On the 20th of December last year Christmas seemed to arrive early for leftists in Latin America and across the World. Chile – who 50 years ago became the first nation to be brutally subjected to Neoliberalism – had just elected a socialist president by a 10% majority, one year after it overwhelmingly voted to draft a new constitution. If Chileans can replace their 1980 constitution, drafted by a US backed military junta, and replace their authoritarian government then there is hope for leftists across the world that the end of the movement is not here, and a better world is possible.
To understand the importance of this recent result we must first understand the 1970-73 Allende presidency. In 1970, Chile was a deeply unequal country with major mineral and agricultural industries privatised and controlled by US corporations. In the 1970 presidential election, Chileans chose to elect Salvador Allende President, becoming the world’s first democratically elected Marxist head of state. Allende rapidly moved to reform the Chilean economy, including nationalising various industries. The reforms reduced extreme poverty, saw an increase in wages and boosted industrial growth. Despite this, Allende’s tactics were controversial amongst the left, both in Latin America and within the Eastern Bloc. Whilst Castro voiced support for Allende, he was critical of the Chilean president’s refusal to work outside the frameworks of a liberal democracy; a revolutionary Allende was not. This “Via Chilena” to socialism meant Chile received little support from the Eastern Bloc, and coupled with state institutions of a liberal democracy actively working against any socialist government, this led to increasing economic difficult for Chile, and an opportunity for the USA.
US Imperialism was facing serious challenges in its ability to exploit Chileans, and Allende’s presidency was not in the interests of American hegemony in Latin America. Nixon proceeded to lead boycotts of Chilean exports in his bid to “make the economy scream”. These tactics are still seen today, with the illegal embargo against Cuba and new sanctions against Venezuela arguably constituting acts of economic terrorism in the name of the Monroe Doctrine. In the 70s the Chilean economy did indeed scream, and the country subsequently fell into recession and hyperinflation, culminating on September 11 1973 when the Chilean Army, backed by the CIA and led by General Pinochet, overthrew the elected government. Chilean soldiers entered the Presidential Palace and after a struggle, President Allende took his own life. Chilean democracy died that day, and General Pinochet would rule the country until 1990. His US backed fascist regime was perhaps the most brutal of all comparable South American regimes of the time: thousands murdered, 10,000 tortured, and nearly 100,000 dissenters were imprisoned during the dictatorship. These CIA-backed fascist juntas had occurred before in Brazil (1964) and Bolivia (1971), but after the coup in Chile the continent become a lapdog for the United States, at least until the end of the cold war and the return of democracy. It is worth noting that these coups removed democratically elected leaders and enacted military dictatorships in the name of safeguarding democracy, a tactic the global right has and will continue to use.
US imperialism meant that the democratic road to socialism Allende had set Chile on was to be destroyed. This was enacted through a group of Chilean students in the 50s – 70s being granted scholarships to study at the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman. Known as the Chicago Boys, they wrote “El Ladrillo”, a document advocating for the implementation of Neoliberal shock treatment in Chile through the drastic reduction of public spending and privatisation of the economy, once again placing US corporate interests ahead of everyday Chileans’. The harsh effects of Neoliberalism were soon felt by the population, as they were similarly in the United Kingdom under Thatcher. In Chile however, Neoliberalism was written into the 1980 constitution, making any deviation from what the US thought would be beneficial for themselves democratically intolerable. This essentially outlawed a socialist “Via Chilena”.
The example of Chile is a pertinent one in addressing an all-too-common misconception of Neoliberalism: the idea that Neoliberalism seeks to minimise the role of the state. The ideology produced by Friedman and Hayek and later implemented by Pinochet, Thatcher, and Reagan cannot simply be described as laissez faire capitalism. Instead, Neoliberalism utilises state power to aid and create an idealised version of the market in order to protect capital. Without a state monopoly on authorised violence there is simply no way private property would remain so. When the Neoliberal ideology arose in the second half of the 20th century, it had an easy time converting somewhat social democratic states into a tool that aides the accumulation of capital and the oppression /exploitation of the working classes, through its rose-tinted ‘hands-off’ way of government. The Neoliberal state is not laissez-faire, its hands were not off nor absent from the striking miners in Orgreave who felt the batons and cavalry of the South Yorkshire Police, nor was it absent from the Chilean dissidents who were tortured and who disappeared under Pinochet’s fascist junta. Those who resist Neoliberalism are painted as an enemy within and have the full force of the state legally unleashed upon them. Neoliberalism necessitates an oppressive state in order to function and it is most definitely not ideologically opposed to state intervention in the economy.
In 2019 Chile responded to increased neoliberal heavy-handedness, with the mobilisation of the Chilean Left emerging through grassroots protest movements after the Santiago Metro increased its fares. People took to the streets to protest the fare hike, and the movement quickly grew. It soon began to define itself in opposition to privatisation, corruption, widening inequality, and marginalisation of indigenous peoples: in essence Chileans’ were taking to the streets in opposition to the country’s Neoliberal status-quo. As people occupied and burnt train stations, president Pinera announced a state of emergency. Over the coming months the civil unrest spread across Chile, anarchists mobilised against Chilean riot police and 3.7 million people took to the streets. This protest movement was arguably one of the most successful in Latin American history, with Pinera forced to reform healthcare, pensions and education. Most importantly, protestors secured a national referendum on whether Chile should abandon its 1980 constitution and elect a national assembly to draft a new one.
Here I would like to make the important point that whilst Chile’s current President is a socialist and the country seems to be once again in a leftward trajectory after 50 years, these victories did not come from the top. State power didn’t enable these changes, and whilst state power will today be key in achieving socialism in Chile and abroad, true power does not come from the state but from the people in the streets. Epitomising this point is the fact that the Chilean President is not a typical politician, instead coming from the grassroots, having been a key leader in the 2012 student protest. Without Chilean anarchists and the Left mobilising to disrupt and protest the status quo, Chileans would not be saying goodbye to Neoliberalism. The left need also be acutely aware that achieving state power is a means not an end. It is in fact one of many means, and it isn’t even absolutely necessary if we consider what was perhaps one of the most successful socialist projects – Revolutionary Catalonia, which had no state at all. Anarchist Catalonia was arguably more meaningfully democratic than our liberal democracy can ever hope to be. Leftists would do well to remember that state institutions serve primarily to protect Capital, not to aid workers.
In this country, the British left came closer to state power in 2015-19 than at any other time in recent political history. However, the elected Conservative government is perhaps the most authoritarian in recent memory. It has botched the pandemic response resulting in over 100,000 dead, and the party that only 3 years ago seemed like a possible vehicle for socialism seems hell bent in excluding the left and returning to the oxymoronic times of a Neoliberal Labour Party. But it could be worse, as John McDonnell pointed out after the 2019 disaster: “Normally when a socialist revolution fails, they all get taken to a football stadium and shot, at least that hasn’t happened this time.”
The left can blame internal sabotage all it wants (and it has every right to, without this it is very possible we would have elected a Labour government in 2017), but this discourse does not help it move any closer to power. In my opinion, a key mistake of the Corbyn era was thinking that a handful of MPs would single handily usher in socialism. Of course, activists up and down the country did tremendous work in the years 2015-19, but as the events in Chile demonstrate, for the populist left to win state power it must have millions on the streets demanding change, and a powerful trade union movement that forces the hand of Capital. The recent Kill the Bill and BLM protests were a missed opportunity to truly mobilise the left at a grassroots level. However, not all hope is lost. 2021 saw a reinvigorated trade unionism in Britain, and the coming months also promise to be strike heavy. Recent increases in union organising is further evidence that socialism will not be handed down from state power, but seized from the grassroots, as was the case in Chile. The road ahead is long and it will be hard work, but if Chileans have, after 50 years, rejected Neoliberalism, then I believe there is hope for us all.
Comrades, I leave you with this quote from Allende’s final radio broadcast as La Moneda was bombed by the air force:
“Other men will overcome this dark and bitter moment when treason seeks to prevail. Go forward knowing that, sooner rather than later, the great avenues will open again where free men will walk to build a better society.”
Edited by Theo Adler-Williams
Comments