The PSRDC steps into the debate on Proletarian Democracy

["Ben Seattle" <Left-Transparency@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi everyone,

On Friday I received a short email from the Cuban Revolutionary
Social Democratic Party (PSRDC) informing me that their web page
at:

    http://frontpage.shadow.net/~psrdc/

had been updated with comments that appear to be a response to
the on-going discussion/debate that José Pérez and me have been
having on Louis Proyect's marxmail.org list.  I have copied
(below) the section that was in English.  I will make comments in
a separate post.

Ben Seattle
----//-// 10.Sep.2000
www.Leninism.org
www.egroups.com/group/theorist/


________________________________________
Proletarian democracy in Cuba -fact or fiction
STEPPING INTO THE DEBATE

The essay on the role of the workers' movement in Cuba, where the
informations given by Mr. José G. Pérez are commented, possibly
requires a more detailed appreciation, but it has come on the
screen when we had already concluded the materials for the
Social-Revolutionary Democratic Party of Cuba's electronic
review. But considering its special importance, we have hurried
to insert it this very month.

First of all we believe it is necessary to repeat that the
interpretations of expressions such as "dictatorship of the
proletariat", "unique and only party" and "democratic centralism"
are out of context in Marx's thought as well as in that of the
most reputable socialist thinkers. The "unique and only party",
for either Lenin or Trotsky, was always a contingential step due
to the political instability the country was living through.. The
soviets were supposed to be temporary institutions, set to
guarantee the democratic process. When Stalin established his
rule and set forth that sort of stunt creature of `state
capitalism', he intendedly used the misconception of those
wordings as a justification for becoming himself a new czar.

We never pretend to be scholars of Marxist thought nor of the
Russian totalitarian process and its consequences at
international level. We simply want to focus on the Cuban
situation, where, in the need of an alibi that would justify the
installment of a stalinist socialism, the government has fostered
the most primitive of interpretations.

In Cuba, the legally recognized organization of the workers'
movement is nothing but a unique and only nationwide structure,
subordinated to the Communist Party, to the political police and
to the managerial bureaucracy, whether this be of the state or of
the foreign enterprises now established in the country. This
absolute and total subordination has been duly formalized within
the actual legal structure.

In the case of the foreign enterprises, the state has become
itself a work-serving enterprise and the only ruler of the
relations and rights of that working force, this means: of the
workers. Something very similar to what is happening in many
capitalistic democracies and which is worrying us very much.

We, Cuban Social-Revolutionaries, do advocate a unique and only
central confederacy of workers, as well as unique sectorial and
regional organizations. We reject the so called union
parallelism. But the central, sectorial and regional
organizations indeed have to be the institutions that really
represent the unions; we mean: the workers' community, whose
faculties are to be decided and ruled by the very unions. What we
mean is that authority must be democratically built from the
bases up to the summit.

This is exactly the opposite of the actual Cuban system where the
central organization of the workers and from there down to the
simple unions, all the structure is submitted directly to the
Communist Party, the government and the political police. These
three form the unique and undifferentiated beam of power; hence,
authority is enforced from the summit to the base.

For us, Social-Revolutionaries, it is a matter of dogmatic
principle that the union has to be, accordingly to the Cuban
social law tradition: 1) of public law, 2) unique and only, 3)
autonomous, 4) democratic and 5) non partisan, for it has to be
the real and only institution representing the community of
labour. The community of labour (the union, as it was legally
dessigned) is the real authority, the functions of which are to
be delegeted up to the local, regional, sectorial or national
levels. In the brief essay named "Revolutionary Unionism",
appearing on this very page, this is more broadly explained.

Roberto Simeón
Cuban Revolutionary Social Democratic Party Secretary
En el exilio, Septiembre del 2000.

-----Original Message-----
From: Soreb123@xxxxxxx
To: Left-transparency@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Friday, September 08, 2000 7:18 AM
Subject: Att. Ben Seattle

PARTIDO SOCIAL REVOLUCIONARIO
DEMOCRATICO DE CUBA
REVISTA ELECTRONICA:
  http://frontpage.shadow.net/~psrdc/

Hemos actualizado  nuestra revista electronica.  Cuatro nuevos
analisis sobre la globalizacion, Cuba y la anfictionia del
Caribe -tesis economica- son algunos de los nuevos temas que
aparecen en la misma. Los invitamos a visitarla, y hacer sus
comentarios, sean estos coincidentes o disidentes.

We have updated our Web Page, PROLETARICAN DEMOCRACY IN CUBA.
FACT OR FICTION is one of the topics that appear in our page.  We
envite you to visit and make favorable or dissenting coments.

Fraternalmente.

Roberto Simeon.
Secretario.