This Sunday, the people of Chile will decide: Approve a new constitution or default to the old written under dictator Augusto Pinochet by a group of economists known as the ‘Chicago Boys’. Who were they? Why did they matter? And how can we bury their bloody legacy?
The ‘Chicago Boys’, a group of Chilean economists who had studied at the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman, wrote the El Ladrillo (or The Brick), during the campaign of Jorge Alessandri, the right-wing presidential candidate in the 1970 elections.
This document, finished just weeks before the US-backed coup of 1973, defined the Chilean neoliberal model, inspiring Pinochet's Constitution of 1980, and charting a path of misery that would define Pinochet’s 17-year rule.
The coup d'état of June 1973 removed socialist president Salvador Allende from power — and empowered the Chicago Boys. They promoted their neoliberal economic program vociferously, with newspapers running headlines like ‘Constitution will protect Chileans from Marxism.’
This program became a reality during the military junta’s 1980 plebiscite — and the devastation began. The constitution protected big business and attacked workers. Freedoms disappeared and social rights previously guaranteed by the state were left to the whim of the market.
42 years later, as Chile prepares for another constitutional plebiscite, faculty and alumni from the University of Chicago unite to bury the bloody legacy of the Chicago Boys, and celebrate the inauguration of a new era of “social, economic, and ecological justice” in Chile.
