Opinión pública en Chile durante la unidad popular: Una revisión de "la tesis de la polarización".

In the political history of Chile, the process leading to the coup d'état in 1973 is explained by the widespread assumption of the political polarization of society that required "recourse to the military as guarantors of democracy." In this work, based on the distinction between polarization and politicization, we seek to answer to what extent does the ideological polarization manifested at the elite level during 1970 illustrate the political-ideological positioning of the masses in Chile? that is, for the period prior to the coup d'état in Chile, were the citizens polarized ideologically as were the party elites? These questions are answered from the survey data periodically carried out by the sociologist Eduardo Hamuy during 1970 and 1973. The data are analyzed from the arrival to the presidency of Salvador Allende in 1970 until the months before his overthrow. Finally, it is concluded that although politicization was high, there was no polarization at the level of Chilean citizenship. At the same time, there is a predominant rejection of the relevance of a military government for Chile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]