SECOND OF THREE PARTS
I ) PETTY BOURGEOIS FEARS. As a consequence of H above, the PT's propaganda never mentioned the shibboleth words "crisis of capitalism" or "international crisis", but preferred instead "crisis of the FHC government". Quite ironically, it was FHC himself who took the lead and begin to talk about the crisis of globalized capitalism, its inherent anarchy and even spoke about the coming new wave of ireversible technological unemployment ! Up to now PT is at odds into trying to explain to the people how the international capitalist crisis is linked to the big business policies of the FHC government (specially favoring financial capital) and how they could be overplaced by progressive policies (palliatives, of course, within the frontiers of capitalism).
J) FAILURE TO SPREAD NATIONWIDE INFORMATION ABOUT PT ADMINISTRATIONS. PT is proud of the so called "_petista_ way of government". It refers to the administrative success and popularity in ruling many cities, both small and large ones (exceptions: PT administrations of São Paulo and Fortaleza, both big cities, were two disasters that destroyed the party forever in this latter municipality). The jewel of the crown is Porto Alegre, the 2.5 million capital city of the state of Rio Grande do Sul, the southernmost one. It has continuously been ruled by PT for about 10 consecutive years and it is now regarded to be the best Brazilian city in quality of life. This municipality was chosen as an example to the big cities of the world by the 1995 International Habitat Conference. The main "secret" is regarded to be the so caled participative budget: the whole population gets directly involved into the making of the city budget and its priorities by a continuous consultation process. However, this way of ruling is better known abroad than in Brazil. Furthermore, experience shows that is easier to govern a city than a state, not to mention to govern the fifth largest country of the world with 160 million people...
K) PREJUDICES. Lula suffers a high rejection for social prejudice and the first to discriminate him are the workers themselves. He is a former metalwork with no education higher than the first year of a technical school. He speaks no foreign languages and when addressing audiences, even sophisticated ones, he makes many grammar errors and uses slang too much. Sometimes he speaks in a somewhat aggressive manner. FHC, to the contrary, is an university professor very didactic (specially to conceal facts and to distort them); he is polite, smart, speaks four languages well, witty, elegant, talkative ---oh, believe me, he is the perfect public relations man ! It is not surprisingly that he and Tony Blair have apparently become so close friends. No, no, my vote is not for him, but for Lula ! :>)
L) AN OLD FASHIONED AND BELATED PROGRAM OF FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. The People's Union government blueprint is very small; it was made in a hurry without internal discussion both in PT and in the allied parties; it was disclosed too late (last July); and it resembles too much the summary of a CEPAL textbook exhumed from the sixties (CEPAL is the UN Economic Comission for Latin America, headquartered at Santiago de Chile). I have been calling it CEPAL/60. It also seems the directives of the old Soviet-line Brazilian Communist Party (PCB), which were overwhelmingly in favor of the national bourgeoisie at fighting with imperialism. Oh, yes, PCB ever forgot to give the proper nationalistic notice to the national bourgeoisie and PT does the same today :>( The program contains no references to the economic crisis (see H above) and promises to create about 14 millions new jobs, but fails to say how it will do this magic. If by chance you receive it, throw it into the trash basket !
M) THOUGH LAST, NOT LEAST IN LOVE: LACK OF STRATEGY. PT statutes define it emphatically as a socialist and revolutionary party, a strategic one in the way towards socialism. It should have been the mass education party in order to win hegemony in the society. Nevertheless, paradoxically due to its unique internal democracy (see N and O, below), now under threat, it has always failed to draw its own face. So, it never developed what could be called a strategy and nowdays falls prey of the ideological topsyturvidom that followed the end of USSR. Many people believe that the Soviet Union up to 1991 was THE socialism (or even THE communism) and it would have been proved to be a failure. So, let's arrange things within the framework of capitalism, trying to "humanize" it !
N) WHAT IS PT, BY THE WAY? Although being a leftist party, PT never was a typical homogenous one, whether a reformist, a radical or anything else. Its rainbow-like variety is at the same time the source of the vigorous historical growth of PT and its greatest weakness. Since its beginnings it was rather a federation of everything and everybody somewhat at the left (see O below), excepting: 1) the two rival CPs (the "Albanian" and the "Soviet" ones) and 2) PDT, that is the left wing of the labor movement founded by the late President Getúlio Vargas, which was (and still is) the Brazilian twin brother of the Argentinian Peronism but without a female Evita Perón (don't cry for the missing goddess, please!). The plans for 1999 foresee the amalgamation of PT and PDT, led by the nominee Vice President in Lula's slate, Leonel Brizola (who also is a Vice President of the Socialist International). This will certainly be fought tenaciously against by the Marxist left wing of PT.
O) TRENDS AND FACTIONS OF PT. Let's list the trends of PT, from the biggest to the smallest ones: 1) the surviving remnants of the urban guerrilla organizations which fought the military dictatorship (1964/1985); 2) the original main constituency, which was the automobile and metal industries workers; 3) the Roman Catholic Church lay movements (the most part of the Church is quite "red" in Brazil); 4) progressive Lutherans and other Protestant affiliations; 5) social democrats; 6) greens and ecological activists; 7) Trots and other non Soviet-aligned communists; 8) anarchists; 9) human rights activists; 10) new agers; 11) black conscience militants; 12) feminist activists; 13) gay priders; and 14) scattered members of some student, professional and labor unions.
Later on there were added: 15) a lot of other industrial workers and labor unionists; 16) a good part of the organized peasants of MST (the landless movement); 17) the growing urban squatters movement; 18, 19) and by now --- do you promise not to laugh? ---even some Pentecostalists and some third way adherents walking astray ! Of course, there are lots of people who do not pertain to any of these "tribes" and who could be vaguely called "narodniks". It is very colurful, isn't it? Anybody from Mars, the red planet? Not yet!
P) CONCLUSIONS.
1) Everyone of you are right, excepting for regarding PT as a monolith, which it is far from being.
2) The enormous economic crisis cannot be fought within the framework of capitalism, as Lula intends to do, and no country standing alone could fight it either, not even USA. Proletarians of all countries, unite ! It is necessary to avoid a strategic defeat of the left wing coalition in Brazil, what would risk to happen if it takes office now (only a mad general will fight anyway and anywhere, under the conditions set up by the enemy and in the places and the dates chosen by the foes).
3) So, the best solution for PT (and for Brazil as well) is not to win these elections, but to lose them in the second round ! So the long postponed radio and TV debate between the two remaining candidates (Lula and FHC) will must be done. People will then have at least a notion that the global crisis is not a "natural" fatality, that it is not a kind of disease transmitted from abroad to a "sane" organism and that there is not solely the neoliberal approach to deal with it (under the guise of technical approach, of course!). The debate will be held at the end of the current "Black October", when the flaws of the Cardoso government be already mounting and quite visible.
4) Let's FHC and the right wing deal ingloriously with the crisis up to the moment when a revolutionary situation arises and is mature enough for letting the people understand that there is no other solution but the rupture with the financial capital, both national and international, or at least a Tobin-like compromise "solution". But... will PT be then prepared to hold office?
In solidarity, Roberto
1848 / 1998: Proletarier aller Länder, vereinigt euch !
Paix entre nous, guerre aux tyrans (....) Ouvriers, paysans, nous sommes Le grand PARTI DES TRAVAILLEURS (L' Internationale)
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The Guardian September 15, 1998: ------------------------------------------------------- Brazil on brink of devaluation Brazilians are facing a return to the years of economic chaos as President Fernando Henrique Cardoso's government tries with little success to halt a flood of dollars leaving the country.
As its share prices hit record lows and pressure increases to devalue its currency, the real, the world's third most populous democracy is looking ever more like the next victim of international financial turbulance. And what happens in Brazil will strongly knock on to the rest of South America, especially Mexico and Argentina.
Some experts even believe that a Brazilian currency devaluation could spread chaos back to the Far East,putting new pressure on the Hong Kong dollar and possibly opening the door to a Chinese devaluation that would shake Asia.
The Brazilian economy is more than twice as big as Russia's, and until early September it had six times more in foreign currency reserves - $70 billion ( £42 billion). But talk of a devaluation has been growing because thegovernment seems powerless to halt the flight of capital. More than $1 billion has been flowing out each day since the beginning of September. At the moment, there is $52 billion left.
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