In this volume Boris Iosifovich Koval, a senior research scholar at the Latin American Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences in Moscow, and a specialist in modern Brazilian history, traces the historical evolution of the Brazilian working class from the mid-nineteenth century to the present. This is the first serious study to be published on the subject anywhere and for this reason alone merits careful reading. Koval demonstrates a thorough knowledge of his field and wide familiarity with the related literature. His scholarship is methodical and his documentation varied, as reflected in the extensive bibliography appended to this volume.
Koval approaches his topic from a Marxist-Leninist perspective, once again drawing attention to the fundamental conceptual differences which separate Marxist and non-Marxist historians. Resting on the thesis that in class societies historical scholarship of necessity reflects the class biases of the historian, Koval censures non-Marxist studies of modern Brazilian social history as falsifications of the historical past. “Bourgeois scholarship,” he writes, “propounds by diverse methods one and the same thesis: that class struggle is unnecessary and obsolete. . ..” In contrast . . . “Marxist scholars consider it their task to reveal the origin, nature and consequences of real processes in the real world. In this respect, the history of classes and class conflict occupies a predominant position [in Marxist historiography], for it operates as the mainspring of social development.”
Central to class conflict in a society passing through the capitalist stage of development is the urban proletariat, which in Brazil, Koval observes, numbers some thirteen million workers, or approximately one third of the entire working class of Latin America. The Brazilian working class, he argues, has evolved through three discernible stages: 1) a formative period bridging the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, in which labor first began to seek redress of economic grievances, without, however, forming an organized movement; 2) a period of rapid growth lasting from the end of World War I through the mid-1950’s, in which the proletariat achieved high degrees of organization and class consciousness; and 3) the contemporary period, in which the technological revolution has produced a “proletarianization” of both the urban middle sectors and the impoverished peasantry, thus adding to the structural complexity of the working class, while at the same time raising its revolutionary potential. An analysis of these three stages, Koval suggests, sheds much light on contemporary Brazil, where, he argues, the issue is not one of nationalism versus imperialism or of capitalism in opposition to vestigial feudalism, but rather of labor in opposition to capital.
Of particular interest is Koval’s analysis of the Vargas era, in which he rejects the view of certain non-Marxist historians that the revolution of 1930 was “a typically bourgeois revolution brought about to strengthen the socio-economic bases of national capitalism.” This view is explained, he writes, by the fact that in the early 1930’s “liberal-bourgeois elements displayed a maximum of revolutionary spirit and managed to move the masses behind them.” “However,” he adds, “the working class was not a blind instrument in Vargas’ hands, as argued by bourgeois historians, and on numerous occasions it acted independently.” Indeed, this very independence, together with the anti-bourgeois agitation of the oligarchical right, forced Vargas and the partisans of a bourgeois order in Brazil to abandon traditional bourgeois-democratic modes of governance in favor of dictatorship. “This,” concludes Koval, “indicates both the weakness of the Brazilian bourgeoisie and the strength of internal social tensions. The economic crisis and the revolution of 1930 actually exacerbated social conflict in the country, loosing the revolutionary energy of the masses.”
Also of special interest is Koval’s use of primary source materials housed in the USSB State Museum on Revolution, in Moscow. This repository is said to contain significant collections bearing on labor and political movements of the interwax period in Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, and Mexico and materials cited by Koval tend to substantiate the historical value of these collections. Curiously, however, Koval seems not to have made full use of the Museum’s holdings. Having drawn upon these materials for his general analysis of the years 1929-1945, he fails to do so in his discussion of the first (1922) and second (1925) congresses of the Partido Comunista do Brasil.
Koval has cast his study in the orthodox mold of Soviet Marxism, and, consequently, can expect a cool response from neo- and non-Marxists alike. Yet this volume represents a serious contribution to the historiography of modern Brazil and must be evaluated accordingly. It warrants translation into English and might well serve as a point of departure for scholarly dialogue on the fundamental issues of Latin American history. No bibliography of modern Brazilian history will now be complete without reference to this title.
