Building a Revolutionary Community: The 1961 Latin American Peace Conference and the 1966 Tricontinental Conference in Comparative Perspective

In the decade after the Cuban Revolution, leftist groups and individuals from around the world sought to both emulate and protect Cuba’s revolutionary experiment. This paper analyses two of the most transnational and prominent efforts to harness the power of Cuba’s example and build a worldwide community of revolutionaries: the 1961 Latin American Peace Conference in Mexico City, and the 1966 Tricontinental Conference in Havana.

In March 1961, former Mexican president Lázaro Cárdenas convened the Latin American Conference for National Sovereignty, Economic Emancipation, and Peace (or Latin American Peace Conference.) The gathering drew international attention to the miserable conditions in Latin America, denounced the United States’ imperialist activities, and defended the Cuban Revolution. It brought together thousands of leftist leaders from across the hemisphere. The attendees hoped that their Peace Conference would be a non-violent way to spread the reforms associated with the Cuban Revolution while also protecting the island from U.S. aggression. To their disappointment, the events of the following years proved that violence would have to be met with violence.

Toughened and disillusioned by events such as the Bay of Pigs invasion, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the U.S. occupation of the Panama Canal Zone in 1964 and the Dominican Republic in 1965, leftist leaders organized another international conference, this time in Havana. The Tricontinental Conference drew revolutionaries from across Latin America, Asia, and Africa and struck a more militant tone than the earlier gathering. This paper discusses how the contrasts between the 1961 Peace Conference and the 1966 Tricontinental Conference illuminate the changing ways that the world interacted with both the idea of the Cuban Revolution and with the island itself.