The Demobilization of Civil Society: Posttraumatic Memory in the Reconstruction of Chilean Democracy
Latin American Perspectives: A Journal on Capitalism and Socialism
Published online on September 08, 2016
Abstract
The return of democracy in Chile was characterized by the fragmentation, weakening, and crisis of social movements, which were barely present in decision making and defining the national political agenda in the postdictatorship period. Of the multiple factors that contributed to this demobilization, an important one was the influence of the collective trauma inherited from previous decades. In time, however, posttraumatic memory contributed to the generation of new identities and inputs for the collective action of the 2011 protest cycle.
El retorno a la democracia en Chile se caracterizó por la fragmentación, debilitamiento y crisis de los movimientos sociales, con una escasa presencia de éstos en la toma de decisiones y en la definición de la agenda política nacional en la fase post-dictatorial. De los factores multiples que contribuyeron a dar forma a esta desmovilización, un factor importante era la influencia del post-trauma colectivo heredado de las décadas precedentes. Con el tiempo, esta memoria post-traumática permite la (re)generación de nuevas identidades e ideas-fuerza para la acción colectiva del ciclo de protestas 2011.