the perspectives of the Democratic Junta. tions of this approach.
The Junta's first programmatic document contrasted the non-continuity of the regime with the necessary continuity of the State in no uncertain terms: "Spanish society wants a complete change so that the national function of the State can be safeguarded without shocks or upheavals. In brief, everything must change so that everything can remain as before.
The twelve points of this programme were in consequence devoted to a large extent to the maintenance and safeguarding of the State atus inherited from Francoism, as if the dictator himself was just an unfortunate wart on it. *An absolute amnesty for all those responsible for acts of a political nature' was demanded.
PAY DEARLY
Today the CP general secretary, Santiago Carrillo, has to admit that those 'who approved the executions Franco, Arias Navarro, Juan Carlos will pay very dearly for their crimes. But what about the 200,000 Among the many repercussions of the present crisis in Spain, one of the least noted has been the harsh blow it has dealt to summer of 1974, when the dictator seemed to be nearing his end. It was basically oriented towards a perspective of 'national reconciliation' and of continuity at the level of the State apparatus. Here DANIEL BENSAID looks at the disastrous implicawho demonstrated in Franco's support, and the policemen ed fire on the demonstrators in Zarauz - didn't they also approve the executions? And in that case, where do you draw the line on this "absolute amnesty, which is supposed to set the seal on the national reconciliation?
GRIEF-STRICKEN The Spanish Communist Party, appar- when it talks about national reconciliation, wants to draw a sponge over forty grief-stricken years of history, wiping it from the memory of the workers. The platform of the Junta refers to the civil war as 'the victory of one section of the Spanish people over another, erasing its class nature and deploring - as reactionar ies have always done - the tragedy of a fratricidal struggle.
The mind boggles at the thought that in a few years time the party of Corvalan could refer to Pinochet's coup in Chile as the victory of one section of the people over another, without being any more specific.... self be forgotten so easily. Obstinately it runs through history and the generations to jog our memories. Indeed, it never entirely ended.
he imposed the five death sentences in September. To talk about reconciliation in these circumstances is to give up without a fight; worse still, it is to disarm the workers in the face of the enemy.
wno openl LEGALISATION ages the 'legalisation of all parties antees to the openly Francoist sectors; 'the independence and juridicensuring that the Francoist penal code will be maintained; and the a reference to the maintenance of the American bases in Spain.
UPRISING
tion is so narrow that already a year ago it envisiged a pre-emptive limitation on the democratic rights of the working class. The right to demonstrate was confined to peaceful demonstrations'. though he would like to ward off such a development, Carrillo cannot • ignore the possibility of an armed uprising its wish to ensure the continuity of But the civil war will not let itFranco himself recognised this when of the soldiers.
The Democratic Junta also enviswithout exception', thus giving guaral unity of the judicial function', thus respect of international agreements", The road of the peaceful transiwill of the people?.
Today, even The platform of the Junta, with the State, only recognises 'the individuality' of the Basque, Catalan and Galician peoples within the framework of the unity of the Spanish State', thus excluding any form of self-determination. Finally, the platform includes no demands relating to the living standards of the working class (wages, jobs), and has not a word to say about the living conditions In a word, the struggles and trials of strength of the last year have shown that the platform of the Democratic Junta is impotent and useless as soon as it is a question of giving direction to concrete struggles. Preparing for reconciliation is hardly the best way of defending the working class against the effects of the crisis and the bosses' attacks.
UNIFICATION
What Carrillo wants, what he is hoping for, is 'the unification of all the anti-Francoist forces, of the left and the right", and 'the intervention of the army to impose the This scenario is worth examining more closely in the light of recent events.
1. The unification of all the antiFrancoist forces. On this point. after the passage of a year, the balance sheet is distinctly thin. Far from having been able to extend the Democratic Junta to include other groups, the CP has seen the emergence of a rival coalition - the Democratic Convergence, made ul of the Socialist Party (PSOE), the Christian Democracy, the Basque National Party (PNV) and two important far left groups the MCE and ORT).
Of course the recent crackdown of the regime has sharpened the social and political polarisation of the country, creating the conditions for a dialogue between the Junta and the Convergence. But the existence of two reformist groupings has a more substantial basis than simple tactical differences.
IDEAL MODEL In last spring, the minister Carro declared that the 'German social democracy constitutes the ideal model for Spanish political development. At first sight this appears to be a rather bizare statement, for one can hardly imagine German social democracy - viable in a country where the working class has still to recover from the blood-letting of the 1930s - being successfully transplanted to a country where the class struggle is among the most intense in Europe But he was really talking about something else entirely → the fact the Spanish bourgeoisie finds itself ill equipped after 40 years of dictatorial rule to enmesh the working class in manoeuvres on the parliamentary terrain The most enlightened fraction of the ruling class has understood the danger it will be in if, on the morrow of the fall of the dictatorship, it is up against a powertul and prestigious Communist Party which - with the exception of the extreme left - is the sole party with a base in the workers movement. This means that between the modernist wing of the regime around Fraga Iribarne, which preaches constitutional re• form', and the Democratic Junta with its democratic rupture', the Spanish bourgeoisie would like to insert a social democratic party, giving it time to establish its identity and take on a recognisable shape MONARCHIST The Socialist Party (PSOE) at first stayed outside the Junta, citing the haste of the operation and refusing to enter into a pact with reactionaries like the monarchist Calvo SerBut the real nature of this tactical disagreement was revealed in the full light of day with the creation of the Convergence, when the PSOE started to boast that it had attracted much more representative sections of the bourgeoisie than those which had joined the CP in the Junta.
The fact is that in the light of the Portuguese experience, the PSOE has all the advantages - even if Carrillo's party has been forced to go ahead and give the maximum guarantees to its own bourgeoisie. The emergence and eventual development of a social democratic party would allow the possibility of an alliance between the Convergence and the Liberals of the present regime, and a corresponding reduction in the weight of the CP. After all, whatever the latter's protestations of good conduct, it is still in the eyes of the ruling class a Communist Party capable of re-asserting its links with the USSR if the situation demanded it.
The most unhappy aspect of the affair is perhaps the involvement in this operation of two far left organ isations which have played an undeniable role in the mass mobilisations, particularly in Euskadi (the Basque country).
UNPRINCIPLED The Convergence, a class-collaborationist pact if ever there was one, hasn't even adopted a programme or a platform - which speaks volumes about the tactical and unprincipled nature of the alliance. And when a pact is justified more on the very fact of uniting than on the basis of the unity, its meaning becomes even clearer: social democracy is a much
better bet than the Communist Party when it comes to bringing about national reconciliation via collaboration with the remnants of Francoism, even if the CP does hold out its hand to 'anti-Francoists red weekly 6 november 1975
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This body - which consists mainly of the Communist Party and opposition monarchists - was hastily created during the