Anarchism in El Salvador
reached its peak during the labour movement of the 1920s, in which anarcho-syndicalists played a leading role. The movement was subsequently suppressed by the
military dictatorship
before experiencing a resurgence in the 21st century.
History
[
edit
]
Following the independence of El Salvador, power and property began to concentrate in the hands of an oligarchy, as the country's economy became centered around the production and export of coffee. In 1871, the ruling conservative government of
Francisco Duenas
was overthrown by the liberal
Santiago Gonzalez
, who completed the country's transformation into what has been described as a "coffee republic".
[1]
Liberal rule was eventually consolidated by the
military
, with a liberal military junta holding power continuously and each president officially designating their successor.
Early anarcho-syndicalism in El Salvador
[
edit
]
By this time, anarchism had already been spread to El Salvador by the French individualist anarchist
Anselme Bellegarrigue
, who had fled there from the repression of the
Second French Empire
, beginning the dissemination of anarchist ideas throughout the country during the latter half of the 19th century. In 1904, the lawyer Enrique Cordova published
La perspectiva teorica del anarquismo
, becoming the first known Salvadoran anarchist, himself inspired by the works of
Peter Kropotkin
and
Leo Tolstoy
.
[2]
At the turn of the 20th century, an organized
labour movement
had arisen in El Salvador, forming an opposition to the country's ruling oligarchy,
[3]
and
anarcho-syndicalism
began to develop among Salvadoran workers.
[4]
Anarchist publications subsequently spread throughout the country, with the
Ritos
being first published in 1908 and the
Renovacion
being first published in 1911.
[5]
Eventually, the tensions between the workers and oligarchs boiled over in 1913, when president
Manuel Enrique Araujo
was assassinated by coffee farmers.
[6]
This assassination led to a period of
one-party rule
by the
National Democratic Party
, which continued the liberal military administration's policy of monoculture coffee production.
[7]
It was in this political climate that Salvadoran anarchists formed the country's first
trade unions
and became key participants in the
resistance movement
against the oligarchy.
[8]
The first Salvadoran Workers' Congress was held in
Armenia, Sonsonate
,
[9]
in which two hundred delegates of workers' organizations agreed to the immediate objective of founding a national workers union, comprising all workers' unions of the time.
[10]
Thus, anarcho-syndicalists founded the Union Obrera Salvadorena (UOS) in 1922 and the Federacion Regional de Trabajadores de El Salvador (FRTS) in 1924, although the latter became predominantly
Marxist
in 1929.
[11]
This caused a split within the FRTS, after which the Centro Sindical Libertario was established in 1930, becoming the first specifically anarchist organization in El Salvador.
[12]
When the
Great Depression
brought with it a collapse in coffee prices, the country's economy became unable to sustain itself through its one main industry.
[13]
In the aftermath, the country's first
free and fair elections
were held,
[13]
in which the
Labor Party
candidate
Arturo Araujo
was elected as
President of El Salvador
.
[14]
[15]
Although he had progressive ideals, having promised food, clothing, work and housing to every Salvadoran, Araujo was himself a landowner and took power in the midst of massive labor and student strikes. He declared
martial law
to suppress the strikes, but the military soon turned on him too. Supported by the country's oligarchy, Araujo was overthrown in a
coup d'etat
led by the
Civic Directory
, which established a
military dictatorship
.
[16]
[17]
Under the military dictatorship
[
edit
]
Under the rule of
Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez
and the far-right
National Pro Patria Party
began to repress the labour movement. When the
Communist Party
won several seats during the
1932 legislative election
, the government cancelled the results of the election.
[18]
[19]
This culminated in the
1932 Salvadoran peasant uprising
, driven by communists, anarcho-syndicalists and indigenous peasants.
[20]
However, the revolt was brutally suppressed by the government, killing tens of thousands of people, most of whom were indigenous
Pipil people
.
[21]
[22]
As a result, the Salvadoran anarchist movement, including the Centro Sindical Libertario, was largely dissolved or driven underground.
[23]
The government subsequently pursued a brutal campaign of repression until 1944, when Salvadoran students organized a general strike which resulted in the overthrow of the Martinez regime.
[24]
[25]
However, the overthrow of Martinez did not bring the end of the military dictatorship, which continued to rule the country under a series of right-wing parties, supported by the
United States
for its
anti-communist
stance.
[18]
In the 1970s, the left-wing was revitalized by the student movement, which saw the Revolutionary Left Movement bringing together
Trotskyists
, anarchists and Marxists which supported armed struggle against the regime.
[26]
The military dictatorship was finally overthrown in the
1979 Salvadoran coup d'etat
, which brought the moderate
Revolutionary Government Junta
to power, overseeing the
transition to democracy
. But this also ignited the
Salvadoran Civil War
, in which the
Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front
brought together a broad coalition of
revolutionary socialists
,
syndicalists
and anarchists to fight against the US-backed government. Tens of thousands of people died during the war and an unknown number were
forcibly disappeared
.
[27]
[28]
[29]
With the ratification of the
Chapultepec Peace Accords
in 1992, the FMLN disarmed itself and the country's left-wing organizations were once against legalized. Soon after the FMLN became one of the country's largest political parties, forming the Salvadoran government from 2009 to 2019.
The contemporary anarchist movement
[
edit
]
Since the end of the civil war, the Salvadoran anarchist movement slowly began to re-emerge, as counter-cultural Salvadoran youth movements took up anarchism to criticize the country's politics, from outside any political parties. In 2002, the hardcore punk scene of
San Salvador
brought punks, skinheads and straight edge people together into the Salvadoran Anarchist Movement (MAS). The organization published pamphlets and fanzines at punk concerts, but soon began to make their presence felt in the streets. On May 1, 2003, the MAS paraded through the streets of the capital as part of the May Day celebrations. In 2004, members of the MAS and the
veganarchist
Celula de Liberacion Animal (CLA) came together to form the Libertarian Action Collective (KAL), dedicated to the publication of anarchist and vegan ideas through literature, music and direct action. Other anarchist organizations also began to emerge around the capital, including the Anarchist Social Action Collective (KASA), the Salvadoran Anarchist Revolutionary Circle (CRAS) and the Kolectivo Resistencia Libertaria (KRL). Accion Directa (AD) also arose as a result of a libertarian split from the FMLN's youth bloc. From 2006, efforts were made to strengthen ties between the various anarchist organizations in El Salvador. This culminated with the above groups coming together to participate in a coordinated large-scale action at the May Day celebrations of 2008, under the banner of the Coordinadora Anarquista (CA). The work continued in an attempt to unify and support the various groups as part of a horizontal organization.
[30]
In 2015, the Agrupacion Conciencia Anarquista was established and began publishing the anarchist magazine
Aurora
, forming the Salvadoran chapter of the Anarchist Federation of Central America and the Caribbean (FACC).
[31]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
Federal Research Division Library of Congress (1990). Haggerty, Richard A. (ed.).
El Salvador: A Country Study
(PDF)
. Washington, D.C.: The Library of Congress. p. 9-10
. Retrieved
17 September
2020
.
- ^
Argueta, Ricardo (2014). "El primer pensador anarquista en El Salvador (1904)" (in Spanish). Analisis sociologico boletin. pp. 3?14.
- ^
Acuna Ortega, Victor Hugo (1993). "Clases subalternas y movimientos sociales en Centroamerica (1870-1930)". In Edelberto Torres Rivas (ed.).
Historia General de Centroamerica
(in Spanish).
Madrid
:
Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences
.
ISBN
9788486956288
.
OCLC
600810176
.
- ^
Launed, Carles (1978).
El anarcosindicalismo en el siglo XX
. Coleccion de formacion e interpretacion libertaria (in Spanish).
Barcelona
.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link
)
- ^
Nettlau, Max
(1979).
La anarquia a traves de los tiempos
. Coleccion Documento.
Barcelona
: Antalbe.
ISBN
9788436514452
.
OCLC
7197984
.
- ^
Kuny Mena, Enrique (11 May 2003).
"A 90 anos del magnicidio Doctor Manuel Enrique Araujo"
[90 Years after the Assassination of Doctor Manuel Enrique Araujo].
Vertice
(in Spanish). Archived from
the original
on 17 June 2008
. Retrieved
17 September
2020
.
- ^
Paige, Jeffery M. (1993).
"Coffee and Power in El Salvador"
.
Latin American Research Review
.
28
(3). The Latin American Studies Association: 7?40.
doi
:
10.1017/S0023879100016940
.
JSTOR
2503609
.
S2CID
252914247
.
- ^
Taracena Arriola, Arturo (1984). "La confederacion obrera de Centro America 1921-1928". Anuario de Estudios Centroamericanos (in Spanish). Vol. 10. p. 83.
ISSN
0377-7316
.
OCLC
5547311486
.
- ^
Menjivar, Rafael (1982).
Formacion y lucha del proletariado industrial salvadoreno
(in Spanish).
San Salvador
:
Central American University
. p. 39.
OCLC
491060228
.
- ^
Arias Gomez, Jorge (1996).
Farabundo Marti
(in Spanish) (1 ed.).
San Jose, Costa Rica
: EDUCA. p. 51.
OCLC
988746727
.
- ^
Menjivar Larin, Rafael (1985). "Notas sobre el movimiento obrero salvadoreno". In Gonzalez Casanova (ed.).
Historia del movimiento obrero en America Latina
(in Spanish).
Siglo Veintiuno
. pp. 73?74.
ISBN
9789682312298
.
OCLC
159854916
.
- ^
Tercena Arriola, Arturo (1990). "Un salvadoreno en la historia de Guatemala: Entrevista con Miguel Angel Vasquez Equizabal". Boletin del Centro de Estudios del Movimiento Obrero y Socialista de Mexico (in Spanish). Memoria. p. 19.
- ^
a
b
Federal Research Division Library of Congress (1990). Haggerty, Richard A. (ed.).
El Salvador: A Country Study
(PDF)
. Washington, D.C.: The Library of Congress. p. 14
. Retrieved
17 September
2020
.
- ^
Grieb, Kenneth J. (1971). "The United States and the Rise of General Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez".
Journal of Latin American Studies
.
3
(2): 152.
doi
:
10.1017/S0022216X00001425
.
JSTOR
156558
.
S2CID
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.
- ^
Nohlen, Dieter (2005).
Elections in the Americas: A Data Handbook
. Vol. 1. p. 287.
- ^
Grieb, Kenneth J. (1971). "The United States and the Rise of General Maximiliano Hernandez Martinez".
Journal of Latin American Studies
.
3
(2): 152.
doi
:
10.1017/S0022216X00001425
.
JSTOR
156558
.
S2CID
146607906
.
- ^
Federal Research Division Library of Congress (1990). Haggerty, Richard A. (ed.).
El Salvador: A Country Study
(PDF)
. Washington, D.C.: The Library of Congress. p. 200
. Retrieved
17 September
2020
.
- ^
a
b
Beverley, John (1982). "El Salvador".
Social Text
(5). Duke University Press: 55?72.
doi
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.
JSTOR
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.
- ^
Lungo Ucles, Mario (1996).
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. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. p. 114.
- ^
Roque, Dalton (2000).
Miguel Marmol: Los sucesos de 1932 en El Salvador
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. p. 261.
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.
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.
- ^
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Matanza: El Salvador's Communist Revolt of 1932
. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. pp. 88?91.
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.
- ^
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El Salvador: A Country Study
(PDF)
. Washington, D.C.: The Library of Congress. p. 16
. Retrieved
17 September
2020
.
- ^
Roque, Dalton (2000).
Miguel Marmol: Los sucesos de 1932 en El Salvador
. Coleccion Testigos de la historia (in Spanish) (3 ed.).
San Salvador
:
Central American University
. p. 264.
ISBN
9788484051848
.
OCLC
493045652
.
- ^
Ackerman, Peter; Duval, Jack (2000).
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.
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:
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. pp. 241?265.
- ^
Parkman, Patricia (1988).
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.
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:
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.
- ^
Gonzalez, Medardo (2008). Rufino Antonio Quezada; Hugo Roger Martinez (eds.).
25 anos de de estudio y lucha: Una cronologia del movimiento estudiantil
. Coleccion Memoria historica de la Universidad de El Salvador (in Spanish) (2 ed.).
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. p. 36.
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.
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.
- ^
Report of the UN Truth Commission on El Salvador
(Report). United Nations. April 1, 1993.
- ^
"
'Removing the Veil': El Salvador Apologizes for State Violence on 20th Anniversary of Peace Accords"
.
NACLA
. Retrieved
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.
- ^
"El Salvador's Funes apologizes for civil war abuses"
.
Reuters
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. Retrieved
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- ^
Ortiz Diaz, Wilfredo Salvador (2 August 2009).
"Breve bosquejo historico del anarquismo en El Salvador"
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- ^
Elisa (18 January 2020).
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. The Final Straw Radio
. Retrieved
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2021
.
Bibliography
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]
External links
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]
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