For all its notoriety, General Pinochet's well-known dictatorship (1973–90) remains under-studied. Even though there are many monographic works addressing its different aspects, before the book under review was published there had been no successful attempts to address Chile's military regime in a comprehensive way. In this context, The Pinochet Regime seems destined to become a canonical source on the subject.
The author, Carlos Huneeus – one of Chile's most distinguished political scientists – devoted long years of his academic life to researching and writing this book. Notwithstanding the fact that he was a strong opponent of Pinochet's regime, he manages to provide a detached, objective account. Huneeus' style is dry, but never dull – in fact, although the perspective is highly analytical, the narrative is at times gripping. In a clear, direct style he describes the mechanics of power within the regime in a thoughtful and documented way. Furthermore, he analyses the dictatorship's social and economic policies as well as the cultural changes they produced.
The book argues that Pinochet's regime had a clear identity, characterised by three basic elements: a brutal use of coercion (particularly in its first stages); a set of economic reforms which completely transformed the country; and the figure of Pinochet himself. These three features reinforced each other, although Huneeus asserts that the leading factor was Pinochet's leadership and will to power. Furthermore, he argues that in order to create a new political order, the regime resorted to three sources of legitimacy: what he calls ‘historical legitimacy’, ‘legal-constitutional legitimacy’ and ‘economic legitimacy’. The first was based on the accusation that the previous government (led by Salvador Allende) was set to establish a Marxist dictatorship, as well as on a general indictment of the country's political development in the previous decades. The second aimed at providing the de facto government with a more solid juridical basis, specifically a new constitution, which would signal the ‘legal nature’ of the regime. Finally, ‘economic legitimacy’ was sought through a market-based economic boom which – it was hoped – would provide a significant contrast with the chaotic state of the economy during Allende's last year in power. Another aspect of the regime that Huneeus rightly emphasises is Pinochet's ability to recruit two groups of civilians that became crucial partners in his enterprise: the so-called Gremialistas and the better known Chicago Boys. While the first group played a key role in the process of political institutionalisation of the regime, the second was crucial in the elaboration and implementation of the social and economic policies of the government.
This study of Chile's authoritarian period is remarkable in its attention to detail. Most assertions are backed by an impressive bibliography (30 pages long) as well as important primary sources (including interviews with key players). Furthermore, the study covers the most important elements of the regime, from the role of the military as a key element of Pinochet's political design (Huneeus shows that 67 out of the 133 ministers of the regime were military officers), to the role that the economic crisis of 1982–83 played in encouraging opposition to the dictatorship. It also devotes two insightful chapters to the aftermath of the authoritarian period.
One of the most fascinating aspects of the book is its analysis of the way General Pinochet managed to secure a firm hold of the leadership within the regime, something that was not a given at first. Indeed, because Pinochet was a latecomer in the conspiracy against the constitutional government of Salvador Allende (in fact, he was the last of the four heads of the Chilean armed forces to join the coup), he had to wait for critical junctures to advance his ambitions of becoming the leader of the military junta and then the official president of the republic. Of course, the fact that he was in command of the army (by far the most powerful branch of the armed forces) gave him a big advantage vis-à-vis the other members of the junta – but, as Huneeus persuasively shows, the road was not an easy one and demanded from Pinochet a decisiveness and political ability that he did not show in the beginning. This background, continues Huneeus, may explain the brutal – and totally unnecessary – use of violence that Pinochet displayed against dissidents, particularly in the first few years of the regime.
Perhaps due to the fact that the book is centred mostly on mechanics of power and the policies advanced by the military regime, there is little analysis on the opposition to that regime. In fact, the opposition becomes salient in Huneeus' book only toward the end of his account of the dictatorship, particularly in his description of the plebiscite which in 1988 led to the end of Pinochet's regime. Aside from this omission, the most important shortcoming of this otherwise excellent book is that it only partially answers the crucial question that Huneeus himself poses in the first pages of his study: ‘How do we explain an authoritarian regime that lasted so long in a country with such a lengthy democratic tradition?’ (p. xxi). The reason for this partial failure is that in order to answer this question properly it is not enough to analyse the authoritarian regime (as Huneeus does so well); it is also necessary to thoroughly understand the ‘democratic tradition’ that preceded it, particularly the administrations of Salvador Allende (1970–73) and Eduardo Frei Montalva (1964–70), which remain – oddly – far less understood than Pinochet's regime.
Given Huneeus' passion for the subject – and the solid scholarship he has demonstrated he can produce – perhaps he should take the lead in providing a systematic account of the two administrations that preceded the coup of 11 September 1973. That would give him the chance to be in a position to address what remains one of Chile's most intriguing (and important) historical questions.
