NICARAGUA 1979-1989 - AN UTOPIAN PROGRAM FOR SOCIALISM

An analysis of Nicaragua's economic organization, within the framework of a study of small socialist countries may seem like a contradiction in terms from two points of view: firstly, because the S.N.L.F. (the Sandinista National Liberation Front) was defeated at the elections, and secondly, because the system introduced by the S.N.L.F. (1989-1990) was not compatible with the socio-economic systems of the USSR, Eastern Europe, or even Cuba. However, the fact that the Sandinista experiment was aimed at acting as a viable counter-model to two systems of capitalist dependence operating in the region, and that it was implicitly (and indeed explicitly, according to some statements) socialist in orientation, justifies the inclusion of the Nicaraguan economic experiment in a study on socialism, including in its broadest sense of research and implementation of new systems of social organization. The study is in two parts. The first examines projects for socio-economic change, and tries to evaluate whatever elements of originality they may contain for example, how fitted they are to engendering change, and in what way they resemble other socialist projects. The second part is concerned with the results that have been obtained, and how far these diverge from the initial projects. We are able to identify external and internal causes of these divergences and which are doubtless, in the final analysis, responsible for the electoral defeat.