The PCP - the exception to the rule
Despite the existence of this party, at the end of the century, the majority of the working class were drawn into the radical bourgeois republican movement that was to overthrow the monarchy in 1910. The SP never became anything more than a small group of intellectuals without influence or roots
The Hotel Victoria in the center of Lisbon is an old edifice in Mussolini's neo-Roman style, which became the rage in Salazar's Portugal. It is where the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) has its headquarters. This image out of the 1940s fits like a glove a party that has managed, not without some difficulty, to endorse all the positions of the USSR at a time when the other Communist parties are trying to distinguish themselves from
The PCP did not hesitate, in accordance with its line of unconditional support from the first for Jaruzelski, to organize a meeting of friendship between the PCP and the Polish Communist Party in one of its strong-
Portugal is a country that strongly proclaims its historical originality. The PCP has run this claim up its own flag pole. The most recent expression of it was the "Portúguese road to socialism" in 1974-75. But the country's most original feature may in fact be the PCP itself, a party of the 1940s in 1984.
in the working class. This situation persisted until the disappearance of the SP in the 1930s.
With the SP paralyzed and tied to the bourgeois republicans, the anarchists were able to emerge as the major proletarian current in the period between 1910 and 1923, in which the working class organized, achieved consciousness, and struck out for class independence. PCP formed
The most advanced working-class activists were in the ranks of the anarchists, and it was out of this current that the PCP was to emerge. In 1919, tbe Portuguese Maximalist Federation (FMP was formed, which grouped around the journal Bandeira Vermelho Whose common denominator was athy for the Russian revolution conviction that "being bolsheviks not mean renouncing libertarian i (Bandeira Vermelha, September 3, 191
The dictatorship of the peo was accepted as inevitable, but for a revolutionary party was well understood. After a number founders of the FMP were lost, the was formed from this current in 192 Its political positions were still confused. For example, it still did accept democratic centralism. itical perspective was one of imme revolution. This went so far that tibe party considered that the street demon
Lisbon March 1975. PCP rally with Alvaro Cunhal. (DR) Nuno PINHEIRO
One of the reasons generally advanced to explain the decline of the Communist parties in West Europe and their distancing themselves from the USSR is that the model of Soviet socialism has lost its attraction for workers who, despite the crisis of capitalism, retain a standard of living higher than the average for the Soviet population, without the problems of bureaucratic repression.
However, Portuguese wages are the lowest in Europe, the minimum monthly wage being less than 100 US dollars. Inflation reached a rate of 33% in 1983, while wages rose by only 18% The number of unemployed exceeds 750,000 in a country of 10 million inhabitants, and only one unemployed person in ten gets even the derisory unemployment benefits that the state provides. It is now International Viewpoint 11 February 1985 known that 150,000 workers are continuing to work to keep their jobs, although they have not gotten any wages for many months.
Health services and social assistance housing, aid to the aged, and more severely. So, while Portuguese workers may feel closer to their cousins who have emigrated to France or Germany, does not seem so repellant to them as is claimed. We will see if that is sufficient to explain the exceptional position of the Portuguese CP in the European workers movement.
To understand the situation of the PCP today, it is essential to go back into the tumultous and little known history of the Portuguese workers movement and its organizations. Despite the belated character of Portuguese industrialization and the smallness of a working strations that took place in Lisbon in 1924 meant that the stage of the February revolution had already passed.
In reality, Portugal was not only the European country furthest removed from Russia geographically. It was also the furthest away from any possibility of a revolution. The activists became dem oralized and left the party. The firs years of the PCP were to be marked by grave internal crises which, in the absence of a democratic internal life, led to the intervention of the Communist International.
While this intervention helped to bring about political clarification, especially after 1924, it also went hand in hand with the fading away of the party, which in 1925 joined in an electoral front with the Republican Party but did not elect a single deputy.
The bottom line in the balance sheet of the period was that the party that had had a thousand members in 1921 (prob-
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PORTUGAL
ably an exaggerated figure) was reduced to 500 members in 1924 and seventy members after the military coup d'etat of 1926 (1), even before it was touched by repression. In 1929, it had no more
From the coup d'etat of 1926 - which went off without meeting hardly any resistance from the workers - until it was reorganized in 1929, the party continued to decline, having no perspective other than the hope of a republican coup d'etat. The reorganization was based on the marine arsenal union and on a delegation that visited Moscow for anniversary of the October
The delegation included Bento Goncalves, a young arsenal worker, who was not yet a member of the party but would become general secretary two years later,
The party's historical continuity was, thus, very thin, and its political orientation was to change in tune with the shifts of the Communist Interperiod." (2) In the almost complete absence of the Social Democracy, PCP organ, O Proletario, accused anarchists of social fascism!
The period from 1926 to 1934 was which the regime grew stronger. But it was also one in which the PCP built up the possibilities for its future, mainly because the anarchists and the republicans were content to wait for a "countercoup"
On January 18, 1934, a general strike was launched against a decree by the regime aimed at putting an end to the independent unions that had maintained a semi-legal existence up to that time. The PCP and the anarchists collaborated in the strike. Although it was defeated, it was one of the decisive episodes in the resistance to the dictatorship. ening of the repression, the PCP was forced to work in the strictest clandestinity. For the party, this was the time of the transition from the "third period" to that of the popular front. (3) At the time, its literature was marked by phrases such as "class against class" and "the united front from below,"
"people's democratic revolution," while in practice the party reconciled the "united front at the top,' for alliances with the liberal bourgeoisie, with organizing a soviet in Grande, a small working-class town in the center of the country.
However, after the organization of the "League Against War and Fascism" in 1934, the PCP became firmly ensconced in the following year in the popularfront line. This was marked by the organization of a series of fronts designed inparticular to bring in the petty bourgeoisie. After the party leadership was jailed in 1935, a period of organizational confusion opened up, in which two separate versions of Avante, the party's central organ, appeared, and relations with the USSR were cut.
situation was clarified by a new reorganization in 1941. This was consolidated by the Third Congress of the party in 1943, which put in place a leadership that has remained essentially the same to this day. From the party of 1929, to say nothing of the one of 1921, virtually were fundamental in the building up of the party. This period was marked both by the party's participation in workers struggles and by the organization of the Movement of Antifascist National Unity (MUNAF) and the Democratic Unity Movement (MUD), antifascist fronts with liberal bourgeois
Remaining the only opposition to the dietatorship after the war, with attempts to reorganize the SP proving fruitless, the PCP managed to build up its strength despite the repression of the Cunhal spent almost all the 1950s in
At the beginning of the 1960s, the colonial wars started. The PCP opposed desertion, which was assuming massive expressing a radicalization of the youth. The disorientation of its activists, which was the consequence of this line, was aggravated by the appearance of new international poles of attracCunhal's return
The Sino-Soviet split produced the first split in the PCP, a Maoist one. Then there was the impact of the Algerian and Cuban revolutions, which gave rise to Finally, there was the influence of May 1968 in France. It was in that period that the far-left organizations were formed, the PCP sought to counter by forming the Armed Revolutionary Action
(ARA) and carrying out anti-colonial sabotage actions.
In 1968, Salazar was forced to step down because of illness. The new dicliberalization, which aroused the hopes of sections of the opposition. Although this perspective led to total disilluion, the workers made some important gains, in particular with the election of opposition trade-union leaderships. In 1971, this gave rise to the formation of Intersyndical, the trade-union confederation led by the PCP, which is today by far the largest of them all.
final period of the dictatorship, there was a growing radicalization of the working-class and the youth, which even affected the young officers, who later would take the initiative in overthrowing the regime.
had been an unsuccesful coup attempt only a month before, when the coup d'etat of the young officers came on April 25, 1974 (4), the PCP did not believe in the possibility of the regime being overthrown by the military. In a communique issued a few days before the April 25 revolution, it said: "All illusions about an easy overthrow of the fascist dietatorship will not bring this any closer. Rather they delay its actual overturn, and remove many Portuguese from the struggle." (Political Documents of the Central Committee,
In fact, the party was not prepared for the new situation, and it had no perspec tive going beyond the overthrow of the dictatorship. From the organizational stand-point, it had at most 5,000 members and about 100 full-timers, concentrated essentially in Lisbon and Alentejo, the agricultural area to the south and east of the capital. The leadership consisted of twenty members elected by the Central Committee in 1965. All of them were full-timers, and many were in prison or exile, like Alvaro Cunhal himself, the Portugal on April 30, 1974.
Cunhal's return was presented as a new version of Lenin's arrival in Petrograd in April 1917. The PCP's prestige was clearly considerable. That could be seen by the press run of the first legal Avante - 500,000 copies, which must be an all-time record for the Portuguese
But this circulation was to fall to 100,000 copies in 1975, then to 85,000 in 1976, and finally to about 40,000 today.
In the early period of the revolution, the PCP's tactics were designed mainly to put as many of its activists as possible in the key places in the state apparatus, while the mass movement was advancing and very rapidly going beyond the limited objectives of the PCP's strategy of "national democratic revolution.
"discipline," "moderation" and "responsibility" that are the stock in trade of the reformist parties, the Portuguese masses thought that everything was possible, and calls for moder-
The PCP participated in the first governments. In addition to getting Ministry of Labor, it got Cunhal named minister without portfolio. He, thus, got the same status as Mario Soares, the leader of an SP formed less than a year before, which had no base among the workers, and barely 200 members: and Sa Carneiro, leader of the People's Dem1. As a result of this coup d'etat by the rightwing military, the parliament and the parties were dissolved and the press subjected to censorship. Antonio Oliveira de Salazar, appointed minister of finance in 1928, became premier in 1931, and established a dictatorship that was to last until the revolution of 1974. 2. Between 1928 and 1934, the ultraleft line of the Communist International, called the line of the "third period," involved an ultrasectarian attitude toward the Social Democratic parties, which were denounced as social fascist. 8. In 1934, and in particular at the Seventh Congress of the Communist International in 1935, the Communist parties adopted the "popular front" line, which advocated alliances with bourgeois "democratic" forces against fascism. 4. On the revolutionary process in Portugal in 1974-1975, see the article by Francisco Louca in International Viewpoint, No. 52, May 1984.
International Viewpoint 11 February 1985
at the same time it was doing its best to divert it and hold it back, in the name of non-existent class alliances and of gaining strategic posts in the state apparatus.
After March 11 and the breakup of the alliances that could limit the revolution, the PCP and the SP turned their main fire on each other. The conflicts sharpened in the armed forces, while potential dualpower organs spread, even though their centralization remained very limited.
As we have seen, the PCP participated in some of these bodies, or even gave impetus to them. In the organizations of the far left, the illusion then appeared about the possibility of "forcing" the PCP to become revolutionary. At the same time, according to Cunhal's report to the Eighth Congress in 1976, sections of the party supported an alliance with the "ultraleftists."
In August 1975, the Revolutionary
Front (FUR) was formed. included, besides the PCP, the People's Democratic Movement (MDP), which was controlled by the PCP; the movement of the Socialist Left (MES): the Revolutionary Party of the Proletariat
People's Socialist (FSP), the League for Revolutionary Unity and Action (LUAR); and the International Communist League, Portuguese section of the Fourth International. A few days later, the PCP left the FUR to seek an alliance with the moderate
Portugal, April 1975. Mague engineering factory. (DR) ocratic Party (PPD), which was then in formation.
In the eyes of the PCP, this represented the confirmation of the alliance of anti-monopoly strata in the national democratic revolution - the working-class (PCP), the petty bourgeoisie (SP), and the middle bourgeoisie (PPD) - as the PCP put it explicitly! Since the PCP did not believe that it was possible to establish a bourgeois democratic regime, its objective was a "national democratic regime,' the expression of an alliance of the classes cited above, which would make possible a peaceful transition to socialism.
Two developments were to shake up the party at the time. On the one hand, there was an enormous increase in membership. It went from less than 5,000 at the start of the revolution to 15,000 in July, to 50,000 in September, to more than 100,000 in May of the following year, and 115,000 in September of the same year. Today it is 200,000. The apparatus was suspicious of the new members.
Although Cunhal said in his reports to the Seventh and Eighth congresses (1974 and 1976) that no distinction should be made between members who joined before and after 1974, the fact is that the October 1974 congress did not even elect a new leadership. It simply reconfirmed the leadership elected in 1965 with the addition of a few co-opted members.
The second disturbing factor was that the mass movement was tending to go over the barriers placed in its way. At the time of its October 1974 congress, International Viewpoint 11 February 1985 the PCP had not yet understood this, but certain special features were already beg inning to appear in the process underway — workers control; structures of selforganization, such as the Workers Committees; and land occupations. Nothing of this was reflected in the documents of the congress.
In the congress, the stress was put on strengthening the "democratic state," which was to be accomplished "by placing in the key posts persons enjoying the total confidence of the democratic forces." (Cunhal's report to the Seventh Congress.)
The land occupations and the spread of workers and neighborhood committees were seen by the PCP only as an additional opportunity for putting pressure on the state apparatus. So, in February 1975, it promoted the formation of the first People's Assembly in Almada. But this assembly was reduced to being merely a front for the party in the typical Stalinist style.
In the conditions of the time, it was necessary to take account of the military question. The alliance people and the Armed Forces Movement (MFA) became for the PCP the expression of the alliance "anti-monopoly strata."
Once again, the social clivages widened, especially after the attempted rightist coup d'etat on March 11, 1975. Caught between its position as a government party and the acceleration of the mass movement, the PCP found itself in difficult position. It wanted to appear to be the driving force in the process, when military officers close to the Socialist Party.
The autonomous organization of the masses was already going beyond what the PCP considered the acceptable limits. The organs of "people's power" were beginning to get an idea that they could be something quite different than pressure groups. People began to talk about a National People's Assembly, which would be a decisive body in a future state power.
The autonomous soldiers movement became a factor of regroupment, and dissipated the illusions still placed in the MFA, attracting to its own demonstrations large strata of workers, including supporters of the Socialist Party. The pre-revolutionary situation was beginning to assemble the conditions for transforming itself into a revolutionary one.
These possibilities were cut short by the coup d'etat of November 25, 1975. (5) For the PCP, this event meant the loss of some of the positions it had gained. But at the same time, it removed the "ultra-leftist" danger, thanks, in particular, to the destruction of the autonomous soldiers organizations.
toward the coup d'etat has been the subject of many controversies. The SP right has accused it of trying to take power. However, the fact 5. A coup d'etat carried out by a coalition of the right and center in the armed forces, whose real leader was the future president, Ramalho Eanes. This coup d'etat reestablished the authority of the bourgeois state and paved the way ime. See the article by Francisco Louca for the establishment of a parliamentary cited reg above.
25
is that the PCP did not even mobilize its members to respond to the coup. The confessions, as is often the case, appeared later. Thus, in his report to the Eighth revolutionary left.
Congress in 1976, Cunhal acknowledged that the coup was not as unfavorable as
"People-MFA
"The tendit had seemed for the party:
ency that took hold during the stabilization of democracy (one of the indices of which was PCP members remaining in the government after November 25) ran was always
"Eanesist"
SP counter to the plans of the reactionaries.
the
To "reinforce the democratic state,"
and represents the stability was preferable to instability, and, henceforth, it was better to concentrate on not losing too many positions in the state apparatus. In fact, the PCP's
Eanes.
positions were lost little by little. To try months in
1979,
"the PCP has to preserve its positions, the analytical clarity, the serenity in and the necessary courage to action, combat mutual suspicion, to argue for the revolutionary tense a rapprochement of the sectors that come into conflict, to defend all have possible forms of cooperation between the people and the armed forces." (Cunhal's report to the Eighth Congress.)
Such appeals by the PCP did not, however, get much of a response. It did hold and 20% of the vote.
on to its ministerial portfolios, but a lot
"purged" from their of its members were jobs, while the "military left," the left in the MFA, lost nearly all its positions.
growth.
However,
The bourgeoisie would then be able given to do without the loyal services of the of the
Stalinists.
mainly tied to the
For a « national democratic revolution » offered
The far left believed in the possibility of a socialist revolution. The FSP wrote: "1975, year of the revolution."
But Cunhal and his party never envisaged going so far. That is why the party first secretary said in his report that the
Portuguese revolution was not over and would not end until democracy had been definitively consolidated. The dupcertain stagnation.
licity continued. He called not only for
If these regime, but the defending the term
"revolution" was still used in the report to satisfy and deceive the masses.
The stabilization to score two was points. In April 1976, a constitution was approved that reflected tbe contradictions of the previous year. Despite the loss of most of the gains of 1975, this constitution was and continues to be one of the PCP's main hobby horses. In this way, it presents the image of a party of the stability and democratic order. In the same month, in the elections for the
Assembly of the Republic (parliament), the PCP saw its vote go from 12.5% to
14.6%. It gained 20,000 votes in the working class area of Setubal, and more futile.
parliamentary delegation increased its from thirty to forty deputies.
The second step in the stabilization was accomplished in June 1976, with the election to the presidency of Ramalho the general who led the military
Eanes, operations on November
25. In these elections, the PCP ran one of its leaders,
Octavio Pato, who took a line of non-
26 them for nothing.
grow until it elections.
Since the the lack of of the are being tions.
SP government with combine to
The
The up for dialogue.
Since coming elections.
in
1975, about the has been
This pattern may party. It is not in a
The
The party's
BOOK REVIEW.
lin during the 1930s later commented: a 'fifty/fifty' deal with the capitalist Nazi collaborators they had already overthrown? The Yugoslav revolutionaries said 'No Thanks' and took power, making
Yugoslavia a workers'state. Stalin was furious about this 'ultra left' provocation