Very little serious analytical work has been done on the Communist movement in Latin America either by the Latin Americans themselves or by people in this country. Most of the material available is either propaganda by the Communist parties themselves or is emotional, almost McCarthyite presentations by enemies of the Communists. The present volume, which is a critical analysis of the Argentine Communists, is therefore most welcome.
The point of view from which this book is written is unique and somewhat confusing. The author is at the same time an admirer and follower of Leon Trotsky and a strong Argentine nationalist. His analysis, therefore, is drawn from a mixture of these two rather conflicting sources.
The fundamental thesis of the book is that the Communist Party has always been essentially an alien force in Argentine politics. On the one hand it is a continuation of the point of view of the porteños of Buenos Aires, who, the author argues, have always been hostile to the national interests of Argentina, and have not only been essentially foreign in their ideas but have sought to justify the economic subordination of Argentina to the countries buying its principal export products.
However, the Communist Party has been more than this, according to Ramos. Organized originally largely by Slavic immigrants, the party from the beginning has been subordinate to the Soviet Union. Therefore, the author devotes a considerable portion of the book to tracing the evolution of the development of the USSR, and particularly the various struggles for leadership in the Soviet Communist Party. It is here that the Trotskyite influence on Ramos’ thinking is most clear.
In this connection, he is critical of some ex-Communists, such as Rodolfo Puiggros, who have sought to explain the failures and “betrayals” of the Argentine Communist Party solely in terms of the nefarious influence which Victorio Codovilla, its founder and still its secretary general, have had in determining its policies. Quite rightly, he points out that Codovilla was during most of his career an agent of Stalin within the International, and whatever changes he has made in party policy from time to time in Argentina are merely reflections of the Comintern policy as laid down by Stalin and his successors. Although Ramos himself obviously dislikes Codovilla, and is constantly pointing out that he is really a foreigner, not an Argentine, he feels that Codovilla is merely a reflection of the alien character of the Communists, not the cause of it.
The author was and is a supporter of Peronismo. He regards it as merely the latest reflection of the nationalist spirit in Argentine history. At the same time, he regards it as the real expression of the Argentine working class, as opposed to the immigrants who until the 1930’s made up the majority of the country’s urban labor force. He argues that the failure of the pre-Perón leadership of the labor movement in Argentina (the “sepoys” as he calls them), whether Anarchist, Socialist, or Communist, was their lack of interest in the large number of native Argentines who migrated to the cities as a result of the growth of industrialization in the 1930’s and thereafter.
Ramos argues that in Latin America it is the working class which is destined to assume the leadership of the social revolution. It is within that context that he views and supports Peronismo. He sees the basic objective of that revolution to be the “reintegration” of the “Latin American nation.” According to his rather oversimplified thesis, the basic urge of the Latin Americans at the time of independence, which was to establish one single nation, was subverted by foreign intervention—particularly that of the British—and by those elements in the various parts of Latin America who were allied with or serving the interests of the foreigners. There seems to be no recognition on Ramos’ part that perhaps geography, transportation difficulties, ethnic differences, personal rivalries, and other factors might have had something to do with what he calls the “balkanization” of Latin America.
Ramos’ book is one of the clearest expressions which this reviewer has seen of the way in which Leninism stood Marxism on its head. Whereas Marx saw the great struggle in the world as being between the working class and the bourgeoisie of each country, Lenin in Imperialism” and some other writings tended to make it appear as a class struggle between the poor nations and the rich ones. It is within this context that Ramos tends to see Argentina as one of the proletarian” countries ; and it is because he thinks that the Argentine Communists have not understood Marxism-Leninism in this light that he so bitterly criticizes them.
Although this volume has the handicaps of its frame of reference, it is something which will be of value to all students of International Communism, as well as those concerned with contemporary Argentina.