Back when I was contemplating a Political Science minor, I took a few upper level poly sci courses. Posted below is one of the essays I wrote in PLS 462 -- Comparative Revolutions. It's a long read, but it might interesting to the SC crowd. If anyone is interested, I can email them the full PDF. For copyright purposes, this can be considered public domain.

Introduction
A Revolution is a major period in a country’s development. Depending on whether or on
the revolution is successful, the country may be able to radically change its place in the
international community and (attempt to) create a more equitable society in general. The
ideology of the revolution is the fuel that fires those who fight against oppressive governments
and illegitimate leaders. During these revolutions the ideology may change, often drastically, as
steps are being made to overthrow the existing political structure and consolidate power. The
goal of this paper is to find out why the revolutionary ideology is so susceptible to change when
it is such an integral part of the entire revolution. As Lenin once put it, “Without a revolutionary
theory, there is no revolutionary movement.” (Guevara).


Cuba and Fidel Castro
In 1959, Fidel Castro and his army of guerrilla fighters overthrew military dictator
Fulgencio Batista. It is common knowledge that Cuba is now a communist dictatorship with
Castro at the helm. What is not is that Fidel Castro was (and still may not be) a Marxist-Leninist
until at least 1961 (en.wikipedia.org). What factors would shape the Cuban revolution into a
Marxist one?
We must recall that Castro’s band of guerrilla fighters, as well as his civilian organizers
and protestors, were all organized under one unifying idea – get Batista out – as well as their
reverence for the Cuban nationalist, José Martí. Since getting someone out of power is not an
ideology, but a single issue based upon a larger ideology, the Cuban revolution really had no
coherent ideology before it became a reality. To make matters worse, the unifying factor of
Batista’s removal could very well belong to many diverse ideologies. For instance, communists
may see the plight of agrarian peasants due to Batista’s policies; liberal democrats may take
offense at the totalitarian nature of the government. Of course these two schools of thought do
not have much else in common throughout their entire ideologies. This seems to be the case of
the Cuban revolution. There was a large coalition that was formed due to a single issue, and
after the revolution was carried out and power secured, the binding issue was no longer binding
since the goal had been accomplished. This leads to a fragmentation of the revolutionary
coalition unless the concerns of all groups can be reconciled. Liberal democrats, social
democrats, communists, etc. are now able to argue over their old issues again.

Castro’s revolution was deemed communist for two reasons. The first reason was the
strength of the Communist Party in Cuba. Castro needed communist support for his revolution
in order for it to be a success. Communist influence from Ché Guevara, one of Castro’s closest
advisors and confidants, could have helped Castro move towards communism. The second
reason was US apprehension in the early days of the new government. When Castro sought to
buy Soviet Oil, Washington took this as a bad omen and the Cuban-American relationship went
south. Castro, being a pragmatist of sorts, knew he needed the backing of a superpower in order
to achieve his goals. Subsequently, he picked the Soviet Union after the US-backed Bay of Pigs
invasion in 1961. In order to attract Soviet aid, he declared the revolution Marxist-Leninist. It
seems rather ironic that at the time of the Bay of Pigs invasion, Castro may have still been
warming to the idea of a Cuban-American alliance. The invasion turned Castro into a
communist (at least in name), which was why we invaded in the first place.

In this case, the revolutionary ideology changed from non-existent (or at the very least
incoherent) to communist due to the pragmatism and egotism of Fidel Castro. He felt that the
revolution’s goals could not be carried out without his watchful eye.

Nicaragua and the FSLN
The Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) or the Sandinistas succeeded in
overthrowing the Somoza family autocracy (in this case Anastasio Somoza) in July, 1979.
Today, Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in Latin America, but is a free democracy (one
of the goals of the FSLN). The FSLN is currently the main opposition party to the governing
PLC. Was the ideology of the FSLN to blame for this loss of power or was pluralism part of the
ideology all along?

The revolutionary ideology of the FSLN was (and still is) a very divisive issue. The
Reagan administration as well as many conservatives decried the FSLN as a Marxist group that
wished to turn Nicaragua into another Cuba (en.wikipedia.org). Conversely, many liberals and
social democrats spoke of how moderate the FLSN was. They simply wanted freedom and
democracy instead of crushing dictatorship. It seems they were both right.

The FSLN was founded in 1961 with a type of Marxist Nationalism as the base of their
ideology. As the movement gained strength, three distinct sub-groups formed: The agrarian
GPP, the Marxist TP, and the moderate, “third way” TI. It seems that conservatives have
exaggerated the GPP and TP’s influence in the FSLN, since the moderate TI was the most
popular group. The 1979 platform moved away from Marxism and incorporated social
democracy as the main tenant of the movement along with Nicaraguan nationalism in the style of
A.C. Sandino, the champion and namesake of the movement.

After Somoza was removed from office, the FSLN could show the world their true plans
for the revolution. A five person governing junta was set up as a temporary head of state as well
as “Committees for Defense of the Revolution” (CDS), used to keep local order. The junta was
composed of Daniel Ortega, Moises Hassan, Sergio Ramirez, businessman Alfonso Rebelo
Callejas, and Violeta Barrios de Chamorro (the first three being part of the FSLN, the latter two
being independents). This level of pluralism and power-sharing was unmatched in previous
revolutions. The Reagan administration was apparently not satisfied with the FSLN. Somoza
loyalists and mercenaries were regrouped, trained, and funded by the CIA in order to overthrow
the FSLN government and bring back rule under Somoza. These troops were known as Contras.

The Contras threw a wrench in the plans of the FSLN. Social reforms were not able to be
implemented as effectively or as quickly as was originally expected since the majority of the
national budget was aimed at fighting off the Contras. This conflict, coupled with a bankrupt
economy, forced the FSLN to abandon many of their principles and adopt a more totalitarian
style of government throughout the 1980s. Amnesty International spoke of human rights abuse
and the taking of political prisoners during the conflict (en.wikipedia.org). An exception was the
1984 elections, which were considered to be fair and free from corruption by international
observers (but not by the Reagan administration, which was illegally funding the Contras with
arms sales to the Iranians).

The second round of elections, held in 1990, served to oust the FSLN. The new
government (headed by junta member Violetta Barrios de Chamarro) allowed the FSLN to
remain as an opposition party due to the fact that the transfer of power was without bloodshed.

The ideology of the FSLN changed from Marxist to social democratic over the span of 18
years. This shift can be explained by looking at the increasing popularity of the movement. As
more and more people decided to declare war on the Somoza regime, more dialog was
initiated and the ideology moved toward moderation as more moderates entered the coalition.
Moderate elements were also more successful in recruiting new members, so naturally the new
members would be more moderate and moderates would have more control as the revolutionary
coalition grew. US involvement can be debated as to whether or not it forced the FSLN to have
free elections (the theory being that they feigned moderation to keep the coalition together long
enough to defeat the Contras). My research shows this to most likely be false. US involvement
tended to turn the FSLN into exactly what the US feared – a totalitarian Marxist government in
the style of Cuba. Of course, as we have heard before, hindsight is 20/20.

Comparing the ideologies and the factors of variability
The revolutionary ideology of the Cuban revolution started as an amorphous “single-
issue ideology” and ended up as a communist dictatorship. The Nicaraguan case, on the other
hand, started out as communist, and moved toward social democracy. Oddly enough, these two
countries had a similar past. Both were subject to imperialist exploitation throughout their
history. Both looked to link their struggles with those of past nationalist leaders (Martí for Cuba;
Sandino for Nicaragua). Both faced US intervention throughout the post-revolutionary period.
It seems odd that their ideologies would become so different in light of their shared past.

The revolutions do share to common factors of variability, that is, factors that changed
and/or shaped the revolutionary ideology. Those factors are extra-national intervention and the
need for popular support in order to complete the revolution.

US intervention served as an ideological catalyst in both cases. In Cuba, the revolution
was not declared as Marxist-Leninist until the Bay of Pigs invasion. In short, it seems Castro
was forced into Marxism. In Nicaragua, it tended to give FSLN hard-liners more ammo to use to
shape the party’s ideology. Since the study was limited to two similar countries, making the
assumption that intervention is counterproductive and will radicalize the revolutionary group is
premature.

The usage of a large heterogeneous coalition in both cases tended to destabilize the
revolutionary ideology. It is easy to keep the coalition’s ideology static when there is no change
in the members. As the coalition becomes larger, there is a greater chance of variability. In the
Cuban case, Castro’s charismatic leadership allowed the strongest element, the Communist
Party, to shape the revolutionary ideology as they saw fit – away from moderation and towards
the left. The Nicaraguan case saw no single identifiable leader and a strong moderate faction.
The moderates took advantage of this and used the 1984 elections to show more radical elements
of the FSLN that the moderate ideology could work.

At best we can only say international intervention and the coalition building and
reduction state serve as catalysts to the revolutionary ideology due to the limited nature of this
study. When studying revolutions, we may be well served by looking for these two factors of
variability and then looking for a rapid change in policy. Indeed, studying revolutionary
ideology may give us a bit more time to decide if a revolution will occur.