“When the army comes out, it is to kill”, this quote by Augustus Pinochet pretty much summarizes the measures he took to end communism in Chile. I could not attend the Quintana’s pre-departure session so I decided to study the effect of Pinochet regime on Chile. Dictators all over the world have always had both negative and positive impact on the countries they have ruled. I found this article which did a nice assessment of the regime.
http://www.e-ir.info/2015/05/14/an-assessment-of-the-pinochet-regime-in-chile/
Pinochet’s military government adopted the neo-liberal, free market policies under the influence of “Chicago Boys”, a group of Chilean economists who studied at the University of Chicago. In its time between 1973 and 1990 the government implemented several economic reforms like currency stabilization and tariff cutting. They opened the country’s markets to global trade and restricted labor unions. Social security and the state controlled industries were privatized. The effects these reforms produced forced Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman to term this change “Miracle of Chile”.
On the other side United Nations regularly condemned Chile for the human right violations during the period. According to reports between 1200 and 3200 people were killed during this time. Around 30,000 people were tortured. The free market reforms did not improve the standard of living of the lower classes according to the article. Hence it can be argued that Pinochet’s regime in Chile did more harm than good for the country.
http://www.e-ir.info/2015/05/14/an-assessment-of-the-pinochet-regime-in-chile/
Pinochet’s military government adopted the neo-liberal, free market policies under the influence of “Chicago Boys”, a group of Chilean economists who studied at the University of Chicago. In its time between 1973 and 1990 the government implemented several economic reforms like currency stabilization and tariff cutting. They opened the country’s markets to global trade and restricted labor unions. Social security and the state controlled industries were privatized. The effects these reforms produced forced Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman to term this change “Miracle of Chile”.
On the other side United Nations regularly condemned Chile for the human right violations during the period. According to reports between 1200 and 3200 people were killed during this time. Around 30,000 people were tortured. The free market reforms did not improve the standard of living of the lower classes according to the article. Hence it can be argued that Pinochet’s regime in Chile did more harm than good for the country.