to develop these resources.
So, is this a socialist revolution?
Socialist revolution, transformation of capitalism; it is both at the same time. Changes are being introduced into the existing capitalist system and this opens the way for different relations.
Furthermore, there is a void in terms of the socialist project. After the collapse of the Soviet model, the left has to reconstruct one. We have some signposts — new values such as solidarity and pluralism. But these are not yet articulated into a system.
There are two important things to be taken into account here: the revolution must develop the productive forces and it must do this on the basis of new relations between producers. What is happening in El Salvador must be looked at in terms of these two
Here, the forces of the old order have state power at their disposal, while at the international level outside powers interfere in our country, limiting the power even of the state. They dictate policy and apply economic pressure. The problems of payment of the foreign debt and of getting new credit are means of pressure used by the IMF, the World Bank and AID to restrict our room
The other problem is that there is no longer a rearguard for the left. I would say that such a rearguard does exist, not geographical in nature but rooted in the populations. It is a question of popular sectors, social and political forces that are being formed throughout the world. This rearguard is currently dispersed, and often not even aware of itself.
The level of productive forces is a block. But there are possibilities, for example the current technological revolution, and a certain development of the conditions of access to the technology which are no longer the exclusive preserve of powerful economic interests. The new technologies do not always need big investment but knowledge and educated people. On the other hand, institutions have emerged that contribute in one way or another to transfer knowledge to popular sectors. There is thus room for the development of productive forces available to the popular sectors.
There is also space opening up in terms of the relations of production - self-management projects for example. These are currently weak, but there are possibilities, not only due to revolutionary voluntarism, but to objective conditions.
Thus the revolution is nothing more than the building of these popular sectors of the economy?
The idea of building this sector is developing, at least at the level of an exchange of ideas. However, this would be a small, weak enclave inside the capitalist economy. But the revolution is more than just the seizure of power, and sometimes the seizure of power is not useful for the revolution. I do not neglect the question of power but we have to have a clear vision of its use. It is very important that the state power should coincide with real social power, which means organized participation.
The question of the state apparatus is important - revolutionary work cannot come to fruition without state power - but that should not lead us to think that the only way to advance the revolution is through state power. We have to change our view that the seizure of power is indispensable for the revolution to go forward. The revolution is built before that the seizure; the latter is an important phase in the revolutionary process. We do not have to await it before we can do anything.
So, we can relativize the seizure of power?
Some changes can take place before the change in state power is carried through. The revolution implies the seizure of power. But the germ of the revolution and the development of that germ do not necessarily need power. *