Peronism

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Peronism is the name of the most important political force in contemporary Argentina. It emerged from the first and second presidencies of Juan Domingo Perón, who was democratically elected in 1946 and, after winning elections in 1952, was overthrown by a military coup in 1955. Beyond being a political party, Peronism has been a social and political movement firmly entrenched in the organization and political identity of Argentine society, and has given birth from the 1970s to the 2000s to different political factions with conflicting ideologies and programs.

Perón’s election to the presidency in 1946 represented a reaction to the economic and industrial changes introduced by military regimes following an oligarchic restoration (1930–1939). Peronism emerged as a working- and lower-class movement, and survived an eighteen-year ban on the party, the exile of its leader (1955–1973), decades of repression, and the 1974 death of Perón, then serving his third presidential term.

Even though there is general agreement that the changes implemented by Perón transformed Argentine society, politics, and culture forever, the true character of Peronism has been widely disputed. While it has been presented as one of the paradigmatic cases of Latin American populism (De la Torre 1992), it has also been seen as a political movement with certain affinities with fascism, due to the dictatorial style of Perón’s government and Perón’s open admiration for Benito Mussolini. Peronism has also been studied as a strategic alliance of the working classes with the state (Murmis and Portantiero 1971), among other interpretations.

According to Daniel James (1988), one of the constitutive elements of Peronism was a belief in the essential virtue of the people. Perón considered the organization of labor vital for the success of the state in asserting workers’ rights against the interests of the oligarchy. Peronism was associated with the achievement of higher wages, the generalization of a system of collective bargaining, greater levels of unionization, and better living conditions for the working classes and the poor. Peronism represented an expanded notion of the meaning of citizenship, and challenged the accepted forms of social hierarchy and traditional symbols of authority.

At the same time, Peronism was characterized by nationalism and corporatism, an emphasis on class harmony and the central role of the leader, and the overwhelming presence of a paternalistic state. Industrialization was one of the most important goals of Perón’s government (Rock 1987).

The impact of Peronism on the working classes’ organization was ambiguous, and thus did not have a single meaning for those classes. As James notes, the Peronist state made great efforts between the late 1940s and the mid-1950s to institutionalize and control the workers’ movement, whose demands Perón had earlier encouraged, and to absorb it into the framework of a new state-sponsored orthodoxy. From this perspective, Peronism can be seen as a demobilizing force encouraging passivity among workers, who were limited in their actions by a powerful and controlling state. However, efforts to control the unions from above did not prevent the emergence of a strong oppositional culture among workers, which was the foundation of “rank-and-file resistance to the post-1955 regimes and became the basis for the reassertion of Peronism as the dominant force within the Argentine workers’ movement” (James 1988, p. 40). As a political movement, Peronism drastically changed the way in which the Argentine working classes behaved politically, and how they related to other groups. Most workers saw in Peronism the promise and possibility of a better society in which they would have a vital role.

More than fifty years after its emergence, Peronism remains linked to the image of Perón, and his second wife, Eva Perón, known as Evita. Although both Perón and Evita were strong, charismatic leaders, Evita played a particularly important role in gaining the devotion and unconditional loyalty of the working classes through her speeches and actions. Her direct distribution of aid to the poor is still remembered among Argentines, and her image serves as a model for many women politicians.

Peronism not only divided Argentine society in two groups—namely, Peronists and anti-Peronists—it also has divided itself into many “Peronisms,” with competing ideological perspectives, including socialist, nationalist, and conservative tendencies. Drawing rhetorically on Peronist ideals, symbols, and myths, and counting on the organizational support of the Peronist party, Carlos Menem— president of Argentina from 1989 to 1999—shaped a neoliberal project that was in fact antithetical to the original Peronism. In contrast, in 2003 Néstor Kirchner became president following a campaign based on the same kind of Peronist themes, but set out to establish a completely different political and social program, probably closer to the original Peronist ideals.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

De la Torre, Carlos. 1992. The Ambiguous Meanings of Latin American Populisms. Social Research 59 (2): 385–414.

James, Daniel. 1988. Resistance and Integration: Peronism and the Argentine Working Class, 1946–1976. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Levitsky, Steven. 2003. Transforming Labor-Based Parties in Latin America: Argentine Peronism in Comparative Perspective. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Murmis, Miguel, and Juan Carlos Portantiero. 1971. Estudios sobre los orígenes del peronismo [Studies on the Origins of Peronism]. Buenos Aires: Siglo XXI.

Rock, David. 1987. Argentina, 1516–1982: From Spanish Colonization to Alfonsín. Rev. ed. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Diana E. Baldermann

Javier Auyero