After the 11th, Before 'The Ten': Christian Democratic Unionism and the First Year of the Dictatorship in Chile, 1973–1975

Abstract

From the study of unpublished documents of the Christian Democratic Party, the political practices of its main union leaders and activists are analyzed, between 1973 and 1974, specifically between the end of Allende's government and the Popular Unity, and during the first year of the Dictatorship in Chile. It is proposed that this group of DC trade unionists, together with other leaders sympathetic to the Military Junta, tried to become an independent trade union referent, with respect to the Dictatorship and also respect to the rank and file workers, seeking to fill the vacuum left by the suppression of the CUT and the workers' left, and to increase their influence with respect to the State. This was done mainly through two maneuvers: the attempt to build a new trade union center, and support for the military junta at the annual meeting of the International Labor Office in Geneva. In this way, the DC trade unionism, before moving to the opposition to the dictatorship, tried a way of collaboration and dialogue with it, which was unsuccessful.