Citation

Blake SW. Stud. Conflict Terrorism 1992; 15(3): 201-223.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1992, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/10576109208435902

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

From its inception in July 1979, a debate raged in policy and academic circles as to the fundamental political, ideological, and structural nature of the Sandinista regime. The two main intellectual camps fell along these lines: (1) the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) showed signs of traditional Latin American authoritarianism, but had a healthy strain of social democracy within its ranks. If only the U.S.‐sponsored "counterrevolution" would disappear, the Sandinistas would be able to develop their latent pluralism; (2) the FSLN was a Marxist‐Leninist regime, the leadership of which had a clear blueprint for taking and holding power and which sought to construct a Communist Utopia. Although this paper argues that the second line more clearly characterizes the nature of the Sandinista state, it strives to reach a broader understanding of the nature and structure of that state by employing the "Totalitarian" model of analysis first developed by Hannah Arendt in her monumental study "Origins of Totalitarianism." That model recognized numerous similarities between the regimes of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, such as a Utopian ideology, a secret political police, a single dictatorial party (and leader), and a compulsion to control all areas of civil society. Having defined Totalitarianism theory, the paper then moves on to examine Sandinista ideology, Sandinista "party" institutions like the "block committees" and the youth group, and the instruments of coercion such as the politicized armed forces and the secret political police. It shows how any and all rivals to the Front's power were penetrated, harassed, and in some cases crushed in order to smooth the way toward the leadership's Leninist Utopia∗ The paper finds that, by adhering to a Utopian ideology, by constructing an elaborate party‐army‐police nexus, and by seeking to penetrate every aspect of life in Nicaragua, the Sandinista regime met the definition of totalitarian and that it fell within the numerous experiments of the 20th century.

Language: en