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Among the popular feminist projects of the dictatorship period in Chile was the Yela group in Talca, made up of pobladoras (women shantytown residents) and two Maryknoll sisters. Of particular interest is the manner in which this group’s popular feminism and antiviolence work during the 1980s was shaped by the women-church movement and feminist theology related to patriarchy, violence against women, and women’s collective resistance strategies. Over the long term, religious elements were gradually excluded from Casa Yela’s antiviolence work in favor of more secular feminist interpretations. Entre los proyectos feministas populares durante la época de la dictadura en Chile se encuentra la presencia del grupo Yela de Talca, formado por pobladoras (mujeres residentes de poblaciones) y dos hermanas Maryknoll. De particular interés es la forma en que el feminismo popular y antiviolencia de este grupo durante la década de 1980 se moldeó a partir del movimiento mujer-iglesia y la teología feminista relacionada con el patriarcado, la violencia contra las mujeres y las estrategias de resistencia colectiva de mujeres. A largo plazo, los elementos religiosos fueron gradualmente excluidos del trabajo antiviolencia de Casa Yela en favor de interpretaciones feministas más seculares.

Democratic governments are not the only ones that formulate political strategies to generate consensus. The last Argentine dictatorship (1976–1983) also developed cultural, educational, and communication policies to maintain and increase its support and to curb the opposition. However, these policies have not been studied in the postdictatorship, largely because of the prevalence of the image of the apagón cultural (cultural blackout)—the notion that the dictatorship’s project was simply repression and censorship. Examination of recently discovered official documents reveals the productive and creative character of the dictatorship’s cultural projects, which were used to increase social control and impose a certain “order.” Los gobiernos democráticos no son los únicos que formulan estrategias políticas para generar consenso. La última dictadura argentina (1976–1983) también desarrolló políticas culturales, educativas y de comunicación para mantener e incrementar su apoyo y frenar a la oposición. Sin embargo, estas políticas no se han estudiado en la postdictadura, en gran parte debido a la prevalencia de la imagen del apagón cultural—la noción de que el proyecto de la dictadura era simplemente represión y censura. El examen de documentos oficiales recientemente descubiertos revela el carácter productivo y creativo de los proyectos culturales de la dictadura, que se utilizaron para aumentar el control social e imponer un cierto “orden”.

The Araguaia guerrilla war (1972–1974) was an attempt to reconcile armed struggle and political awareness that became a sort of “guerrilla focus” with roots in the peasant population, which assumed a decisive role in the resistance to military repression. This period was characterized by the centralization of operations of information and repression, consolidating the tactic of “political disappearance” in Brazil. The military occupation terrorized the population to mitigate any multiplier effect of the insurgency, and its success reverberated throughout the continent. At the same time, denunciations of its human rights abuses helped to erode the dictatorship. A guerrilha do Araguaia (1972–1974) representou um esforço para reconciliar a luta armada e a consciência política que se tornou uma espécie de foco de guerrilha com raízes na população campesina, que por sua vez desempenhou papel decisivo na resistência à opressão militar. Esse período caracterizou-se pela centralização das operações de informação e repressão, consolidando a tática de “desaparecimento político” no Brasil. A ocupação militar aterrorizou a população com o propósito de reduzir a possibilidade de insurgência e nesse sentido alcançou sucesso que reverberou por todo continente. Contudo, denúncias das violações de direitos humanos contribuíram para a erosão da ditadura.

Since the early 1990s, Chilean democratic governments after Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship have made an effort to allocate publicly subsidized housing to the lower classes. Nevertheless, the dominance of market principles in urban policies has contributed to the formation of highly segregated neighborhoods and the gentrification of peripheral neighborhoods. As a result, Chilean public opinion is witnessing the rearticulation of what in the mid-twentieth century was known as the pobladores movement—social mobilizations demanding housing solutions for the poor. In the old working-class municipality of Peñalolén, severe gentrification since the late 1980s has triggered the appearance of autonomous grassroots organizations such as the Movimiento de Pobladores en Lucha (MPL). The movement has been able to fight social and spatial injustice in Santiago through a subversive appropriation of state policies. Its experience reveals the potentialities of such mobilizations for democratizing cities under a neoliberal regime. Desde principios de los noventa, los gobiernos democráticos chilenos que siguieron a la dictadura de Augusto Pinochet han intentado proveer vivienda social subsidiada a las clases populares. Sin embargo, el predominio de principios de libre mercado en las políticas urbanas ha contribuido a la formación de barrios altamente segregados y a la gentrificación (o “aburguesamiento”) de los vecindarios periféricos. Por consiguiente, la opinión pública chilena está presenciando la rearticulación de lo que a mediados del siglo 20 se conoció como el movimiento de pobladores —movilizaciones sociales que demandaban soluciones habitacionales para los pobres. En el otrora municipio popular de Peñalolén, la importante gentrificación que se ha venido desarrollando desde finales de los 80 ha redundado en la aparición de organizaciones de base autónomas como el Movimiento de Pobladores en Lucha (MPL). Este movimiento ha sido capaz de combatir la injusticia social y espacial en Santiago mediante una apropiación subversiva de políticas estatales, experiencia que revela el potencial de dichas movilizaciones para la democratización de las ciudades bajo un régimen neoliberal.

The Colegio Médico de Chile (College of Physicians of Chile) was a significant professional association with a long history and a leadership position in discussions about physicians as an occupational group and about public health in Chile. It opposed the socialist Popular Unity government (1970–1973), supported the military coup, collaborated actively with the dictatorship for several years afterward, and later joined the opposition demanding a return to democracy. Since the formal return to democracy in 1990, it has continued to participate in public discussions not only about health but also about human rights, reparations, and democratic convivencia in Chile. Examining its history helps us to historicize the construction of contemporary memory, facilitating an analysis of groups that do not correspond to the binary opposition of victims and victimizers that dominates the historical literature. The Colegio’s use of the same memories in different contexts leads us to reflect upon the fact that public memories are much more mobile and pragmatic and less principled than they first appear. This underlines the importance of including class and professional or corporate identity and other differences in analyses of the discourse of memory. El Colegio Médico de Chile es una importante asociación profesional con una larga historia y una posición de liderazgo en las discusiones sobre los médicos como grupo ocupacional y sobre la salud pública en Chile. Se opusieron al gobierno socialista de la Unidad Popular (1970–1973), apoyaron el golpe militar, colaboraron activamente con la dictadura durante varios años y más tarde se unieron a la oposición que exigía el regreso de la democracia. Desde el retorno formal de la democracia en 1990, el Colegio ha participado activamente en los debates públicos no sólo sobre la salud sino también sobre los derechos humanos, las reparaciones y la convivencia democrática en Chile. Si examinamos su historia podemos historizar la construcción de la memoria contemporánea, lo que nos ayuda a analizar aquellos grupos que no cuadran con la oposición binaria de víctimas y victimarios que domina la literatura histórica. El uso que hace el Colegio de las mismas memorias en diferentes contextos nos lleva a reflexionar sobre el hecho de que las memorias públicas son mucho más flexibles y pragmáticas y menos guiadas por principios de lo que parecen a primera vista. Todo esto subraya la importancia de incluir clase e identidad profesional o corporativa y otras diferencias en los análisis del discurso de la memoria.

The U.S.-backed Latin American military dictatorships of the 1970s and 1980s resulted in a lack of documentary evidence about the lives of thousands of political activists, intellectuals, union leaders, and everyday people who were tortured and disappeared by their own governments. In Argentina, people have attempted to come to terms with such horrific past events in a variety of ways that are neither static nor univocal. The dynamic process of memory building is influenced by ongoing political debates, shifting power dynamics, global markets, social movements, and a host of other factors such as justice policies. Spaces of memory and museums created in former clandestine centers of torture and disappearance bring to light a politics of truth that works against and reframes a history of silence through impunity. Parte del legado de las dictaduras militares latinoamericanas de los años 70 y 80 apo-yadas por los Estados Unidos es la carencia de pruebas documentales acerca de las vidas de miles de militantes políticos, intelectuales, líderes sindicales y gente común que fueron torturados y desaparecidos por sus propios gobiernos. En la Argentina, la gente ha tratado de lidiar con estos horribles hechos del pasado por medio de una variedad de formas que no son ni estáticas ni unívocas. El proceso dinámico de construir la memoria está influenciado por los debates políticos en curso, las cambiantes dinámicas de poder, los mercados globales, los movimientos sociales y una gama de otros factores tales como las políticas judiciales. Los espacios de la memoria y los museos creados en antiguos centros de tortura y desapariciones clandestinos como el ESMA y el Olimpo ponen de manifiesto una política de la verdad que de forma visual actúa en contra de una historia del silencio guiada por la impunidad y la redefine.

Los esfuerzos para clasificar la prisión de Punta Carretas (ahora transformada en un centro comercial) como un “lugar del olvido” impuesto por medio de la lógica del mercado ocultan la productividad en curso del lugar como vehículo de la memoria ligado no unicamente a la dictadura militar pero también a la privatización del patrimonio público. No toman en cuenta el proceso dinámico y complejo de la creación de un pasado común que es el resultado de los enfrentamientos directos entre diferentes sectores de la sociedad uruguaya. La creciente politicización y espacialización de la memoria colectiva, con el énfasis en las experiencias pasadas de represión, pasa por alto el vínculo entre la memoria, la historia, el estado nacional, el museo, la vida cotidiana, los sueños de la gente, el sentido del futuro y la utopía. Efforts to classify the Punta Carretas Prison, repurposed as a shopping center, into a “site of forgetting” imposed through the logic of the market obscure the ongoing productivity of the place as a vehicle of memory linked not only to the military dictatorship but also to the privatization of public patrimony. They fail to account for the dynamic and complex process of construction of a common past resulting from direct confrontations between different sectors of Uruguayan society. The increasing politicization and spatialization of collective memory, focusing on past experiences of repression, overlook the link between memory, history, nationstate, museum, everyday life, people’s dreams, their sense of the future, and utopia Fil: Guglielmucci, Ana. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina

Muralism is one of the most striking expressions of one of Chile’s most emblematic working-class neighborhoods, La Victoria, which is known for the land takeover in which it originated and its resistance to the military dictatorship. Muralism served as the physical carrier of messages of resistance during the dictatorship and later consolidated an imaginary of political condemnation and venting in the face of repression. With democracy, muralism has made the memory of the neighborhood graphic, propitiated a dialogue between the experience of the land occupation and the dictatorship, and generated a discourse that, emerging from the popular, continues to confront the mechanisms of forgetting circulated by the official truths imposed by the compromised democratic transition. El muralismo es una de las expresiones más propias de uno de los barrios populares más emblemáticos de Chile: La Victoria, conocida por la toma que le dio origen y por su resistencia a la dictadura militar. El muralismo cumplió la función de ser el soporte físico de mensajes de resistencia durante la dictadura, consolidando posteriormente un imaginario de denuncia política y de desahogo frente a la represión. Con la democracia, el muralismo ha tenido la función de hacer gráfica la memoria de la población, propiciando un diálogo entre la experiencia de la toma y de la dictadura, generándose una discursividad que, desde lo popular, continúa enfrentando los dispositivos de desmemoria accionados por las verdades oficiales impuestas por la transición democrática pactada.

Ethnographic research on the life experiences of former political prisoners and their families in Uruguay suggests the need for rethinking of the concept of trauma, which is often inadequate to convey the historical and social specificity of painful memories. The collective wound is constructed in public space, and intimate memories are closely linked to the framework in which they are embedded. Working on the victim’s self is not sufficient to overcome the trauma, distracting attention from the need for social recognition and justice. Making history and doing justice are unavoidable steps in the establishment of a different political regime. Las investigaciones etnográficas sobre las experiencias de vida de ex presos políticos y sus familias en Uruguay sugieren la necesidad de replantearse el concepto de trauma, el cual suele ser casi siempre inadecuado para expresar la especificidad histórica y social de las memorias dolorosas. La herida colectiva se construye en el espacio público y las memorias íntimas están estrechamente vinculadas con el marco en el que están inmersas. Trabajar sólo con el yo de la víctima no es suficiente para superar el trauma, y desvía la atención de la necesidad de reconocimiento social y justicia. Hacer historia y hacer justicia son pasos ineludibles en el establecimiento de un régimen político diferente.

The last Argentine dictatorship (1976–1983) left a legacy of an estimated 30,000 desaparecidos (disappeared people). Three decades later, the wall of impunity is now being torn down. Trials are spreading across Argentina and hundreds of repressors are being judged. These trials are public spaces for collective memory making, political arenas for competing memory battles, and forums in which new information and perspectives about what happened under state terrorism continually emerge. Through the testimonies of survivors and the claims of the defense teams we gain new knowledge about the level and scope of the human rights abuses, how the repressive apparatus worked, the everyday “normality” of state terrorism, and society’s complicity. La última dictadura argentina (1976–1983) dejó un legado de cerca de 30,000 desaparecidos. Tres décadas más tarde, el muro de la impunidad está siendo derribado. Los juicios se multiplican por todo el país y cientos de represores están siendo enjuiciados. Estos juicios son espacios públicos para la construcción de la memoria colectiva, escenarios politicos para las batallas sobre la memoria y foros en los que continuamente surgen nuevas perspectivas e información sobre lo ocurrido bajo el terrorismo de estado. A través del testimonio de los sobrevivientes y los reclamos de los equipos de defensa legal surge un nuevo conocimiento acerca del nivel y el alcance de los abusos de los derechos humanos y sobre cómo funcionaba el aparato represivo, la “normalidad” cotidiana del terrrorismo de estado y la complicidad de la sociedad.

The democratization that followed the last military dictatorship in Argentina (1976–1983) has been influenced by human rights organizations’ relentless work to bring about truth and justice regarding the consequences of state terrorism and to keep the memory of that period alive. These efforts frame the discursive context in which human rights violations, including torture, are interpreted in contemporary Argentina. Argentine interviewees from across the political spectrum condemn torture, but the language and frames they use and the narratives surrounding political events vary. These accounts expose the conflicted terrain of memory making and the ambivalences and contradictions that permeate the construction of a torture-rejecting culture.La democratización que vino después de la última dictadura militar en la Argentina (1976–1983) ha sido influenciada por el trabajo incesante de las organizaciones de derechos humanos para lograr que se establezca la verdad y se haga justicia sobre las consecuencias del terrorismo de estado y para mantener la memoria sobre ese periodo viva. Estos esfuerzos enmarcan el contexto discursivo a través del cual las violaciones de los derechos humanos, entre ellas la tortura, son interpretadas en la Argentina contemporánea. Las personas entrevistadas en Argentina, quienes atraviesan el espectro político, condenan la tortura. Sin embargo, el lenguaje y los esquemas que usan y las narrativas sobre los acontecimientos políticos varían. Estos relatos exponen el terreno conflictivo de la construcción de la memoria y las ambivalencias y contradicciones que permean la construcción de una cultura de rechazo hacia la tortura.

La Comisión Nacional sobre la Desaparición de Personas fue creada en 1983 para investigar el paradero de las miles de personas que fueron desaparecidas durante la dictadura en Argentina. Su informe Nunca Más sirvió para procesar a las juntas militares y dar a conocer el pasado a las nuevas generaciones y como modelo para los informes de las comisiones de la verdad que se establecieron en otros países latinoamericanos. Debido a su carácter canónico, sirve para ilustrar las políticas de la memoria sobre las desapariciones forzadas en la Argentina después del regreso de la democracia. The Nunca Más (Never Again) report was prepared by Argentina’s Comisión Nacional sobre la Desapareción de Personas (National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons), created in 1983 to investigate the fate of thousands of persons who were disappeared during the dictatorship. It was used in the prosecution of the military juntas, to convey the past to the new generations, and as a model for the reports of truth commissions established in other Latin American countries. Because of its canonical nature, it illustrates the politics of memory regarding forced disappearances in Argentina following the return to democracy. Fil: Crenzel, Emilio Ariel. Universidad de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina

Examining the democratization of communications in Brazil through the lens of broadcast television reveals a conflicted process involving actors with opposing interests, all the more so because it is a sector characterized by oligopoly. An analysis of three of the five presidencies following the end of Brazil’s military dictatorship suggests on the whole that communications policy has yet to embrace the process of democratization that has occurred in other sectors of Brazilian society. One of the few advances made during this period was the federal government’s implementation of public television in 2007. No other action has been taken to alter the mechanisms that keep the mass media in the hands of the few. Examinar o processo da democratização das comunicações no Brasil pela lente da radiodifusão revela que o processo é conflituoso e envolve atores cujos interesses se opõem, sobretudo por tratar-se de um setor caraterizado por constituir um oligopólio. A análise de três dos cinco governos que sucederam o fim da ditadura militar, sugere, em geral, que a política de comunicações ainda não incorporou o processo democratizante que aconteceu em outros setores da sociedade brasileira. Um dos poucos avanços registrados no período foi introdução em 2007 do serviço público de televisão. No entanto, não houve ações para mudar os mecanismos que permitem a concentração midiática.

An aspect of analyses of the Latin American military dictatorships that has so far been little recognized is the influence of the French concept of the guerre révolutionnaire (revolutionary war) developed by that country’s colonial army when engaged in Algeria in the 1950s. Evidence of this influence contradicts the view that U.S. doctrine was the main ideological factor affecting the military leaders of Brazil, Chile, and Argentina in the 1960s and 1970s. Há um aspeto, até agora pouco reconhecido, das análises das ditaduras militares do Cono Sul do século XX, é a influência do conceito francês da guerre révolutionnaire (guerra revolucionária), desenvolvido pelo exército colonial desse país na época da luta algeriana de independência. A evidência de tal influência contradiz a concepção da doutrina estadunidense ser o fator ideológico principal compartilhado pelos chefes militares brasileiros, chilenos e argentinos das décadas de 1960 e 1970.

The coming of peace in Central America after several decades of civil war and military dictatorships has not resulted in an end to violence. Murder rates have risen to such a degree that these countries are among the most violent in the world. One form of violence that has received a great deal of attention is the murder of women, but many argue that this is only one of many forms of violence that women face on a daily basis. The women’s organizations that have emerged in Guatemala since the end of the civil war have focused on demanding greater political and economic rights for women and laws that recognize violence against women as a crime and improve the mechanisms for investigating and prosecuting it. Two recent laws redefine sex crimes in such a way as to suggest that they should be seen as heinous acts regardless of the woman’s sexual history, character, or age. Though these discursive changes are a triumph, problems with the legal system and the persistence of sexist ideologies have so far limited the effectiveness of these new laws.La llegada de la paz a Centroamérica tras varias décadas de guerra civil y dictaduras militares no ha puesto fin a la violencia. El índice de asesinatos ha aumentado a tal grado que estos países se encuentran entre los más violentos del mundo. Una forma de violencia que ha recibido mucha atención es el femicidio, pero muchos argumentan que esta es sólo una entre muchas formas de violencia que las mujeres enfrentan a diario. Las organizaciones de mujeres que han surgido en Guatemala desde el fin de la guerra civil se han centrado en demandar mayores derechos políticos y económicos para las mujeres y leyes que reconozcan como delito la violencia contra la mujer, mejorando los mecanismos de investigación y justicia. Dos leyes recientes redefinen los delitos sexuales de tal forma que sugieren que pueden considerarse actos atroces sin importar la edad, carácter o historia sexual de la mujer. Aunque estos cambios discursivos representan un triunfo, los problemas con el sistema legal y la persistencia de ideologías machistas han limitado, hasta ahora, la eficacia de estas nuevas leyes.

During the twentieth century, the political action of the urban poor in Santiago de Chile and Rio de Janeiro was a focal point of research in the social sciences. A critical reading of the major theories that were proposed begins with an analysis of marginality theory, which represented the first (negative) interpretation of the political potential of the marginalized. Subsequently, Santiago and Rio witnessed a series of urban popular experiences that elicited two opposing schools of thought: the urban-social-movement school and the utilitarian perspective. Chilean and Brazilian social scientists grappled with the way the popular sectors reacted to each country’s military dictatorship, and their interpretations reflected a certain indeterminacy, ranging from rediscovery to eulogy to denial. Urban popular struggle must be rethought in order to move beyond this theoretical ambivalence. Durante el siglo veinte, la acción política de parte de los pobres urbanos de Santiago de Chile y Rio de Janeiro fue un foco investigativo en las ciencias sociales. Esta lectura crítica de las principales teorías propone, en primer lugar, un análisis de la teoría de la marginalidad, la cual representó la primera interpretación (negativa) del potencial político de los marginados. Posteriormente, Santiago y Rio de Janeiro fueron testigos de una serie de experiencias populares urbanas, las cuales configuraron dos modos de pensamiento opuestos: la escuela de los movimientos sociales urbanos y la perspectiva utilitaria. Los cientistas sociales chilenos y brasileños, al enfrentar la forma en la cual los sectores populares reaccionaron frente a las dictaduras militares en cada país, reflejaron en sus interpretaciones una cierta indeterminación, fluctuando entre el redescubrimiento, la exaltación, hasta la negación. La lucha popular urbana tiene que volver a pensarse para superar esta ambivalencia teórica.

The economic and social crisis in Argentina at the end of 2001 ended a decade of explicit free-market or neoliberal policies that had their roots in the country’s last military dictatorship (1976–1983). The current challenges facing the city, along with legacies of this recent past, include increasing social inequality, crime, poverty, and the difficulty of managing public services that were comprehensively privatized during the 1990s. State responses to these challenges have been more effective with regard to employment than with regard to their impact on housing and security. La crisis económica y social en Argentina a finales del 2001 acabó con una década de política de mercado libre o neoliberalismo que tenía sus raíces en la dictadura militar (1976–1983). Los desafíos contemporáneos que encara la ciudad, al lado de la herencia de su pasado reciente, incluye el agrandar del desequilibrio social, el crimen, la pobreza, y la dificultad del manejo de servicios públicos los cuales fueron privatizados comprensivamente durante los 1990. Las respuestas del estado a estos retos han sido más eficaces en torno al empleo que en su impacto en la vivienda y la seguridad.

Two Uruguayan documentaries, Al pie del arbol blanco (2007) and El circulo (2008), engage with the process of uncovering or recovering the recent past under military rule in Uruguay (1973–1985). Rather than following the established documentary convention of deploying archival footage, both films use a variety of cinematographic techniques to depict present-day places in an effort to reconstruct links between the past and the present. Contextualized in relation to the recent construction of museums of memory in the public sphere in countries such as Uruguay and Argentina, these documentaries construct two very personal virtual (in the sense of cinematic rather than physical) “museums of memory.” In this way they illustrate how individual attempts to reconstruct the lost past can fill in the gaps in official recollections of history.Dos documentales uruguayos, Al pie del arbol blanco (2007) y El circulo (2008) abordan el proceso de descubrimiento y recuperacion del pasado reciente bajo mando militar en el ...

The Chilean documentary Estadio Nacional (Carmen Luz Parot, 2001) conflates present and past by testifying, through different voices and images, to the National Stadium’s conversion into a concentration camp immediately after the September 11, 1973, coup d’etat. Analysis of the way in which the stadium is critically revisited by victims of the dictatorship who were tortured there calls attention to the importance of the representation of space as a sort of archaeological work of memory that allows victims both to work through their traumatic experiences and to denounce the atrocities committed by their captors. In this sense, the film can be seen as a simulacrum of a pending judicial investigation in that it turns the public into a witness of this unfinished trial.El documental chileno Estadio Nacional (Carmen Luz Parot, 2001) combina el presente y el pasado atestiguando, por medio de distintas voces e imagenes, la conversion del Estadio Nacional en un campo de concentracion inmediatamente despues del gol...

The year 2008 was prolific in terms of documentary film production in Uruguay. This type of Uruguayan cinema, which dates to the 1960s, was interrupted by the military dictatorship (1973–1984), and...

The representations of ruins in three of Patricio Guzman’s postdictatorial documentaries—Chile, la memoria obstinata (1997), La isla de Robinson Crusoe (1999), and El caso Pinochet (2001)—can be seen as allegories of different aspects of Chilean history: the defeat of Allende’s democratic alliance, the end of the Pinochet regime, and the challenges of social reconciliation in contemporary Chile. Guzman’s strategy of screening architectonic ruins evokes the ruin of the socialist and dictatorial regimes in Chile. The filmmaker also presents a second image of ruin that evokes the ruin of the screen and, in this way, confronts viewers with the limits of representation, language, reconciliation, and testimony.Las representaciones de ruinas en tres de los documentales de la posdictadura de Patricio Guzman—Chile, la memoria obstinada (1997), La isla de Robinson Crusoe (1999), y Le cas Pinochet (2001)—pueden verse como alegoricas de aspectos distintos de la historia de Chile: la derrota de la Alianza Democratica ...

The military regimes of 1964–1989 in Chile, Argentina, and Brazil implemented a code of legitimacy that appealed to various secular beliefs rooted in civil society at the same time that they fostered a common myth of religious legitimation—that of defending “Western Christian civilization.” It was under this umbrella that military groups and religious actors faced each other and/or established alliances. In this cultural politics, religious actors that had previously been excluded from the power game sought to sup- port and/or be recognized by the state as allies in the construction of a belief in the legitimacy of the dictatorships. Fil: Catoggio, Maria Soledad. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Saavedra 15. Centro de Estudios e Investigaciones Laborales; Argentina

I have always been struck by the fact that, as far as U.S. policy toward Latin America and the Caribbean is concerned, every time a new president arrives at the White House it is as if history began anew. What happened before is alien to him, as if instead of assuming responsibility for a state, he represented himself in the way of absolute monarchs. The president never has to explain previous policies, whether the support of military dictatorships or interven tions in civil wars, the imposition of immigration measures, trade or environ mental practices, covert or financial actions against governments, humanitarian, antidrug, or military-aid missions, weapons sales, psychological warfare, or unilateral military-diplomatic decisions. He never feels compelled to coordi nate his actions with those he calls "America's allies in this hemisphere," among them actions that involve U.S. alliances with Europe, Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, and so on, even though these affect "our hemisphere." It is as if, every four (or eight) years, the United States disappeared and another country took its place, a country led by someone whose main concerns, even after taking a tour of the region, are elsewhere. For Latin Americans the experience is quite different. They cannot help remembering the losses, damages, costs, and aftertastes of the things that have taken place over the past 50 years. At the same time, they do not expect much from the United States. (Or perhaps some of them do: the Chileans, considered among the United States' closest partners in the region, for example, were actually expecting that, during his recent visit to Santiago, President Obama would apologize for the U.S.-backed overthrow of Salvador Allende in 1973 and for U.S. support for the dictatorship of 1973—1990.) Although he cele brated as exemplary the Brazilian transition from dictatorship to democracy, Brazilians might have been surprised if the president had recognized the U.S. support for the military junta of 1964-1985 and Salvadorans if he had apolo gized for the prolonging of the atrocious war of 1980-1992. Although it is dif ficult to make a fresh start, some governments have tried to bury these memories and, with them, their illusions regarding the United States. They welcome the president and talk about partnerships, but they scarcely believe in specific agreements. Most countries do not count on U.S. support in dealing with their internal problems, nor do they look to the North to find a way to international development. They are establishing (or attempting to establish) more trade agreements with China than with the United States and relying

Housing has been a persistent problem in Chile. Concertacion governments have sought to address the housing problem through a continuation of the neoliberal policies established by the dictatorship under Pinochet, emphasizing housing as commodity rather than a right. A study of housing policies under the Concertacion reveals improvements in the quantitative supply with increased spending. Yet these neoliberal housing programs stratify residents into categories of poverty in which the poorest residents compete against one another to access subsidies and find housing. These programs prevent citizens from acting collectively to demand policy changes; instead housing is treated as a problem of poor families who must seek to resolve their situation on the individual level by enrolling in subsidy programs. As a result, the unequal distribution of housing in Chile continues, and the poor end up in low-quality housing in economically segregated neighborhoods far from jobs and services.La vivienda ha sido un probl...

Brazilian industrial entrepreneurs have shown a high degree of mobilization and political activity in defense of their specific interests since the beginning of Brazilian industrial capitalist development. They have been characterized by pragmatism, support of different governments and political regimes (dictatorships or democracies), and adaptation to the political instability typical of the country from the proclamation of the Republic until the mid-1980s. For almost half a century they have played a prominent role in sustaining the different phases of national developmentalism by joining diverse political coalitions that upheld the industrial order. The past 10 years have been marked by an important reversal of this pattern that is essentially political: the socialization of entrepreneurs in democratic values, rules, and practices. A thread of continuity is represented by an ideological pragmatism characterized by successive adaptations to positions more or less aligned with a more active role for the state.

At the end of a two-hour interview I conducted with Bolivian Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera in La Paz on June 20,2009,1 asked whether he had any thing he had written recently that he would like to see published in English in Latin American Perspectives. He pulled out his latest book, La potencia plebeya: Accidn colectiva e identidades indtgenas, obreras y populares en Bolivia, produced in collaboration with Pablo Stefanoni (Buenos Aires: CLACSO-Promoteo, 2008), and pointed to the last essay, "Bloque de poder y punto de bifurcation," writ ten just before the recall referendum that not only reaffirmed both President Evo Morales and Garcia Linera's mandate but also proved to be a significant defeat for the right. LAP's translation of this essay appears in this issue. Garcia Linera emerged as one of Bolivia's leading intellectuals during the late 1990s after he had spent five years imprisoned for his role in the Ejercito Guerrillero Tupac Katari (Tupac Katari Guerrilla Army?EGTK), which rejected Che Guevera's/oco theory in favor of mass insurrection. Raised in Cochabamba in a middle-class family that had been part of the rural landowning elite until the 1953 agrarian reform, he had been politicized as a young man by wide spread popular resistance to the Banzer dictatorship (1971-1978). In the early 1980s, while studying mathematics at the National Autonomous University in Mexico City, he was active in Central America solidarity work and became intrigued by debates over the Maya's role in Guatemalan revolutionary strug gles. Always a voracious reader, he began to read social science broadly, focus ing on the search for a Marxist interpretation adapted to Andean reality. Back in Bolivia, he continued what had become an obsession: to challenge the left's stilted and mechanistic class analysis and develop a theory that articulated Marxism with Bolivia's emerging indigenist discourse and movement. By the end of the 1990s he was teaching sociology in La Paz's public uni versity and was a founding member of Comuna, a radical intellectual forum. He increasingly became a public intellectual, appearing for four years as a panelist on the La Paz television program El Pentdgono. Generally identified with the more indigenist rival to Evo Morales Felipe Quispe, he surprised many people when he agreed to join Evo Morales's ticket in 2005 as vice presidential candidate. With his European racial features, dressed in a suit, and projecting a cultured and sophisticated image, he has taken on a role of mollifying Bolivia's upper and middle classes, terrified by an indigenous run government. However, even while he has played the role of mediator in disputes with the right, his radical discourse has been modified by the prag matism necessary to run a small, historically dependent country.

The intervention of the U.S. Marines in Nicaragua in 1926 inspired opposition of two kinds, one against any U.S. intervention and the other specifically aligned with the Nicaraguan guerrillas under Augusto Sandino. These groups succeeded in having limits placed on the war but, by abandoning Sandino at a critical moment, set the stage for the creation of a new pro-U.S. Nicaraguan military that was able to seize power and control Nicaragua without the need for U.S. troops. The Somoza dictatorship was an unintended Nicaragua without the need for U.S. troops. The Somoza dictatorship was an unintended consequence of the organized opposition to U.S. intervention.

The international movement in solidarity with Chile that developed and flourished in the 1970s first emerged when the Unidad Popular government of Salvador Allende (1970—1973) was still in power but gained strength after the Chilean military overthrew the government and imposed the military dictatorship that ruled that country from 1973 to 1990. The power of the movement stems from the historical context in which it arose, the tremendous appeal exerted by the Allende government, North Americans’ familiarity with and support for the UP government, the outrage and horror many felt at the atrocities committed by the dictatorship, and the presence of Chilean political refugees in the United States. The work that the solidarity movement engaged in ranged from securing entry for political refugees and direct action against the Chilean ship Esmeralda to raising funds for the Chilean resistance through cultural programs. While political tensions among the refugees undermined the movement to a degree, the presence of the refugees brought their experience into the lives of North Americans and inspired them to support the Chilean resistance.

Since the mid-1970s, a number of testimonial narratives have contributed to the literature on the Brazilian military regime. These works, representing both the military and the Brazilian left, carry on the political struggles of the period (1964—1984). Through the dynamics of their publication, a tense dialogue has been established. A comparison of the memoirs of leftist militants with those of military men reveals that the practice of torture continues to be a source of apparently unending discord between the two sides.