Pinochet's guru gains new

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Pinochet puts Friedmanism into practice On the economic front Milton Friedman must now be accounted the most influential person in the world Friedman's economic views are known in Britain as monetarism and in the United States as "supply-side economics"

They derive from the works of the right-wing Chicago economist Friedrich von Hayek, and now hold sway not only Santiago (Chile), Downing Street and the Treasuries of Lisbon and Canberra; but they have now risen to dominance in Kingston, Jamaica, and are about to become orthodoxy in the Oval Office itself.

Reagan's election now brings Friedman and like-thinking economists to the centre of influence in the whole imperialist world.

The central axis of their policy is that the economic crisis must be allowed to take its "natural" course without the working class and the weakest sections of the capitalist class being protected and shielded in any way by the economic actions of the state:

The specitic common features of the policy have been an emphasis on cutting the budget deficit through severe cuts in public spending, together with strict control of the money supply land-as is necessary political bribe to gain electoral popularity-cuts in taves for the most prosperous sections of the middle class. on November 12 that some Polish CP leaders were driven to take action against the new unions-which claim a membership of 10 million in 8,000 Reagan, lor instance, in the most explicit promise of his campaign, has undertaken to reduce federal income tax by 10% in cach of the next three annual l'ederal budgets.

Reagan has also, like Thatcher, undertaken both to increase defence spending and to reduce the government deficit to zero.

Thatcher's experience has shown that these objectives are in the present circumstances mutually exclusive.

Submerged

Or rather, they are mutually exclusive within the framework of parliamentary democracy and of the maintenance : of such rights won by the working class as unemployment benefit, social security; free or subsidised education and health services.

It is the attacks on all of these which are the hidden and submerged portion of the programme on which Thatcher, Sa Carneiro, Fraser, Seaga and now Reagan have been clected.

Now elected, Rcagan, like Thatcher, will find that once the submerged part of the programme becomes visible the first problem that arises is of being re-elected, or even of avoiding a possible open confrontation with the working class in which the survival of the government would be at stake.

It is more than a coincidence theretore, that there is only one country so far where Friedmanism has been applied and has partially "worked". That Pinochet's savage dictatorship Chile.

There the rate of inflation has been enormously reduced since the 1973 coup; state spending has been massively cut and the government's finances have been put in order.

So many of the stated objectives of Friedmanism have been achieved.

But all this was achieved at the cost of the unstated necessary consequences-a catastrophic level of unemployment and a huge cut in real wages.

Terrible defeat

Those consequences have been possible in Chile only because of the terrible defeat brutally inflicted on the working class in 1973.

The Chilean defeat is, rore, à requirea classes.

Italy Prime Cossiga Ronald difficult So Forlano ago abr Italy ber another course, measure of what is and his ilk). by all capitalist ruling Victory on points They are still not prepared in most cases for the knock-out battle which took place in Chile.

For now they are looking more towards gaining a victory on points by exploiting the potentially demoralising effects of mass unemployment and falling living standards.

Ta.. 1--9- arranther recenty aeposed Minister Francesco would be able to tell Reagan just how such a victory is. would his successor who warned two weeks ut the possibility of oming another Chile of Turkey (with help, of from Forlano himself So would Margaret Thatcher who came onto the world stage 18 months ago to wild capitalist applause, glittering with prestige and apparent political authority, ready to perform economic magic with the wand of monetarism.

Now she presides over a government which is increasingly disunited, and is patently incapable reaching its declared aims without embarking on a new perilous attack or the working class.

So as the fanfares subside, Reagan must soon realise that the prospects of him riding triumphant into the sunset this time round are very dim indeed. More