Introduction
In each revolutionary process that has occurred in Latin America, one can detect the influence of «Guevarismo». Che's legacy lives on in the collective imagination of the fighters, and in the debate on the methods, strategies and nature of their struggles. His message is a seed that in 30 years has taken root in the political culture of the Latin American left, developing stem and leaves, and bearing fruit. Or also, as one of the red threads that, from Patagonia to Rio Grande, have been manufactured in the fabric of dreams, utopias and revolutionary actions.
Che was not only a heroic combatant, but also a revolutionary thinker, a forerunner of a political and ethical project for which he fought and died. The philosophy that gives coercion, color and warmth to its ideological drive is a deep and original revolutionary humanism. For Che, the true communist, the true revolutionary is he who considers the problems of humanity his own personal problem; he who "feels deeply every time a man dies anywhere in the world; and it is filled with great happiness every time the flag of freedom appears anywhere in the world ».
His internationalism, in addition to being a way of life, a secular belief, a categorical imperative, and a deep sensitivity was the most original, pure, combative and concrete expression of this revolutionary humanism.
Che often repeated Martí's famous phrase that sums up "the colors of human dignity:" A true man must be hurt when another is hit in the face. " His fight to achieve this type of human dignity was the force behind his actions, from the battle of Santa Clara to his last bet in the Bolivian mountains.
Don Quixote, the novel that Che read in the Sierra Maestra and taught in his literature classes to recruits, peasants, as well as being the hero with whom he ironically identified in his last letter to his parents. At that time, too, he is not far from Marxism.
Humanism was undoubtedly Marxist, but his was an unorthodox type of Marxism, which radically departed from the dogmas found in the librettos of Soviet origin or in the "structuralist" and "antihumanist" interpretations that emerged in Europe and Latin America to mid-60s.
Che showed great interest in the writings of the young Marx in his "Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844" because that work concretely suggests "that man is an individual being, while the problems of his liberation belong to the social being", emphasizing the Relevance of the struggle of the human conscience against alienation: «without this type of enveloping consciousness of the social being of man, communism is not possible».
A deadly enemy of capitalism and imperialism, Ernesto Guevara dreamed of a world of justice and freedom, where man would stop exploiting his neighbor. The man of this new society, whom Che called "the new man" or "the man of the 21st century", would be an individual who, after breaking with alienation, would unite with his neighbors in solidarity and universal brotherhood. This new world must be a world of socialism. As Che said in his "Letter to the Tricontinental" (1967) "There is no other alternative; the socialist revolution or a caricature of revolution ».
Although Che never developed a finished theory of the role of democracy within the socialist transition, he rejected authoritarian and dictatorial conceptions that did so much damage to socialist beliefs in this century. To those who argue that people must be educated from above, that false dogma rejected by Marx in his "Thesis on Feuerbach", that is, who will teach the teacher? Che replied in a speech in 1960, "The first step in educating the people is to present the revolution to them. Never be led to believe that you can help them conquer their rights through education alone, while they must endure a despotic government. First and foremost, teach them to conquer their rights and as they gain representation in government, they will learn what you teach them and much more;without much effort they will become teachers, better than the others ».
In other words, the only pedagogy that is libertarian is one that allows the people to educate themselves through revolutionary practice, or as Marx said in German Ideology, "in revolutionary activity, personal changes coincide with a change in conditions ».
In March 1965 he wrote an essay "Socialism and Man in Cuba", in which he put under scrutiny the socialist models prevalent in the countries of Eastern Europe and, always from the humanist and revolutionary point of view, repudiated those nations whose intention was to defeat capitalism, based on its fetishisms.
"In pursuit of the Quixotic goal of building socialism through the use of spent tools inherited from capitalism - individual material incentives, profits, etc. –We could find that we reached a dead end… To build communism while strengthening the pillars of society we must create the new man. »
In relation to the fundamental economic problems that socialism had to face with the greatest urgency, Che wrote a series of articles that were published in the magazine “Nuestra Industria” and others.
As they are:
- About Production Costs. The attitude towards work. Economic interests and incentives. Method of Direction and Control of the Economy. Socialist planning.
Che had several important responsibilities in the economic direction of the Revolution that forced him to prepare and make outstanding contributions to Economic Thought, as follows:
- On October 7, 1959 he was Head of the INRA Department. On November 26, 1959 he was appointed President of the National Bank of Cuba. On February 23, 1961, he was appointed Minister of Industries until 1965, when he left for internationalist activities.
It is in the Ministry of Industries that he stays most of the time and due to the scope of his responsibilities, he was forced to study Economics, Philosophy, Accounting, Statistics and Linear Programming.
Che said that without knowing the book "Capital" one cannot be an economist in every sense of the word and devoted himself for several years to studying Karl Marx's Capital with the Soviet professor Anastasio Mancilla.
This great man was also one of the first to raise the need for a School of Economics, but not only as an institution but a School of Thought.
The general objective of this Work is to express and publicize the main economic categories in which Ché analyzed for the construction of socialism.
Latin America and underdevelopment in the thought of Che
Latin Americans find it very difficult to compete internationally with our products, mainly primary products, while we depend on large manufacturing production with high added value.
This without counting that, although the underdeveloped countries of the world represent approximately 85% of the world population, while the highly industrialized countries only represent 15%, paradoxically the underdeveloped ones produce less than 25% of the global product.
There are a series of essential structural characteristics that typify the homogeneity of the underdeveloped Latin American countries: The fundamental weight of the economy of the economically active population is in agriculture; They are open economies based on the export of a reduced group of products, generally primary, that constitute the primary source of the country's income and there is a low standard of living for the population, accompanied by high levels of unemployment, illiteracy, malnutrition and other illnesses. social.
Although we cannot depart from the analysis of the fact that Latin American countries are both heterogeneous and homogeneous, it is worth evaluating them as a whole. This does not imply ignoring that identical trajectories and development models are not possible for everyone. If anyone gave a vision of what underdevelopment was, it was Commander Ernesto Che Guevara, who using an original analogy pointed out the following:
“A dwarf with a huge head and a swollen chest is underdeveloped in that his weak legs or short arms do not articulate with the rest of his anatomy; it is the product of a teratological phenomenon that has distorted its development. That is what we really are, the softly called underdeveloped, truly colonial, semi-colonial and dependent countries. " one
From these words it is derived that Che did not link the existence of underdevelopment to any geographical, sociological or psychological fatalism; much less reduced it to a matter of low income. He associated it with distortions in the economy and society of a certain country, occurring throughout an entire historical process marked by colonialism and imperialism, which blocked the path of industrialization, and with it the conditions and forms of future development.
"The" underdeveloped "or distorted development, involves dangerous specializations in raw materials, which keep all our peoples under threat of hunger. We, the underdeveloped, are also those of the monoculture, those of the monoproduct, those of the monomarket. A unique product whose uncertain sale depends on a single market that imposes and sets conditions ”.
Therefore, its emergence is associated with colonialism first and neocolonialism later. It is characterized by structural dependence which defines its features and the dynamics of its movement. Underdevelopment, as part of the global capitalist system, atomizes societies, fragments them and makes them very vulnerable.
The internal ruling classes maintain and define their close ties to capitalism and are not interested in eliminating the status quo that guarantees their position.
In Cuba we have the advantage that the Revolutionary Government has the political will and from power it can gradually build and emerge from the structural deformations that we have suffered for centuries and that certainly cannot be resolved in a few years.
Underdevelopment and development must be seen from a multidimensional point of view, since it is not enough to take into account the economic dimension, but the social, cultural, political and environmental dimensions, among others, are of crucial importance.
The origin and consolidation of underdevelopment are linked to the conformation of the capitalist mode of production and its worldwide expansion. It is an internal and external phenomenon at the same time. The capitalist socialization of production advances both internally of each nation and externally.
Through transnationalization, capitalist socialization advances abroad, a process that, according to its convenience, has selectively annexed those territories, economies and sectors with the least degree of development, but which guarantee obtaining large sums of capital gains of the central countries of the system.
Imperialism seeks new forms of domination to achieve its objectives; that is why with free trade it tries to take advantage of unequal exchange. Proof of this can be seen in Plan Colombia and Plan Puebla-Panama, with which, under the guise of collaboration, the United States imposes transnational domination in territories rich in natural resources, with exuberant biodiversity, in addition to having important reserves gas and oil.
Other theories of underdevelopment emerged in the 1960s that gave greater importance to the external causes of this phenomenon. Likewise, great contributions were made to this conception, highlighting the intellectual Raúl Prebish, one of the most important economists in Latin America, who made scientific contributions to the problem of underdevelopment in the countries of the region, with his theoretical model that he called Center-Periphery, in which it classified developed and underdeveloped countries.
Categories of Political Economy that Ché analyzed
The dialectical character of Ché's economic idea resides in the new way in which the correlation between productive forces and production relations is theoretically reflected in the epoch of transition from capitalism to socialism. Transforming communist alienated labor involves not only producing material goods, but also producing the new, non-alienated man.
Ché was an advocate of the budgetary financing system and carries out with great respect and appreciation the criticism when establishing the general differences between the economic calculation and the budgetary financing system, where Che affirms: “It should be clarified now that what we are looking for is a more efficient way of reaching communism; there is no discrepancy in principle. ”
However, it must be said that the practical purpose in Che is not limited to achieving a strictly technical efficiency of economic management; It is not a mere comparison of social work expenses with their results. It is not even limited to the strictly national limits of our economy.
In Che's economic idea there is a need to achieve comprehensiveness conceived at all levels, even to "further unite the world socialist system."
That is why we can identify in Che a new perspective: the concept of comprehensiveness goes beyond the national limits of the proletariat, to analyze even those contradictions in international economic relations in the current international division of labor that limit the development of underdeveloped countries.
How can one aspire to transform capitalism into socialism worldwide under the brutal effects that emanate from the law of value in international economic relations with respect to revolutionary underdeveloped countries?
Che raises the need for an effective international division of labor together with the then socialist market, but with a different conception than the world market:
"… we believe that, particularly in a highly developed foreign trade society, such as ours, the law of value on an international scale should be recognized as a fact that governs commercial transactions, even within the socialist field, and we recognize the need for this trade (within the socialist field) now move to higher forms in the countries of the new society, preventing the widening of the differences between developed countries and those most backward due to the action of exchange. That is to say, it is necessary to find trade formulas that allow the financing of industrial investments in developing countries, although this contravenes the price systems existing in the capitalist market, which would allow the most even advance in the entire socialist field,with the natural consequences of smoothing out rough edges and uniting the spirit of proletarian internationalism ”.
In this warning of Che to the danger of subordinating himself to the law-of-value action, which can lead to the absence of unity and solidarity in a world socialist society, it shows what is missing from that new society that wants to build, and not only from a practical point of view, but also a theoretical one.
Ché said:
"We believe that in this spirit the responsibility of helping dependent countries should be faced and that there should be no more talk of developing a mutually beneficial trade based on prices than the law of value and international relations of unequal exchange, product of the law of value, they oppose backward countries. "
"How can it mean 'mutual benefit' to sell raw materials that cost sweat and suffering without limits to backward countries at world market prices and to buy at world market prices the machines produced in today's large automated factories?"
"If we establish that kind of relationship between the two groups of nations, we must agree that the socialist countries are, in a certain way, complicit in imperial exploitation."
In the process of building socialism, Marx, Lenin and Che agree on the idea of the "big factory", which must overcome the separation between the social division of labor at the social level and at the level of the company or economic unit, such and such occurs in capitalism. Although this "great factory" or "social productive apparatus" is still far from being achieved; From the beginning, planning must be strategically the one that guarantees the defining structural changes of the new society, which does not deny the validity of the law of value within the limits of this transit to the “great factory”.
Che himself made theoretical efforts very well aimed at determining the role of the mercantile categories: cost and price in the socialist system. In the system proposed by Che we can see the cost (as a measure of business efficiency) and the price (as a measure of social efficiency).
A "paternalistic" socialism protects the worst company not socially necessary. It is logical that a society that builds socialism inherits a non-homogeneous national productive apparatus, with a very unequal productive structure. What mechanisms must be created so that only the worst socially necessary companies work and those that outperform the latter?
It is interesting how Ernesto Che Guevara recognized the importance of comparing business production costs with a view to measuring business management efficiency; and at the same time, it recognized national prices, compared to international prices, to measure the competitiveness of the national productive apparatus vis-à-vis the rest of the world.
Socialism must induce certain competition, that which eliminates the socially unnecessary. A much-needed company may become unnecessary beyond a certain limit, even not by itself, but because the best ones move faster.
Che contributed with his ideas and practice to advance along this path of linking real social action with the socialist economic administration mechanism, even though the Budgetary Financing System did not reach its maximum development.
Che had a comprehensive conception of how socialist society should act on the various concrete economic forms (those inherited from capitalism and those that were just beginning with socialism) and very particularly for the specific case of a country like Cuba, with an underdeveloped economy, with a deformed economic structure and highly dependent on international economic relations. This comprehensive conception is one of the main advantages of the budget financing system.
Ernesto Che Guevara recognized that the Budgetary Financing System required constant improvement. This system was put into practice in Cuba, coexisting with another system in other branches of the economy: the Economic Calculation; or as Che preferred to call it, Financial self-management.
It was expected that the Budgetary Financing System; and also, the Economic Calculation, will present difficulties and limitations in its execution in an underdeveloped country like Cuba, which was just beginning this new path of socialist construction.
For Ché the basic directions in the construction of socialism are:
- Creation of the Material Technical Base of the country through the relationship and conversion of science, technology and production. The formation of the new man through the processes of direct and indirect education.
There is a dialectic between the two, sometimes this is not understood and Che is accused of being idealistic, voluntarist and his reasoning is not taken into account that to advance in the material it is necessary to advance in consciousness and vice versa.
The category Law of Value for Ché:
- The function of the Law of Value in the commercial economy is to distribute and regulate spontaneously. It produces economic-social differentiation and rivalries in the same proportions and direction of the development of mercantile production, until it comes to dominate man, to enslave him. The construction of socialism is a consciously, deliberate, volitional process, aimed at overcoming contradictions and inequalities of capitalism, to create a new way of human life. The distribution of labor and wealth, therefore, must also be deliberately planned. Planning is the fundamental way, not the only one, but the fundamental way for men to direct the fair distribution of wealth.The Law of Valor directs and distributes scarce resources in an unjust and unequal way, and subordinates men to dates. Planning directs and distributes wealth (scarce resources) according to the material and spiritual growth of all citizens and all the people. The law of value must disappear in the construction of socialism to the extent that it is achieved, through the conscious leadership of the socialist system, creating for all the material and spiritual wealth necessary to reach the kingdom of freedom.Through the conscious leadership of the socialist system, create for all the material and spiritual wealth necessary to reach the kingdom of freedom.Through the conscious leadership of the socialist system, create for all the material and spiritual wealth necessary to reach the kingdom of freedom.
The why of Commander Guevara
Since the Ministry of Industries was established on February 23, 1961, Commander Ernesto Che Guevara has been assigned the responsibility of directing that body, which had such an important role to play in promoting and diversifying the Cuban economy.
There are dissimilar colleagues from Che's stage as Minister of Industries, essentially those who worked under his direction in that organism's own building, who retain indelible memories and among them is Juan Valdés Gravalosa.
In his capacity as secretary of the Board of Directors of this Ministry, Valdés Gravalosa appreciated Che's qualities and characteristics as leader of our Revolution.
"Commander Ernesto Guevara always insisted the leaders of the Ministry of Industries on the need for study, for constant improvement, and in that he was also an example.
“He didn't just ask others to study, he was the first to do it.
“I remember that at a meeting at the agency, he asked each person present what he was or was going to study.
“I do not forget that a colleague who was characterized by being quite self-sufficient told him that he had no need to study because he had a university degree.
“In a rather unfortunate tone he commented that he was not in the situation of other leaders of the Ministry who had low school level.
Hearing these words, Che interrupted him and asked him with some sharpness:
-Can you tell me what is the fundamental law of socialism?
"The obviously surprised comrade did not manage to give a specific answer and remained in the air.
"Then Che limited himself to comment:
-You see, despite your level you don't know how to answer that elementary question, so you should study political economy ”.
Famous phrases in the Thought of Ché
"The fight for product quality is a revolutionary and avant-garde fight, and they are never mistaken in thinking that by being a revolutionary you can give the people a poor quality product, that would be an attack on the Revolution."
"The budgetary financing calculation system, of the monopoly system, is more progressive than the self-management system."
“Achieving the satisfaction of the ever increasing needs of the population is a moral law or a political objective, in no case of an economic nature. The Fundamental Law of Socialism would be planning, linked to the development of the productive forces and consciousness. "
"Measure of ideological political work aimed at training the new man provided with efficiency and with technical criteria."
"To build communism, simultaneously with the material base, you have to make a new man."
"… in Cuba there is nothing published, if we exclude the Soviet bricks that have the inconvenience of not letting you think (…) as a method it is the most anti-Marxist, but also they are usually very bad. So I made a curriculum for myself, which I think can be studied and greatly improved to form the basis of a true school of thought. ” (Letter from Che to Armando Hart Dávalos).
“The new formation society has to compete very hard with the past. This is felt not only in the individual conscience, where the residues of an education systematically oriented to the isolation of the individual weigh, but also because of the very character of this period of transition with persistent mercantile relations. The commodity is the economic cell of capitalist society; as long as it exists, its effects will be felt in the organization of production and therefore in consciousness…. ”
“We are not facing the period of pure transition, as Marx saw it in the Critique of the Gotha Program, but a new phase not foreseen by him; first period of transition from communism or the construction of socialism. This takes place amid violent class struggles and with elements of capitalism within it that obscure the full understanding of its essence.
Most important characteristics of the economic thought of che
To better understand Che's thinking, it is good to take into account articulated axes that identify him as genes that articulate all his work.
- The Latin American vocation. The people as subject and protagonist of the story. In all his work there is a level of historicity. The Conception of the revolutionary struggle (guerrilla warfare). At the time it was like the fundamental way to achieve the objectives of transforming society, today there are other ways. The Battle of Ideas for example. The Conception of development and social.
The economic-philosophical thinking of Ché has a coherent conception of the world.
- His philosophical conceptions of praxis allow him to overcome the old dichotomy between "materialism and idealism". It is not that it is neutral, but that it does not go to extremes. It thinks of society as a whole. It places the main problems of philosophy in close relationship with politics, economy and history. It divides the problems into pieces, systematizes them and unites them into a whole. The construction of socialism is not only a new way of distributing social wealth, a new morality, but of living, of creating a new culture. Economy gave the subjectivism factor a privileged place. It assigns a great strategic importance to the development of consciousness. You cannot build the new society without the creative criticism that the new man means.
Criticism for Ché is a critically coherent conception of the world.
- It has to be dialogue, never monologue, it is not just valuation, it is above all creation. Criticism makes thought, creates thought, is the source of ideas and culture as well as the enunciative and transforming force of reality. Honesty, restraint and common sense, are three substantial attributes of criticism, both of scientific criticism and that carried out daily in the social and political life of society.
The objectives of teaching Ché in the new socialist and communist society are:
- Family cultural training. Special interest in history, philosophy, literature and mathematics. Knowledge of classical and Latin American Marxist thought. Tour of the "Capital America". Knowledge and its relations with the revolutionary processes of Latin America. The enormous will and his concern for his human improvement and that of others.
Ché spoke of the main interrelated processes in the construction of the new socialist model, these are:
- Transformation of agrarian structures. Agrarian reform. Progressive industrialization. Education and culture. Science and Technique. Participation of workers, of the people in all transforming processes.
These processes exposed thus by Che have continued to be promoted by Fidel as an expression of the continuity of revolutionary thought, typical of our process.
Conclusions
As a final consideration of this presentation, I want to emphasize that Ché's vision was marked by a depth in his experiences and conscience that made him determine the future with incalculable certainty, hence his commitment to the ethical and human values of the new man.
Che's economic formation goes through a process of critical assimilation of economic ideas, theories and doctrines elaborated, developed and disclosed by economists of different currents and schools of economic thought; however, revolutionary practice in Cuba is the determining factor of his work and thought in the field of economic and social theory.
It must be borne in mind that building socialism on a small, underdeveloped, long and narrow island with few natural resources, with great structural deformations, pressured on the one hand by the United States and the capitalist world and on the other by the socialist world especially The USSR, which although it also helped, made it difficult to create an economic model, hence the changes and experimentation that logically had to be done.
He was a true communist, who lived in very difficult times and that his thinking is more important today than ever.
The Latin American peoples that today rise for a better world with the day-to-day construction of ALBA, is the best tribute that can be given to this Great Man of Humanity.
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