Abraham Guillén

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Abraham Guillén (born March 13, 1913 in Guadalajara , Spain ; † August 1, 1993 ?) Was a Spanish journalist, economist and political scientist who was influenced by both anarchism and Marxism and was next to Carlos Marighela as the most important theoretician of urban guerrilla . He influenced the Tupamaros in Uruguay in their early stages .

theory

Guillen had practical experience as a participant on the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War . After his flight from Spain in 1940 he lived in Cuba , Argentina and Uruguay and returned to Spain after Franco's death . He worked for left-wing magazines and was a professor of economics in Buenos Aires .

Guillén was ideologically influenced by both anarchist and Marxist ideas. He saw in the politically, socially and economically marginalized masses of large cities like Montevideo an ideal revolutionary potential. He considered young people, especially students, to be particularly suitable for setting revolutionary processes in motion. However, like his contemporary and counterpart in Brazil, Carlos Marighela , he did not solve the contradiction in terms of how a small revolutionary elite, which operated anonymously and mostly at night, should be able to organize massive support.

When the Tupamaros, founded in 1963, began their first armed actions in 1966, using Guillén as a model, he initially welcomed this. But soon he thought the path he had taken was wrong. Guillén, who rejected unnecessary violence, did not consider the so-called people's prisons to be suitable for gaining public sympathy for the Tupamaros. His main work Estrategia de guerilla urbana was published in Montevideo in 1969 and was also published in English in 1973.

After Franco's death, Guillén returned to Spain and worked there as a university lecturer. Shortly before his death, he published Tecnica de la desinformación, a book on the dangers of mass manipulation through new media such as television.

Works

  • El imperio del dolar: América Latina: Revolución o alienación , Buenos Aires 1962.
  • Teoria de la violencia; guerra y lucha de clases , Buenos Aires 1965.
  • Desafío al Pentagono; la guerrilla latinoamericana , Montevideo 1969.
  • Philosophy of the urban guerrilla. The revolutionary writings of Abraham Guillén , New York 1973.
  • Tecnica de la desinformación , Madrid 1991.

literature

  • Keyword: Guillén, Abraham (1912-) , in: Ian FW Beckett: Encyclopedia of Guerilla Warfare , New York 2001, p. 94.
  • Keyword: Tupamaros , in: ibid., P. 240f.

See also

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Guillén, Abraham
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Spanish journalist, economist and political scientist
DATE OF BIRTH March 13, 1913
PLACE OF BIRTH Guadalajara
DATE OF DEATH uncertain: August 1, 1993