On April 25, 1974, the Salazarist dictatorship, which had lasted in
Portugal for around fifty years, was overthrown by a group of youngsoldiers (self-called "Armed Forces Movement" - MFA) with the program of
putting an end to the colonial wars. , to grant independence to the
colonies and to establish a democratic, even socialist, regime. The
nineteen months that followed (April 25, 1974 - November 25, 1975) saw
the emergence of powerful social movements, protesting at the start but
which little by little became part of a resolutely egalitarian and
united society project, without however succeeding in impose itself in a
context of the Cold War where the future of Portugal and its colonies
becomes a geopolitical issue that goes beyond them.
This article discusses one of the major components of this movement,
namely the land occupation movement and the agrarian reform that
accompanied it.
The context
We cannot understand the history of the movement of land occupations and
agrarian reform which followed the overthrow of the dictatorship in
Portugal in 1974-1975 without referring to the specific characteristics
of the land tenure system as it persisted for almost eight centuries in
the south of the Iberian Peninsula, after the reconquest against the
Moors. The occupation by the Moors, which lasted for almost five
centuries (roughly between 800 and 1300), had removed all traces of the
feudal system, giving way at the time of the Reconquest to large
latifundia, distributed to originally to military leaders as forms of
reward. These latifundia, which employed mainly temporary workers
(although there were also some imported forms of slavery), constituted a
form of primitive capitalism, based on unlimited exploitation of local
labor.
The stability and harshness of such a system can be explained by the
particularity of the agro-climatic conditions of these semi-arid
Mediterranean zones. On the one hand, these made small-scale farms (such
as those found massively in the wetter areas north of the Tagus - center
and north of the country) practically inoperable. On the other hand,
between extensive livestock farming employing very little labor and
cereal farming requiring, on the contrary, a significant but temporary
workforce, the profit rates were relatively equivalent, depending on the
evolution of price. In this way, the landowners could limit themselves
to one or a few permanent employees and only employ daily workers at
harvest time, which they could do without from one year to the next if
the profits from cereals were limited. This proved insufficient compared
to the benefits of extensive livestock farming. The system of day
laborers was thus established, whose remuneration was fixed early in the
morning on the village square, in a balance of power very favorable to
the landowners - hence, for the rural proletariat, a situation of great
precariousness and miserable living conditions. Only one constraint
weighed on the landowners: the need to grow cereal crops at least once
every ten years to clean the pastures. But many had found a solution by
renting the land for the year to precarious sharecroppers, who gradually
equipped themselves with agricultural machines and played a determining
role during land occupations.
This historical particularity explains the formation of a clearly marked
working class, very different from the peasantry which characterizes
most rural areas, and a particularly fierce class struggle. This took
more organized forms in the 20th century, notably under the impetus of
the anarcho-syndicalist movement, culminating in the general strike of
1910, during the first republican revolution - a strike whose main
achievement was to shorten the day of work: no longer from daybreak to
nightfall, but from sunrise to sunset. Another strong moment, the
general strike of 1962, in the midst of a dictatorial regime, which
ended with the recognition of the eight-hour working day. This, however,
pushed landowners to mechanize and agricultural workers to seek
alternatives, such as the rural exodus towards the capital and its
working-class suburbs or precarious sharecropping in irrigated areas
requiring virtually no investment. It was in fact at the same time that
the large dams intended for irrigation were built, which considerably
modified the needs for fixed labor and therefore the balance of power
between agricultural workers and landowners in the few areas concerned
(mainly in western Alentejo).
The process
At the time of the overthrow of the dictatorship on April 25, 1974, the
anarcho-syndicalist movement no longer existed and the only real
opposition force was the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP) - which,
however, had very few activists in the campaigns. Seeking to develop its
base once democratic freedoms were established, this party will then
implement a strategy of developing trade unionism through the Ministry
of Labor, which it was assigned in the power-sharing negotiations within
provisional governments. To do this, he initiated negotiations on
"collective labor contracts" (CCT) between agricultural workers' unions,
set up under the impetus of his activists, and landowners, represented
by the ALA, a fairly modernist, interested organization. abandoning the
daily system. During the summer of 1974, these negotiations met with
some success and the CTTs were able to develop throughout Alentejo and
Ribatejo throughout the harvest periods (cereal harvest, tomato
collection, grape harvest, olive collection, etc.). .).
The problem began to arise when the Ministry of Labor and the unions
imposed a transformation of these CTTs, initially signed only for the
harvest period, into definitive CCTs, transforming agricultural workers
into permanent employees. Distrust then set in, moreover in a political
climate where the neocolonialist right represented by Spinola had lost
power, marking a first radicalization to the left (September 28, 1974).
The landowners began to decapitalize their farms to flee the country and
settle mostly in Brazil. Hence the establishment of a balance of power
between agricultural worker unions imposing the hiring of permanent
workers, with direct control of agricultural operations under the aegis
of the Ministry of Labor, and landowners trying to escape this control
and recover their capital to invest it elsewhere. This balance of power
would naturally lead to the occupation of the abandoned latufundia. To
prevent the movement from getting out of hand, the rural workers' union
and the Communist Party organized a major conference on February 9,
1975, calling for agrarian reform.
However, the land occupation movement did not start from this
initiative. The first occupations were the work of precarious
sharecroppers who were used to renting their machines at the time of
winter plowing: in January and February 1975, in order not to leave the
land abandoned by the landowners fallow, they chose to occupy them
afterwards. having ensured the neutrality of public authorities and the MFA.
They thus mark the start of a movement of occupation of all the
latifundia by agricultural workers and their transformation into
cooperatives, a movement which will gain more and more momentum until
November 25, 1975. In initially this movement remained limited, but,
with March 11, 1975, the date of a second failed coup attempt by Spinola
aiming to regain power, the MFA became radicalized, a new provisional
government was set up and an agrarian reform law is announced, which has
the effect of boosting latifundia occupations. A second boost was given
with the promulgation of the agrarian reform law in July 1975 and the
establishment of regional agrarian reform centers (CRRA) to legalize
occupations. Finally, a third decisive acceleration occurred in
September 1975 with the promulgation of the law allocating credits to
newly created cooperatives to enable them to pay salaries while waiting
for the harvests. This removed the last hesitations, so that by November
25, 1975, the date on which the movement lost the support of the MFA,
removed from power, more than a million hectares of latifundia had
already been transformed into cooperatives.
Cooperatives
So what are these cooperatives? What are its essential features?
First of all, they are part of a broader movement of occupations which
marked the country throughout the period called PREC (ongoing
revolutionary process), i.e. from April 25, 1974 to November 25, 1975:
occupations of empty houses by the inhabitants, then abandoned
businesses, land and means of communication (the newspaper Republica and
Radio Renaissance in particular). This in a political context where the
MFA itself was evolving towards the idea of a classless society and
separate popular power (ie not affiliated with a party), at least in its
most radical branch, that in contact with directly with social
movements. Such a context has contributed to developing a shared culture
seeking to build a society on humanist values. Culture undoubtedly also
influenced by the anarcho-syndicalist past of the early 20th century,
which we find in certain characteristics of cooperatives. Let us cite in
particular:
salary egalitarianism: the same salary for everyone, whatever the level
of responsibility (the differences between men and women have not
however been called into question, despite a nascent feminist movement,
but limited to large cities);
the transformation of private property into common property, which did
not only concern the latifundia and their infrastructure but also the
property held by the cooperators, such as agricultural machines: they
were transferred free of charge to the cooperative, private property no
longer having any meaning in a society now considered socialist;
open solidarity well beyond the limits of the cooperatives since anyone
looking for work was immediately welcomed and integrated into the
cooperative
the capacity for self-organization based on the skills of each
individual - which was verified in particular during the association
between former precarious sharecroppers, better prepared for management
tasks, and agricultural workers, more assigned to technical and manual
tasks;
internal democracy regarding decisions to be made;
autonomy in relation to public institutions, which translated,
especially after November 25, into a strong resilience of cooperatives:
they survived for more than ten years despite all the attempts made to
destroy them and difficulties of all kinds that they faced due to their
isolation.
However, the situations are quite different depending on the context.
For example, where the Communist Party gained the most influence, around
Beja and Serpa, it sought to group cooperatives into enormous industrial
units called "collective production units" (UCP), where democracy direct
was now impractical.
Follow-ups and lessons
After November 25, 1975, the cooperatives sanctioned by the agrarian
reform found themselves devoid of any institutional support while a
counter-agrarian reform was established aimed at returning the occupied
lands to the former owners or to their heirs or buyers, thus reducing
little little by little their means of production. There were many forms
of resistance, many cooperatives were led to buy the land themselves to
ensure their survival. However, with time and new generations, the
culture of cooperation has eroded, and, faced with the failure of
agrarian reform, many have chosen to emigrate.
Fifty years later, there is little left of this formidable movement
which marked the history of Portugal and could have developed a model of
humanity which we are sorely lacking today, in the face of the enormous
challenges we face. . Even those who experienced this exceptional period
sometimes wonder how such a movement could exist!
Samuel Thirion*
Note:
* Author of a thesis on agrarian reform in Portugal (IEDES, University
of Paris I-Panthéon-Sorbonne, November 1980). Contact:
samuel.thirion@wikispiral.org
http://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spip.php?article4198
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