[Marxism] Re: the return of the Sandinistas

["Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Okay, the Proyect-Lippmann dialogue continues.

There is some point to what Walter has to say, as usual.  The fact of
the matter is that in the process of the decay and effective defeat (but
not complete crushing) of the revolution, the FSLN was basically
absorbed as into the system, but more as a bourgeois nationalist party
-- part of the continuing fight between the old Somocista (now slightly
democratized) and anti-Somocista bourgeois families that helped lay the
basis at one time for revolutionizing the Ortegas,
Wheelock, and others.

But this is the party through which the nationalist, anti-imperialist,
and even pro-socialist sentiments still run.  In Nicaragua, El Salvador,
and Guatemala, there was a process of not only defeating and breaking
up, but of absorbing sections of the revolutionary movements.  What
emerged from the conflict was not the unmodified reactionary social
order that went in, but something modified, broadened out in certain
ways, but also more crisis ridden, decayed, and, on the part of the
conscious revolutionaries and the masses, somewhat demoralized and
disoriented.  The fact is that for a time the Sandinistas became part of
the vanguard of those on the left who advocated the idea that "there is
no alternative" to neoliberalism and US domination.  But time has
passed, new currents are running, and it has become clearer that
neoliberalism is not the only alternative, and not even the only
alternative within the bourgeois system.

I believe that we are still a ways away from any revival of
revolutionary activity in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala, and
that the rest of Central America is much affected by the mood.  If
revolutionary action revives soon, it is more likely to be in Honduras
than the other three or even Panama.

The Sandinistas' big problem is that they are identified for many not
only with defeat, but with benefitting from the defeat during the great
pinata when quite a few Sandinista, Daniel Ortega included, became
beneficiaries as well as  victims of the defeated revolution as they
moved to takeover properties facing privatization.
But even more importantly, I think they came to represent, even to those
who still supported them helplessness before US imperialism.  This was
partly because of the isolation of Nicaragua in the world at the time --
after the stagnation of the struggle in El Salvador set in with the
destruction of the Grenadian revolution by the Coard coup which opened
the door to the US invasion.

The masses do not recover quickly when defeat in the face of
overwhelming power is combined with capitulation, and, in my experience,
the leadership which experiences this never does.  So when the US says
they will not tolerate a Sandinista government, a lot of people conclude
that a Sandinista government is not worth the effort since it cannot
stand up to the US power, which is proven and tested in battle against
Ortega's "Sandinism."  That, as well as disillusionment and so forth in
the masses, is why it is very hard to elect a Nicaraguan government
right now in the face of US opposition.  But the Sandinistas have made
gains, the US is facing revolutionary and other challenges in the
region, and everyone has the experience of Bolivia, where the US
government's attempt to exercise its veto power in the elections, became
an advantage in the electoral process for Morales (but only because he
conveyed convincingly a core of intransigeance, whatever his clarity --
or that of the masses of indigenous peasants, peddlers, workers,
etcetera -- about socialism).  So perhaps under these circumstances the
Sandinistas will have a better shot.

No, the election of Ortega to the presidency will not mean the
resumption of the Nicaraguan revolution, and I am not at all sure he any
longer has the spine needed to stand up to the US as much as Kirchner
does.  He will be the long-awaited and oft-proclaimed "another Lula", I
believe -- if we and the Nicaraguan people are lucky..

Nonetheless, I will be hoping that Ortega wins the next election, and
that the people decide to force Washington's hand -- one way or another,
to try to isolate them for democratically electing a president or to
recognize that they have lost their veto power and to try to establish a
relationship.

And I tend to believe that an FSLN government, because of its roots in
the labor movement and its ties to nationalist opposition to the
traditional level of US domination, will tend to be friendlier to
Venezuela, Bolivia, and Cuba -- much as the Lula government in Brazil
has been.
Fred Feldman
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