[NYTr] How to Defend the Cuban Revolution: James Petras Explains It All to You
 
Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2007 02:19:44 -0500 (CDT)

Via NY Transfer News Collective  *  All the News that Doesn't Fit
 
[Actually, this is a long self-defense by James Petras of his claim to
be able to give Cuba sage advice.  It's not likely that Cuba needs the
armchair revolutionaries from Amerika to tell them how to "avoid the
catastrophic consequences" experienced by former socialist regimes...
but here they come anyway.

Particularly amusing is Petras speaking about himself in the third
person when reaffirming contentions from a previous article written
with Robin Abaya in Rebelion. Why do some of these spewers
of turgid prose think they can give advice to Cuba when they haven't
managed to achieve the tiniest beginnings of a revolution here in the
belly of the beast?  Not that anyone expects them to, and quite
possibly they even mean well, but why do they think they're qualified to
pontificate about the correct next steps for the one socialist
revolution that has actually survived?  It's all very well to say
they know a lot about the USSR and China -- and maybe they do -- but
they seem not to know that Cuban Socialism is not the least bit like
Soviet Socialism or Chinese Communism. And in fact, the Cuban
leadership is well aware of dissatisfactions and "contradictions" --
that old tired Marxist term -- and has been dealing with them very
creatively for years. -NY Transfer]

Palestine Chronicle - Sep 19, 2007
http://www.palestinechronicle.com/story-09190740616.htm

Defending the Cuban Revolution

By pointing out Cubabs contradictions, our desire is for the revolution
to avoid the catastrophic consequences of similar contradictions in
former socialist regimes.

By James Petras
Special to PalestineChronicle.com

Revolutions and the Cuban is no exception, advance in a contradictory
process: in the course of solving basic immediate problems they
confront new challenges. There are revolutionary writers who recognize
this dialectical process and the need to critically support the
revolution. On the other hand there are publicists who arrogate to
themselves the role of unconditional apologists for every shift in
policy of the official spokesperson, parroting the argument of the day.

In their recent essay bCuba: Continuing Revolution and Contemporary
Contradictionsb (Rebellion), James Petras and Robin Abaya describe the
historic accomplishments of the Cuban Revolution in great detail b its
socio-economic advances, successes in resisting US imperialist
aggression, its capacity to sustain basic popular programs despite the
collapse of its principle trading partners and its recent economic
recovery and growth. In this context of outlining the world-historic
accomplishments of the Cuban Revolution, Petras-Abaya highlight the
emergence of contradictions which could erode the popular bases of the
revolution: the massive housing deficit, low wages/salaries of workers,
transport shortages, widespread theft of public property, low
productivity and overdependence on tourism, raw material exports and
food imports (particularly from the US). Most of those problems are
acknowledged by some of the leaders of the revolution. The causes can
be traced to the lack of popular control over investment policy,
resulting in over-development of export-services and lack of investment
in public housing, transportation and agriculture.

Petras and Abaya point to the need to reflect and re-think big capital
intensive investments in hotels and bio-tech in light of rising popular
demands and discontent with the chronic lack of basic items of private
consumption. They conclude that fighting widespread corruption and
securing greater transparency in public budgets and personal income of
authorities engaged in joint ventures can be achieved through public
televised hearings convoked by elected independent commissions of
workers, farmers, professionals and certified independent accountants.
Their article reflects several decades of support for the Cuban
Revolution (even at times at a personal cost) and a deep affection for
its revolutionary people. Their belief is that genuine defenders of the
revolution offer constructive criticism in order to advance the process
against its external and internal enemies.

Based on observations and careful studies of the erosion of socialism
in the USSR and China, we find that when the workers and farmers are
not consulted in the planning of investments and priorities, support
for socialism declines and neo-liberalism grows. By pointing out Cubabs
contradictions, our desire is for the revolution to avoid the
catastrophic consequences of similar contradictions in former socialist
regimes.

The article has served one of its main purposes in that it has
stimulated widespread debate inside and outside of Cuba, among
intellectuals and political activists. In particular, in Cuba, Raul
Castro has encouraged wide-ranging critical debate, the formation of
commissions to examine basic policies and to encourage the formulation
of new socio-economic strategies. Petras-Abayasb paper was written in
the spirit of joining in this fraternal debate.

Fidel Castro and Pablo Gonzales Casanova

Two well known writers of great fame and recognition however failed to
capture the fraternal spirit and to recognize the abiding solidarity of
the Petras-Abaya essay. Fidel Castro accused the writers of bpoisoningb
the intellectual discussion, of supporting neo-liberalism and other
such bthought crimesb. He accused the writers of bpretending to be
friends of the revolutionb while intending to slander it. According to
this logic (parroted and amplified by Gonzales Casanova) the revolution
is always advancing in a linear fashion, ever forward and without
contradiction, backed by a people capable of endless sacrifice of their
basic needs. According to this argument, to deny this linearity and to
document contradictions and internal challenges is to play into the
hands of counter-revolution.

There are several serious problems with Fidelbs harsh polemic. First
and foremost his denunciation of Petras-Abaya as
bsuper-revolutionariesb, bneo-liberalsb and bvenomousb can be taken as
a threat to anyone engaged in the profound debate taking place in Cuba
today. Tens of thousands of Cubans are taking advantage of Raulbs new
opening to engage in constructive criticism, some of which goes much
farther than Petras and Abaya. Secondly Fidelbs argument of infinite
support for the revolution reflects a degree of voluntarism that does
not correspond with the reality: The great mass of Cubanbs are tired of
waiting, married couples on lists for decades for a decent apartment
and salary increases, waiting till the end of the month for the next
paycheck in order to buy decent quality food on the free market and for
hours for crowded public transport. In real life there are limits in
waiting for basic improvements, even among the most revolutionary of
people.

The inadequacy of Fidel and Gonzales-Casanovasb political polemics is
most in evidence in their use of personal invective: The emptier the
argument, the harsher the ad hominem attacks.

Pablo Gonzalez Casanovabs essay is a case in point. Instead of facing
Petras-Abaya empirical documentation, he resorts to the most bizarre
insults by calling Petras a bpervertb and his writing a bperversionb.
His omission of the name of the co-author, Robin Abaya, suggests
blatant sexism. Instead of providing evidence to refute Petras-Abaya
critical observations on the housing, income policy, productivity
problems b he rambles on about our supposedly perverse behavior in
daring to raise criticism of the all wise all knowing Cuban leaders.
Gonzales Casanova has learned nothing from Cuban reality nor has he set
aside his Brezhnev-era apologetics for existing socialist
argumentation. It is not a coincidence that Gonzalez Casanova echoes
Fidelbs polemics; he repeats his invective to caricature and displays
virtually no independent thinking. He writes like a soldier of the
Leader, right or wrong, but not of the revolution. For a politicologo
with claims to being a brigorous social scientistb, Gonzales Casanova
has never gone into the Cuban streets, talked to couples waiting for 10
years for an apartment or waited with hundreds of commuters for a
crowded late bus in 40 degrees centigrade three hundred days a year.
That kind of data is difficult to obtain at VIP receptions in Havana
honoring distinguished foreign academics.

To cover up his dogmatic and opportunistic defense of an uncritical
vision and his servile disservice to the Cuban peoplebs demands for
far-reaching reforms, Gonzales Casanova claims inspiration from the
bsocial movementsb and new leftist currents in Latin America. While
Gonzales Casanova praises bsocial movementsb from his academic tower,
his declared bpervertb, Petras has been working on the ground with
these movements for decades: In Brazil with the MST since 1991 and with
CONLUTA since 2004, in Argentina with the unemployed workers since
2002, in Ecuador with the petroleum workers union since 2002 (and today
with the social movements in the Polo Democratico), in Mexico with the
electrical workers union since many years, with Chavez and the
Chavistas since 2001. And Petras has defended the Cuban revolution
since 1959, when Dr. Gonzales Casanova was still a supporter of the PRI.

There are many other movements and other regions and countries where
Gonzales Casanovabs favorite bpervertb has worked with movements in
struggle: Spain, Catalunya-Basque-AndalucC-a, Greece, Italy, Turkey,
Philippines b but I think that the readers of RebeliC3n get the point.
Casanova, the armchair apologist of Cuba, lacks the elementary facts
about who he criticizes and what he defends. The social movements in
Latin American have a political life. They do not engage in worship of
a leadership cult. They debate, criticize their leaders, their mistakes
and even the Cuban revolutionb&when it is necessary. The social
movementsb irreverence to authority, even of respected leaders like
Fidel, makes them, according to Doctor Gonzalez Casanova, bpervertsb or
according to Fidel bsuper-revolutionariesb.

Defending the Cuban revolution demands unconditional defense against
imperialism and proposals to rectify its problems. These are acts of
love. Polemical invective and personal attacks against life-long
defenders of the revolution and revolutionary movements will further
isolate Cuba and opportunists like Gonzalez Casanova from reality and
the coming social transformations in Latin America and social changes
in Cuba.

[James Petras, a former Professor of Sociology at Binghamton
University, New York, owns a 50-year membership in the class struggle,
is an adviser to the landless and jobless in Brazil and Argentina, and
is co-author of Globalization Unmasked (Zed Books). His latest book is
The Power of Israel in the United States (Clarity Press, 2006). His
forthcoming book is Rulers and Ruled (Bankers, Zionists and Militants
(Clarity Press, Atlanta). He can be reached at: jpetras@binghamton.edu ]

Copyright palestinechronicle.com. 

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