Chilean Women Fight Back

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Woman Worker interviews Maria from the Chilean Liga Obrera Bolshevique (LOB), a Trotskyist organisation affiliated to the Trotskyist International Liaison Committee-of which the Workers Socialist League is also a member. This comrade is living in exile in Paris. Maria, could you start by summarising the events which led up to the 1973 coup?

Well, very briefly, Allende's government of Popular Unity was a coalition between the Socialists, Communists and Radical parties, a popular front which carried with it the inherent treachery of this particular variant of Stalinist class collaboration.

This government started out with limited reforms, nationalisation of copper, increased public spending and wages. However, because this was all done through the rigid confines of Chile's constitution, this peaceful road to socialism led to taking away gains won by the working class under previous regimes and inviting military figures into the government.

Reactionary strikes took place as well as strikes which represented the independent interests of the working class. The USA led the imperialist onslaught with massive CIA aid to reactionary forces as well as economic sabotage.

How did the Stalinists respond to this?

They actually opposed the cordones industriales (factory committees) which were embryo soviets. We fought alone for the building and arming of these committees, correctly arguing that only armed workers defence squads could stand up to the attack which was so clearly on the horizon.

However, we did not have the forces to carry this policy tar enough and atter a mock coup in July which tested the strength of resistance, the final blow was struck on September 11 1973.

The Stalinists then blamed the workers for not coming out to be massacred by the tanks while we called for a retreat under those conditions, and put the blame on the shoulders of the advocates of the Popular Front who had paved the way for bloody repression.

What role did women play during this period?

The proletarian workforce in Chile has been entirely male by tradition and there is a lot of "machismo'. The extended family system is deeply rooted. Women have lived within that framework having perhaps ten or fifteen children. This means that women often played a reactionary role in the early period. Is this also true in the militant mining areas?

Yes. Husbands worked and were militant but it was not unusual for their wives to vote for the Christian Democrats. However, I wouldn't like to give you the impression that Chilean women are subservient or constantly assaulted physically like their Mexican counterparts who are similarly weak economically. For example under Frei's government the women in the mines once forced the men to stay out on strike until their demands were met by refusing to cook for them. How did women begin to break away from this. continued role?

I would say this happened during the reactionary lorry drivers and small business people's strike. You see Chile is so long and narrow and has so few ports that trucks are essential for the distribution of basic necessities.

This strike was broken by superb working class organisation at factory and neighbourhood level. The unions organised hampers of food by exchanging commodities between different factories and warehouses.

Non-factory workers and those in, for example, the print unions organised through neighbourhood committees. It was primarily women who negotiated bulk supplies through the local unions and distributed them at the street level.

People worked voluntarily after work hours food was actually cheaper during the strike.

This seems to contradict reports we heard of an "empty saucepans"demonstration where angry women took to the streets waving empty pans.

Well you see, if you didn't organise through the unions it didn't matter how much money you had because shops were empty. Workers and peasants had plenty to eat, only the bourgeoisie complained and they had stockpiled food anyway!

I went down to that demonstration to see for myself. In Chile the division of wealth is so sharp that you can tell a working class woman at a glance. All these women were magnificently dressed and waving new pans about. In fact there was a lorry distributing new saucepans at the end of the road! Trotskyist organisation affiliated to the This comrade is living in exile in Paris.

Did this radicalisation continue after the coup?

Yes, it accelerated. Most of those imprisoned and killed were men and the majority of the relatively low number of women taken were students.

This meant that women had to assume economic responsibility for their families and organise campaigns for the release of their companions and relatives.

We've seen pictures of those beautiful patchworks they make.

Exactly. These are made by women from the workshops for the organisation of relatives of disappeared and imprisoned people. They provide a source of income and also a focus for campaigns and the organisation of collective child care facilities which have become necessary.

Economic independence has led many women to question sex roles and understand how the institution of the family has held them back politically. There has also been a very high incidence of separations amongst couples in exile because of the threat posed by the fact that it was often easier for women to find manual jobs such as cleaning because of the language barrier.

"Machismo' still persists, even in the left parties, but it is being challenged.

Is there a bourgeois feminist movement in Chile?

No. This movement doesn't really exist anywhere in Latin America. There was a Women's Congress recently but the resolutions passed were along class lines.

Maria, what are the immediate objectives of those of you in exile and your comrades in Chile?

Our main slogans are 'Down with the dictatorship' and For a sovereign constituent assembly' (as distinct from one convened by butcher Pinochet). However we also fight for factory committees and other independent working class organisations to form the basis of further mobilisation towards a workers' and peasants' government. Can the LOB work openly in Chile?

Our comrades work under difficult conditions, selling the paper clandestinely and organising underground with the constant threat of death and imprisonment hanging over their heads.