components of political change in latin america - fitzgibonn

8/12/2019 Components of Political Change in Latin America - Fitzgibonn

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Components of Political Change in Latin AmericaAuthor(s): Russell H. Fitzgibbon

Source: Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs, Vol. 12, No. 2 (Apr., 1970), pp.187-204Published by: Center for Latin American Studies at the University of MiamiStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/174869 .

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/[ r. Tad Szulc, a highlyperceptiveandknowledgeableNew YorkTimes correspondentand certainly an "old Latin American

hand"wrote very wisely: "One of the first rules a reporterneedsto learn in LatinAmerica s that he mustneverbe swayedby rea-son orlogic in trying o gaugefutureevents.Thispreceptshouldapply aswell to thecontemporaryistorianor to the foreign-policymakerobserv-ing the LatinAmericanscene, who must realizethat neithershort-norlong-rangepredictions re possibleand that n allwisdomnoneshouldbeattempted.The sceneis too crowded, he actorsmove too fast, propelledby visibleand invisible orces of formidalble agnitude." Havinguttered

thiswarning,Mr.Szulc proceeded o violate it andmake some sage ob-servationsaboutthe "tomorrow" f LatinAmerica.It mayconsequentlybe permitted this writer to ignore an undoubtedlysound caveat andspeculate or a shortspaceaboutpoliticaltrends n LatinAmerica,withfull realization,however,thatthe imagesone sees inside the crystalballareby no meansclear and certain.

LatinAmerica s a vast andcomplex area and generalization boutit is oftengratuitousand certainlysubjectto qualification t everyturn.But the

inescapable act of LatinAmericanpoliticallife is change-al-teration, nnovation,transition,conversion-or, to use a half-patentedterm from the Latin Americanvocabulary,revolution.But change, or

1 Tad Szulc, The Windsof Revolution: Latin America Today-and Tomorrow(New York: FrederickA. Praeger Inc., 1963), p. 282.

187







188 JOURNALOF INTER-AMERICANTUDIESAND WORLDAFFAIRS

even revolution,has manyelements.Amongthemare the initialbase,the

tempo, direction,sponsorship,aims, controls.Changein any organism

occursconstantly,of course,andLatinAmericanpoliticalsocietyis noexce4ptiono thatgeneralization. erhapsadequatewayscouldbe devised

for gettinga satisfactoryprofileof this continuum,even takinginto ac-

count its proteanelements,but it mightbe more useful to look at the

situationat two contrasting ointsin its development, ay the middleof

the nineteenth enturyandtoday,a hundred-odd earslater.

OLDWINE

As of 1850, even at theriskof grossoversimplification,t wouldbereasonably afe to concludethat politicalsocietyin LatinAmericawas

dominatedby that muchpublicized rio of vested interests,the landed

aristocracy,he military,andthe Church.The estancierosand hacenda-

dos, the militarycaudillos and generals, and memibersof the upper

Churchhierarchymadecommoncausebecause t was to theireconomic

and political nterests o do so. Amongthemselves hey sharedpoliticaland socialpowerand, almostwithoutexception,wereunwilling o broad-

en thebase of thepowerstructure.They were not alwayssociallyor ethnicallyrelated-caudillos and

highmilitary igures oftenthetwotermswere virtuallynterchangeable)werefrequentlydrawnfrom mestizoranks,thoughthe othertwo groups

were usuallycreole-but controlof powercould go a long way towardlevelingof socialbarriershatotherwisewouldhavebeen difficult o sur-

mount.The generalcouldgainestates,oftenby dubiousmeans,andthus

at least partlyopen the door to social status.It was by somewhatthe

sa-me rocess, hough essrefined, hatthenouveauxriches n eighteenth-andnineteenth-centurynglandcould gain partialsocial acceptanceby

buying ntothe landedgentry.It is incorrectto think 'of Latin Americanpolitical society of the

mid-nineteenth enturyas characterized y placidityand calm, though

perhapsstagnations a reasonably atisfactoryermto use. Changewas

there,but its tempowas slow. The greatinfluxof Europeanmigration,withiitspowerfulyeastyeffect,had not yet begun.Only in Mexicowere

the tocsinsof reformand social revolutionbeginning o sound.Argen-tinawasreturningo constitutionalismbut,n considerablemeasure, hat

merelyperpetuatedor severaldecadesa statusquothat evenRosashad

donelittleto alterbasically.Almost everywhere lse, one might have re-

marked hat the morethingschanged, he morethey remained he same.

Changesin individualcountriesbetweenthat relatively nert mid-

nineteenth-centuryoint and the presentday cannotbe sketchedhere.







190 JOURNAL OF INTER-AMERICAN STUDIES AND WORLD AFFAIRS

political change, even offer to lead it. But the question tself overlooksthe essentially ngrownand staticcharacterof the class. Its membersare

sociallyandpsychologically nsulated, hey reflectfully as much as didcourt parasites n pre-1789 France an after-us-4he-delugettitude,theyare the unconscious xponentsof what some LatinAmericansare comingto refer to as juan birchismo.They move in a world of social isolationlike theirkinsmen n the famous ditty aboutBoston,

Where the Lowells speak only with Cabots,And the Cabots speak onlywith God.

To an even greaterdegree than is true of upperclasses, the rising

middleclass, segment,or sector, s keyed to mid-twentieth-centuryalues,wants,anddrives.The middleclass, heterogeneousn composition houghit is, has clearly distinguishable ifferences rom the lower classes. Per-haps as obvious as any is its insistenceon appearanceand "face"as re-flectedin dress, mannerof living, literacy, and type of occupation.Themiddleclass in most parts of Latin America is sufficientlynew that itsmembersusuallyseek to performan individual"OperationBootstrap"and elevate themselvesand their immediate amilies nto the upper class

becausethe inheritedprestigeof the latter is even yet so great.In otherwords, middle-classvalues and status have not yet fully emergedas de-sirableend-points n themselves.In such countriesas Argentina,Uru-guay,Chile, and Mexico, the time may not be far distant,however,whenachievement f solid middle-class osition may be an acceptable erminalsocial status.

As it standseven now, politicsin LatinAmerica is dominated,notmerelyin the four states just mentionedbut in most others as well, byindividuals romthe middlestrataof the social structure.Civilian pro-fessionalpoliticiansand armyofficersalike come overwhelminglyromthose ranks.Not only is that true, but it is equallyevidentand significantthat the large majorityof thosewho contribute o the vitalityof life andculture in most parts of Latin America are middle-classindividuals,whether t be in the realmof theeconomy, he arts, iterature,ntellectualcircles,or others.Only in the area of the economy must middle-classcontributions harewith thoseof thenew rich. Even lalboreaders,whomwe almost nstinctively ssociatewith itheproletariat, re oftenof middle-

classstatus.The lowerclasscan be dividedinto two broadsegments: ndustrial

workers,withwhom shouldprobablybe grouped he unskilled abor en-gagedin mining, and, in the secondplace, peasantsor landlessagricul-tural aborers. n termsof their mpacton the powerstructure f a givencountry,the lower class could formerlybe safely ignored.That is no







COMPONENTS OF POLITICAL CHANGE IN LATIN AMERICA 191

longertrue. Especially hrough he device of the laborunion,with all ofits hierarchical roliferation, ut in occasional nstances hroughagricul-

turalorganizations s well, the lower classes have gained the instrumen-talitiesby which theycan anddo affectpolitics.Unless thatimpactwereto be entirelyartificialand unrealistic, he lower classes had first to begiven political articulateness-and Peron, Castro, Gaitan, Juliao, andothershave helped provide t.

All of this openingup of the closed societythat markedthe LatinAmerica of a centuryago has naturallyand inevitablydiminished heprestigiousand monopolistic ole formerly njoyedby the oligarchy.The

militaryhas been similarlyaffected.Armies, as of a centuryago, were in virtuallyall cases repositories

of rawforce. Air forces were of coursenonexistentand navies almostso;hence commentcanbe confined o armies.Theycompletely acked mod-ern professionalization,hey were caudillo-led n most instances,theirvehicle to politicalpower was a figurativearmytank riding roughshodover all opposition,even as a real tank might do some decadesin thefuture.Finesse beganto come into the operationof even militarycaudi-

llos in thelatterpartof thenineteenth enturyand it was evenmore truein the twentiethexcept in such interludesas the militarydecadeof theMexicanRevolution,when naked and elemental orce madea mockeryof anypretenseof military ophistication.

By the present time, the military picture has altered drastically.Edwin Lieuwen, one of the foremost studentsof the Latin Americanmilitary,categorizes he score of states as those "in which the armedforces dominatepolitics,"the ones "in which the armed forces are intransition rompoliticalto nonpoliticalbodies,"and those"in which thearmed forces are nonpolitical."Writing n 1960, his three groupsin-cludedrespectively: 1) the DominicanRepublic,Nicaragua,Paraguay,El Salvador,Haiti,Honduras,andPanama; 2) Cuba, Guatemala,Ven-ezuela,Peru,Ecuador,Argentina,andBrazil;and (3) Colombia,Chile,Mexico, Bolivia, Uruguay,and Costa Rica. Using 1960 population ig-ures, the three groups'respectivepercentagesof total Latin Americanpopulationwere 7.8, 60.8, and 31.4.

Viewingthesceneseveralyearslater,one mightbe inclined o alterthe categoriessomewhat,althougheven the militarydictatorships pec-tacularlyestablishedn Argentina,Brazil,and Peruprobablydo not in-validateascription f transitionaltatusto those countries.Lieuwencon-cludes that the states in his intermediategroup "assume overridingimportance n contemporaryLatin America,not only becausethey con-tain three-fifths f the population,but also because these countriesare







192 JOURNAL F INTER-AMERIcANTUDIESAND WORLDAFFAIRS

currently n the throesof the military-civiliantrugglefor power. Thefutureof LatinAmericaas a whole may be largelydeterminedby the

duration ndoutcomeof this struggle.For completelyntertwinedwiththelatter,but dependentupon it in manyways, are suchmajor ssuesas that

of dictatorshipersusdemocracy ndthatof evolutionor revolution n theprocessof social change."

A very roughrule of thumbas to what is happeningto militaryimpacton politicsmay be foundin determination f years of civilianasagainstmilitarypresidenciesn the severalstates, as shownin Table 1.The tabulation epresentsat best only an approximation ecauseof the

arbitrary ecisionsthatmustbe made at a numberof pointsin its con-struction nd because heresultingdatarevealonlythebones andnot thefleshof politics.Forwhateverhe deductionsmaybe worth,therespectivepercentages f civilianpresidenciesn the almostsevendecadesthatcon-stituteda little more than the first two-thirdsof the twentiethcenturywere 46, 63, 71, 52, 56, 55, and 70; the overall averagefor the firstsixty-nineyearsof the century s 58 percentof the time undercivilianpresidencies.The trendtowardcivilismis definitethoughnot startling.

The "backsliding"n the 1930s maybe accounted or in partby govern-mentaldeterioration nd crisisas a consequenceof the worldwidede-pressi-on.

Professionalizationf LatinAmericanarmies,beginningwithChile

and Argentinaate in thenineteenth entury,providedan antidote o thecorrelationwith economicdevelopment, ocial rationalization, nd po-litical stability.

But professionalismmongthe militarygraduallybeganto developa secondedgeon the figurativepoliticalswordwielded,an edge thatbe-

came progressivelymoresignficant s the originalone lost its sharpness.The secondedge was honedfrom the growingmilitaryconviction,espe-ciallyevidentaftereconomicbreakdownn 1929 and later had demon-

stratedfrequentcivilianinabilityto cope with governmental risis, that

the armedforceswere equippedand morallyboundto step in politicalcrises and try to resolve them. Sometimes his was in a sense of their

being"abovethe battle,"as occasionallyn Brazil;moreoften,the mili-

tary projectedtself intothe thickof the politicalbattle,as in Argentina.

This convictionof a sensitivity o politicalmissionand obligationwaspartlyborn of a new prideand confidence elt by the militaryas it be-

came increasinglyprofessionalized.The prideand confidencewere ad-

mirableas long as they pointed he armed orcesalonga strictlymilitary

2 EdwinLieuwen, Arms and Politics in Latin America (New York: Published

for the Council on Foreign Relations by FrederickA. Praeger, Inc., 1961), p. 172.







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path; when they began servingas guidepostspointingtoward politicalactivityandintervention hey becameunfortunate.

Economicgrowthanddiversification,ocial stabilization,and polit-ical democratization-admittedlyarge orders n manyLatin Americanstates-will make militarismmore anomalousas timepasses. The devel-opment is apt to be erratic, f for no otherreason than that, with theirmilitaryhardware, he armedforceshave instruments or continuing oexert a direct impacton politics that the other two classic institutionscannot match.On the otherhand, the increasinganomieto be found inpolitics in manypartsof LatinAmericacan,if accompanied y a general

insensitivity y a military egime n powertoward he 'basic ausesof thatalienation,result n blindmilitary nsistenceon retentionof power.Big(military)Brotherknows best -whether thatis a rationalconclusionornot. Golpismo s contagious,and leadersof coups sometimesmove on abasisof camaraderiewiththeiroppositenumbersn othercountries.

The third of the classic institutions, he Catholic church,has alsoundergone reat changeover a century.Traditionally,t was regardedasalmost wholly conservative,or even reactionary,an all but automatic

supporterof established ay authorityand an unquestioningally of thehereditaryanded aristocracy.Althoughostensiblykeyedto divineratherthanmundaneauthority,he Church n LatinAmerica,as in SpainfromReconquestdays forward,did not hesitateto use its great weight forpoliticalends.The apogeedoubtlesscamein GarciaMoreno'sEcuador.But the Church, perhapspartlybecause of its very institutionalization,probablypartiallydue to its sophistication, nd certainly n part becauseof its inheritanceof centuriesof experience,was better fitted than theothertwo classic institutions o bend to the winds of change.The firstalteration eemedto come with Pope Leo's famousRerumNovarum n1891.

Otherevidencesof adaptation ollowedin course, spurredby thecatalyst of additionalimportant encyclicals in 1931 and 1961. TheChurchbecameactivehereand there n organizing nddirectingCatholic-orientedaborunions;some of its hierarchyadvocateddistribution f itssurplus andsamongthe landless;mostsignificant f all, perhaps,Chris-tian Democraticpartiesstarted o modernize he conservative mageof

the Churchn politics.Aggiornamento egancharacterizinghe Catholicchurchhereandthere nLatinAmerica.

The Churchhas increasingly ecognized he growingpluralismandsecularnatureof Latin Americansociety. Perhaps t was forcedto, per-hapsit did so willingly.No one,noteven themost devotedCatholic,nowmaintains hat Latin Americais sufficientlyCatholic that communism







196 JOURNALF INTER-AMERICANTUDIES NDWORLD FFAIRS

can makeno head-wayn thearea.Communisms makingheadway; o isProtestantism,speciallywith the redirectionof missionary hrust after

manyAsiatic regionswere blockedoff; and so are spiritualism ndothermarginalults.Emphasison economicdevelopmentendsto providemorefertilesoil for a "Protestant thic" (however that term may be defined)that waspreviously egarded s only a tare n LatinAmerican ields.

The eminentauthority . Lloyd Mechamquotesa MaryknollFather,AlbertJ. Nevins, in a frankcategorizationof the status of the Churchin Latin Americaas of 1956: "1. Areas where the Church s strong andhas vitality: Mexico, Costa Rica, Colombia, and Argentina.2. Areas

wherethe Church s standingstill: Guatemala,Nicaragua,El Salvador,Chile,Venezuela,Peru andUruguay.3. Areas where he church s dying:Bolivia, Brazil, Cuba,DominicanRepublic,Ecuador,Haiti, Honduras,and Panama." Even without necessarilyacceptingthe abasement m-plied in that pessimisticCatholicestimate, t is obviousthat the Churchhas lost much of its former mpacton LatinAmericanpolitics.

The statistical rofileof the Churchn LatinAmericaprovidessomebasis for the gloominessof FatherNevins' evaluation.In terms of the

slowgrowthof thepriesthoodmeasuredagainstgeneralpopulationgains,thecontinuingarge contingentsof foreignpriests n somecountries, heincreasingatio of eitherCatholicsorall inhabitantso numbers f priests,andotherfactors, t is apparent hat in many partsof Latin AmericatheChurch s on the defensiveand is not in a positionto take an aggressiverole in politics. The average numberof Catholics per priest in LatinAmerica in 1960, for example,was 4,531 and at the same time thecorrespondingigure or the UnitedStateswas 684, a ratioof morethansix and a half to one in favorof the UnitedStates.Althoughthey show

various nternaldiscrepancies,omeof the relevant tatistics,drawn romvariedofficialandquasi-officialCatholicsources,are included n table2.

AND NEW BATTLES

Granting hat the political influenceof the classic institutions nLatinAmerican ociety s vastlydiminished, r at leastaltered,whatnewforces, practices,or groupsaredetermiiningndwill determine he shapeof politics n LatinAmerica?

One of themostimportant lements n thewholepicture s the fan-tastic rateof growthof LatinAmerica'spopulation.This is an aspectoftheproblemof politicsthat,if treatedat all, is dealt withonly casuallyor

incidentally y virtually verywriterwho mentions t. And yet it is of the

3 J. Lloyd Mecham, Churchand State in Latin America (Chapel Hill, N.C.:Universityof North CarolinaPress, 1966), pp. 423-424.








greatest ignificance. ome timebetween1945 and 1950 the total LatimAmericanpopulationpassed that of the UnitedStates,althoughpopula-

*tions f the areashad beenroughlyequalfor many decades.UnitedNations demographersstimate hat by the year 2000 Latin

Americawill have approximately 00,000,000 people, about twice thethenprojectedpopulationof the United States. Many Latin Americangovernments ind it difficulteven now to providebasic social services-education,healthand welfare,sanitation,housing,etc.-for theirpopu-lationsbut theproblemwill be squaredor cubed in size and complexitywith a populationof 600,000,000 only a little more than a generation

hence.The cancerousgrowthof urbanslums (and there are ruralslumsas well) simplyadds a furtherdimension o the problem.

The increase n LatinAmericaneconomicproductivity alls greatlybehind heincrease n biologicalreproduction. heproductiveage brack-ets, generally peaking rom fifteento sixty,will declinein proportion ototal populations n most LatinAmericancountries, he UnitedNationspredicts,and hencethey will have to supportproportionatelyargernum-bers of personsunder fifteenand over sixty. Several countriesare even

now dangerously verpopulatedn proportion o theirresourcesof landandagriculturalroduction,mineralwealth,andindustry.Housingdefi-cits were calculated o total 40,000,000 units in 1960, and it was esti-mated that the deficit would have grownby more than 50 percentby1975. Percapita oodproduction ncreases essrapidly hanpopulationnvirtually verycountryof LatinAmerica.All of thesegrimstatistics pell"trouble,"nitaliccapitals, or LaitinAmericangovernmentsf any politi-calcomplexion.

How city populationgrowthexceedsnational ncreases,how mostdeath ratesgo downandbirthratesgo up, how most countriesarepro-jectedto lose proportionatelyn the productiveage bracketfromfifteento fifty-nine the fractionof the population hatmustproduce he wealththat willenablegovernments o provideprogressively roader ervices orconstantlyexpandingpopulation)is shown in Table 3, drawnor com-puted romU.N. sources.

The potential,and indeedalmostcertain,troublethat comes fromthedemographic icturewouldnotnecessarilyhave arisena centuryago,

even moving the currentpopulationincreaseback to that time. Thepartialexplanationies in the fact thatin recentdecadesa technologicalrevolutionhas occurred hat has had a powerfulconditioningeffectonpolitics.Radio and televisionhavegiveneven the illiterate avela-dwelleran access to politicsthat he could not possibly have had a few decadesago.Theyhave convincedhimthatcontemporarymancan have a better







198 JOURNAL F INTER-AMERICANTUDIESAND WORLDAFFAIRS

TABLE 3

ProjectedAnnualate Rateof % Changen% Change n gains r ossof population urban death ate, birth ate, (%) n15-59increaseO), increase 1930-60 1930-60 agegroup,

Country 1958-62 1960-80

Argentina................ 1.6 2.8 ............ ............ - 3.1Bolivia................ 1.4 3.1 . .......... ............ -10.7Brazil.... 3.4 4.2 ............ ............ - 2.8Chile................ 2.4 3.6 -49.0 -10.3 + 4.3Colombia... 2.2 5.4 + 2.4 +35.0 + 7.9CostaRica ................ 4.3 6.0 -61.8. . - 1.3Cuba................ 2.0 3.3 ........... ............ ............DominicanRepublic....... 3.6 5.8 ............ ........... ............Ecuador................ 3.2 5.2 -38.4 + 3.6 - 2.5El Salvador............... 3.6 4.8 -49.1 + 1.5 - 4.1Guatemala................ 3.2 5.2 -29.1 -12.8 - 6.6Haiti ................ 2.2 7.3 ............ ............ ............Honduras................ 3.0 7.1 -39.1 +19.5 - 3.4Mexico................ 3.1 4.7 -56.8 - 6.9 - 4.1Nicaragua................ 3.5 6.1 ........ ........... - 4.2Panama................ 3.3 3.8 -36.6 +29.1 - 4.5Paraguay................ 2.4 3.8 ............ ............ -2.9

Peru.2.0 4.0 - 9.9 .. + 7.7Uruguay................ 1.4 1.7 -29.0 -11.3 - 2.8Venezuela................ 3.4 5.4 -56.4 +54.5 - 2.7

andfuller ife than his fatherandgrandfather adbeforehim. The poli-ticians have discovered the people.

This growing mutual awareness does not mean that the relationship

immediately and automatically becomes rational. It does not. As men-

tioned before, such quasi-demagogues as the Argentine, Cuban, Colom-bian, and Brazilian examples named-and others-have fully exploited

the possibilities. To introduce rationality into the picture will require ad-

ditional poli-ticaleducation and maturity on the part of the masses, but

there is no denying the fact that the communications revolution has

enormously broadened, currently and, even more, potentially, the base of

politics.A subtle but important by-product of the gift of political articulate-

ness to new millions of lower-class Latin Americans is the substitution,or

attempted substitution, of new formnsof sociopolitical guidance in their

adopted urban environment. in the earlier and more static rural society,

the lower-class individual was a more or less willing subordinate in the

master-and-manrelationship in which the patron provided not only social

control and economic domination but also political supervision in the

narrowly circumscribed area of political activity open to the peon. It







200 JOURNALOF INTER-AMERICANSTUDIES AND WORLD AFFAIRS

litical activityand manipulation.The trend is enhancedby the fact thatlabor leaders are often venal and self-seeking.Were labor activity and

groups more substantive,ess synthetic, he long-range nfluenceof or-ganized abor would be strengthened.As mattersstand, organized aboris often weak and hence correspondingly ependenton militaryor polit-ical allies, where it can gain them, and moresusceptible o Communistpenetration nd nfluence.

Pluralization f Latin American ociety andbroadening f the polit-ical base are reflectedby proliferationof politicalparties.4The day islong since and permanently ast when a catalogueof parties n a given

countrywould contain only the entriesConservativeand Liberal. Chilehas long providedan exampleof a multiparty ystem;Argentina grantednormalpoliticalconditions) seems to be movingin the same direction;othercountriesmay follow. On the otherhand,evidence romChile,bothstatutoryand political, may point towarddecrease in the numberofpartiesand ideologicalpolarization f those remaining.

Not only are political parties subject to the arithmeticof multipli-cation and division-they reflect other trendsas well. One of the most

significant f these is the tendencyfor personalisticpartiesto declineinnumbersand impactand, by the same token,for ideologicaland institu-tionalizedparties o increase.Parties such as werebuilt aroundVelascoIbarranow seem anachronistic.Even the sortof party thatPer6nbuilt,highly structuredhough t was, will probablynot often be duplicatednthefuture.

The Cuban scene is to so great a degreesui generisthat Castro'srelationship o futurepolitical partiesin the islandcannot be predictedwithany assurance.PRI in Mexicooffersby all oddsthe best illustrationof party nstitutionalization.ts monolithicnature lowsin importantpartfrom its monopoly of the party picture, but even where genuine partycompetition xists further nstitutionalizationmay wel come, thoughnotime tablecan be advanced.

"Nationalrevolutionary"'r "aprista-type" roups seemed, someyearsback,to be the waveof the partyfuture in manyLatin Americanstates.Theynowappear o have lost someof theirappeal.For one thing,their essentialdevotion to democracysubjects hemto the likelihoodof

intemalschisms.Foranother, heir nherently eformist haracter ttractsto them in the firstplaceidealistswho in somecases (a) lack experience

4 RussellH. Fitzgibbon,Directory of Latin American Political Parties, March1970. Booklet 2 in Special Studies Series, Center for Latin American Studies,Arizona State University, Tempe 85281. [Editor'snote: This importantpublicationis distributed ree to scholarsin Latin Americanstudies.]








withthe hardrealitiesof partyoperationandperhapsalsothepatience o

learnthem,and (b) maybe subjectto the temptations hat come from

accessor nearaccessto powerandwealth.The metamorphosisn CubanAutenticoss a goodillustration f the latterpossibility.A thirddifficultyfacedby nationalrevolutionary arties s that,thoughthey are not per-

sonalisticgroups, heytendto retain hesame eadershiphroughheyearsand decadesand henceface theriskof runningout of freshblood,steam,ideas, and appeal.Casesin pointcan be foundin the ArgentineSocialistpartyand in the prototypeof themall, the PeruvianApra.

A possibleparty-typeubstituteorthenational evolutionaryroups

maybe the ChristianDemocraticparties.They, like the apristagroups,are reformistalmostby definition,but they differin ithat hey stress a

Christian thicand have at least a tenuousassociationwiththe Catholicchurch.The relationshipbetween party and Churchis of course un-

officialand is viewed warilyby the latter and occasionallyso by theformer. f themodernizationf theChurchcontinuesandsolidifies,how-ever, it is at least conceivablethat at some indeterminableime in thefuture he association ouldbecomeasclose and symibiotics the Church

relationshipormerlywas withConservative arties.Then,LatinAmericaseems alwaysto have with it the Communist

party.LatinAmericanattitudes owardtheirCommunistpartiesareless

emotional hanthosefoundin the UnitedStatesand,by the same token,Communistactivityis usually much freer there than in the northernrepublic.Communistpartiesgenericallyare probablyas realisticand as

little subjectto illusionas any politicalgroupsin Latin America.Theyhave the commondenominator f normallybeinghighly disciplinedand

of beingsubjectto a uniform oreigncontrolin far greaterdegreethan

is trueof ChristianDemocraticparties-if, indeed,a case couldbe madeforanyuniform upervision f thelatter,whichis verydoubtful.

Sino-Sovietdifferences,not to mentionthe unpredictablenterna-

tionalcoursesfollowedby fidelismo,maybringdeteriorationn the uni-

formityof directionof Latin Americancommunism; wo, and possibly

three,rivalpullswithincommunismend to dilute ts effectiveness.There

seems ittle ikelihood,however, hata "national ommunism"will emerge

withanything pproachinghe freedomof action and the variation hown

by individualSocialistparties n Latin America.LatinAmericaseemstohaveno Titos,unlessweputCastro n thatclass.

The threatof fidelismo o the orderlydevelopmentof LatinAmeri-

ca's politics appearsto be diminishing, xcept that the social and eco-

nomic stressesand imbalancesthat plow the groundfor fidelismo are

probablygetting worse instead of better. By the beginningof 1959,








Castro had captured the imagination of Latin America as no other man

in history had done. Had he, within the next year or two, been as free

to "export revolution" or to make the Andes "the SierraMaestra of LatinAmerica" as he might have wished, it is entirely possible that other

"Cubas" might have been planted here and there in Latin America. But it

is highly questionable whether the Soviet Union wants the embarrass-

ment or could support the cost of additional Latin American ventures of

this kind. Furthermore, Castro's failure to build a Cuban utopia has di-

vested him of much of the glamour he earlier held for uncritical Latin

Americans. It is doubtless not prudent to conclude that a fidelista-type

revolution is impossible elsewhere in Latin America, but Castro's stockhas certainly fallen.

In a rather extensive correspondence the present writer had a few

years ago with a Catholic bishop in Latin America (who doubtless should

remain unnamed) the cleric made the frank and interesting comment

that in the length and breadth of Latin America he saw only two ge-

neric political parties that were cognizant of the great pressures for social

reform boiling up all over the area and which were putting forward pro-

grams designed to relieve the pressures. One was the Christian Demo-

cratic, the other the Communist party. He did not include national revo-

lutionary parties or, specifically, the fidelista brand of communism. He

would doubtless have been the first to assert that the sincerity of the ones

he named, i.e., Christian Democratic and Communist, differed as day

from night, but the coupling of the two, coming as it did from a highly

placed prelate, was significant. Many persons would agree that Christian

Democrats and Communists are making the most conscious and insistent

efforts of any Latin American parties to seize leadership of the process

of political change.

An anonymous but discerning commentator wrote in a leading jour-

nal at midcentury that

The obstaclesto the growth of democracyin Latin America,specifically,have been and continueto be: (1) poverty,whichlimits the enjoymentof political freedomby imposingits ownkind of bondage; (2) illiteracy,which goes with poverty andperpetuates t; (3) social insecurity,which makes for despera-

tion and focuses men's attention on more practicalimmediateobjectivesthan those of political democracy;and (4) a tradi-tion of political behaviormarkedby intemperance, ntransig-ence, flamboyance,and worshipof strongmen.5

5 Y," "On a Certain Impatience with Latin America," Foreign Aflairs 28(July 1950): 569.








He shouldhave addeda fifth, or perhapsa first, obstacle: an appallingpopulation ncrease, that imposes a movableceiling against which, as

they rise, economicdevelopmentand politicalaspirationsare constantlybumping heir heads.

IN SUM

Except for neo-Fascistsof various stripes and an occasional dic-tator, very few Latin Americanswould repudiatedemocracyas a goal;even Peronclaimedto be a "democrat" ut the emphasesare differentin LatinAmericaand the United States.In the formerarea, for obvious

reasons, the stress s more on social equalityandeconomic opportunity;in theUnitedStates, t is on politicaldemocracy.Given the attitudesand circumstancesof Latin America, govern-

mentalstabilityandpoliticaldemocracymaycome to the area,butprob-ably only after markedsocial and economicimprovementhas been at-tained. Most norteamericanosail to recognizethe priorities he Latinunconsciously ets forhimself.In consequence,hey undulycriticize heirfellow Americansdown under ornot using a value systemand a context

of changethatwould fit a formatwith which those in the United Stateshave been familiarsincebirthand evenby inheritance.Revolutionof its ownkindwill come to LatinAmerica.Its ultimate

formandguidanceare as yet obscured.John Gerassi n The GreatFearbelieves that only two possibilitiesexist: Communist eadershipor ex-tremenationalist,probablymilitary, eadership.6Tad Szulc in his Windsof Revolution eelsthatLatinAmericawillprobablynot"go Communist"or, on theotherhand,blindlyandunquestioninglyollowa revolutionaryblue printsuch as mightbe involved in the Alliance for Progress.It ismorelikely,he suggests, hat the two alternativesmightneutralizeeachother and thatLatinAmerica'scoursewill representa synthesisof thetwo, in order o maintain he area on anuncommitted asis.

It seemsentirelyprobable hatchangewillcome notby someGrandDesignbutratherby piecemeal, rial-and-erroralancingandadjustmentof pressures, esistanceby thosewho will sufferfromchange,insistenceby ones who willprofit.This willprobablyoftenbe accompanied y vio-lence. Many persons in Latin Americaare not inclined,eitherby in-

heritanceor perhapseven by temperament,o look very favorablyonconciliationand compromise-they may involve a risk to dignidadorevenhonor.By the sametoken, completereliance on the ballot box asthe implementor solving politicalproblemss the exceptionrather han

6 John Gerassi, The Great Fear: The Reconquest of Latin America by LatinAmericans (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1963).








the rule;with good historicalreason, the integrityof electionshas toooften beenopento question.Politicshasbeen takenwithdeadlyserious-

ness and theleavenof a senseof humorhas too oftenbeenlacking.But thereis evidencethat these conditions, oo, are changing, ust

as the underlying ocial and economicsituationsare changingtorren-tially.Brazil,usually,has developeda reputation or findingexpedientsolutions,a middle way, to its problems (which, incidentally,makesmilitarydictatorshiphe more anachronisticn that country).Uruguay,CostaRica, Chile, andVenezuelahave evolveda commendable espectfor and acceptanceof majority ule.MostLatin Americancountrieshave

seen some declinein thatpersonalismwhichretardsand even frustratesresponsiblepoliticalprocesses.All of these are hopeful strawsin the

wind.As Latin Americamoves further nto the twentiethcentury-and

somestatesare doingit only slowly and seeminglyreluctantly-it mustinevitablyrespondto conditioning ircumstancesmoreor less as statesdid whichcame nto the twentieth enturyonJanuary1, 1901. Thismeansthat the dead hand of the past will lose some partof its role of condi-

tionerof what men do in the present.Latin Americans will probablylearn,gradually, hat dignidadhas a higherprice tag than compromiseand that someintermixturef theNorthAmericanCalibanand the Latin

AmericanArielmayhave itsrewards.But Latin Americanpoliticsmust be measured,not againstwhat

prevails n the UnitedStatesor otheradvancedoccidentalcountries,but

againstwhat Latin Americaoffereda century and a half ago. In thatrespect, t has, indeed,comea longway.

components of political change in latin america - fitzgibonn

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