The leaders of the right-wing turn were hastily engraving the epitaph of Latin America populism. Then came October 18, when high school students jumped the turnstile of Santiago de Chile’s metro in protest for a 5 percent fare increase. The ensuing brutal repression set in motion one of the largest social protests in Chile’s history, shattering the neoliberal government of Sebastián Piñera. Just nine days later in Argentina, conservative Mauricio Macri lost his bid for reelection to Peronist candidate Alberto Fernández. Macri had promised that his liberalization policies would “put an end to 70 years of Peronism." They actually fostered its remarkable comeback.
Ernesto Semán
University of Bergen
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