The Chilean Protests and the Re-Liberation of a People

Writing on the Russian Revolution, Lenin said that there are decades where nothing happens and weeks where decades happen. It was this revolution, and the period of brutal wars thereafter that led to deposing of the Russian tsar and the establishment of the world’s first truly socialist government (Paris Commune notwithstanding). It was this revolution that shook the world, and sent the spirit of liberation rippling through the hearts of the international proletariat.  

And while decades of progress can be achieved through weeks of struggle, so too can it be undone by mere days of counterrevolution.

Chile’s socialist party was founded in 1933. Following a path similar to Venezuela, the party sought change through the democratic election of socialist leaders, rather than wage war against its colonial oppressors. This approach culminated to the election of Marxist president Salvador Allende in 1970, the first ever leader to be put into power through democratic socialist means.

President Salvador Allende
Listen to his final speech here

This period after the second world war saw the attempted liberation of many Latin American nations. But just as it had throughout Asia and Africa, the iron fist of Western Imperialism came to bear down once more on those it had oppressed for so long. In Nicaragua, in Guatemala, in Chile. On September 11^th, 1973, a military coup backed by the CIA overthrew Allende and brought Chile under the rule of General Augusto Pinochet, which saw the establishment of a brutal fascist regime, and a return to a west-backed capitalist economy. His dictatorship, which lasted all the way into the early 90s, led to the torture and killing of socialist and left-wing rivals and the “disappearance” of some 3,000 dissenters. Unions were banned, institutions previously state-run were privatized, and wealth disparity rose as mass corruption and collusion spread across the government and economy. The heart of the Chilean people bled as decades of trauma were inflicted upon them, all so that the US could continue to enforce its imperialist and extractivist rule over the soul of a nation wrought with centuries of suffering and oppression.

Eventually, the military dictatorship ended, and Chile’s government transformed into a liberal democracy not too unlike that seen throughout most of the West. And while the terror of Pinochet was over, neoliberal market reforms continued to inflict scars on its citizenry. The West continued to starve the nation of its natural resources to fuel imperialist rule elsewhere in the world.

But the people can only be oppressed for so long, can only be pushed so far until they realize, as Marx said, that they have nothing to loose but the very chains of their enslavement. It is under these conditions that class-consciousness forms, and the revolutionary spirit takes hold once more.

Right now, the people of Chile have taken to the streets in protest, but you’ll see little coverage of it in the news. Western media has for the most part covered only the bourgeois-backed protests happening in Hong Kong, paying scant attention to what’s going on in Chile. Or Haiti. Or Lebanon. Or Iraq, Kashmir, Catalonia, Palestine, Ecuador and many other nations across the world that are fighting as the contradictions of neoliberalism begin to rear their gruesome head, as climate change poses an existential threat to the world and the bourgeois capitulate to fascism rather than undertake any semblance of socialist reform. In many ways, history is repeating itself, and as was the case before, so it is now: the ruling class will let the world burn and society devolve into barbarism if it means they remain in power. That is why they are silent on the Global South’s current string of uprisings, directing the public’s attention away from these, lest international solidarity is built.

In Chile, the protests began with a price increase of subway fares, or at least that was the tipping-point for the Chilean people. Subway fares, representative of a step too far. These protests, like many others, are the result of years of unrest amongst the people, leading to a point where enough is enough.

At the time of writing this, over one million people have taken to the streets of Chile, demanding massive economic reforms and the resignation of current president, Sebastian Pinera. The unrest has led to the destruction of most of Chile’s transit system, alongside the burning and looting of various private businesses. This has led to the president declaring a state of emergency, sending the Chilean army to crush the protests. Currently, the military has killed 19 people, and arrested thousands of others. And yet the fight continues.

These are conditions in which revolution is born.

To my understanding, currently there isn’t an organized force leading the protestors, no underlying ideology beyond anger toward the government. It is a movement of spontaneity. Its hard to say then what these protests may achieve: a move toward minor reformation, or a full-scale upheaval of the Chilean ruling class?

Granted, I’m not a Chilean myself. I have only the etic perspective to go by, and a cursory one at that. Nonetheless I’m optimistic. During Pinochet’s seizing of power, the Chilean singer, socialist, and activist Victor Jara was kidnapped by the military, tortured, and killed. At the time of writing this, protesters have been singing his songs out in the streets. Now again, as they struggle against capitalist totalitarianism once more.

Solidarity with the people of Chile.

STAY INFORMED:

• Are We Witnessing the Start of Another Leftist Wave Across Latin America?
• Agony and Death of Neoliberalism in Latin America
• Why is the Media Covering Protests in Hong Kong, Chile So Differently?