Hipsher - Democratization and The Decline of Urban Social Movements in Chile and Spain

Democratization and the Decline of Urban Social Movements in Chile and Spain
Author(s): Patricia L. Hipsher

Source: Comparative Politics, Vol. 28, No. 3 (Apr., 1996), pp. 227, 273-297
Published by: Comparative Politics, Ph.D. Programs in Political Science, City University of
New York
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Corrections
Patricia L. Hipsher, "Democratization and the Decline of Social Movements in

Chile and Spain," Comparative Politics, 28 (April 1996).
Patricia L. Hipsher has submitted the following corrections for quotations and
references in her article. The author assumes full responsibility for these oversights
and for the inadvertent failure to quote and cite the work of others.
Page 275: The rise and fall of urban social movements in Chile and Spain, as
Schneider argues, "raises critical questions regarding the nature of political life" in
transitional situations and the conditions inhibiting the mobilization of protest.
"Unfortunately, most of the literature on these protest movements fails to address
these questions." Scholars have tended to conceive of "protest as a response to
economic grievances" or the postindustrial crisis of urban development. In Chile,
Schneider argues, the economic crisis of the early 1980s was effective in alienating
certain sectors, particularly the middle class, from the military government;
however, the crisis in and of itself did not lead to protest. Rather, it weakened and
divided the regime, creating the opportunity for protest. (Cathy Lisa Schneider,
"Radical Opposition Parties and Squatters Movements in Pinochet's Chile," in
Sonia Alvarez and Eduardo Escobar, eds., The Making of Social Movements in
Latin America [Boulder: Westview Press, 1992], pp. 261, 262, 264).
Page 278: Successful democratization, he continues, "would almost certainly

depend on" the circumspection and moderation of political elites in their
articulation of "potentially explosive redistributive issues."
Page 278: Fernando Henrique Cardoso contends that the Brazilian transition required
"compromises and calls for tolerance" and that the opposing parties did not retaliate
with violence because they realized that such action would "not help them win
ground."
Page 279: Following World War II, Laurence Whitehead contends, "a broad spec-
trum of European opinion came to oppose and detest right-wing authoritarian" re-
gimes because of their own "direct experience with fascism."
Page 291: According to Gunther, the behavior of the PCE elite was "profoundly
affected by an awareness of the mistakes that culminated in the civil war and by the
painful memories of suffering under the Franquist regime." (Richard Gunther, Gia-
como Sani, and Goldie Shabad, Spain after Franco: The Making of a Competitive
Party System [Berkeley: University of California Press, 1986], p. 146).
Page 291: The reference for notes 83 and 84 should be Gunther, Sani, and Shabad,
Spain after Franco: The Making of a Competitvie Party System.
227
Democratization and the Decline of Urban Social
Movements in Chile and Spain
Patricia L. Hipsher
On February 14, 1976, residents of a working class barrio near Madrid gathe
for a meeting on labor problems. At the meeting, someone brought up the top
a railway line which divided the barrio from the rest of the city where at leas
life was lost per year. As the discussion heated up, the meeting turned i
popular, spontaneous demonstration. Meeting-goers took to the streets, gath
about 1,000 residents from the neighborhood along the way to the railway t
There, at the dangerous crossing, the residents staged a sit-down demonstratio
the following days, residents of the barrio formed an organization to contin
put forth their demands, largely through protest and other contentious strate
Similar insurgent activities broke out in Chilean neighborhoods in 1983. On M
11, 1983, shantytown dwellers throughout Santiago rushed to the stree
participate in the first organized National Day of Protest against the dictators
They marched through the streets shouting slogans and carrying banners to ex
their discontent with the dictatorship and its policies. They also engage
defensive forms of collective action to prevent representatives of the state-po
the military, and firefighters--from entering their neighborhoods.2
At the height of these protest movements, some social movement theo
believed that these urban social movements would deepen the democratiz
process by pressing for more profound political, economic, and social reform
Following the return of democracy, however, these optimistic forecasts prove
be inaccurate, as social movements declined. In Chile, the shantytown movem
which had fought for housing solutions under extremely dangerous circumsta
demobilized almost immediately and began to pursue institutionalized forms
collective action. And in Spain, the neighborhood movement gave up the use
lock-ins and marches and its strategy of direct confrontation in favor of concil
and negotiation.
Movement decline following democratic transitions is a trend that has been
in numerous countries. Many of these countries experienced widescale mass pr
during authoritarian and autocratic regimes. Following the restoration
democracy, these insurgent groups have tended to decline. Examples include
Solidarity trade union movement in Poland, urban social movements in Urug
Brazil, and Russia, and the Spanish labor movement.4
This decline poses a significant puzzle. Democratic regimes, generally, are m
273
Comparative Politics April 1996
politically open and rely less on the use of force and repression for social control
than military dictatorships. Thus, one might expect social movements to thrive in
newly democratized countries. However, case after case suggests the exact
opposite. We find that, at the very moment social movements win the greatest
freedom of action, they demobilize and begin to pursue institutionalized forms of
collective action.
How can we explain the decline of social movements after the return of
democracy? What political factors led to movement demobilization and
institutionalization in Chile and Spain after the restoration of democracy in 1990
and 1977, respectively? In the context of greater political openness and relative
freedom from repression, why did the urban social movements abandon their more
contentious strategies, goals, and forms of collective action for more institutional-
ized forms and tactics?
Despite the generalized nature of posttransitional movement decline, students of
democratic transitions5 and social movement theorists6 have only recently begun to
address this phenomenon. Where scholars have studied movement decline in
transitional periods, they have failed to link the literatures on transitions and social
movements or have put forth explanations that conceive the phenomenon as the
inevitable result of the restoration of institutionalized channels of participation.
This article will attempt to correct these problems by demonstrating how
transitional moments shape social movement development.
The Argument
Movement demobilization and institutionalization were strategic, norm-based

responses to changes in political opportunities over time and in attitudes regarding
the desirability of democracy. Political parties in Chile and Spain, which had once
actively supported insurgent activities by movements and had defined democracy
in terms of grass-roots participation and fundamental political and economic
reforms, abandoned these strategies and goals to support a limited democracy,
defined as the absence of military rule. In an attempt to preserve democratic
stability and not provoke the Right, the parties discouraged protest and encouraged
institutionalized forms of political participation. The consensus about and
commitment to democracy were also present among social movement leaders and
activists, making them more moderate for fear of an authoritarian involution. The
close relationship between political parties and social movements in these two
countries helped to translate party goals into base-level action.
I have chosen Chile and Spain to highlight the process of movement decline
because they represent crucial cases. In Chile the transition was marked by
extremely high levels of protest mobilization in dangerous circumstances. The
274
Patricia L. Hipsher
shantytown dwellers were key actors in this protest movement. However, the
return of democracy was characterized by wholesale demobilization and
institutionalization. The Spanish neighborhood movement, while not as conten-
tious or as important an actor in the Spanish transition as the labor movement, is
also an important test case. It developed between 1969 and 1977 under conditions
of illegality and repression and directly challenged the Franco dictatorship. Once
mobilized, the movement had organizations in nearly every city and was described
as "very militant and [had] a high level of organization and consciousness . . .
being one of the forces that contributed most to the crisis of Francoism and to the
present democratic situation."7 But with the restoration of democracy the
movement became quiescent. Such extreme cases demand an explanation.
Movement Mobilization and Demobilization
The rise and fall of urban movements in Chile and Spain raise critical questio
regarding the nature of political life in transitional situations and the condit
facilitating and inhibiting the mobilization of protest. Unfortunately, most of
literature on these protest movements fails to address these issues adequa
Scholars have tended to conceive of protest as a response either to econo
grievances8 or the postindustrial crisis of urban development.9 In Chile,
economic crisis of the early 1980s was effective in alienating certain sect
particularly the middle class, from the military government; however, the cri
and of itself did not lead to protest. Rather, the crisis weakened and divided
regime, creating the opportunity for protest. In Spain, grievances may have
their roots in the "crisis of urban development," but the movement's emerge
and subsequent development can be explained only by the political context th
determined how and whether individuals organized around grievances.
The decline of social movements involves a process of demobilization an
institutionalization. Charles Tilly defines demobilization as the process by wh
group of active participants in public life becomes a passive collection
individuals.'0 The level of mobilization is measured by the number of pro
participants, movement organizations, and events the movement participates in
sponsors. Institutionalization involves a shift in protesters' tactics. Institutiona
tactics rely on the use of "proper" channels of conflict resolution and are view
nonthreatening by elites "because they leave unchallenged the structur
underpinnings of the political system.""
Of the contemporary theories of social movement development, the politic
process approach best explains the decline of these movements. This appr
explains protest potential with reference to the structure of political opportun
Sidney Tarrow refers to the political opportunity structure as "consistent-but
275
necessarily formal, permanent, or national -dimensions of the political environ-

ment that provide incentives for people to undertake collective action by affecting
their expectations for success or failure."12 Political opportunities are fluid and
variable over time. Therefore, social protest is not constant; rather, it ebbs and
flows, depending on the opportunities available to movement actors. Tarrow refers
to these ebbs and flows as cycles of protest.13
The political process approach argues that movements appear and disappear not
"only in direct response to the level of supporters' grievances," but also to changes
in configurations of power, resources, and institutional arrangements.14 Move-
ments are likely to mobilize in protest when political institutions are divided and
weak'5 and vulnerable to demands16 and when the aggrieved populations have
sufficient resources and support to press their claims.'7 When political conditions
change and power relations no longer favor the insurgent groups, we should expect
the movements to decline.
The political process approach has contributed to our understanding of the
dynamics of social movement development during democratic transitions. In the
late 1980s studies of women's organizations,'8 neighborhood movements,19 and
labor movements20 in Latin America utilized the political process approach to
situate these movements within the broader transitional setting and recognized the
importance of opposition political parties and the church in helping them to
organize and mobilize. These studies have helped compensate for the elite bias of
much of the literature on democratic transitions by arguing that social movements
had an appreciable effect on the strategies and actions of authoritarian and
opposition elites during the transitional periods. However, by focusing solely on
the mobilization of protest they fail to comprehend social movements as political
phenomena that rise and fall as a function of changes in the larger political
environment. If the opening of political opportunities supports the emergence and
development of social movements, it seems reasonable to presume that a
contraction of opportunities supportive of protest would lead to movement decline.
There is persuasive evidence that the opening of opportunities, owing to changes
in the configuration of power, supported movement emergence and mobilization,
which then shaped the transitional process. However, the transitional process and
the actions of authoritarian and opposition elites also shaped the options available
to movements by increasing the risks of protest and reducing their capacity to
mobilize or sustain protest.
Social movements in Spain and Chile mobilized in the wake of major political
changes associated with these countries' transitions from authoritarian rule. Crises
within the state, the development of democratic elite allies, and the easing of
repression contributed to the generation of political insurgency. These pressures
from below made the authoritarians more conciliatory towards the opposition, who
then altered their strategies and objectives in response to regime initiatives.
276
Patricia L. Hipsher
Movement allies and support groups shifted their strategy decisively by

withdrawing their support for democratic rupture and mass mobilization,
supporting limited democratization, and, once in power, using mechanisms of
social control to preserve the democratic settlement reached with authoritarian
elites. Chile and Spain are characterized by strong party systems in which parties
are closely allied with social movements. Consequently, the strategies and tactics
of social movements are often heavily influenced by the parties with which they
have ties.
However, to place all the responsibility for movement demobilization on party

elites is tantamount to assuming that movement activists blindly follow their
leaders and have no understanding of the political environment in which they are
operating. This conclusion is not supported by the evidence; most activists
understood the political game in which they were players and the reasons why
protest was no longer a sensible solution to their problems.
The following review of the literature on democratization demonstrates how
transitional processes may cause changes in the structure of political opportunities
and the ideas held by political actors regarding the relationship between democracy
and collective action. It focuses on two concepts that help explain movement
decline, pacts and political learning.
Elite Accommodation and Movement Demobilization: Theoretical

Perspectives
Transitions from authoritarian rule and the consolidation of democracy in Latin

America and southern Europe have been studied with an eye towards elite political
actors and institutionalized channels of participation, such as parties and elections.
Burton, Higley, and Gunther justify the emphasis on elites by contending that "a
key to the stability and survival of democratic regimes is . . . the establishment of
substantial consensus among elites concerning rules of the democratic political
game and the worth of democratic institutions."2' Guillermo O'Donnell and
Philippe Schmitter recognize that "the dynamics of the transition from authoritarian
rule are not just a matter of elite dispositions, calculations, and pacts." However,
they emphasize these aspects "because they largely determine whether or not an
opening will occur at all and because they set important parameters on the extent of
possible liberalizations and eventual democratization."'22
Most studies of democratization have concluded that successful democratization
largely depends on modernization on the part of opposition elites and compromise
between authoritarian and opposition elites on institutions and rules of the game.
The message of moderation usually refers to issues of economic change and
redistribution. Robert Kaufman, for instance, has stated that "the most promising
277
road towards democratization may involve only incremental changes in the existing
accumulation framework.""23 Successful democratization, he continues, would
almost certainly depend on the circumspection and moderation of political elites in
their articulation of "potentially explosive redistributive issues."'24 Fernando
Henrique Cardoso contends that the Brazilian transition required "compromises
and calls for tolerance" and that the opposing parties did not retaliate with violence
because they realized that such action would not help them win ground.25
Przeworski even goes so far as to conclude that a transition to democracy may
succeed only if economic relations (both the structure of production and the
distribution of income) are left "intact.''26
A common form of collaboration between opposition and authoritarian elites is
pact making. Pacts are negotiated compromises under which actors agree to forgo
or underutilize their capacity to harm each other by extending guarantees not to
threaten each others' corporate autonomies or vital interests. They are important in
democratization, Terry Karl explains, because "they provide a degree of stability
and predictability which is reassuring to threatened traditional elites. The rules they
establish limit the degree of uncertainty facing all political and economic actors in
a moment of transition and therefore are an essential element of successful
democratization."27 Political pacts provide a certain degree of instituti
structural, and personal continuity, thus reducing uncertainty, in exchange
regime change.
If Latin American politics during the 1960s and early 1970s and sout
European politics during the earlier part of the twentieth century were charact
by conflict, brinkmanship, and hostility, how can we account for their moder
in the 1980s and 1990s? Authoritarian regimes have given way to liber
democracies, anchored by a newfound consensus about the attractiveness of lib
democracy as a political model. O'Donnell writes: "Never before has the
ideological 'prestige' of political democracy been higher in Latin America than
now. Authoritarian ideas and institutions are now discredited."28
The heightened prestige of democracy today can be explained in large part by the
trauma of dictatorship and the discrediting of the forces that inspired it. According
to O'Donnell, "most political and cultural forces of any weight now attribute high
intrinsic value to the achievement and consolidation of democracy, "29 "largely as a
consequence of the painful learning induced by the failures of authoritarian regimes
and their unprecedented repression and violence.'"30
Political learning is defined by Nancy Bermeo as "the process through which
people modify their political beliefs and tactics as a result of severe crisis,
frustrations, and dramatic changes in the environment."31 When individuals
experience a traumatic event, they often carry away lessons that guide their future
actions.
The breakdown of democracy, many authors contend, has had a powerful effect
278
Patricia L. Hipsher
on elite ideas and behaviors by offering lessons about what to do to avoid the
repetition of similar events.32 Writing on postauthoritarian Uruguay, Charles
Gillespie states that "a subtle learning process . . . taught major political actors
certain lessons about how to avoid the kind of chaos which might bring a return to
military rule."33 Following World War II, Laurence Whitehead contends, a broad
spectrum of European opinion came to oppose and detest right-wing authoritarian
regimes because of their own direct experience with fascism. 34 Moreover, Richard
Gunther writes, political actors in Spain were keenly aware of the origins of the
civil war, and historical memories of the suffering caused by the war and Franquist
authoritarianism were key to the achievement of consensus and the elite
settlement. 5
As democratic transitions tend to be orchestrated, if not controlled, by political
and military elites, it makes sense that social scientists have emphasized the
consensus about and commitment to democracy among elites. However, by
focusing on elite values and actions most studies fail to recognize that similar
attitudes exist among the mass public and that these attitudes make movements and
their members more likely to pursue strategies that will not threaten democratic
stability or the interests of authoritarian elites.
An important element of pact making is the prohibition on mobilizing one's
supporters, whether the military or social movements. "For opposition actors,"
Burton, Gunther, and Higley write, "this usually involves demobilizing mass
organizations and social movements so as to discourage the outbreak of polarizing
incidents and mass violence."36 Uruguay offers an example of conscious
demobilization. Although the government failed to negotiate a social pact with
labor, the Left and labor union leaders were nonetheless "committed to restraining
labor's demands."'7 Moreover, the municipal government of Montevideo enacted
a series of policies consciously designed to fragment urban movements and reduce
their ability to mobilize in protest.38 Peru in 1978 offers us another example. Cotler
writes that mobilization by the popular movement following the adoption of an
IMF stabilization agreement was frustrated when political parties argued that
" 'public agitation' was a threat to redemocratization and might provide the pretext
for a coup."39
Social movements' willingness to moderate their demands and to demobilize is
partially a consequence of learning from their own experiences under dictatorship.
Kaufman argues that "the trauma of bureaucratic authoritarian repression appears
to have lowered the expectations of at least some of the excluded 'popular sectors'
and their political leaders, making them more amenable to self-limiting
compromises over economic issues."40 Popular sectors suffered tremendously at
the hands of dictators in Latin America and southern Europe. They were subjected
to torture, abduction, and execution; their neighborhoods and houses were invaded
by armed forces; and their rights as citizens (not to mention as laborers) were
279
stripped from them. They, like elites, have come to esteem political democracy and
are likely to practice patience and restraint to preserve it. The following case
studies demonstrate the way in which political learning as well as narrowed
political opportunities led to the decline of contentious collective action by poor
urban dwellers in transitional Chile and Spain.
Chile
Since the 1950s, the Chilean shantytown dwellers' movement has been at the
forefront of national struggles against social, economic, and political injustices,
making it one of the most active and combative social movements in the southern
cone. The movement has traditionally organized the urban poor around issues of
housing, basic public services and utilities, and the cost of living and employment.
To achieve its goals the movement has relied on both traditional grass-roots forms
of organization, such as self-help construction projects, and more contentious
forms of activity, such as land seizures, occupations, and demonstrations.
The shantytown movement began to organize politically in Chile during the
1950s. The first organized land invasion took place in 1957, followed by many
more during the 1960s and early 1970s. They were usually organized or supported
by left-wing political parties, such as the Movement of the Revolutionary Left
(MIR), the Communist Party (PCCh), and the Socialist Party (PSCh). Most of
these early land invasions were harshly repressed by the police and took a heavy
toll on the pobladores.
During the government of Salvador Allende (1970-1973) the shantytown
dwellers' movement exploded. The more open political environment and
government support of the movement's demands encouraged mobilization. This
mobilization took the form of land seizures, street protests, occupations, and the
development of revolutionary neighborhoods. For instance, MIR organized eight
revolutionary neighborhoods, each with its own health clinic, communal kitchen,
and system of people's courts to deal with such problems as drunkenness, domestic
violence, and gambling.41
This wave of revolutionary mobilization came to a drastic halt, at least
temporarily, on September 11, 1973, when military forces overthrew the
government in a bloody coup. Immediately following the coup, thousands of
citizens were detained, and many of them were tortured or killed. During the first
ten years of military rule the government nearly destroyed the fabric of civil society
but managed to restructure the economy. Under Pinochet's neoliberal economic
program, labor unions and labor rights were emasculated, and unemployment (not
to mention underemployment) soared to 30 percent.
During the early 1980s social movements reemerged and formed the backbone of
280
Patricia L. Hipsher
the popular protest movement. In the shantytowns people engaged in collective

forms of subsistence by setting up soup kitchens (ollas comunes, artisan bakeries
(amasanderias), purchasing cooperatives (comprando juntos), and vocational
workshops (talleres laborales). They also organized ostensibly political organiza-
tions, education programs, and groups to solve social and economic problems.
These latter groups included self-help housing collectives, human rights groups,
and organizations of utility debtors.42
The shantytown movement began a process of reorganization in 1979, but not
until 1983 did it mobilize a strong and sustained campaign of protest. The key
elements in the development of an insurgent movement were divisions within the
government coalition brought on primarily by economic crisis, a history of
contentious collective action, and strong external support of civil protest by all of
the opposition political parties and the Catholic church.
The mobilization campaign, which lasted from 1983 to 1986, was organized as a
series of national days of protest, called by varying opposition groups. The main
convoking groups were the Copper Workers' Confederation (CTC), the
Democratic Alliance (AD), the Popular Democratic Movement (MDP), and the
Civic Assembly.43 The protests included strikes, mass absenteeism, slowdowns,
marches, and demonstrations.
In the shantytowns residents marched en masse, banged pots and pans, and kept
children home from school. When provoked by police and the armed forces, they
responded by erecting barricades of rocks, limbs, and burning tires and by
attacking symbols of the state, including firetrucks, police vehicles, PEM/POJH
buildings, and lottery ticket distribution centers.44 During this period shantytown
dwellers also staged the largest illegal land seizure in the country's history. It
involved some 8,000 families and took place on the outskirts of Santiago in
September 1983.45 These actions were harshly repressed by the police and armed
forces. The army, police, and secret police conducted neighborhood searches at all
hours of the night, encircled the shantytowns, and arrested all men over the age of
fifteen.
From 1983 until 1987 community, labor, and party organizations sustained a
high level of mobilization, challenging the dictatorship and calling for nothing less
than the resignation of Pinochet and the return of democracy. The two main
political alignments, the AD and the MDP, supported a strategy of mass protest
and coordinated protest activities on various occasions; however, they had different
ideas as to the purpose of the protests. The AD, composed of severi centrist,
center-right, and social democratic parties, viewed protest as social pressure to
bring the government to the bargaining table to negotiate the transition timetable.
The MDP coalition, in contrast, saw protest as part of an overall strategy to bring
the government to its knees.46 The difference in goals remained obscured until the
281
dictatorship offered to negotiate with the parties of the AD in late 1986 and actively
sought to isolate the MDP.
The protests reached their peak on July 2 and 3, 1986, when the opposition
launched a general strike. The forces of the Civic Assembly paralyzed Santiago for
forty-eight hours. The government suppressed the protest with unusually harsh
tactics and tragic results. During the two days of protest government forces killed
nearly a dozen people, and a military patrol covered two teenagers with kerosene
and set them on fire.
In the wake of the protest, several events caused a break between the Christian
Democratic-led and Communist-led opposition groups. The first was the discovery
on August 12 of a clandestine arsenal of weapons brought into the country by the
Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic Front (FPMR), an armed group associated with the
Communist Party. The second was a violent attack on Pinochet by the FPMR on
September 7. Pinochet survived the attack, but five of his body guards were killed.
Hundreds of political activists, suspected of being connected with these two events,
were arrested, and twenty-five were sentenced to death. Pamela Constable and
Arturo Valenzuela commented that, "although angered by the repressive excess
that followed the assassination attempt, most politically active Chileans were
equally horrified by the crime itself."'47 As a result of these incidents and
Pinochet's own campaign to discredit the Marxist Left, the Christian Democrats
refused further collaboration with the Communists, and the two Socialist factions
patched up their differences and began to work with the PDC for a negotiated
return to democracy.
The government and the AD had negotiated previously, in late 1983, but the
dialogue broke down because of government unwillingness to speed up the
transition timetable. In 1987, however, the AD chose to negotiate a transition with
the government within the strict parameters defined by the 1980 constitution. The
transitional process, which began in 1987 and culminated with the election of
Christian Democrat Patricio Aylwin as president in December 1989, represented a
negotiated transition dominated by authoritarian elites. The regime changed in a
protracted series of steps, delineated by the military regime's own constitution and
initiated and tightly controlled from above. The authoritarian elites exercised
control over the transition by regulating the timing of the reforms, structuring
elections to benefit their supporters, and excluding certain policy areas from the
agenda.
During the plebiscite and election campaigns, the movement remained active,
and the number of housing organizations increased. The campaign activity by
political parties and the democratic election of neighborhood councils (juntas de
vecino) encouraged a flurry of activity in the shantytowns and a spirit of optimism
and hope for the future. Congressional candidates from the Concertacidn por la
Democracia48 and the right-wing coalition Democracia y Progreso,49 along with
282
Patricia L. Hipsher
neighborhood unit leaders, went door-to-door, organizing the homeless into

committees and promising them solutions to their housing problems. The
shantytown dwellers, for the most part, accepted that a limited democracy,
constrained by the institutional and juridical legacies of Pinochet, was better than
no democracy at all, and they actively campaigned to vote "No" in the 1988
plebiscite on Pinochet's presidency. However, they did not demobilize until 1990,
when the Concertacidn took power.
Two changes following the December 1989 elections put the nail in the coffin of
shantytown protest and led to the institutionalization of the movement. The first
was the public proclamation of an antimobilization strategy by the government that
singled out the shantytown movement. The second was a change in the
government's housing subsidy program.
Beginning on February 12, 1990, following the elections but before the
inauguration of the new president, homeless families across the nation launched a
series of illegal land seizures. Enrique Krauss, appointed minister of interior,
publicly condemned the seizures as not being "the appropriate way to resolve
housing problems" and warned that under the new government such acts would not
be tolerated.50 Alberto Etchegarray, future minister of housing, also condemned the
occupations, characterizing them as "concerted actions designed to destabilize the
future government."51 The event, which in earlier times would have received the
encouragement and moral support of at least some of the leading political parties,
were rejected by all except the Communist Party, which simply denied any
involvement or responsibility.
In the months that followed the inauguration of the new president and
congress, shantytown dwellers attempted few land seizures. From cabinet
ministers to members of congress, reaction to the occupations was the same:
categorical rejection and condemnation. In his statements to the press, Luis
Pareto, intendant of Santiago, was clear and empathic: "Breaking up a land
seizure is painful, but it is fundamental to preserving the democratic regime that
the legal norms be respected. Occupations lead to no good end, only to anarchy
and disorder."" 52 Responding to news of the attempted land occupation, Christian
Democratic deputies Ram6n Elizalde and Sergio Velasco criticized the
occupations for being inappropriate and illicit forms of pressure that "endanger
democracy.""53 When DC Deputy Rojo visited one of the "toma" sites, he went
so far as to characterize those who participated in the seizure as
"antidemocratic. "54
The center-left of the Concertaci6n supported the government's position against

mobilization. The secretary of the shantytown department of the Socialist Party
explained his party's position against mobilization.
We are very careful about how we deal with the problem of the homeless because we
283
are in a period of transition. We have to care for the democracy. We don't want
problems during this transitional period. We can't demagogically promote
mobilizations as a solution. It would be easy to occupy the piece of land near the
airport and to encourage a big land seizure to solve the problem but that would be
rather irresponsible on our part. We don't want to provoke the police or our
opponents.-5
The Concertaci6n's rejection of mobilization was soon translated into a shift in

movement strategies, partly owing to the close relationship between political
parties and social movements in the shantytowns and partly due to a commitment to
democracy on the part of shantytown dwellers. Two important features of the
Chilean political structure are a well-established system of strong, ideologically
distinct parties and an interlocking pattern of relations between parties and social
organizations.56 At the national and neighborhood levels movement leaders are
often militants or leaders of a political party. Consequently, a movement's
strategies, tactics, and goals are often heavily influenced, if not dictated, by the
position of the party with which it has ties.
Movement leaders and activists are quick to point out that the shantytown
organizations do not exclude members on the basis of political militancy or ideas.
However, most groups are organized by a base level party leader, someone with
previous political experience, or a neighborhood council member, often affiliated
with a political party. Therefore, the strategies, organizational forms, and forms of
collective action employed by a given shantytown organization usually parallel the
tactics and political line of a national party.57
During the campaign for the 1988 plebiscite on Pinochet's future as president of
the republic, center and center-left parties of the Concertacidn emerged as the
leading prodemocracy coalition. The Communist Party suffered a crisis of
legitimacy, which was reflected in its loss of status and organizational power in the
shantytowns. Thus, the vast majority of the committees in the posttransitional
period had ties to right-wing, centrist, or center-left parties. Significantly, these
parties' positions on the problems of shantytown dwellers and their solutions to
them were moderate and opposed to widescale participation and organization.
Movement leaders, who set their organizations' agenda, came to oppose
mobilization during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Leaders of centrist and
center-left organizations cited a commitment to democracy and a stable transition
as their reasons for rejecting mobilization. Hugo Flores, president of the national
shantytown organization Solidarity stated:
The protests are over now. We will not use land seizures anymore. We were involved
in the 1983 occupations of Fresno and Silva Enriquez, and I used to work with Oscar
Pefia [the Vice President of Metro, a Communist-led shantytown organization]. There
284
Patricia L. Hipsher
has been a lot of debate in our organization about land seizures, and historically this
is not the moment. We must support this democracy.5"
Manuel Morales, a Christian Democrat and president of the Eduardo Frei housing
committee in the shantytown La Pincoya, expressed a similar sentiment. "We have
not participated in or organized any mobilizations, and land occupations are not
accepted by us. I don't believe that they are a solution. We must back the new
government."59
Common themes articulated by movement leaders and activists were the need for
"prudence" and patience and the condemnation of mobilization. Roberto Vargas,
president of the Santiago Regional Federation of Housing and Social Programs
(FERPROHAS), was emphatic in his condemnation of contentious protest
strategies.
The federation is completely against land occupations. One must denounce

occupations. One must denounce leaders who promote them because they are illegal
and create social disorder, and now more than ever we must denounce them because
we are in a government of transition. One must take care of democracy, and
democracy is preserved by maintaining the social order.60
Political parties of the Concertacidn have accepted as fact the notion that protest
is dangerous for democracy, whereas Communist leaders have accepted it, not so
much as fact, but as a widely held belief that informs their political calculations.
Discussing the difficulties of leading a leftist movement under limited democracy,
leaders of the Metropolitan Shantytown Dwellers' Coordinator, Claudina Nufiez
and Oscar Pefia, reveal a more strategic adjustment to the new democracy.
The fundamental problem of the homeless movement at this conjuncture is that it is

very difficult to walk the line between supporting democracy and fighting for the
rights that have not yet been given to us ... We don't worry about having good credit
with the Right. We are a movement of the poor and dispossessed. But that doesn't
mean that we are stupid. We must be consequential with the shantytown sector and
the democracy.6'
This antimobilization strategy represents a departure from the movement's earlier

strategy under the dictatorship. The president of a socialist-dominated housing
committee in the shantytown Jose Maria Caro described the strategic changes
undergone by popular organizations since the return of democracy.
Under the dictatorship the housing committees and the shantytown movement in
general in Jos6 Maria Caro worked on the basis of demands. With the democratic
transition our work has changed. Now that we are part of the Concertaci6n, part of
285
the government, we try to encourage people to save and work through the subsidy
program. Why provoke a land seizure if you know it's going to hurt you politically
and if it could endanger what you've worked so hard to get-democracy.62
The particular strategies and tactics of the movement have been shaped by
channeling mechanisms within the government's housing subsidy program. The
Aylwin government's housing policies channelled the activities of neighborhood
organizations by legitimizing certain forms of collective action and discouraging
the organization of large groups and confederations that would facilitate protests
and mobilization. For example, housing subsidies are awarded on the basis of the
number of points a family has. These points are based on socioeconomic situation,
number of family members, savings, time elapsed since application, and collective
enrollment. The housing program awards each member of the committee an extra
point for each family in the committee, up to fifty points. If a group has one
hundred members, its members will get no more points for the extra fifty members
than a group of only fifty. This regulation has effectively divided and weakened the
movement. Further, in order for a committee to enroll as a group for housing
subsidies, it must have legal status (personalidad juridica). Groups with legal
status are prohibited from participating in mobilizations and extralegal acts. If they
violate this rule, their legal status will be revoked.
In the shantytown Santa Adriana, the decision to obtain legal recognition
required lengthy debate. Traditionally a Communist stronghold, many residents of
Santa Adriana believed that the history of the shantytown dwellers had been one of
struggle and were reluctant to give up their right to protest. Ultimately, however,
the committee voted to seek legal status. It believed that protest would earn them
retribution from the government and could jeopardize the transition.
These policies were consciously developed to channel and control the
movement. Rail Puelle, head of the Christian Democratic Party's shantytown
department, revealed the motives behind them.
When the people begin to mobilize, there is going to be no stopping them, and during
the transition we can not have this. I don't see real participation by the social
movements yet, but I believe that this is a good thing because real participation can be
dangerous in the present political situation. One must create organized channels
within the institutional and political framework so that the people can participate, but
in a controlled form. For example, the housing policy with its extra points for
collective enrollment privileges those who save and make an effort, it gives the
people hope and makes them believe that the government is with them. If such
mechanisms didn't exist, the people would explode.63
After 1987, when political events made a negotiated transition possible and
reduced the power of the Communist Party, movement leaders altered their
286
Patricia L. Hipsher
organizations' strategies and objectives to conform with those of the major

opposition parties with which they had ties and to reflect their commitment to
democratic stability.
Spain
The urban movement in Spain followed a similar pattern during the Spanish
transition to democracy. Emerging about 1970, it began to develop in 1974 amidst
talk of reform by Franco and reached its peak in 1975-76. Following the
repudiation of the strategy of "democratic rupture" by the Communists and
Socialists in early 1977, the associations went into rapid decline.
The main purposes of the neighborhood movement were to procure or improve
public services for working class neighborhoods, improve the quality of life by
providing cultural and social activities, and protest municipal and national
government economic and social policies. The most common issues of the
movement were housing, schooling, public health, transportation, open urban
space, improvement of social life in the neighborhood, and political demands.64
During its first twenty-five to thirty years the Franco dictatorship appealed to
conservative Catholic ideology and widely used repression. Following the civil
war, when repression and economic privation rendered most potential adversaries
acquiescent, the state essentially dominated a fearful society.
The rise of the labor movement and the democratic opposition between the late
1960s and 1974 changed the balance of power between the dictatorship and the
people. Prodemocratic elements within the government and the Catholic church
became important allies in the protest movement's fight against the dictatorship and
the neighborhood organizations' struggles for improved living conditions. The
Second Vatican Council of 1962-65 forced a reassessment of the Spanish church's
alliance with the dictatorship and pushed it towards acceptance of a pluralistic
model of politics. Within the government the dictatorship lost support as well.65
According to Kenneth Medhurst:
Ministers drawn from established right-wing groups had, by the end of Franco's life,
used up their political capital, and, in the absence of any effective pro-regime party,
they could readily be replaced. The result was to drive the State towards increased
reliance upon civilian and military recruits coopted from within the state
bureaucracy.66
During the late 1960s mass social movements emerged and raised demands,
frequently of a political nature. The workers' and students' movements became
increasingly militant and engaged in demonstrations protesting economic and
political policies in Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao, and other major urban areas.67
287
According to Jose Maravall, the number of working hours lost through strikes rose
from 1.5 million in 1966 to 8.7 million in 1970 and 14.5 million in 1975.
Moreover, the workers' demands took on a more political dimension from
1974. According to Maravall, between 1963 and 1967 demands for solidarit
a political nature represented four percent of the total, whereas between 1
1974 their proportion rose to 45.4 percent.68
The rise of the workers' movement and the increasing influence of a dem
elite opposition created space for the neighborhood movement to m
Paralleling the protest against the country's economic and political policies
growing concern for living conditions in working class neighborhoods. W
labor and student demonstrations met with severe repression, political orga
and activity moved to the neighborhoods.69
In an environment hostile to these two movements, the Left, especi
Communist Party (PCE), began to develop mass organizations in the ne
hoods. These organizations were known as Comisiones de Barrio (neigh
committees) and, according to Castells, "were, above all, political bodies cr
for agitation."70 The secretary general of a large regional branch of
explained: "In the final years of the dictatorship, the neighborhood associ
were fundamentally a cover for clandestine political activity. There were
kinds of activity. There was the more or less consistent defense of the inte
the neighborhoods, but fundamentally they were platforms for political
against the regime."'71
While these organizations maintained a degree of independence from th
their leadership, technical assistants, and allies were nearly all Com
militants or leaders. Party members were encouraged to join in the worker,
professional, and neighborhood movements, to assume leadership position
them, and to induce them to act in accord with the party's program and
interests. Over 68 percent of the delegates attending the fourth congress
Communist Party claimed to be members of neighborhood associations. O
the trade union movement did the Communist presence surpass that foun
neighborhood movement.72 Neighborhood organizations often worke
professionals when looking for solutions to local problems. As Ramon Tam
explained: "What doubt is there that within the citizen movement one mus
on good jurists, on experts in administrative law, and on good sociolog
architects, this is, on good technicians who know how to channel the needs
fellow citizens?"73 Not surprisingly, these technicians and professionals we
party members. By providing public services, they generated positive
toward the party, cultivated a loyal following, and shaped the strate
demands of the organizations.
Although they were few in number and their capacity to mobilize on a lar
was not well developed, neighborhood organizations emerged on the
288
Patricia L. Hipsher
scene in the early 1970s. Jordi Borja identifies several significant events that
illustrate the movement's capacity for collective action in the Barcelona area.74 In
1973 it took a strong stand against the Greater Barcelona Plan and the Comarcal
(District) Plan, opposing them out of concern for the unrepresentativeness of the
organizations which reviewed these two planning projects. A year later, several
social and political groups presented the Memorandum of Citizens' Groups to the
mayor of Barcelona. This memorandum represented the support of important
bourgeois and middle class community and civic organizations for the working
class neighborhoods. This support emboldened the neighborhood associations to
lead a general protest in Barcelona against the city council's "No to Catalan."
In 1975, during the last months of Franco's life, the movement began decisively
to test the real possibilities of democracy by initiating several campaigns that
received wide citizen support and marked "a qualitative increase in its offensive
capacity.""75 The first was the campaign in Madrid for better public schooling.
Massive delegations met with city authorities, and up to 20,000 people participated
in street demonstrations. The same year, an association of housewives, together
with neighborhood organizations and merchants, launched a campaign against the
high cost of living and led a boycott in February 1975. The organizations were also
active during this period in the struggle for political democracy. The political wing
of the Provincial Federation of Neighborhood Associations, then illegal, demanded
democratic liberties and worked closely with the trade union movement on this
issue.
By the mid 1970s Spanish opposition parties had long abandoned attempts to
overthrow the regime. However, they continued to advocate a "democratic
rupture," calling for a freely elected constituent assembly, presided over by a
provisional government composed of all democratic parties, that would not
guarantee a place for proregime forces. This strategy was favored by the PCE,
PSOE, the Christian Democrats, Social Democrats, Liberals, and several small
regional parties.
Following the death of Franco in November 1975, the Left clung to this strategy
and held the initiative during the first several months of the post-Franco era, in
large part because of the Navarro government's -unwillingness and inability to
initiate reforms. With the government all but paralyzed by divisions and lack of
leadership and Franco dead, the opposition was filled with new hopes. These
hopes, Medhurst writes, "were speedily reflected in the surfacing of still
technically illegal parties and in the organization of still technically illegal
strikes."76 In March 1976 the Coordinacidn Democrdtica (Democratic Coordina-
tor) was created.77 This organization brought together those political parties that
had favored a democratic rupture, along with the democratic trade union
movement. As part of an overall strategy to bring down the government and take
289
control of the transitional process, the Coordinacicn Democrdtica encouraged its

mass organizations to mobilize in protest.
The support of the Democratic Coordinator, along with the death of Franco,
invigorated the neighborhood movement. In one Madrid shantytown the
neighborhood association grew from only six residents in 1970 to over 1400
families in 1977.78 The neighborhood movement in Alcala-de-Henares experienced
even more dramatic growth. The first neighborhood association was started there in
1974 with fifty residents. By 1977 there were four coordinated associations in the
city, each one with a membership of over 600. By mid 1977 there were 110
neighborhood organizations in Madrid, counting on some 60,000 members with a
core of about 5,000 militants.79
Until 1977 the movement remained mobilized, struggling for its own particular
demands as well as broader political goals through confrontational and disruptive
means. In May 1976 60,000 citizens of Madrid demonstrated in Calle Preciados
against the high cost of living. One month later, on June 22, 50,000 people
gathered in the center of Madrid to again protest the cost of living and to demand
the legalization of the neighborhood associations. Throughout 1976 residents
continued to mount demonstrations supporting the legalization of the Neighbors'
Associations and the Provincial Federation of Associations of Neighbors, drawing
as many as 100,000 supporters into the streets at a given time.80
While Arias' tenure as prime minister was characterized by internal division and
gridlock and continued repression of the citizenry, Suarez succeeded in creating
coalitions that supported his political reforms, both within the Spanish parliament
(the Cortes) and with opposition parties. On September 11, 1976, only two months
after the fall of the Arias government, Suarez presented to the nation a project of
political reform that called for free elections. When the Cortes opposed the
program, Suarez took the issue directly to the people in a referendum, held on
December 15, 1976. According to John Coverdale, Communists, Socialists,
regional nationalists, and some Christian Democrats (all members of the
Democratic Coordinator) campaigned in favor of abstention, but without gusto.81
Suarez's overtures to establish a dialogue and negotiate with the opposition, along
with the Left's awareness that the democratic transition was fragile and subject to
reversal, broke down the Left's commitment to a democratic rupture. Gradually,
the opposition dropped its demand for a democratic rupture and began to talk
instead about a negotiated democratic break. When citizens supported the program
of political reform with 94.2 percent of the vote, members of the opposition
quickly jumped on the bandwagon for a negotiated transition.
Besides the obvious fact that the opposition's strategy of democratic rupture
became obsolete and irrelevant after the referendum, there was another reason for
leftist support of negotiations: political learning. Bermeo, among others, has noted
that values, historical memories, and perceptions of the transition as a fragile
290
Patricia L. Hipsher
process encourage caution and moderation among opposition political leaders.82

The PCE, the party that had spearheaded the organization of poor urban
neighborhoods, certainly reacted to the transition in this way.
The PCE, beginning in autumn 1976 and intensifying after the referendum,
played a largely nonconflictual role in the transitional process. It actively supported
the Moncloa Pacts and discouraged its members from engaging in disruptive
protest activities.83 According to Gunther, the behavior of the PCE elite was
profoundly affected by an awareness of the mistakes that culminated in the civil
war and by painful memories of suffering under the Franquist regime. A former
member of the PCE secretariat explained:
This memory of the past obliges us to take these circumstances into account, that is,
to follow a policy of moderation. We feel responsibility for this process [of
democratization, and] the need to make a superhuman effort so that this process is not
truncated. .... we can not allow ourselves the luxury of expressing opinions which
might be misunderstood, which could be, or appear to be, extremist.84
Fear of returning to the dark days of dictatorship and a belief that a limited
democracy was far better than no democracy at all pushed the PCE towards
moderation and restraint.
The PCE's strategic changes shaped the strategies of the neighborhood
movement by virtue of their close ties. Beginning in 1977, the neighborhood
movement declined noticeably. Manuel Castells, a researcher and supporter of the
movement, has even called it a period of "crisis. "85 The movement abandoned its
former tactic of confronting the authorities directly through street protests and
demands. In addition, the movement withdrew its political demands for
"democratic rupture," which would have excluded former authoritarian elites from
the democratization process, and accepted a negotiated settlement.
In one working class neighborhood, La Vaguada, the movement had been
fighting for over two years to stop the development of a metropolitan shopping
center and a new motorway access that would cut across the residential complex.
The most prominent political party within the neighborhood organization was the
PCE. During the two-year-long struggle, the residents sent petitions to the town
council and letters to the king, painted murals, clashed with police, and protested
outside of city hall in a strategy of direct confrontation. In early 1977 its leaders,
concerned that continued confrontation would make the party look like idealistic
extremists, decided to adopt a more conciliatory position and negotiated with the
project developers, capitulating on almost every point.86 Similar incidents arose in
other communities.
These incidents had the effect of institutionalizing the movement, taking away its
principal means of political recourse, protest,87 and creating conflict between
291
movement activists and party militants, thus weakening its "ability to mobilize
either residents or public opinion.""88 The incidents leading to the decline of the
movement, through conflict and institutionalization, can be explained only by
changes in the political environment at the end of 1976 and strategic changes by
leftist political parties, especially the PCE, to support the consolidation of a
negotiated democracy.
Summary and Conclusions
Transitions from authoritarian rule not only provide opportunities for grass roots
social movements to mobilize in protest but may also place constraints on their
ability to remain insurgent. The opening of the political process during transitions
and the accompanying changes in the political opportunity structure encourage
movement insurgency. In Spain, the increasing influence of an elite opposition
within the church and the government, an increasingly militant labor movement,
and the death of Franco in November 1975 allowed the emergence of neighborhood
movement activity in Spain. The close ties between neighborhood organizations
and the Communist Party, which initially actively encouraged confrontation with
the government and calls for a democratic rupture, favored the use of contentious
collective strategies by the movement.
A similar process of mobilization-demobilization occurred in Chile. Divisions
among authoritarian elites, brought on by the 1982 economic crisis, and
government indecision regarding how best to deal with the emerging protest
movement gave the shantytown dwellers the political space to reassert themselves.
Opposition party support for mass protest either to bring the dictatorship down or to
bring it to the bargaining table emboldened the movement and fostered continued
mobilization.
As the transitions progressed, the political climates changed, and opportunities

for disruptive collective action narrowed. So as not to provoke the Right into
reversing the process of democratization and to enhance the stability of the country,
the PCE in Spain and the parties of the Concertacidn and the Communist Party in
Chile pursued a strategy of nonconfrontation. Strong parties with close ties to
social movements facilitated elites' efforts to deliver mass support for the
settlements. Moreover, pobladores' suffering under the dictatorship in Chile and
the continued presence of authoritarian elites in positions of power stirred up fears
of a return to authoritarian rule and discouraged mobilization that could endanger
democratic stability. The institutionalization and internal factionalization of the
Spanish neighborhood movement in the late stages of the transition weakened the
movement and sapped its mobilization potential.
The pacted democracies of Latin America have been criticized by numerous
292
Patricia L. Hipsher
scholars for ignoring the demands of the poor and instituting harsh austerity
programs. Nevertheless, we must recall that the return to democracy, albeit a
limited one, benefits even the poorest people in Latin America and southern
Europe. Bermeo argues that "even marginal changes can have great meaning if you
are living at the margin, and if you are given to dissent, the difference between
democracy and dictatorship can literally be the difference between life and
death."'89 Democracy has benefited the poor in a variety of ways. Associations of
the urban poor are now able to participate in politics; civil liberties have been
restored; and electoral contestation is permitted. It is ironic that, at a time when
memories of dictatorship are still clear and the fear and threat of an authoritarian
regression remain foremost in the thoughts of political leaders, democratization has
been based on the patience of those who can least afford it-the poor.
NOTES
1. Alice Gail Bier, "Urban Growth and Urban Politics: A Study of Neighborhood Associa
Two Cities in Spain" (Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, 1979), p. 72.
2. See Cathy Schneider, "Radical Opposition Parties and Squatters Movements in Pinochet'
in Sonia Alvarez and Arturo Escobar, eds., The Making of Social Movements in Latin Am
(Boulder: Westview Press, 1990), pp. 260-275; Gonzalo de la Maza and Mario Garc6s, La expl
las mayorias: Protesta nacional, 1983-1984 (Santiago: Educaci6n y Comunicaci6n, 1985)
Arriagada, Negociaci6n Polftica v movilizaci6n social: La crftica de las protestas (Santia
1987); and Philip Oxhorn, Democracia v participacidn popular.: Organizaciones poblacion
futura democracia chilena (Santiago: FLACSO, 1986).
3. This mode of analysis is characteristic of the new social movement theorists. For rev
analyses of this approach in Latin America, see Ruth Correa Leite Cardoso, "Popular Movements
Context of the Consolidation of Democracy in Brazil," and Orlando Fals Borda, "Social Mov
and Political Power in Latin America," both in Alvarez and Escobar, eds, pp. 291-316.
4. On Solidarity, see David Ost, Solidarity and the Politics of Anti-Politics (Philadelphia:
University Press, 1990). On urban movements, see Eduardo Canel, "Democratization and th
of Urban Social Movements in Uruguay: A Political-Institutional Account," in Alvarez and
eds., pp. 276-290; Scott Mainwaring, The Catholic Church and Politics in Brazil, 1916-1985
(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986); and C. G. Pickvance, "Social Movements and Local
Politics in the Transition from State Socialism: A Preliminary Report on Housing Movements in
Moscow," presented at the European Conference on Social Movements, Berlin, October 29-31, 1992.
On the Spanish labor movement, see Jose Maravall, The Transition to Democracy in Spain (New York:
St. Martin's Press, 1982); and Lynn Wozniak, "Economic Orthodoxy and Industrial Protest:
Consolidating Spanish Democracy" (Ph.D., diss., Cornell University, 1992).
5. Leading examples of elite-centered studies of democratic transitions include Guillermo O'Donnell,
Philippe Schmitter, and Laurence Whitehead, eds., Transitions from Authoritarian Rule, 4 vols.
(Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986); Larry Diamond, Juan Linz, and Seymour
Martin Lipset, eds., Democracy in Developing Countries (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1989);
Geoffrey Pridham, ed., Securing Democracy: Political Parties and Democratic Consolidation in
Southern Europe (London: Routledge, 1990); and Richard Gunther and John Higley, eds., Elites and
293
Democratic Consolidation in Latin America and Southern Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1992).
6. Sidney Tarrow's work on cycles of protest addresses the dynamics of movement decline. He
makes the point that protest itself can alter the structure of political opportunities and may narrow the
opportunities for protest in certain circumstances. See Sidney Tarrow, Democracy and Disorder:
Protest and Politics in Italy, 1965-1975 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989), and Power in
Movement: Social Movements, Collective Action and Politics (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1994). On the demobilization of social movements in Latin America, see Canel, "Democratization and
the Decline"; Philip Oxhorn, "Where Did All the Protesters Go? Popular Mobilization and the
Transition to Democracy in Chile," Latin American Perspectives, 82 (Summer 1994), 49-68; Vivienne
Bennett, "The Evolution of Urban Popular Movements in Mexico between 1968 and 1988," in Alvarez
and Escobar, eds., pp. 240-259; and Jane Jaquette, ed., The Women's Movement in Latin America
(Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1994).
7. Manuel Castells, "Urban Social Movements and the Struggle for Democracy: The Citizens'
Movement in Madrid," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 2 (March 1978), 134.
8. See Genaro Arriagada, Pinochet: The Politics of Power (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1988); Eduardo
Valenzuela, La rebelion de los jovenes (Santiago: CED, 1984).
9. See Manuel Castells, The City and the Grassroots (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1983); Fernando de Teran, "New Planning Experiences in Democratic Spain," International Journal of
Urban and Regional Research, 22 (March 19891), 97-105; and Tilman Evers, "Identity: The Hidden
Side of New Social Movements in Latin America," in David Slater, ed., New Social Movements and the
State in Latin America (Dordrecht: Foris/CEDLA Publications, 1985).
10. Charles Tilly, From Mobilization to Revolution (New York: Random House, 1978), p. 54.
11. Doug McAdam, Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency, 1930-1970
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1983), p. 57.
12. Tarrow, Power in Movement, p. 85.
13. Ibid., and Tarrow, Democracy and Disorder.
14. Tarrow, Power in Movement, p. 18.
15. See Eric Hobsbawm, "Peasant Land Occupations," Past and Present, 62 (February 1974),
120-152; Tarrow, Democracy and Disorder, p. 56; and O'Donnell and Schmitter, vol. 4, p. 19.
16. Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward, Poor People's Movements (New York: Vintage Books,
1977), pp. 15-18, 198-202; and McAdam, p. 82.
17. See William Gamson, The Strategy of Social Protest (Homewood: Dorsey, 1975); Craig Jenkins
and Charles Perrow, "Insurgency of the Powerless: Farm Workers' Movements (1946-1972),"
American Sociological Review, 42 (1977), 249-268; Michael Lipsky, Protest in City Politics: Rent
Strikes, Housing, and the Power of the Poor (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1970), p. 14; Tarrow,
Democracy and Disorder; and Susan Eckstein, "Power and Popular Protest in Latin America," in Susan
Eckstein, ed., Power and Popular Protest (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), p. 35.
18. Sonia Alvarez, Engendering Democracy in Brazil: Women's Movements in Transition Politics
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).
19. Judith Adler Hellman, "The Study of New Social Movements in Latin America and the Question
of Autonomy," in Alvarez and Escobar, eds., pp. 52-61; Mainwaring; and Schneider.
20. Maria Lorena Cook, "Organizing Opposition in the Teachers' Movement in Oaxaca," in Joe
Foweraker and Ann Craig, eds., Popular Movements and Political Change in Mexico (Boulder: Lynne
Rienner, 1990), pp. 199-212.
21. Michael Burton, John Higley, and Richard Gunther, "Introduction: Elite Transformations and
Democratic Regimes," in Higley and Gunther, eds., p. 4.
22. O'Donnell and Schmitter, vol. 4, p. 48.
294
Patricia L. Hipsher
23. Robert Kaufman, "Liberalization and Democratization in South America: Perspectives- from the
1970s," in O'Donnell, Schmitter, and Whitehead, eds., vol. 1. p. 106.
24. Ibid.
25. Fernando Henrique Cardoso, "Entrepreneurs and the Transition Process: The Brazilian Case,"
O'Donnell, Schmitter, and Whitehead, vol. 3, p. 152.
26. Adam Przeworski, "Some Problems in the Study of the Transition to Democracy," in O'Donn
Schmitter, and Whitehead, eds., vol. 3, p. 63.
27. Terry Karl, "Petroleum and Political Pacts: The Transition to Democracy in Venezuela,"
O'Donnell, Schmitter, and Whitehead, eds., vol. 2. p. 198.
28. Guillermo O'Donnell, "Introduction to the Latin American Cases," in O'Donnell, Schmitter, and
Whitehead, eds., vol. 2, p. 15.
29. Ibid. In contrast, see Rustow's observation that parties tend to establish democracy out of
stalemate rather than a belief in it as a political model. Dankwart A. Rustow, "Transitions to
Democracy: Toward a Dynamic Model," Comparative Politics, 2 (April 1970), 337-64.
30. O'Donnell, p. 15.
31. Nancy Bermeo, "Rethinking Regime Change," Comparative Politics, 22 (April 1990), 274.
32. J. Samuel Valenzuela, "Democratic Consolidation in Post-Transitional Settings: Notion, Process,
and Facilitating Conditions," in Scott Mainwaring, Guillermo O'Donnell, and J. Samuel Valenzuela,
eds., Issues in Democratic Consolidation: The New South American Democracies in Comparative
Perspective (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1992), p. 78.
33. Charles Gillespie, "Uruguay's Transition from Collegial Military-Technocratic Rule," in
O'Donnell, Schmitter, and Whitehead, eds., vol. 2, p. 194.
34. Laurence Whitehead, "International Aspects of Democratization," in O'Donnell, Schmitter, and
Whitehead, eds., vol. 3, p. 16.
35. Richard Gunther, "Spain: The Very Model of the Modern Elite Settlement," in Gunther and
Higley, eds., p. 77.
36. Gunther, Higley, and Burton, p. 23.
37. Charles Gillespie, "The Role of Civil-Military Pacts in Elite Settlements and Elite Convergence:
Democratic Consolidation in Uruguay," in Gunther and Higley, eds., p. 202.
38. Canel, pp. 285, 286.
39. Julio Cotler, "Military Interventions and 'Transfer of Power to Civilians' in Peru," in O'Donnell,
Schmitter, and Whitehead, eds., vol. 2, p. 165.
40. Kaufman, p. 101.
41. Ernesto Pastrano and Monica Threlfall, Pan, techo y poder: El movimiento de pobladores en Chile
1970-1973 (Buenos Aires: Ediciones S.A.P., 1974).
42. See Guillermo Campero, Entre la sobrevivencia v la acci6n politica: Las organizaciones de
pobladores en Santiago (Santiago: ILET, 1987), Clarisa Hardy, Hambre + Dignidad = Ollas
Comunes (Santiago: PET, 1986), and Organizarse para vivir (Santiago: PET, 1988).
43. The Democratic Popular Movement (MDP) was an opposition coalition of various left-wing
parties and movements, including the Communist Party, the Christian Left, Ad-MAPU, and MIR. The
Civic Assembly (AC) was an opposition coalition of various associations and interest groups, including
the truckers' federation, retailers, and professional associations.
44. The Minimum Employment Program (PEM) and the Jobs Program for Heads of Households
(POJH) were make-work employment programs established by Pinochet in 1983.
45. Roel Klaarhamer, 'Nuestra lucha es mas grande que la casa" (Master's thesis, Catholic
University, Nijmegen, 1986).
46. See Manuel Antonio Garret6n, 'Popular Mobilization and the Militay Regime in Chile: The
Complexities of the Invisible Transition," in Eckstein, ed., pp. 259-277.
295
47. Arturo Valenzuela and Pamela Constable, A Nation of Enemies (New York: W. W. Norton,
1991), p. 294.
48. The Concertaci6n or Coalition of Parties for Democracy was a coalition of seventeen center and
center-right parties that won the presidency in 1989 and 1993. Included were the Christian Democratic
Party, Socialist Party, Party for Democracy, Radical Party, Social Democratic Party, the
Humanist/Green alliance, and other minor parties.
49. Democracia y Progreso (Democracy and Progress) was a right-wing coalition of political parties
in the 1989 elections. The principal parties were Renovaci6n Nacional (National Renovation) and UDI
(Independent Democratic Union).
50. El Siglo, Mar. 5-18, 1990.
51. El Mercurio, Feb. 13, 1990.
52. Ultimas Noticias, Aug. 7, 1990.
53. Fortin, Aug. 7, 1990.
54. La Tercera, Aug. 8, 1990.
55. Gregorio Carneza, Interview, Santiago, Chile, March 5, 1991.
56. Manuel Antonio Garret6n, The Chilean Political Process (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1989), p. 89.
57. O'Donnell predicted the success of Chilean political parties in restraining their supporters and
demobilizing mass organizations. After spelling out the conditions that facilitate pact-making and
demobilization, he concluded that, "with the ... exception of Chile, this set of conditions has not been
met" in Latin American transitions. O'Donnell, p. 13.
58. Hugo Flores, Interview, Santiago, Chile, February 14, 1991.
59. Manual Morales, Interview, Santiago, Chile, February 5, 1991.
60. Roberto Vargas, Interview, Santiago, Chile, March 1, 1991.
61. Claudina Nufiez and Oscar Pefia, Interview, Santiago, Chile, July 25, 1991.
62. Jose Nancucheo, Interview, Santiago, Chile, March 8, 1991.
63. Rauil Puelle, Interview, Santiago, Chile, June 7, 1992.
64. Castells, City and the Grassroots; Bier, pp. 61, 62.
65. Javier Tussell, La Espahia de Franco (Madrid: Historia 16, 1989), pp. 187-199.
66. Kenneth Medhurst, "Spain's Evolutionary Pathway from Dictatorship to Democracy," in
Pridham, ed., p. 32.
67. Jose Maravall, Dictadura y disentimiento politico: Obreros y estudiantes bajo el franquismo
(Madrid: Ediciones Alfaguara, 1978); Tussell, pp. 199-209.
68. Maravall, Transition to Democracy in Spain, p. 9.
69. Manuel Castells, Ciudad, democracia v socialismo (Madrid: Siglo XXI, 1977), p. 89.
70. Castells, "Urban Social Movements," p. 135.
71. Gunther, "Spain: The Very Model of the Modem Elite Settlement," p. 151.
72. Ibid., p. 150.
73. Cited in Gunther, "Spain: The Very Model of the Modem Elite Settlement," p. 150.
74. Jordi Borja, "Popular Movements and Urban Alternatives in Post-Franco Spain," International
Journal of Urban and Regional Research, 1 (March 1977), 153-155.
76. Medhurst, p. 34.
77. Democratic Coordination organized the PCE, PSOE, the Socialist Party of Enrique Tierno Galvin,
the Democratic Left, the Carlists, the social democratic USDE, the Basque Nationalist PNV, the
Spanish Labor Party (PTE), and other smaller parties.
78. Castells, City and the Grassroots, p. 243.
79. Ibid., p. 247.
296
Patricia L. Hipsher
81. John Coverdale, The Political Transformation of Spain after Franco (New York: Praeger, 1979),
p. 51.
82. Nancy Bermeo, "Democracy and the Lessons of Dictatorship," Comparative Politics, 24 (April
1992), 273-292; and Gunther, "Spain: The Very Model of the Modern Elite Settlement," pp. 146-148.
83. Gunther, "Spain: The Very Model of the Modern Elite Settlement," pp. 146-148, writes that PCE
leaders stated on numerous occasions from 1977 to 1979 that the principal political objective of the
party was "the consolidation of democracy."
84. Ibid., p. 147.
85. Castells, Citv and the Grassroots, p. 273.
86. Ibid., pp. 249-251.
87. Piven and Cloward, pp. 32-34, argue that organization and institutionalization are the two
principal foes of poor people's movements because they strip them of their only form of political
recourse, disruptive protest. Poor people's movements lack the resources and access to the political
process that wealthier, enfranchised groups enjoy.
88. Castells, City and the Grassroots, p. 249-251.
89. Bermeo, "Rethinking Regime Change," p. 374.
297

Hipsher - Democratization and The Decline of Urban Social Movements in Chile and Spain

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Democratization and the Decline of Urban Social Movements in Chile and Spain

Author(s): Patricia L. Hipsher

Comparative Politics, Ph.D. Programs in Political Science, City University of New

Patricia L. Hipsher, "Democratization and the Decline of Social Movements in

Page 278: Successful democratization, he continues, "would almost certainly

Movement demobilization and institutionalization were strategic, norm-based

Movement Mobilization and Demobilization

necessarily formal, permanent, or national -dimensions of the political environ-

Movement allies and support groups shifted their strategy decisively by

However, to place all the responsibility for movement demobilization on party

Elite Accommodation and Movement Demobilization: Theoretical

Transitions from authoritarian rule and the consolidation of democracy in Latin

the popular protest movement. In the shantytowns people engaged in collective

neighborhood unit leaders, went door-to-door, organizing the homeless into

The center-left of the Concertaci6n supported the government's position against

The Concertaci6n's rejection of mobilization was soon translated into a shift in

The federation is completely against land occupations. One must denounce

The fundamental problem of the homeless movement at this conjuncture is that it is

This antimobilization strategy represents a departure from the movement's earlier

organizations' strategies and objectives to conform with those of the major

control of the transitional process, the Coordinacicn Democrdtica encouraged its

process encourage caution and moderation among opposition political leaders.82

Summary and Conclusions

As the transitions progressed, the political climates changed, and opportunities

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