Arts/Review

CHE GUEVARA: ECONOMICS AND.
POLITICS IN THE TRANSITION TO
SOCIALISM. By Carlos Tablada. 286
pages. Published by Pathfinder Press/ —
Pacific and Asia, Sydney, Australia.

An educational new book, Che Guevara:
Economics and Politics in the Transition to
Socialism, provides some clues to aid in
understanding the apparent disagreement
of the Cuban leadership with some of the
new trends that are taking place in the
socialist world.

Ernesto Che Gue-
vara was certainly
one of the more
attractive personali-
ties among the lead-
ers of the world
communist move-
ment. Persons such
as myself, who saw
him only once or
twice as a speaker at
meetings, were never-
theless deeply impres-
sed by his personal magnetism and persua-
sive oratory. The Cuban public have wor-
shipped him and his memory as a sort of
secular saint.

It is apparent from his writings that Che
had studied deeply the classics of Marxism,
and earnestly sought to apply them to the
specifics of the Cuban revolution. Rightly
or wrongly his approach differed, both in
theory and in application, from that of the
current leaders of the European socialist
states, and most drastically from the
reforms now occurring in those states.

Author Carlos Tablada quotes Che
Guevara as saying: “A socialist economy
without communist moral values does not
interest.me. We fight poverty but we also
fight alienation. One-of the fundamental

GUEVARA

Che’s theories on socialist transformation

aims of Marxism is to eliminate material
interest ... and profit from man’s psycho-
logical motivations.”

Being concerned with the problem of
building a new socialist society, Che
searched the literature concerning the tran-
sition period from capitalism to socialism
and could find no satisfactory answer to the
question of how the overall remodeling of
social relations would condition the forms
of social consciousness. Instead he found
two approaches that did not satisfy him:

1. The establishment of the dictatorship
of the proletariat per se is taken as a guaran-
tee of the increasing emergence of commu-
nist consciousness.

2. The economy is treated as something
independent of the superstructural forms
that accompany it.

Che regarded both as misunderstandings
of basic Marxism-Leninism. Repeatedly he
returned, in a variety of formulations, to the
theme that “communism is a phenomenon
of consciousness and not solely a pheno-
menon of production. We cannot arrive at
communism through the simple mechanical
accumulation of quantities of goods made
available to people.” And he asserted:
“...to build communism it is necessary,
simultaneously with the new material foun-
dations, to build the new man.”

Having the responsibility for building the
socialist economy of Cuba, Che developed
the theory and method of the “budgetary
finance system” which he contrasted with
the “financial self-management system”
popular in some socialist countries. The
budgetary finance system he described as
follows:

“We propose a centralized system of
economic management based on rigourous
Supervision within the enterprises ... We
view the economy as one big enterprise . ..
The name budgetary finance system comes
from the fact that the enterprise turns all its

revenues over to the national budget, that is,
it does not accumulate its revenues or retain
them in the form of cash in an account of its
own.”

This sounds very much like the over cen-
tralized economy that the Soviet Union is
now struggling to correct by returning more
and more of the decision-making to the
production units. Che however says, ‘‘ ...
centralized planning is the mode of exist-
ence of socialist society, its defining charac-
teristic, and the point at which man’s
consciousness finally succeeds in synthesiz-

ing and directing the economy toward its .

goal: the full liberation of the human being
within the framework of communist
society.”

Tablada quotes Che in several contexts
condemning the use of the “law of
value” — for example, a market system —
as inherently capitalistic:

“The pipe dream that socialism can be
achieved with the help of the dull instru-
ments left to us by capitalism (the commod-
ity as the economic cell, profitability,
individual material interest as a lever, etc.)
can lead into.a blind alley.”

In support of this, Che cited a statement
by Lenin: “All of us who have studied at
least the elements of Marxism know that
this exchange and freedom of trade inevita-
bly lead to a division of commodity produc-
ers into owners of capital and owners of
labour power, a division into capitalists and

*wage-workers, i.e. a revival of capitalist

wage-slavery ...”
Whatever one may think of Che’s

approach, the presentation of his views by -

Tablada should be a worthwhile contribu-
tion to the debate now raging between the
“conservatives” and “reformers” of the
socialist world. © ics

— Emil Bjarnason

Emil Bjarnason is an economist and

founder of the Trade Union Research Bureau.

In Visible Colours is a film and video
festival seeking to fill a void in the enter-
tainment scene. The brainchild of co-
directors Zainub Verjee and Lorraine
Chan, the festival that runs Wednesday,
Nov. 15 to Sunday, Nov. 19 at three Van-
couver venues features works by women
of colour. Not surprisingly, the themes of
many of the more than 80 films and videos
from Canada and several other countries
deal with the dual burdens of racism and
sexism. The Tribune saw four of these ina
prescreening:

Black Mother, Black Daughter is a half-
hour documentary from the National
Film Board that tells, through mother-
daughter interviews, about the black
community of Halifax-Dartmouth which
once resided in a community called Afric-
ville. That unique neighbourhood, popu-
lated by Nova Scotians descended from
slaves and black United Empire Loyalists,
was destroyed to make ‘way for “urban
development,” we learn. in this long-
overdue examination of an ignored part of
Canada’s diverse society..

This film is not defeatist. Nova Scotia’s
black community is undergoing a kind of
“empowerment through community acti-
vism and artistic endeavours, as displayed
in a visit to a recording studio where the a
cappella women’s group, For the Moment,
is recording. An interview with co-director
Sylvia Hamilton’s mother provides a
glimpse into the tribulations of racism and
how a strong character deals with it, in one
of the documentary’s high points.

Perfect Image?, from Britain, uses rap

and rock video formats and a series of
skits to probe, with biting humour and not
a little anger, the cosmetic contortions two
women — one very African looking, the
other much less so — must go through in
desperate attempts to meet societal pres-
sures motivated by racial and sexual con-
siderations.

In one outstanding scene, an African
woman vents her frustrations over a
departed lover by smashing artifacts from
the relationship. His complaint was the
tribal markings that adorn her face, we’re
told.

The neurosis engendered by Africans
not being allowed to be African spills over
into seemingly petty concerns, such as the
type of eye shadow one wears to comple-
ment, or disguise, skin tones. The obses-
sions continue even after the “end” of the
film, when the actresses discuss, madden-
ingly, details of their anatomies in the
dressing room. Such unsubtle close-ups
are discomfiting, but then, they’re meant
to be.

Bastion Point is not especially con-
cerned with women, but this entry from
New Zealand will ring a few bells with
Canadians who have participated in, or
witnessed, road blockades and other
forms of demonstration over Native land
claims. It’s a documentary on the final day
of an occupation of a “public” park in
Aukland, New Zealand’s largest city, by
Maori activists who point out that the land
was never ceded to the Crown.

After more than 500 days of occupa-
tion, cordons of police move in to carry off

Filling void with In Visible Colours

the demonstrators, who are passively res-
isting, with the usual absence of cultural
sensitivity. During the actions, bereaved
parents are forbidden to visit and say
prayers at the grave of their child who died
during the occupation. ;

This film, whose creators deserve credit
just for covering in detail the police action
under adverse circumstance, takes the
trouble to point out that the Maori’s dwel-
lings were dismantled by scab labour —
the local trades council refused to provide
any of its members to do the onerous task.

Sari Red is a 12-minute video directed
by Pratibha Parma which uses vibrant
colour and voice-overs to good effect in
describing the murder of a young Indo-
British woman and the injury and traum-
atization of her two friends by white
youths, who drove a van over the curb and
into the three students, who had angrily
responded to racial taunts.

The story is told through images of red
cloth blowing in the breeze and stark city-
scapes accompanied by a chorus of voices
that grow increasingly angrier. At first
somewhat distracting, the combination
becomes mesmerizing and the outrage
comes through, powerfully.

In Visible Colours, co-sponsored by the
National Film Board and Women In
Focus, screens its entries at the Vancouver
East Cinema, and Robson Square Media
Centre’s cinema and theatre. Festival
passes are $50 and $40, or $6 and $5 gen-
eral admission. Phone In Visible Colours
at 685-1137.

— Dan Keeton

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COMING EVENTS

NOV. 17 — Hear Cuban author Carlos Tab-
lada on “Building Socialism in Cuba: The Ideas
of Che Guevara.” Tablada is a Cuban econo-
mist and author of El Pensamiento Economico
de Ernesto Che Guevara. Russian People’s
Home, 600 Campbell Ave., Reception and Bar:
7 p.m. Meeting: 8 p.m. Other speakers include:
Mike Barker, Provincial Executive member of
HEU; Dr. James Lindsay, Past president of
Canada Cuba Friendship Association; George
Lai, ANC; Roberto Aviles, FMLN support group
and Betsey Stone, representative of Pathfinder
Press. Call 872-3314 or 872-8343

NOV. 25 — Pacific Tribune celebration dinner
in honour of Ben Swankey. 6 p.m. Maritime
Labour Centre. Tickets: $15. Phone Angela at
Trib office, 251-1186 for ticket reservations or
information.

DEC. 2 — Annual Labour Bazaar. Russian
Hall, 600 Campbell Ave. 12 noon to 4 p.m.
Gifts, crafts, Christmas decorations, white ele-

‘ phant table. For table reservation call Anna at

294-6775.

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Pacific Tribune, November 13, 1989 « 7