Revolutionary Transition Designs For Survival, Participatory Democracy and New Socialism : IMC Print

-- A Una Trumviraste a Otra? Lideres Hoy?

April 25th Draft: EMERGENCY COMUNIQUE:

For the People of Ecuador and Bolivia and All Who Struggle Against USA Imperialism

Revolutionary Transition Designs For Survival, Participatory Democracy and The Development of "A New Socialism"

Chapter Two II, at: http://www.bcz.com/members/blog/revolucionarias/

"There has to be direct democracy, people’s government with popular assemblies and congresses where the people retain the right to remove, nominate, sanction, and recall their elected delegates and representatives… As well as political democracy there has to be economic democracy. If an elite owns and controls big business such as oil and the mines there can be neither real democracy nor social equality. Control over the productive apparatus of society has to be distributed.

This can take forms such as community ownership, self-managed enterprises and cooperatives. We call for a people’s revolutionary constituent assembly to help reconstruct from below the republic, the state and the nation of Venezuela…[ Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru... Belize...everywhere and all of the above] We have resources of energy, gold, silver, petroleum and steel. If we use national capital and process them here in Latin America we can sow the seeds of a new continent and a new development. " Hugo Chavez (Our reference for this is: Stephen O’Brien interview of Chavez at the São Paulo Forum in El Salvador in July 1996 for the CISLAC magazine Venceremos.)

Eight years later, at the opening of a social debt forum in Caracas Hugo Chavez set the outline for a continuing debate asking the question: " If it isn't Capitalism, what is it? I have no doubts ... its Socialism ... which Socialism of the many that exist? ... we must invent it ... therefore, the importance of debate ... 21st Socialism has to be invented."

AN APPEAL FOR AID:

We are unaware of other groups producing aids for revolutionary transitions, but we hope to find them. We ask for input, for collaboration (translations) and a website where these issues can be addressed, debated and made available to people in several languages. Time is slipping away and the capitalists, imperialists and elite are always far ahead of the people and the poor. Please consider the importance of the events unfolding in Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela (not to mention the cruel disasters of Colombia and the inevitably of Peru.)

Radical Restructuring: Part I. Applying Revolutionary Transition Designs to Develop A New Socialism

Poor Countries and Revolutionary Movements cannot expect any help from anyone. They cannot wait for Chavez in Venezuela or a worldwide movement of aid to attend to their needs. They must prepare for the worst: USA invasions or USA collusion with elite sabotage and a collapse of economic relations with most of the world. The MER solidaristic economic program addresses this real world context and what countries must do. It is also meant as a guide for revolutionary groups to present workable and visionary manifestos of the path to a sustainable and equitable design for living. Our dreams are utopian, but we aim for real and enduring results. To re-build the foundation of a people start with education – once you know what you want to teach...

Part II. Revolutionary Policies for Transitional Survival:
Democratic Redistribution and Radical Restructuring for a New Beginning

The following program will typically be required of the revolutions in the Andes and throughout Latin America (the pace of adaptation and implementation may vary somewhat) :

Phase One:
1. All cities, towns and rural districts should form popular assemblies that document the Demands, Expectations and Policies that the residents support. A two thirds vote should be attempted on these positions from the participants of the assemblies. Failing that, the vote tallies for the majority and minority positions should be recorded. In forming these assemblies care should be given to balance participation and functionality with size. We estimate that each assembly should represent between 2000 and 20,000 people over 16 years of age. Based on this criteria a nation of 5 million people over 16 would have about 500 assemblies. Geography and travel requirements should also be considered so that travel does not restrict participation unduly.
2. Based on these Position decisions, each assembly would designate a national subdivision (contiguous or nearby) that it chooses to affiliate with. Depending on these desired affiliations each country would be divided up into three to seven autonomous regions.
3. The assemblies of the cities, towns and rural areas would then choose Delegates to a Regional Popular Assembly for each autonomous region. The delegates should be chosen proportionately from lists of delegates who support differing Positions, ethnic groups or sub-regions. Each assembly would choose one delegate per 1000 people living in their assumed influence. If there were 5 million people in the country and five autonomous regions of about one million each, then each Regional Assembly would have about 1000 delegates attending.
4. Regional Assemblies would vote on Positions and select Delegates for a National Constituent Constitutional Convention; one delegate per 30,000 people in the region. Roughly, 160 Delegates from each Region would then attend the Constitutional Convention.
5. Regional Assemblies would continue to meet, vote on evolving Positions and send updates to the Constitutional Convention. Final decisions from the Constitutional Convention would be voted on by the entire population of each region with a majority vote required for ratification. Failing ratification a Region would have to work out a relationship with the rest of the country. Provisions for requiring a Region to accept the National decision could be made if the Ratification was supported by more than two thirds of the nation and less than 60 percent of a Region rejected the new Constitution. Provisions for a requirement that the percentage of participating voters in each region meet a certain threshold (66 percent?) should be considered. The processes used in Venezuela and the Venezuelan Constitution should also be consulted.
6. Regional Assemblies would assume all roles of the government pending the ratification of a new constitution. Local Popular Assemblies representing at least 30,000 people could over-ride Regional Assembly decisions by the vote of 75 percent of the participants of the local Popular Assembly (Until the Constitution is ratified).
7. All of the above recommendations are designed for countries where the government has collapsed or lost all legitimacy. They are also applicable for regions of a country where there is oppression from a central government or where the national government is fast loosing legitimacy.

PHASE TWO: 1. National Constituent Constitutional Convention

A CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION should consider all aspects of a nation's future and the means to establish democratic, transparent and productive structures for the whole nation. For the first month of its meeting Positions should only be adopted by a two thirds vote, after one month a 51 percent vote should be adopted. Care should be given to assure that the votes and voices of all significant sectors of the nation are included in the Convention: women, students, workers, soldiers, indigenous groups, young people, slum dweller organizations, unions representing poor workers, small farmers and landless farmers.

PHASE THREE: Recommendations for a New Constitution:

a. Prioritize: The needs of the whole population for a new revolutionary/solidarity education; water for drinking and for crops; pure and affordable food/national food security; equitable land distribution; indigenous, campesino and small farm agricultural support; and enhanced popular participation in all decisions.
b. Secondary priorities: Community and national defense; housing with long term use/needs taken into account (priority for slum, rural and border areas); cooperative production units; Watershed restoration; and public spending for the sustainable development of natural and other resources.
c. Policies:
1. Expropriation of all foreign, elite or important land, structures and businesses. In cases where this is too difficult or too dangerous then the Constitution should institute extreme taxation of all foreign and elite owned businesses, bank accounts and resources to accomplish state takeover at the lowest cost and minimal disruption.
2. Extreme tariffs on all products imported to or from non-aligned nations. Quotas on imports from friendly nations to protect local businesses.
3. Extensive long term programs for the relocation of urban people to rural areas for production and for defense.
4. Education for solidarity and revolutionary economics, society and consciousness. 5. (to be continued and updated)

Part III. Overview of the Struggle and a New Agrarian Based Socialist Economics
In The MER Solidarity Model there is a market economy but the government at all levels – directed by the people’s budget prioritizations – intervenes in the market to create sufficient basic goods and to satisfy basic needs within sustainability guidelines. ( LINKS…)

A Typical Program for The Revolutionary Takeover of a Country like Bolivia or Ecuador or Peru
I. The Short Transition Period (First 3-5 Weeks of a Takeover) : Immediate Priorities (Go-Slow Option)
The development path for Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru is quite similar. The poor and their allies must seize most of the land and all valuable industries, assets and bank accounts. The first thing that a new government does is to seize the banks (including the Central Bank), institute currency controls, and seal its borders to prevent capital or equipment flight. We assume that the armed forces and the police remain loyal to the people and all suspect individuals and units would be demobilized or jailed.

Security and law and order are the next responsibilities. Soldiers and police not required for protection of vital installations should be assigned to neighborhood or regional assemblies to be deployed as requested by these local authorities (worker-soldier alliance). Lists of critical jobs should be drawn up by the assemblies and the positions necessary are filled. Garbage collection, water supply, electricity (rationed), and emergency medical needs are at the top with sewage disposal and heating or cooling next. The central government's primary role other than security is to seize all food supplies and critical parts (equipment) and to distribute it fairly according to need and circumstances (weather, poverty and breakdowns). The government (local, regional and national) should also distribute transport vehicles and fuel supplies as best it can.

II. Phase II of Transition Period (First 3 months) :
Beginning the Orientation to Long-Run Priorities (The "Go-Slow" Option)
The primary requirements during the first months of a popular uprising are to further develop and secure the neighborhood and regional assembly operations, effectiveness and organization; to prioritize productive factors (money, skills, workers and material) for long run production of basic goods; and the planning for the inputs and related needs to secure the factors required to produce: Food, electricity, transport services, housing, health care, communications, environmental/sanitation and water.

III. ECONOMIC POLICIES: "Go Slow" Option
1. Credit and Currency Controls.
2. Public Land given to organizations and sustainable farming coops.
3. Modest Credit programs for key sectors of the economy.
4. Increased property and income taxes on corporations, the rich and idle lands.
5. Partial decentralization of administration, armed forces and large state enterprises.
6. Increased minimum wages and health clinic access.
7. Regional Employment Programs in agriculture, land improvements, transportation and import substitution enterprises (public and private).
8. Import Substitution becomes the main industrial and cooperative sector focus, with attention to interconnections (linkages and input factors).
9. Modest re-nationalization of progressively smaller foreign and then domestic monopolies, oligarchies and concentrations of ownership.
10. Encourage South American Countries (or all countries) to abrogate the UN drug treaty and launch new legalization and crop substitution programs.
11. Direct the national and regional universities and trade schools to study and compliment research in organic farming, solidarity enterprises, import substitution and ways to assist other countries (Cuba, Bolivia etc... )
12. Limit News Media ownership and require more PSAs (public or educational) and programming by organizations representing poor people and minorities. Institute high fines for lies and media misinformation ...

IV. Phase III - of The "Go Slow" Option

1. All of Part II, but more and faster...
2. Subsidize linkages that support import substitution enterprises managed by workers collectively or through cooperatives. Extend these programs both locally, regionally and beyond the country with friendly regimes.
3. Military construction projects: schools, hospitals, sanitation, water, market places, environmental restoration and infrastructure. Creation of a civil militia and dual purpose roles for military units.
4. Links across borders and funding for a variety of rural development approaches. Eco and activista tourism, aid programs and fair trade networking (high valued crops and crafts).
5. Government purchases of lands and increased confiscations.
6. Increase taxes on medium size farms and some on small farms that are profitable.
7. Limits tightened on land ownership. Require divestment (break up) of business conglomerates.
8. Re-location projects to rural areas for urban people. Grant urban land titles and increase urban and near-urban land and business confiscations and purchases.
9. Education for Solidarity at all levels of society.
10. Establish regionally owned and locally operated retail food stores to sell stable goods at subsidized prices in poor neighborhoods and rural areas. Community cafeterias and Free Stores (for rationed clothing, toys, household products) established as possible.
11. TACTICS of Strategic Effect: High and progressively increased corporate Taxation can be used to Bankrupt FOREIGN OR ELITE factories and other business interests. Use the governmental powers of condemnation and the justification of the public's goods/benefits... Can also use buyouts with low fixed exchange rates (an low interest) payments - and then devalue the currency a lot. - Or just simply nationalize and promise to pay... or not...

Part IV. The Crisis Program :
The Fast or Crisis Transitional Economic Program

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In this scenario communities in all regions will be forced to hold clandestine or rushed meetings of Popular Assemblies to form political cadres and self defense arrangements. Hopefully, the majority of people in many nations by this time will have seen and embraced the connection of all struggles for sovereignty, autonomy, resistance, food security and radical restructuring of all aspects of all countries. This consciousness will empower people knowing that their struggle is one of many and an important part of a continental struggle whose success will sustain and re-enforce their efforts and eventual triumph – both in the struggle and in the re-construction of humane societies.

Significant damage may be done to valuable infrastructure such as businesses and institutions that were seen as supporters of the former corrupt regime: public service utilities like water, power, education, mass transit or telephone (general communications) that had been privatized or run corruptly. Foreign corporations, banks and local partners of large foreign corporations may also be targeted. Large landowners will be ruthlessly driven from their vast properties and genetically altered seed and chemical suppliers may well be destroyed. Media broadcast facilities are often ransacked and export facilities (ports) are sure to be looted or damaged.

Crisis Policies

Implement all of the Slow Program policies quickly, over the course of a few months. Get rid of US $ and the previous currency. End trade with those aligned with the US. Fire most of the upper level military. Put half of the military to work like in Venezuela' Plan Bolivar and welcome Cuban, Venezuelan and international aid workers (doctors, engineers, advisers).

Everywhere people will denounce the US and demand leaders like Hugo Chavez and public policies that redistribute power to the people, land to the poor and dignity for all. Nationalize, and then localize a people's democratic news and entertainment media network to educate and inform the people and to spread the message of resistance to the imperialists. Ban all advertising for money and replace with consumer reports and tests of products.

For the Preservation of Domestic Security and Self Defense (originally written for Venezuela but applicable everywhere):

1. Restrict travel by the wealthy of your country (Venezuelans and others) and require background checks of US, Colombian and Haitian citizens entering Venezuela (or other aligned places).
2.Maintain strict currency controls and broaden investigations of tax paying compliance by US and opposition connected businesses and organizations.
3. Expose the connections between the Cisneros clan (or your local and national elite), the AUC/Colombian elite, the Miami-Cuban CIA mafia and Spanish rightwing drug dealers (and US, Spanish and Mexican Banks!)
4. Phase out US Embassies, all US government operations, most US NGOs and all US corporations and other related associations.
5. Accept only Euro currency for oil and other exports (until a regional currency is adopted). Institute surcharges on all US ships, airplanes and US exports and imports. Venezuela Econ Policies http://vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=16154
6. Stop oil and other exports to US client regimes in the region: Colombia, Dominican Republic, Aruba, Curacao (Israel).
7. Sell national assets that are outside of your country (CITIGO in Venezuela's case). Assist Bolivia and other friendly countries with their energy projects and operations. Start palm oil (bio-diesel) plantations and processing facilities in regions with few energy sources.
8. Place high tariffs on all luxury goods.
9. Slow down, shut down and sell businesses or properties owned outside of your country (CITGO in Venezuela's case).
10. Demand that the US pull out of military agreements in your country (weapons, training, drug war) and in the region (Aruba – Curacao near Venezuela, Manta in Ecuador, Iquitos in Peru). Make OAS demand that the US obey international law, treaties and withdraw its fleet from near the coasts of Venezuela, Ecuador and Peru - Or else an oil and trade embargo will be enforced !

Part V. Other Examples of Demands and the Issues involved in Revolutionary Changes:

Many people have known about policies that can improve conditions for rural people. An example is found in the demands made by highland Indians in Ecuador. Conaie and Ecuarunari led the Indian uprising of 1990, helped by Confeniae. From the platform that the occupation of the Santo Domingo church provided, the leadership disseminated a succinct program:
1. Return of lands and territories taken from indigenous communities, without costly legal fees
2. Sufficient water for both human consumption and irrigation in the indigenous communities, and an environmental plan to prevent contamination of water supplies
3. No payment of the municipal taxes levied on the small properties owned by indigenous farmers
4. Creation of long-term financing for bilingual education programs in the communities
5. Creation of provincial and regional credit agencies under the control of Conaie
6. Debt pardon for all debts indigenous communities have incurred with government ministries and banks
7. Reform of the first article of the Ecuadorian Constitution such that it recognizes Ecuador as a multinational state
8. Immediate delivery of funds and credits currently assigned to the indigenous nationalities
9. A minimum two-year price freeze on raw materials & manufactured goods used by communities in agricultural production, & a reasonable price increase for agricultural products sold by the communities, relying on the free-market.
10. Initiation & termination of all necessary & priority construction of basic infrastructure in the indigenous communities
11. Unrestricted import and export privileges for indigenous artisans and merchants of artisan-craft
12. Strict protection and controlled exploration of archaeological sites under the supervision of Conaie
13. Expulsion of Summer Institute of Linguistics (a missionary group), in accordance with Executive Decree 1159 of 1981
14. Respect for the rights of children and the raising of consciousness in the government regarding the actual state of affairs extant among children
15. National support for the practice of indigenous medicine
16. Immediate dismantling of organizations created by the political parties that parallel governmental institutions at the municipal and provincial levels, and which manipulate political consciousness and elections in the indigenous communities (Hoy 6/29/90)

Part VI. Consider your revolution an experiment in developing an alternative to corporate dominated globalization.

Implement the kinds of policies that :

1. show that poor people in the 3rd world can generate significant economic growth without international corporate investment;
2. create an economy with substantial resistance barriers to corporate domination: Generate jobs that are insulated from multinational corporate practices of moving into a region and then leaving to escape upward wage pressures;
3. make more efficient use of local raw materials than would a vertically integrated international corporate production process;
4. reinforce local democracy, participation, and empowerment of ordinary people. The goals of new projects include developing an economy that is egalitarian and a political structure that allows for the greatest possible democratic participation of workers and consumers in designing their own products.
5. provide an example to others of the power of cooperatives as engines of economic growth and development that simultaneously promote social justice and support communities.

Development Guides and Ideas:

Do inventories of natural resources, public resources (lands and schools etc ); Collect data on trade, fair trade inputs, forest resources and problem areas (pollution, erosion, corruption); Hydro potentials with a priority to the cheapest, least disruptive and the development needs of a place (social harmony, or small scale economic development priorities.)

Inventory crafts outputs and investigate their expanded market potential. Analyze potentials for tourism and the risks associated with it.

Natural resources - especially coal, oil, gas and forests (and the impacts of their development) - are set to the highest criteria for development and wise, long–run sustainable management. Sustainability and the future value of resources are carefully considered (long term yields and profits realized by slow development of the resource). Another factor is the future availability of improved techniques for mitigating ecological problems. Also, less public funding of infrastructure investments are needed in the short term under a "go-slow" regime (pipelines, ports and roads). Instead, national and regional governments can invest in schools, teachers and revolutionary criteria that will help people come up with more creative, practical and socially profitable goals and methods of resource and social development.

Reduce erosion, build smarter (infrastructure, industry, utilities) and focus skills and investments on import substitution (ISE ) products and techniques.
The goal and the planning for university and high school research is directed to how to improve and facilitate the alternative economic program of solidarity and social economy - For example: students would design or compare (dissect) foreign models of motors or engines and test them and see which were best and worst and then redesign them for local production - or a cheap method of remanufacturing used items (justified by overall ISE program).

Part VI. (To be Continued) Part II, at:

http://www.bcz.com/members/blog/revolucionarias/

Voces de Ecuador:

“DESTRUIR EL CAPITALISMO...CONSTRUIR EL SOCIALISMO”

Lo que hoy presenciamos en el Ecuador es un acumulado de descontento, que pretendió ser manipulado, y seguramente lo será, a partir de la pugna de dos grupos dominantes por el control de la Corte Suprema de Justicia, del Tribunal Electoral y del Tribunal Constitucional, donde el gobierno de Gutiérrez, aupados por el PRIAN, el PRE, se confrontaban con el PSC, la ID. Como siempre en este cotejo político dos grupos económicos buscan el reacomodo, el control para incrementar sus ganancias, y servir mejor a las grandes transnacionales: por un lado el grupo liderado por Fidel Egas y en el otro campo están Noboa e Isaías.
Punto aparte merecen lo que en nuestro país se llama “izquierda”, aquella que institucionalizada en la maraña burocrática y oportunista del sistema, se ha puesto a la cola de las distintas facciones de la burguesía y en un descarado ir y venir sola a atinado esconderse como la avestruz (escondida la cabeza en un hueco, su culote visible persiste en su afán de alcanzar migajas del sistema para mantener su aparato burocrático electorero) y de manera maniobrera hoy pretende colarse a la lucha emprendida por los y las ecuatorianas.

Desobediencia, rebelión, paro, acción directa, construcción, debate, reflexión, son palabras que en una dialéctica de encaminar futuro se han entremezclado, y que exigen que se potencie organización que surja desde abajo, y que practiqué una democracia directa para el desarrollo de su agenda política propia y sus formas de lucha a emprender. Para cambiar el Ecuador no basta que se vayan todos hay que “destruir el capitalismo para construir el socialismo”, como proclamaba una pancarta difundida por un bloque autónomo en el pasado paro de la ciudad de Quito.

revolutionary_democracy@yahoo.com Website:

http://www.bcz.com/members/blog/revolucionarias/

Desobediencia, rebelión, paro, acción directa, construcción, debate, reflexión, son palabras que en una dialéctica de encaminar futuro se han entremezclado, y que exigen que se potencie organización que surja desde abajo, y que practiqué una democracia directa para el desarrollo de su agenda política propia y sus formas de lucha a emprender. Para cambiar el Ecuador no basta que se vayan todos hay que “destruir el capitalismo para construir el socialismo