July 2024 | by Tom Baker
This extended letter from Comandante Che Guevara was published in the Uruguayan weekly publication, Marcha on March 12, 1965. Che was a founding member and central leader of the Cuban July 26 Movement. One of his most important assignments after the overthrow of the US backed dictatorship was to be president of the National Bank and Minister of Industries from 1961-65. This letter was written while he was on an extended tour of Africa. Guevara made his contributions to the theory and practice of socialism in a brief period of 13 years – from when he radicalized politically in Guatemala in 1954 to his death at the hands of the agents of capitalism and imperialism at age 39 in 1967.
This letter is critical to understand the aims and goals of the Cuban Revolution as seen by one of the central leaders. Che’s intent seems to be to provoke debate and give a new perspective on some of the foundations of current socialist thought. The most important concepts of Che’s writings on philosophy, economics, ethics and politics are summarized in this letter.
This article serves to synthesize Che’s concept of the new man or woman emerging in Cuba — the individual as a direct and conscious actor in the actual process of constructing socialism. Cuba was creating “a new type of individual” as a result of the revolution, because as Che said “there is nothing that can educate a person… like living through a revolution.”
More or less, I plan to review the letter chronologically, allowing Che to speak for himself. Primarily, I will be paraphrasing and quoting Che, with minimal contextual remarks.
Introduction:
“A common argument from the mouths of capitalist spokespeople, in the ideological struggle against socialism, is that socialism, (or the period of building socialism into which we have entered) is characterized by the abolition of the individual for the sake of the state.”
In response, as a dialectical materialist, Che sets out to establish the historical facts and current mass engagement in Cuba and examines the following:
– Invisible laws of capitalism
– The individual and socialism
– Danger of Sectarianism and dogmatism
– Post-revolutionary challenges in the struggle to build socialism
First Heroic Stage:
He summarizes the history of Cuba’s revolutionary struggle before and after the taking of power. First, the July 26, 1953 attack on the Moncada barracks was a disaster, as Che says. Survivors were imprisoned, but recommenced the revolutionary struggle after being released in a general amnesty. During this campaign, in which there was only the germ of socialism, the individual was a fundamental factor. The triumph or failure of the mission depended on that individual’s capacity for action in two distinct environments: the people, the still sleeping mass that had to be mobilized; and its vanguard, the guerrillas, the motor force of the mobilization, the generator of revolutionary consciousness and militant enthusiasm. This vanguard was the catalyzing agent that created the subjective conditions necessary for victory in January 1959.
“Here again, in the framework of the proletarianization of our thinking, of this revolution that took place in our habits and our minds, the individual was the basic factor. Every one of the combatants of the Sierra Maestra who reached an upper rank in the revolutionary forces has a record of outstanding deeds to his or her credit. They attained their rank on this basis…. In the attitude of our fighters could be glimpsed the man and woman of the future.”
This new revolutionary government power was based on the Rebel Army, but it initially included the “treacherous bourgeoisie” who tried to block measures to benefit the population, such as the Agrarian Reform law. Public pressure forced the bourgeois president to resign and Fidel becomes Prime Minister in July 1959. Workers and peasants became more militant and US pressure against the new revolution grew in the face of sweeping nationalizations, land reform, free health care, etc. On May Day 1961 Fidel declared the socialist goal of the revolution.
Participation of the masses
The masses of people demonstrated their valor and sacrifice to defend the gains of the revolution and defeat any attempt to destroy it: During the 1961 US mercenary invasion of the Bay of Pigs, the October missile crisis of 1962, the Hurricane Flora of 1962 and elsewhere. During this “heroic stage” the masses also participated in the agrarian reform, the literacy campaign (one million people) and the administration of state enterprises.
Che explains the masses are not a flock of sheep which followed Fidel blindly. He won their trust by interpreting their desires and aspirations and from his sincere struggle to fulfill the promises made. He agrees there is a subordination of the individual to the new state. He lays out a process whereby an initiative in the field of economy, culture, sports, etc., is developed by the leadership, explained to the people, who make it their own and with enthusiasm and discipline carry out the tasks.
Che refers to the close dialectical unity between the individual and the mass, in which both are inter-related and at the same time, in which the mass, as an aggregate of individuals, intersects with its leaders. He admits this is difficult for someone not living through the experience of the revolution to understand.
He admits that the state makes mistakes sometimes, which causes a decline in collective enthusiasm. Work can be paralysed and then a correction must be made. He refers to the sectarian policy imposed by Anibal Escalante in 1962 where democratic centralism and the spirit of sacrifice were undermined, (Escalante was leader of the PSP (the party representing the Stalinist leadership of USSR). During fusion of the July 26 movement and the PSP, he attempted to take over the process to advance the CP line that Cuba was not at the stage to build socialism.)
Invisible laws of capitalism
Che reminds us that in capitalist society alienated individuals are tied to society by an invisible umbilical cord — the law of value. This law shapes the course and destiny of our lives. In his article “On the Concept of Value” published in 1963, he opened a debate on the role of Marx’s labour theory of value within the construction of socialism.
Che’s Budgetary Finance System (BFS) was based on enterprises being financed by the state budget and centralized economic planning. This was counter to the financially autonomous enterprises with moral incentives in USSR economy which Che said would impede progress to socialism. The BFS was the expression of his search for an apparatus to increase productive capacity and labour productivity without relying on capitalist mechanisms which he maintained undermined the formation of new consciousness and social relations integral to communism. Che placed the withering away of alienation at the centre of his theory of transition to socialism.
“I am not interested in dry economic socialism. We are fighting against misery, but we are also fighting against alienation.” Recall Marx said there are 2 key sources of social alienation in capitalist society: the market and the state. Socialism presumed the withering away of both.
Individual and Socialism
The Individual has a dual existence as a unique being and as a member of society. There is an incompleteness quality, a feeling of being an unfinished product in each of us. Continual labour is necessary to eradicate vestiges of the past in our consciousness. The past makes itself felt not only in our consciousness but also the very character of the transition period while commodity relations persist. For Che, socialism could not exist if economics was not combined with social and political consciousness. Without an awareness of rights and duties, it would be impossible to construct a new society.
Che argues that it wasn’t capitalism’s internal contradictions that caused the system to explode in Cuba. In neo-colonial countries, it is the national liberation struggle. Underdevelopment as a result of centuries of colonial and imperialist exploitation combined with flight of capital makes a rapid transition to socialism impossible without sacrifices. Adding to the challenge is that all socialist projects face massive military, economic and misinformation wars waged by pro-imperialist forces.
In the Communist Manifesto Marx and Engels envisioned socialism and the problem of the transition to it as a process in which the proletariat as a class will “wrest by degrees all capital from the bourgeoisie” to “centralize all instruments of production in the hands of the [workers’] state,” which it controls, and use them to increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible.” The workers’ state will abolish land property and nationalize the property of those who flee the revolution or revolt against it. Other enterprises will be gradually transferred to the workers’ state. The goal is a producers’ association in which “the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.”
Che explains, the economic base for socialism must be constructed and there is a temptation to use the dull instruments left by capitalism as the lever to accelerate development… Commodity relations still persisting as the economic cell, profitability, material interest, etc. He says that type of economic foundation undermines the development of consciousness.
“To build communism it is necessary, simultaneous with new material foundations, to build the new man and woman.”
Or as Marx put it in 1844: “key to this process will be the self-organization and self-activity of the working people to wither away all forms of alienation, subordination and exploitation.”
New Consciousness
The Masses are mobilized bringing together their collective and individual interests through moral and material incentives, while deepening consciousness as a way of developing towards socialism. “Retaining the effectiveness of these incentives requires the development of a consciousness with a new scale of values. Society as a whole must be converted into a gigantic school.”
How was capitalist consciousness formed? By force, education and direct propaganda on inevitability of class society, hope of improvement of one’s being (self made man mythology)
For Cuba, direct education has an even greater importance. Education takes hold among the masses and new attitudes become a habit. Masses make it their own and influence those not yet educated. Education must directly relate to production and be conducted in a collective manner to contribute to consciousness and have a greater impact.
Conscious process of self-education
Individual feel the impact of new social power and perceive they don’t entirely measure up to its standards. Self-education begins.
In this period of building socialism we can see the new man/woman emerging…never a completed process as it goes hand in hand with development of new economic forms.
Some still are solitary in satisfying their own ambitions, but over time they acquire consciousness of the need to incorporate into society and be part of the motor of that society. They will follow the vanguard (party, advanced workers and individuals) in close communion. The prize is the new society of communist human beings.
The vanguard draws nourishment from the masses. Masses can only advance if vanguard provides inspiration. “The dictatorship of proletariat operates not only on the defeated class but on individuals of the victorious class.”
Institutionalization of the revolution
At this point the party was still experimenting with the appropriate institutions that would permit a complete identification between the government and the community. They wanted a new structure appropriate to the special conditions of building socialism (not bourgeois democracy). They strove to avoid a formality that separated the vanguard from the masses and individual. He states that “the most important revolutionary aspiration is to see human beings liberated from their alienation.”
Despite the lack of a perfect mechanism for it, the masses are now making history as a conscious collective of individuals fighting for the same cause. The opportunities for self-expression and making oneself felt in the social organism are infinitely greater.
New Status of work
Che argued that work played a crucial role in the construction of a new society. He analysed the differences between work undertaken within a capitalist society and that which was free of alienation in a socialist society.
“Work no longer entails surrendering a part of one’s being in the form of labor power sold, which no longer belongs to the individual, but becomes an expression of oneself, a contribution to the common life in which one is reflected, the fulfillment of one’s social duty.”
Che analyzes the inherited relations of production in Cuba and insists that there are two fundamental changes required to end the exploitation of one human by another and achieve a socialist society:
1. Increase in production – utilization of the best technology.
2. Deepening of consciousness – putting duty and sacrifice ahead of individual gain.
It is still necessary to deepen conscious participation, in all the structures of management and production, and to link this to the idea of the need for technical and ideological education. In this way the individual will reach total consciousness as a social being, which is equivalent to the full realization as a human creature, once the chains of alienation are broken. This will be translated concretely into the reconquering of one’s true nature through liberated labor, and the expression of one’s own human condition through culture and art.
Che critiques the scholasticism that has held back the development of Marxist philosophy and impeded a systematic treatment of the transition period. (Clearly a reference to Stalinist USSR.)
Individualism
For a long time, individuals have been trying to free themselves from alienation through culture and art. “While a person dies every day during the eight or more hours in which he or she functions as a commodity, individuals come to life afterward in their spiritual creations.”
The solitary human being is seeking harmony with the world. One defends one’s individuality, which is oppressed by the environment, and reacts to aesthetic ideas as a unique being whose aspiration is to remain immaculate.
New Impulse for Artistic Experimentation
In Cuba at this time there are enormous changes taking place in society and power structures. Cuba was just emerging from underdevelopment with a neo-colonial culture imposed by a dominant class. Constant struggle between values of the past and the attempt to construct an all-encompassing culture based on solidarity and real social justice. The struggle was made more difficult not only by the persistence of past culture but also by dogmatic and authoritarian tendencies of so called “social realism” in USSR.
The capitalist superstructure imposes a kind of art in which the artist must be educated. Rebels are subdued by the machine, and only exceptional talents may create their own work. The rest become shamefaced hirelings or are crushed. Meaningless anguish or vulgar amusement thus becomes convenient safety valves for human anxiety. The idea of using art as a weapon of protest is combated.
He calls for a new ideological-cultural mechanism that permits free enquiry and the uprooting of old weeds that multiply. This would be based on the human being of the 21st century.
New revolutionary generation
The role of the party and revolutionary youth in the construction of a new society is addressed in several of Che’s writings. He refers to youth as the malleable clay for which a new person can be built with none of the old defects. “We place our hope in the youth and prepare it to take the banner from our hands” Importance of incorporating youth into work from the outset, encouraging physical work during vacations or along with studies…. never a punishment.
The Party is a vanguard organization, made up of best workers, proposed for membership by fellow workers. Party becomes a mass party only when masses are educated for communism.
Role of the individual
He examines the role of the personality of individuals leading the masses, using Fidel Castro’s leadership as an example… making the individual feel more complete, with more inner wealth and much more responsibility… not just improved standard of living.
Love of living Humanity
“At the risk of seeming ridiculous, let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love.” A leader must combine a passionate spirit with a cold intelligence to make painful decisions without flinching. They must idealize the love of the people, of the most sacred causes and make it one and indivisible. They must have a large dose of humanity, a large sense of justice and truth in order to avoid extremes, cold scholasticism or isolation from the masses.
He highlights the importance of world revolution, of proletarian internationalism as a duty and revolutionary necessity. This is a glorious period of sacrifice. Cuba must make sacrifices because it is the vanguard of America, showing the Latin American masses the road to full freedom.
Danger of dogmatism
Che speaks to the present risks in their situation, dangers of dogmatism, freezing the ties with the masses midway in the task and corruption of revolutionaries. ‘The revolution is made by human beings, but individuals must forge their revolutionary spirit day by day.”
Conclusion
Che draws a list of some inspiring conclusions on freedom and the role of the individual in mobilizing the masses and finally the role of the vanguard group… best among the good… the party.
Summary:
Guevara’s socialism is deeply humanist. He contributed two key elements to the theory of socialism.
1. He rejuvenated Marx’s view of socialism as the process of de-alienation of humanity.
2. Guevara viewed socialism not as a society of plenty but as a society in which human development and self-realization take place. That is why volunteer labour was central to his theory and life. Guevara was also exemplary. He practiced what he preached.
The Cuban school children chant “We Will Be Like Che.” Perhaps a new generation will rise to learn from his example and will be like Che.