Abstract
The dependent character of the Cuban bourgeoisie in the aftermath of the Revolution of 1895–98, the cycles of economic and political crisis with roots in the Island's sugar monoculture and economic dependency on the US and the pattern of US interventions in Cuban affairs under the Platt Amendment produced a profound crisis of legitimacy of the Cuban state during the Republic. Public intellectuals, in Antonio Gramsci's definition, played an important role in mediating the cyclical crisis with the purpose of maintaining public consent for Republican institutions, political parties and elites. Cosme de la Torriente y Peraza was a leading figure among public intellectuals who performed this role on behalf of Republican democracy beginning with the administration of President Estrada y Palma (1902–06) and culminating with the Fulgencio Batista regime (1952–58). His political career provides insights into the root causes of the crisis of confidence in Republican political institutions and leaders that paved the way for the Revolution of 1958.
Highlights
Barrington Moore’s classic Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy advances the thesis that the democratic path to modernisation depends on the International Journal of Cuban Studies 7.2 Winter 2015 strategic role played by the bourgeoisie in a country’s development, asserting that ‘no bourgeoisie, no democracy’ (Moore 1967)
In Antonio Gramsci’s analysis of the capitalist state in Intellectuals and the Organization of Culture (Gramsci 1971), public intellectuals play a crucial role in legitimising bourgeois democracy by formulating political doctrines and ideologies that analyse the crisis and contradictions of capitalism, by creating awareness of the long-term interests of the bourgeoisie as a whole in the political system and by obtaining consensus of the popular classes for bourgeois rule
This article examines the political thought and career of Cosme de la Torriente y Peraza, a prominent public intellectual and politician of the Republic (1901–58) whose career exemplifies the pursuit of hegemony based on moral and intellectual arguments for the Constitutions of 1901 and 1940 and resistance to the Platt Amendment
Summary
Barrington Moore’s classic Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy advances the thesis that the democratic path to modernisation depends on the International Journal of Cuban Studies 7.2 Winter 2015 strategic role played by the bourgeoisie in a country’s development, asserting that ‘no bourgeoisie, no democracy’ (Moore 1967). Torriente appealed for public support to lead a national protest against the dictatorship, calling on all concerned people and political parties for concerted non-violent action against the regime stating that ‘While pursuing all possible agreements, I advise citizens to keep calm and to allow time for those who are acting even at the levels of policy’ (Ibarra y Guitart, 2003: 81) He aspired to achieve a mediated solution to the political crisis in a manner that would restore democratic legitimacy inspiring confidence and respect in the political institutions of the Republic. Forget your self-interests and think about Cuba’ (El Mundo 1956: A-4, col. 2)
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