Chile's difficult "transition"a bourgeoisie in a tight comer
Ten years after seizing power through a military coup and mas- never be defeated." And the flag of the Movement of the sive slaughter and repression, the Chilean dictatorship now finds Revolutionary Left (MIR) waved over the crowd.
itself in a deep and apparently irreversible crisis. This rally, the first held by the left in many years, highlights
Two recent events illustrate the new political situation that the role of the movement of the workers and the poor masses
To commemorate the tenth an- in the struggle against the dictatorship and the involvement of niversary of this seizure of power, Pinochet held a festival in the traditional working-class formations that have reorganized
Santiago on September 9 that drew about 40,000 peopie. underground in the recent years.
this number, according to le Monde of October 13, A sort of race against time has developed in fact between the unemployed people dependent on government mobilization and reorganization of the forces of the workers and popular movements and the maneuvers of the Christian
Democrat-led Democratic Alliance that is seeking to negotiate
CHILE has opened up in the country.
"a greai many were subsidies and functionaries.
A month later, on October 11, a rally
United Democratic Command (CUD), an umbrella organization a democratic transition with Pinochet's minister of the interior,
Onofre Jarpa, that would not threaten the continuity of miliand of shantytown-dwellers associations tary rule and would thus defuse the struggle over the overthrow student organizations, which is supported by
Democratic Movement (MDP) recently formed by the Communist Party, assembled more than 80,000 people.
The following is the first of a two-part series by a special correspondent of International Viewpoint analyzing the politfeel it, you can feel it, Allende's spirit is
"You can gans here were se siente, Allende esta presente. "] ical and organizational problems that face the reviving workers
["Se siente, and people's movement and the problems of strategy raised by historic slogan of the Popular Unity government ousted by the
"The people united will the struggle against the dictatorship.
Pinochet coup was taken up massively,
Jair GIL succession
The of national days of protest ("protestas nacionales"), coming at a rate of at least one a month since
May 1983, represents a fundamental turn in the Chilean political situation.
Through these mobilizations on May
11, June 14, July 11, August 11, September 8 and 11, and October 11, the mass movement has burst onto the political scene, opening up a process that will be extremely difficult to reverse. It may go through ups and downs but it would take the largest kind of political developments to turn it back or contain it.
A lot of observers in fact did not ex-
"initial stirrings"
pect to see any until
1989, the date set by General Pinochet for transferring power over to civilian hands and for which he staged a plebiscite to confirm it in 1980. Nonetheless, these "protestas" revealed a substantial change in the relationship of forces among the classes and within the classes.
This evolution was hidden by the dictatorial nature of the military's rule, but it could not but come out into the open when the mass movement erupted.
These mass mobilizations were the result of the crisis the Pinochet dictatorship entered into at the end of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s.
"CHICAGO BOYS" SERVE AS
APPRENTICE SORCERERS
Under the combined effect of the defeat of the working class after the September 11, 1973 coup that overthrew
Allende's class-collaborationist Popular
(UP) government and of the
Unity international economic crisis, Chile was to serve as a laboratory for the so-called
Chicago Boys, adepts of Milton Friedman's (1) monetarist and extreme free- market policy.
International Viewpoint 28 November 1983 organized by the human-rights and the People's of the dictatorship.
Punctilious defense of private initiative and enterprise and of freedom of trade was to create a full-fledged economic catastrophe, ruining local industry and throwing the financial system into tur-
Suicidal tariff cutting reduced Chile's custom duties to the lowest in the world and opened the floodgates for a torrent of imports. Between 1977 and 1982, the volume of imports from the United States
In addition to the selling off of the nationalized public industries, the balance sheet of this policy includes more than 2,000 business failures and a 15 percent drop in industrial production in
Then financial speculation and a spiraling rate of indebtedness led to the col-
The September 1983 'protesta' (DR) lapse of the banking and financial system. Up until August 1982, the military dictatorship kept the peso at a relatively high rate against the dollar, 39 to the dollar. This promoted not only the influx of imports but also frenetic speculation and growing indebtedness to the IMF and the international banks.
What is more, when the peso was later devalued in August 1982, going from 39 to 60 against the dollar and even 90 1. Milton Friedman is an American economist known as the guru of the "Chicago School." His theory links the fluctuations in economic activity to the money supply rather than to investment. On this basis, he has developed "monetarist" school of economics, calling for a return to a very pure form of free-market economy and opposing state intervention in the mechanisms regulating the capitalist economy.
17
the black market, the entire private banksystem, one of the solidest institutions of the Chilian regime, collapsed in
Their coffers empty, the reputation and power of the Chilean trusts linked to the Vial, Cruzat-Larrain, and other such families, who had been the pillars of the dictatorship's economic model, severely undercut. At that point, Pinochet sacked the Chicago Boys who had been advising his government.
Since the collapse of the country's banking and financial system, Chile's
The index of this is that in August 1983, Caceres, one of Pinochet's economic ministers, signed a new agreement to get 1.3 billion dollars in credits. This will be added to Chile's foreign debt, which already amounts to 20 billion
MASS DESPERATION
The social consequences of an economic policy that ruined the country are even more dramatic. Unemployment, poverty, hunger - that is the reality of
"economic model" for the Chilean people.
than 30 percent of the entire population, 3 million out of 11 million people, are out of work and get no social workers are obliged to work in the government projects under the Minimum Employment Plan (PEM) and the Family monthly wages of 2,000 to 4,000 pesos, when the average wage is between 6,000
According to an official analysis of wage differentials, percent of workers earn less than 10,000 pesos a month, and 71.32 percent less than 20,000. To understand what these figures mean, you have to realize that a loaf of bread costs 40 to 60 pesos - that is, 50 to 80 U.S. cents - and that the average monthly wage of Chilean workers corresponds to 80 to 100 dollars.
Moreover, 700,000 families are without homes, 160,000 have no running water, and more than 300 shantytowns have no electricity.
Behind these figures there lies a terrible reality. Hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children have nothing to eat. Hundreds of thousands of workers or people coming from the bourgeoisie find themselves declassed and forced to live by various "odd jobs."
all-pervading poverty is material basis for what is called vandal-
In fact, one of the features of the recent "protestas" has been that they have set off social explosions, with the young and not so young looting stores to get the clothing and food they need. The minds of the well-off are haunted by visions of these gangs of "vandals" swarming into the upper-class neighborhood and pillaging everything.
Within the bourgeoisie, the dictatorships economic model produced a shift in the relationship of forces to the disadvantage of the industrial national bourgeoisie and to the advantage of the economic groups linked to foreign capital, as well as the ruin of the middle bourgeoisie and petty bourgeoisie.
### PINOCHET ISOLATED
In sociopolitical terms, the result of this was that the regime put in power by the counterrevolutionary coup of September 1973 lost its social base. what has created the material social basis for the political realignment around the Christian Democrats. turnabout by the people in comfortable neighborhoods in Santiago who have participated in the pot-banging protests (cacerolazos).
The buildup of long-contained social, and political tensions the regime into an unprecedented crisis from which no economic finagling can offer a way out. Extremely vulnerable to the fluctuations of raw-materials prices, the Chilean economy has to rely on copper exports to fuel a new cycle of accumulation, as was the case in the 1930s. and imperialist capital, Chile pursues a policy of developing importsubstituting industries as it did in the past. It can only sink further and further into debt as its financing problems indated itself in the context of the relationship of forces that resulted from the defeat of the mass movement in which involved the destruction of all the working-class organizations and the liquidation of all institutions of bourgeois democracy. The basis for governing by "civil-war methods" was the paralysis of the mass movement and the achievement of a social consensus of the bourgeoisie and sectors of the petty bourgeoisie around the dictatorship.
However, after the collapse of the regime's social and economic base at the end of the 1970s and the revival of the mass movement, initially through the outbreak of limited workers struggles and reorganization of the trade-union movement, the Pinochet regime has become a and more inadequate political instrument for the bourgeoisie. been increasingly unable to cope with the new relationship of class forces. has precipitated a political crisis. bourgeoisie, as well as the proletariat, Pinochet dictatorship has become un-
The model for a transition to parliamentary rule that the Chilean bourgeoisie would like to apply in the 1980s is the way the shift from Francoism to constitutional monarchy was accomplished in
This was explained quite lucidly by Andres Zaldivar, a Christian Democrat leader who returned to Chile on September 4 after three years of exile and who is
Funeral for demonstrator killed by police (DR)
chairperson of the international Christian Democrat organization.
"Personally I am for trying to achieve as broad a consensus as possible. It is useful to recall the Spanish example and the Moncloa Pacts. Democratic Center Union government headed by Adolfo Suarez. But in order to avoid a political and social confrontation, Suarez sat down at the same table with Felipe Gonzalez, Santiago Carrillo,
Iribarne, and a consensus was achieved on the constitution." (2)
THE PROBLEM OF THE DIE-HARD DICTATORSHIP
The problem is that Chile is not Spain and there are a lot of obstacles to following such a policy. First of all, Chile, unlike Spain, is an underdeveloped, pendent capitalist country. there is the problem of General Augusto Pinochet. Franco died, leaving the way open for the transition. Pinochet is very much alive and represents a major obstacle to any real liberalization. his personal excesses, his declarations of war on the politicians (3), his stated will-
Interview in the September 1983 issue of the Chilean magazine Que Pasa. •Today Be say be these pornican gents to de On September 10, General Pinochet said: GOOGE TERE which no understanding could emerge. (El Mercurio, September 11, 1983). • International Viewpoint 28 November 1983
ingness to organize a new "September 1973" and his rejection of any change in the calendar of the transition to constitutional rule before 1989, there is something quite real and substantial.
Pinochet is the cornerstone of the military dictatorship. He controls the government, the generals' assembly - the military's parliament - and the armed forces as a whole, which represents a basic institution in Chilean life. The continuing solidity of the dictatorship's police and military apparatus, moreover, is demonstrated every day by the repression of the mass mobilizations and the opposition groups.
Whatever means are used to remove General Pinochet, the military dictatorship is too bound up with him for his departure not to mean a qualitative increase in the crisis of the dictatorship and a qualitative advance of the mass move-
This is why Pinochet, backed up by the rest of the junta and the assembly of generals, opposes any real liberaliza-
Thus, it is impossible both to "tough democracy" ment.
The second There cratic
"transimassive and poverty. meaning.
The slogans of "Liberty" are systematically backed up with calls for "Peace, " "Justice, " "Food and Jobs." The democracy that tens of thousands of Chileans are demanding means precisely "bread and work." And in the present economic situation it will be very difficult to implement a socialpact policy. International Viewpoint 28 November 1983 were = po parti state woul reorg in 11, an UI abilit For polic ity ULIG the workers
The Chilean bourgeoisie does not have a strong class-collaborationist movement that it can turn to for help in tying down like the Peronist movement in Argentina. Nor is there anything like the Communist Party in Spain, which in the course of twenty years of the struggle Francoism won control of the key sectors of the mass movement through the Workers Commissions (except, possibly, in the Basque country). Such political apparatuses are essential for the bourgeoisie to be able to carry out a transition to democratic forms involving political or social pacts between the classes.
THE "DIALOGUE"
In these conditions, terrified of chaos and of a big vacuum developing in the wake of the military's departure, the government, the Chilean capitalist class and representatives are solution that is inherently contradictory. That is, they want to carry through a limited democratization in the context of a continuity of military rule. significantly, is the view of Sergio VergaraLarrain, one of the bankers of the CruzatLarrain family, who calls himself "a man of the central center" but who really "Our action can have two objectives. We can appeal to the military to make a change, assuring them that it will not lead
Or we can reach an agreement We can have a dialogue for stability, consensus or a majority."
the banker replied, think that they should be a party to this
There cannot be any dialogue without the Communists." (4)
This is the outlook of one of the capitalists' big managers, who in fact rejects
"protestas." It is shared by other representatives of the Chilean such as Jorge Fontaine and Angel Fantuzzi, who today support liberalization
In this state of affairs, we have to look at the way the two main forces in this "dialogue" - the Democratic Alliance, controlled by the Christian Democrats, and the Pinochet-Jarpa team - are lining up.
The Democratic Alliance (AD) was founded in August 1983. It is a coalition dominated by Gabriel Valdes's Christian
Democrats. It also includes the Nationalists and some sections of Socialist Party supporters. It is also linked to the Project for the Development of a National Consensus (PRODEN), a socio-political organization controlled by the Christian Democrats. (5) Its formal program calls for the resignation of Pinochet, setting a date for elections, the election of a constituent assembly, and a social pact.
The AD is the force that is the offical interlocutor in the dialogue with the dictatorship. But this has not kept some of its leaders, such as Gabriel Valdes or some of its demonstrations, such as the September 8 one in Santiago, from suffering
At this stage the AD is in fact the Christian Democratic Party.
In the 1960s, under the leadership of Eduardo Frei, the Christian Democrats carried out a policy that corresponded to the interests of the industrial national bourgeoisie and of certain sections of the peasantry, since they instituted an agrar-
Although it was a bourgeois party, the Christian Democracy nonetheless developed a base among some strata of the working class. In particular it had an influence in the United Confederation of Workers (CUT). Its nationalist-populist ideology provided a basis for winning support in such strata
Today the Christian Democracy is rebuilding its forces. Among some sections of the petty bourgeoisie, the students in particular, it is seen as one of the most active political forces in the opposition. If there were an election today, it would get a lot of votes. Nonetheless, it is confronted with many problems.
First of all, the Christian Democratic leaders know that they will not have the benefit of an economic situation enabling them to buy peace. It cannot be for gotten either that the Christian Democrats' support for the military coup d'etat against the Allende government made a lasting imprint on some sections of the masses, even if today, ten years after the this does not overly tarnish its
Finaily, in the immediate future the Christian Democrats have to regain credibility in the eyes of the Chilean bourgeoisie itself. Today, ten years after the elimination of all parliamentary life, the bourgeoisie is well aware of all the weaknesses and internal divisions that the Christian Democrats suffer from. But if the Christian Democrats want to regain credibility for the bourgeosie, that means that they cannot do anything to meet the aspirations of the masses, who are threatening the bourgeoisie's rule.
There are already some examples that illustrate this problem. In the negotiations with Onofre Jarpa, the minister of
Interview in the August 10, 1983 issue of the Chilean weekly Hoy. 5. PRODEN was formed by former Christian Democrat members of parliament and conservative figures at the end of 1982 as a "study circle" in order to get around the ban on political parties. Its objective was to work out a political schema for the transition to democracy.
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the interior that Pinochet assigned in August to conduct the "dialogue," the Christian Democrats Pinochet go. Jarpa explained that everything was negotiable, except for Pinochet's resignation. A series of statements by representatives of capital toe the same
So, the Christain Democrats have backed off from demanding Pinochet's resignation in the negotiations. credibility in the eyes of the masses is obviously going to suffer as a result.
Another example is the rally called September 4 by PRODEN, which was to be the first public meeting held with the permission of the government. granted a permit for using one of the biggest parks in Santiago, right in the middle of the city, O'Higgins Park. It disclaimed all responsibility for maintaining order, thereby leaving this obligation in the hands of the Christian Democratic lead-
The meeting was being built. dreds of thousands of people were expected to come, including large numbers from the provincial cities.
But what happened? The PRODEN the Christian Democratic Party refused at the last minute to assume their responsibilities and cancelled the meeting.
In October, this capitulation was still clearer, when the Christian refused to issue a call for the mobilizations on the l1th of that month. was a response to the fears of the bourgeoisie of the capital city, who were terrified at the thought of such a concentration of people and of the possibility of groups getting out of hand and of the acts of "vandalism" that might be committed.
Christian Democratic leaders eased the apprehensions of the bourgeoi-
But at the same time they revealed their fear of the mass movement and the limits of their control over it, thereby exposing a weakness that the junta immediately exploited.
The logic of the policy of conciliation with the dictatorship and of retreating under the pressure of Pinochet's military chiefs is clear. It has led the Christian Democrats, in order to reassure the bourgeoisie, to opt for a continuity of military rule, while at the same time demanding a democratization that would enable them to rebuild their party. For this purpose they want the schedule for the return to constitutional rule to be reduced to 18 months. (This would involve adopting a law on political parties in three months, election of a constituent assembly in six months, and a referendum on the proposed constitutional reform in the following year.)
However, even though the Christian have accepted the general framework of dialogue with the military, all the plans and schedules they have proposed have run up against insoluable basic questions such as the type of constitutent assembly, the names of the parties that can be legalized, and the nature and content of the next constitution.
A lot of people in Chile are saying that Pinochet is not running the government 20 any more, that it is now in the hands of Sergio Onofre Jarpa. Pinochet still has a firm grip on the reins of the military apparatus. his speech on September 11 presenting the latest economic measures — a 15 percent wage increase for pubiic workers, aid to some sectors of national industry, and the initiative of calling a referendum on the changes in the 1980 constitution - shows that he is definitely strongman in the dictatorship.
Nonetheless, it would be wrong to the significance of Pinochet naming Jarpa minister of the interior. As a conservative bourgeois politician, the former general secretary of the National Party - the party of the bourgeois right and the main civilian group backing Pinochet's coup - Jarpa is the very model of the reactionary Chilian "states-
By taking Jarpa into the government, the dictatorship is broadening to incorporate the bourgeoisie directly, including some of their politicians. This move is the first step toward a "civilian-military government."
However, the government's discussions with the opposition have been held in the framework of accepting Article 24 of the 1980 constitution, which gives Pinochet the power to restrict public freedoms at his discretion. The framework of the discussions also involves excluding from the all parties that countenance class war. It involves accepting the continuity of military rule, keeping Pinochet. In this context, Jarpa has the full confidence of the military.
"Jarpa Operation" also has the blessing of the church and the support of the most influential representatives of capital and U.S. imperialism.
The terms of this dialogue therefore give a centrai place to the armed forces. So the combined effects of the political crisis and the mass mobilizations on the military become important elements in the picture. So far, however, unlike their Argentine counterparts, who do a lot of talking and accuse each other, the Chilean military have remained silent.
There is no doubt, however, that there are tensions within the military and that they are playing a fundamental role in the dialogue between Jarpa and the Demo-
Somesmonths before the mass movement erupted onto the political scene, people had already lost their fear." This feeling developed after 197879, when the mass movement began to reform around trade-union struggles. With the start of the "protestas," movement went into a stage of open mass struggle. This began with the call for a national work stoppage on May 11, 1983 issued by the copper-miners union (CTC) led by Rudolfo Seguel,
Following Seguel's arrest, what began as a strike call turned into national days dictatorship.
While the shantytowns have been tibe heart of all the mass mobilizations againsi the dictatorship, the opposition to Pinochet nonetheless goes far beyond the poor masses and even the petty bour-
The "cacerolazas" that begin as soon as night falls on ali the days of protest and make it possible for people in their homes to participate in the actions have always spread throughout Santiago, including into the upper-class neighbor-
The Democratic Alliance is one of the initiating centers of these days of protest. But it is necessary to make a distinction between the dynamic of the mass movement itself and the objectives set for it by the present leadership, in particular the forces grouped together in the Demo-
The shantytowns are the mobilizing centers for the "protestas" and the driving forces in them - the youth, the workers, and the poor masses, both employed and unemployed - use their own method, direct action. For example, on September 8, from 10:00 p.m. on the same scenario was repeated in all the neighborhoods "cacerolazos", bonfires on the main streets, barricades, police charges, dispersion, formation of new demonstrations, and so on. And this continued until midnight or 1:00 in the
These forms of struggle have now become classical. Most often they are inspiried by young natural leaders between the ages of 12 and 20, who spearhead of these mobilizations. gardless of whether they are semi-spontaneous or led by some activist of a clandestine left organization, these mass mobilizations always run up against the decisive probiems of organization, leadership, and political centralization.
This organizational weakness is a serious obstacle today to the extension of the mobilizations of the workers and poor masses. A feature of the most recent "protestas" has been the organization of "demonstrations" and "marches" in the shantytowns. areas, the idea is already going around of coordinating these actions, of having several of these neighborhood marches converge in more imposing demonstra-
In fact, all the preconditions already in these shantytowns for a national march of the workers and poor masses on Santiago. This could build a rally of hundreds of thousands of people against the dictatorship in the center of the
The October 11 rally in Santiago, which was organized by the left and assembled 80,000 persons, is the first step toward organizing really massive demonstrations.
However, as the situation ripens for broader confrontations, the problems of the mass organizations and political perspectives for the struggle take on more immediacy. I will deal with these questions in some detail in my next article. •
International Viewpoint 28 November 1983