In his poem „Praise of Dialectics“ from 1934, Bertolt Brecht (transl. by John Willet) explains that we can break oppression. The Carnation Revolution proved this impressively. After 48 long years, the people of Portugal shook off the yoke of fascism. They ended the colonial war and won democratic and social rights. Millions of people, who until then had had no access to politics, created a revolutionary situation.
To overcome the world of exploitation was no longer a mere utopia. It was realised in a brief historical moment as a link between the mass movement and political and armed power. It found its form in expropriations, occupations, self-administration, nationalisation, district committees and workers‘ commissions.
The ruling classes, however, did not tolerate any attack on property relations. But this was not the end of the story, which is why the last lines of the poem read:
Those who were losers today
will be triumphant tomorrow.
And from never will come today!
The Carnation Revolution in collective remembrance – street art by American artist Shepard Fairey from 2017 in Lisbon.
25 April 2023 in Lisbon: The choir of the Casa da Achada and locals sing the song Grândola, Vila Morena – the starting signal of the Carnation Revolution.
Festa do Avante! The PCP’s annual press festival, organised by thousands of volunteers and attended by hundreds of thousands, demonstrates the communist party’s roots in society. Another left-wing party emerged in 1999 with the movement-orientated Bloco de Esquerda (Left Bloc) from, among others former small parties of the Carnation Revolution.
If parts of the bourgeoisie’s apparatus of violence develop a left-wing consciousness and switch sides, many things are possible – including peace and socialism.
Images
Kimble Young, commons.wikimedia.org, Street_art_lisbon_(27782506228).jpg), bearbeitet, CC BY-SA 2.0
Contaminadas, commons.wikimedia.org, Coro_da_Casa_da_Achada_e_populares_cantam_canção_Grândola_Vila_Morena,_de_Zeca_Afonso,_em_25_de_abril_de_2023,_em_Lisboa.webm, Videostill, CC BY-SA 4.0
Mar del Sur, commons.wikimedia.org, Festa_do_Avante!_Com%C3%ADcio_02.JPG, CC BY-SA 4.0
Klaus Steiniger