Fighting for the True Path of Revolution: The Communist Party of El Salvador (PCS) during the Sixties

Abstract

The Salvadoran Communist Party (PCS) underwent great internal tensions throughout the 1960s, which led to its fracture at the end of the decade. Conventionally, these tensions have been explained as the result of internal differences related to the party’s position on the armed struggle. In contrast, this article shows that the internal dynamics of the party in this period can be explained by a series of disputes with a strong class component, which involved the two factions competing for the leadership of the organization. On the one hand, there was a workers’ faction in favor of proletarianizing the leadership of the party and deepening the class struggle through the work of the trade unions, and on the other, a sector of intellectuals that supported the political-electoral struggle, with the prospect of gradually accumulating forces. The reversal of the liberalization process experienced under the Salvadoran authoritarian regime since the early sixties, together with the party’s position on the war against Honduras, aggravated the internal contradictions of the organization, leading to its rupture in 1970