Toward a

By
Hernando Calvo Ospina                                         Read Spanish Version

On Sept.
30, elections were held in Ecuador to elect the people who will draft
a new Constitution. The Alianza País organization, led by
President Rafael Correa Delgado, won more than 70 percent of the
votes; the runner-up received barely 7 percent. It was an
overwhelming triumph, something never before seen in the history of
Ecuador. 

With 80
of the 130 representatives, Alianza País will have an absolute
majority in the Constituent Assembly. With that advantage, the chief
of state will be able to "refound the republic" and
initiate a model of development that will break away from
neoliberalism.

Economist
Alberto Acosta, former Minister of Energy and future president of the
Assembly, says that Alianza País began to toddle in August
2005 "without being enlightened." The party "fed from
the struggles and efforts of many social and political sectors. It
was not the exclusive creation of Correa, who had just resigned from
the Ministry of the Economy."

In the
November 2006 elections, Correa was elected president. In January
2007, the economist and lecturer took office. "We went from
being specialists in protests to introduce proposals. With the
presidency came the duty to build," Acosta says.

And the
foundations for that construction will be "21st-Century
socialism." It is a type of socialism that, according to Acosta,
"it is not the socialism that had rooted its responses in
manuals. We don’t start from dogmatic visions. If we write a manual,
it will be for the purpose of changing its pages every time we need
to. It will be corrected constantly, because we do not believe in a
definitive truth. Our task will be a permanent construction of
democracy. That’s how 21st-Century socialism must be constructed."

In his
simple office in Carondelet Palace, the colonial building that is the
seat of government, President Correa explains what 21st-Century
socialism is, "when applied to the particularities of Ecuador." 

"We
favor a citizen’s revolution, with a radical, profound and swift
change in the political, social and economic structures," he
says. "This country’s political institutionality has run out of
steam. A Congress that, according to polls, has a 3-percent
credibility rating, is not representative. The groups that still call
themselves ‘political parties’ are only feudal, caudillist
organizations without the slightest ideology.

"This
country cannot continue to live within the economic standards of the
past 20 years, caused by the policies imposed by Washington, which
have been disastrous for Ecuador and Latin America. Among other
effects, in our country those policies have translated into more than
2 million émigrés in recent years," the president
says. And he goes on.

"I
couldn’t care less how the government of the United States, the
Europeans or any other country view our changes. I care even less
what the transnational corporations think. What’s important to me are
the Ecuadorean people, the rulers and owners of this country. I hope
that no nation, no matter how powerful, will try to dictate what
policies we must follow.

"Nor
shall we accept that the Colombian government continue to fumigate
forests along our border, because that is noxious for our citizens,
plants, animals and water. And don’t try to draw us into the
fratricidal internal conflict afflicting that sister nation. We
refuse to get involved in that problem, but if we can in any way help
to solve it, we’ll be ready.

"We
have said clearly that the Plan Colombia, a strategy devised by
Bogotá and Washington, is militaristic and violent; that it
has been incapable of ending the war. We are the recipients of the
negative effects of that plan, beginning with the large number of
Colombians who are obliged to seek refuge in our territory. 

"I
continue. To advance that citizen’s revolution, we need a
21st-Century socialism. Many people told us to call it ‘humanism.’ We
said no, because we are not impressed by that word. It is through
socialism that we shall seek justice, equity, a productive economy
that generates jobs.

"Our
project is called that because it coincides with the scientific
socialism of Marx and Engels. For example, here, the people must
rule, not the market. The market must be a good servant, not the
master. The human being can no longer be treated as just another tool
for production, for the purpose of accumulating capital.

"The
market economy has emphasized the creation of merchandise and its
value. It cares not for the needs of the human being, or the price to
be paid for the environment, etc.

"The
importance of collective action is another point of coincidence with
classic socialism. We must overcome the fallacy of individualism as
an engine of society, where, by an act of magic, [the capitalists]
turned selfishness into a slogan of social virtue and competition as
a way of life.

"That’s
how they forced us to compete, even among the nations of the
so-called Third World. That’s absurd. It forced us to cheapen our
export products, but to do so we had to lower the working conditions,
accept labor flexibilization, reduce wages, etc. So, who came up the
winner? The so-called First World: foreign capital.

"We
differ from classical socialism. For example, today it is very
difficult to talk about the nationalization of all the means of
production. But we do have to democratize them. Yet, it is necessary
to nationalize the means of production that are strategic to the
nation’s economy and therefore must not fall into private hands.

"One
of the worst mistakes of classical socialism is that it was not very
different from the concept of development espoused by capitalism. It
offered us a faster, more equitable road, but that road reached the
same concept of industrial development and increased production. Look
at the competition between the Soviet Union and the United States, as
to who produced more.

"However,
it gave us a different alternative for sustainable development that
considered other dimensions, such as articulation with nature. That’s
one of the challenges of 21st-Century socialism: to submit a
different proposal for development.

"Another
difference will surely shock several traditional socialists. We must
talk about principles, not about models. In this, classic socialism
was overbearing and arrogant. It always sent us to look at
such-and-such a page in our search for truths and solutions. It gave
us a catechism. And that’s a grave error.

"We
must adapt to the situations of each country, without pre-established
models. I say this as an academician. I believe that any attempt to
pigeon-hole within simplistic laws processes as complex as the
advancement of society is bound to fail.

"We
have the great advantage and obligation to build as we advance,"
Correa concludes. "We cannot allow a resurgence of indisputable
definitions or dogmas. We must not lose the essence of our strength
— creativity." 

Hernando
Calvo Ospina, a special correspondent for the monthly Le Monde
Diplomatique, conducted this and other interviews. Based on them, the
magazine this month will publish a wide-ranging report on the
political situation in Ecuador. It will be available in the various
international editions of Le Monde Diplomatique:

http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/int/