Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis: Icons of the Just City 303118937X, 9783031189371

Citation preview

Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis Icons of the Just City

Patricia Vilches

Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis

Patricia Vilches

Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis Icons of the Just City

Patricia Vilches Spanish and Italian Studies Lawrence University Appleton, WI, USA

ISBN 978-3-031-18937-1 ISBN 978-3-031-18938-8 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: © Harvey Loake This Palgrave Pivot imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

This book is dedicated to don Miguel Lawner We architects have an obligation to rethink the future seriously. Not in the terms we have grown accustomed to lately. With respect to human quality of life, changes must be made. This ought to be the fundamental reason to put an end to this neoliberal system that is leading us to collapse. Things must improve. Our cities cannot continue to be built as poorly as we have seen them these past forty years… Chile now has a problem not only with homelessness but also with poorly constructed homes (Lawner. Colegio de Arquitectos, 31 August 2021, https://youtu.be/PmO9WNT2s2Y).

Preface

“Careful, you could hurt your arm,” Salvador Allende said to me. The time was near the 4 September 1970 presidential election, at an impromptu rally. I have sensorial memoryscapes, sounds, and visions, from that day. We are waiting in expectation, grandmother, uncle, cousins, and many other people. Allende gets out of a blue Fiat 125 and there is an explosion of applause. After the speech, he returns to the Fiat. As he shuts the door, I notice that the window is open all the way. On impulse I stretch out my arm and touch his cheek as the car is about to take off; Allende gestures to the driver to wait. He tells me to be careful with my arm. We say good-bye. Until that moment, I had only seen his image in print, on T.V., posters, murals, and so on, never in person. I had never truly ‘seen’ Allende himself. Reaching for his face, perhaps I hoped to capture some of his iridescence. This brief encounter has now come full circle in this book. Fifty years after Chile’s 11 September 1973 coup d’état, which is synonymous with Allende’s death, Chileans are still reckoning with his legacy. Allende will be forever recognized for his belief in the vía chilena al socialismo, that is, the idea that Socialism could be installed in Chile via the ballot; that he could negotiate with the opposition for the betterment of the nation; that the Chilean Armed Forces were constitutional; and, that he could find consensus among the different parties of the Unidad Popular [Popular Unity] coalition that brought him to power. All of his efforts, at every level, were rendered null by the coup. In the aftermath, torturing,

vii

viii

PREFACE

killing, imprisoning, desaparecidos, and exiliados became a new part of the nation’s lexicon. Allende joked about his own quixotic candidacy and said that his epitaph would read, “Here Lies Salvador Allende, the Future President of Chile.” He had run for the office four times. Once inaugurated, Allende ceased to be the perennial winless opposition politician in the eyes of the United States’ government. Now he was a threat. The coup assured a return to power of the traditional dominant sectors of Chilean society. Five decades have passed, and the emotional impact of Allende’s death has not lessened: a self-inflicted gunshot that ended it all while La Moneda, the Presidential Palace, was in flames. Recorded, iconic, soundscapes of him on the Chilean 9/11 have turned Allende into ‘The Man of La Moneda.’ These soundscapes not only serve as memoryscapes of the coup but also expose the president’s frame of mind on that decisive day. He communicated with the country on several occasions before the end. I listened to Allende’s last speech with my grandmother. Historian Alfredo Jocelyn-Holt remarks that, when Allende delivers his final words, we can detect a sonajera [rattling sounds] produced by conversations and other noises, which creates a cacophony of sorts. As many have witnessed via filmed material, the sonajera of the coup includes jets, artillery, military troops, and the sound of guns and bullets. These have become soundmarks for Chileans, the earcons of the coup. Allende ended his life amidst that sonajera. It was an extreme, definite, irreversible act performed by a man who loved life. The gravitas of the president’s delivery has stood the test of time. It is arguably his most memorable public address, issued at 9:10 a.m. via Radio Magallanes. Above all else, Allende spoke of his determination to stay put until the very end. The insurrected generals and the conservative segments of society on 11 September 1973 were victorious. They made clear that they had always been in possession of what Pierre Bourdieu calls cultural capital, meaning, in this context, the postcoup socio-cultural tenets and tendencies required to create an extreme neoliberal, ‘dictatorship’ habitus ; that is, the economic resources, the social networks, the desired level of education, and so on. The history of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes and its insertion in Chile’s cultural history is treated in this book. Built in the wealthy sector of Las Condes in Santiago, the four- and five-story apartment blocks of the Villa San Luis became emblematic of the Allende administration’s effort for spatial justice. After the coup, the rhetoric of cutting the pie

PREFACE

ix

for many and ‘integration for all’ was ‘out.’ Via Pinochet’s neoliberal economic practices, isolation of the poor and new gated communities for the rich was ‘in.’ Toward the beginning of the second decade of the twenty-first century, the buildings had become a revenant of Allende’s push for an integrated city. The Villa San Luis de Las Condes had by then disintegrated from its original purposes. Apartment block 14 was the only one left. It was no longer a functioning building, but there it was, a surviving structure, still standing, flattened, but not fully vanquished. It has been deconstructed now to be converted into a national museum. It literally carries on its shoulders the burden of Allende’s history as President of the Republic. The structure that remains is a permanent memorial for the Villa San Luis, built in accord with Allende’s aspiration to create dignified homes for the underprivileged of Chile. The complex, and the project of urban integration it represents, may have largely been destroyed. But the Villa San Luis will never cease to signify Allende’s desire for spatial justice. It exemplifies an iconic space for a vivienda social, social housing, for the marginalized in Chile. The Villa San Luis de Las Condes was built from a platform of affect all those decades ago. The eviction of its families took on additional meaning in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. The sense of shock, isolation, dissolution of family ties, and displacement felt by the residents of the Villa San Luis became a prescient metaphor for the experiences of the pandemic. The broken dreams of Chile’s social experiment exist now in an even wider context of physical and emotional displacement. In the words of Constanza Romero and Felipe Santibáñez, the history of the Villa San Luis makes “feelings and emotions collide with any type of rational line that we would want to follow” (Interview 19 November 2021). In this light, I hope that this book helps in some way to keep the memory and hope of Allende’s just city alive. Great Ponton, UK June 2022

Patricia Vilches

Acknowledgments

The completion of this book followed a journey of discovery of Salvador Allende’s forward-thinking policies about the city as a concept. Immediately, events of the past confronted me with a need to become acquainted with protagonists in Allende’s social vision. Interviews became instrumental in allowing me to solidify and amplify the material that I had already researched. First and foremost, I would like to thank don Miguel Lawner, National Architecture Award 2019. He generously provided me with an account of the Unidad Popular period with a focus on housing as well as with precious information about the planning and construction of the Villa San Luis. Our conversations transported me to the time and the place. He also gave me a unique opportunity to conceptualize Allende’s desire to create a just city in Santiago. Along with the interviews with don Miguel, I consider the interviews I had with the former residents of the Villa San Luis to be among the most enriching experiences in my academic career. In April 2022, I had the opportunity to be with many of these resilient individuals at a social gathering in Villa Alessandri, in Santiago. Their stories are indelible, vivid memoryscapes of a forced displacement that took place almost five decades ago. Many thanks to all of you, Gladys Arriagada, María Eugenia Cáceres, Ana María Epuñan, María Yolanda Flores, Antonieta Miranda, Ximena Salinas, and your families. I would also like to thank Jorge ‘Choche’ Cepeda and Nano Aguirre, beneficiaries of the Allende experiment for social housing from a different perspective.

xi

xii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

In their interviews, Cepeda and Aguirre relived great moments of their childhood and youth; their lives were enhanced because they lived in the district of Las Condes. Their lens allows us a glimpse into the benefits of Allende’s thinking, of what it connotes to provide social housing in a setting where the inhabitants are surrounded also by the means to lead a dignified life. I would like to express my deep gratitude to journalists Constanza Romero and Felipe Santibáñez, co-authors of Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende (2022). From the moment I met Constanza and Felipe they generously and eagerly helped me along with my study. In our interviews, they were thorough in their explanation of their chronicle of the Villa San Luis. I could see that their research for their thesis at the Universidad de Chile went beyond academics. It was a work of love and justice. Also, Constanza and Felipe met with me in Santiago so that I could find the homes of the former residents of the Villa San Luis. Thank you so much. I am greatly indebted to Pablo Seguel, academic at the CMN, Consejo Monumentos Nacionales. From the first moment I contacted Pablo he acted diligently and set up a meeting accommodating my schedule in Chile. At various interviews, he guided me through the intricacies of the historical mapping and chronological history of the Villa San Luis. He also gave me critical documentation about the philosophical thinking of the members of the CORMU during the Allende presidency. Thank you, Pablo, for your willingness to meet and answer all my questions about the complex history of the apartment blocks. Journalist Francisca Allende, co-author of Despojo de la Villa San Luis (2018), was also ready to help me with my research from the beginning. She stated that a lecture by don Miguel on the history of the Villa San Luis had propelled her and classmate Scarlett Olave, then students of journalism at the Universidad de Chile, to continue further research on the evictions of people from their homes. It became their undergraduate thesis and later a book. This study made Francisca an advocate for the former residents. Thank you, Francisca, for your guidance and willingness to share your experience. I would like to thank Ameya Balsekar, Silvia Nagy-Zekmi, and Virginia Salvo. Ameya and I have met for a coffee for more than a decade, ever since we became paired in a mentorship program at Lawrence University. That was a lucky occurrence. Ameya has steadily been a strong supporter of my work. For the Villa San Luis study, I have received Ameya’s enthusiastic backing and willingness to read my material at different stages.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

xiii

Silvia has also been a strong presence and mentor in my academic career. From my first acquaintance with Silvia, she has kindly offered her advice, encouragement, and willingness to read my material and debate pertinent issues, as is the case for this Villa San Luis project. For her part, Virginia supported me with her own time and helped me stay informed of current events. She kept me abreast of current events that have affected the Villa San Luis and kept me in contact with its former inhabitants. She accompanied me in Santiago in all my endeavors related to the project. As a social worker, Virginia presented critical views on the ramifications of Allende’s push for social housing in the Chilean seventies. Thank you Ameya, Silvia, and Virginia. You have been such great allies of mine. I would like to thank my husband and fellow scholar Gerald Seaman, and my sons Mario and Riccardo Seaman. You are so understanding, and I am forever grateful to you for never disturbing my pace or my peace while writing. On the other hand, writing also requires conversation. Jerry, thank you for listening and giving me sound advice while formulating my ideas. I shall forever be grateful to you for being such a generous and critical reader of my work, asking the right questions, and giving up your own time to discuss my project. I would also like to thank members of my family, my mother Adela Bustamante, my brother Christian Vilches, my uncle Omar Bustamante, my cousins Denise Bustamante, Sandra Gajardo, and Cecilia Vilches, for listening to me, discussing, and cheering me on, accompanying me on this journey through Chile’s cultural history. Your support keeps me going and it propels me to go forward. Thank you, also, for sharing memoryscapes from what for us was an energizing and challenging period. Finally, I would like to thank my father, Mario Vilches. Papá, you are no longer of this earth, but I feel your guidance, ánimo, and encouragement every day.

Contents

1

Introduction A New Way of Living for the Working Classes From Marginalized Citizens to Pobladoras and Pobladores Apartment Block 14: A Monumental Construction Chapter Contents References

1 2 8 11 12 20

2

Chile and Its Spaces of Difference Santiago and COVID-19 The 1800s, Martín Rivas, Pelucones and Pipiolos Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna, Intendente of Santiago Love, Friendship, and Social Divide in Palomita Blanca and Machuca On the Mapocho River, Cats Are Brought to Die Inhabiting an In-Betweenness References

23 24 26 30

The Years of Constructing Daringly Dis/Locating the City A History of Tomas Tomas and Campamentos, 1960s and 1970s The Making of the Villa San Luis References

49 50 53 57 60 67

3

33 42 44 45

xv

xvi

CONTENTS

4

The Just City Invaded Construction, Affect, and Fear of Tomas A Site of Despojos Paradise Lost References

5

From Social Experiment to Chile’s Most Expensive Paño Geográfico Pinochet’s Hand in a Capitalist Imagined Community Pinochet and the Villa San Luis in Democracy Chile’s Habitus Under the Nose of a New Democracy The Inmobiliarias Build a Habitus Contested Meanings for the Same Soil The Fate of Lote 18-A Allende’s just City References

6

The Villa San Luis: Five Decades Later A National Monument The Monumento Histórico Nacional and the Estallido Social A Tale of Two Cities The Social Spaces of Allende’s Presidential Candidacies A Promise Builds a Legacy References

71 72 77 87 89 91 92 95 97 99 104 109 112 113 116 121 122 126 131 134 137 138

Glossary of Terms and Acronyms

141

Index

147

About The Author

Patricia Vilches is Professor of Spanish and Italian at Lawrence University, from which she retired. Her research is focused on Latin American cultural history, sociopolitical literary studies, material culture, and space studies with emphasis on nineteenth-century Chile via the oeuvre of Alberto Blest Gana and twentieth-century Chile via Salvador Allende, Violeta Parra, Víctor Jara, and the Nueva Canción Chilena. Her publications include an edited volume on Parra, titled Mapping Violeta Parra’s Cultural Landscapes, to which she also contributed a chapter. New York: Palgrave Macmillan (2018). She has also edited and contributed a chapter to the book Negotiating Space in Latin America. Netherlands: Brill Academic Publishers (2020). She edited and contributed a chapter to Blest Gana at 100, published by Open Cultural Studies (2021). Her piece explores the social space of nineteenth-century Santiago, with themes that include the marketplace, consumerism, and sensorial stimuli. Vilches’s current research projects include Chilean twentieth-century cultural and musical history via spatial, material, and geographical mapping.

xvii

List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Fig. 1.2 Fig. 1.3 Fig. 1.4

Fig. 1.5

Fig. 1.6

Fig. 1.7

Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 1972 (Photo courtesy of Archivo Miguel Lawner) Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 2017 (Photo courtesy of Constanza Romero) The barricaded space of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 2019 (Photo by Patricia Vilches) Miguel Lawner speaking at the Museo de la Memoria in 2017. The background photo shows the remains of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes surrounded by glassy high-rises (Photo courtesy of Constanza Romero) Pobladora, pobladores, and their families during construction of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes (n.d.) (Photo courtesy of Archivo Miguel Lawner) Interior of Block 14 of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 2021 during the process of deconstruction (Photo courtesy of Ana María Epuñan) Former pobladoras of the Villa San Luis inside Block 14 on 27 September 2022. From left to right: Gladys Arriagada, María Aravena, Margarita Monjes, and Antonieta Miranda (Photo by Patricia Vilches)

3 4 5

9

10

13

14

xix

CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Abstract This chapter introduces Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis: Icons of the Just City and provides an overview of chapter contents. Allende changed the space of Santiago by building social housing for those who had previously been homeless in the city. This book focuses on the history of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes, a población built in the center of the affluent comuna of Las Condes, in the eastern part of Santiago. The majority of the población’s inhabitants were people who had made their monthly mortgage payments but later suffered evictions during the Pinochet dictatorship. These obvious human rights violations also highlight Chile’s exacerbated social divisions. A neoliberal habitus favored the wealthiest of Chileans while simultaneously injuring the majority. Such circumstances were clearly detrimental to the poor subjects of Villa San Luis. After the coup, the logic of neoliberalism dictated that they be thrown out of the space of the rich. Keywords Villa San Luis de Las Condes · Salvador Allende · La Moneda · Chilean dictatorship · Santiago · Material culture

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8_1

1

2

P. VILCHES

A New Way of Living for the Working Classes The history of the Villa San Luis, a población 1 built in the early seventies in the affluent comuna [district] of Las Condes in Santiago, Chile, is not well-known outside of the southern-cone nation, or even inside it. The Villa San Luis mirrors and illuminates the truncated goals of the UP, Unidad Popular [Popular Unity] government of Salvador Allende, President of Chile from 1970 to 1973. When the first apartment blocks were occupied, the población was officially renamed Villa Compañero Ministro Carlos Cortés by request of the inhabitants of San Luis. They wanted to honor Carlos Cortés, Minister of Vivienda y Urbanismo [Housing and Urban Development] during the UP government.2 A blue-collar worker himself, Cortés, had supported the pobladoras and pobladores through the entire construction process of the población. He died unexpectedly in 1971 while in office (Allende and Olave 2018, 37; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Lawner 2007, 5). After the 11 September 1973 coup, its name reverted back to Villa San Luis. The población is a blueprint and an historical frame of reference. It is a defiant sociopolitical gesture that ignited controversy in a contested space. Henri Lefebvre asserts that social space “subsumes things produced and encompasses their interrelationships in their coexistence and simultaneity” (1991, 74). The fact that the población was planned to be built in moneyed Las Condes invokes Allende’s energetic and innovative plans for social inclusion. Through books, essays, documentaries, T.V. investigative reports, and newspaper articles, I learned of the two iterations

1 In Chile, a población (pl. poblaciones ) is understood as a residential area that houses middle-lower to lower-income members of society. Manuel Castells defines a población as a “self-constructed, state-organized housing” (1983, 181). In essence, the term entails the idea of a working-class, social housing, in a neighborhood. Pobladoras and pobladores are the people who reside in poblaciones. 2 Carlos Cortés, minister of Allende, died of a heart attack early in his tenure and did not see the fruits of his efforts to provide housing for the pobladores sin casa of Santiago. Because of his prominence, the residents had a statue of the minister installed on a plaza at the Villa San Luis. The statue was removed by the dictatorship in the first years after the coup. Costanza Romero and Felipe Santibáñez narrate that the statue “was torn off its base and left lying on the ground” (2022, 39). In 1976, Juan Carlos Larrañaga, a neighbor from the población, hid the statue from the military to preserve it and keep it from further destruction. It was exhibited for the first time for the general public at Santiago’s Museo de la Memoria in 2017, four decades after it was put in a safe place (“‘La memoria es lo único que nos queda’” 2017; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 62).

1

INTRODUCTION

3

of the Villa San Luis: the first with Allende and the second with Augusto Pinochet. I absorbed its history in mentis through various interviews with people involved in the story. A generous archive of the población, available on the internet, shows early 1970s images and reproduces buildings that encapsulated the hopes of many (Fig. 1.1). Later images reveal the hardships of the población through different decades; they depict its transformation. Twenty-first-century photos of the población portray broken dreams: boarded up spaces, graffiti, and a sense of abandonment amidst the affluence of new construction (Fig. 1.2). In my first ‘in person’ encounter with what remained of the población, I found wooden boards barricading the entire area. Surrounding it were high-rise, ‘glassy’ buildings. I was furiously reading through metaphorical fence lines while attempting to take it all in. There was a sign that read: Peligro de Derrumbe [Danger of Collapsing] (Fig. 1.3). I realized then that it was a forbidden space. The totality of the apartment blocks was gone, except for a disheveled Block 14. Right next to Block 14, I saw crumbled ruins where Block 15 had once stood. As I had never seen how the space looked during the time of the población, standing in the area in person gave me the opportunity to absorb its memoryscapes through what remained of Block 14. The Villa San Luis stands as a testament of the Socialist president’s policies on the urban space. The población was decimated by the dictatorship

Fig. 1.1 Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 1972 (Photo courtesy of Archivo Miguel Lawner)

4

P. VILCHES

Fig. 1.2 Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 2017 (Photo courtesy of Constanza Romero)

and became a victim of the economic interests that have dominated the nation for the past five decades. Yet, like Allende’s prominent mausoleum at Santiago’s Cementerio General, one apartment block, the only material culture left from the project, now holds a unique historical status in the country as a national museum. This structure is an iconic space reflecting Allende’s presence in Chile. This book concentrates on President Allende’s initiatives for a just city, to enable all citizens to have the right to the city, a concept understood generally as the “equitable usufruct of cities within the principles of sustainability and social justice” (Pulgar 2008).3 Through testimony, visual representations, fiction, and so on, this text also analyzes the “mental maps” and the “symbolic boundaries” (Lamont 1992, 4–5), constructed by the upper sectors in Chile. This is especially emphasized in Chapter 2. As well, five decades after the coup, this text frames the history of the población Villa San Luis—which unfolds the history of 3 Translation mine. All translations from Spanish to English are mine unless otherwise indicated.

1

INTRODUCTION

5

Fig. 1.3 The barricaded space of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 2019 (Photo by Patricia Vilches)

Chile—during the Allende era, coup, postcoup, and contemporary times. Like Allende, the población comes under attack by Pinochet, who ruled the nation with an iron hand from 1973 to 1990. The material culture of the población denotes the years the Socialist president was in power and also chronicles his program. In the words of Edward Soja, the Villa San Luis articulates “how a spatial perspective can add new insights at a political-theoretical level to efforts to understand and to struggle against social injustice of every kind” (Soja et al. 2011). This study focuses particularly on the case of the Villa San Luis, but it should be noted that it was not the only construction of the UP administration. Alongside Allende’s sociopolitical-philosophical legacy in the Villa San Luis, other physical edifices also embody his mission. Sociologist and historian Pablo Seguel, academic at the CMN, Consejo Monumentos Nacionales de Chile [Chilean Council of National Monuments], informs that some of those constructions include Remodelación San Borja and phase 2 of the

6

P. VILCHES

Villa San Luis (east of Manquehue Street in Las Condes) (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). Perhaps because of its less strategic geographical space, Villa San Luis 2 has continued to exist quietly and undisturbed, for the most part, fulfilling its mission ever since it was planned within an environment of affluence as a vivienda social [social housing].4 The president’s mandate contributed to different types of constructions in Santiago’s urban scape. In the three years of Allende’s government, 158,000 viviendas were built with an average of 52,000 units per year. By comparison, during the Eduardo Frei Montalva administration (1964–1970), 39,000 had been built annually. Frei Montalva constructed 230,000 and initiated about 240,000 living spaces, with 55.3 percent under public sector jurisdiction. There were 30,000 built while Pinochet was in power (1973–1990) (Hidalgo 2019, 332; Lawner 2008, 284). During the UP government, the homes were preferably assigned to the most vulnerable sectors of society (Lawner 2008, 284). This approach manifests the Allende administration’s planning and building with a new idea of Chile in mind. Allende’s directives toward the idea of a vivienda social for Chileans were implemented taking into consideration “sociospatial causality”, aware of the existence of “powerful forces that arise from socially produced spaces such as urban agglomerations and cohesive regional economies” (Soja 2010, 14). The Villa San Luis was a highreaching scheme and the choice of the privileged paño geográfico [piece of land] became a sensorially loud statement. The project defines the UP president’s uncompromising vision and courageous initiative to formulate a just city. Through the vehicle of the CORMU, Corporación de Mejoramiento Urbano [Corporation for Urban Development], Allende left a significant legacy of dignified vivienda social. Equally, with the Villa San Luis, he proved that during his government he followed a revolutionary

4 Miguel Lawner relates the difficulties encountered by the Allende administration at the beginning of the president’s tenure: “We received a housing sector with few projects underway, with the stock of public land exhausted and the coffers of the National Savings and Loan System (SINAP) empty, a result of the massive withdrawal of funds that had taken place during the days prior to the assumption of Allende. We must add that we inherited an economy with meager growth as well as a high unemployment rate, to which were added the uncertainties of the business world regarding their future, promoted by the terror campaigns unleashed the same day that Allende’s victory was confirmed [by Congress]” (2020, 170).

1

INTRODUCTION

7

but democratic vía chilena.5 The población is a testament of what a just society meant for him, one that could be situated within a path that would not involve the threat of armed force (Teitelboim 2008, 18). Allende generated a “renewed right to the urban life” (Lefebvre 2000, 158), with the Villa San Luis program. The mission of the CORMU, in alignment with Allende’s public policies, was to control how the urban space would be constructed, limiting its horizontal expansion and the possibility of financial speculation (Lawner 2008, 288). Hence, the CORMU brought a new conception of a vivienda social apparatus into play. Chilean Architect Miguel Lawner, head of the CORMU 1970–1973, qualified Allende’s thousand-day presidency as the most vigorous and creative administration in Chile in terms of directives toward housing and urban policies (2008, 281) (Fig. 1.4). The CORMU professionals acted as facilitators—and even educators—of a marginalized constituency that had lived in informal housing and, through the Villa San Luis, were becoming urban dwellers (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). The CORMU professionals’ regard toward a just city aligned their construction philosophies with planners in other cities around the world. Actually, they were schooled in urban architectural guidelines that originated from prominent urban centers, like New York City. Since the early decades of the twentieth century, public housing in Manhattan, in particular, has coexisted in friendly (and negotiated) terms with posh high-rise buildings for the affluent. New York City’s low-income public housing residents, despite noted difficulties and pressure from businesses, tend to thrive in matters of employment and levels of education when they are amidst zones of high income. This has been analyzed in comparison with other low-income public housing counterparts that are surrounded by areas of

5 The vía chilena al socialismo [Chilean Road to Socialism] was an integral part of Allende’s program for the presidency. The Unidad Popular, UP, coalition became officially constituted on 9 October 1969. Now the different political parties had to reach an agreement on a government program. The concept of vía chilena had been developing in left-wing political parties for quite some time. Not everyone agreed. However, Allende had faith that this was the course to take: “The [Chilean] left generally agreed that Socialism was the solution to the structural crisis in society. The so-called vía chilena al socialismo was the expression that narrated the project of the left, which aspired to carry out profound changes in society, in the economic, political, and social orders. These would take place from within the current legal-political institutions” (Torres Dujisin 2020, 330).

8

P. VILCHES

equally low-income city dwellers (Dastrup and Ellen 2016, 88).6 In the case of Chile, the Municipality of Las Condes was asked by the CORMU to reformulate its traditional and conservative stances on social boundaries to create an inclusive neighborhood. However, a rethinking away from and reevaluation of old parameters was never embraced by members of the comuna’s administration. No matter, building a población in the middle of affluent Las Condes meant that the CORMU directed its goals toward the betterment of vulnerable sectors and the lessening of social disparity in Santiago.

From Marginalized Citizens to Pobladoras and Pobladores Allende had proclaimed that “the UP would be the founder of a new model for the construction of a socialist society,” all to be carried out following tenets that included preserving democratic and pluralistic traditions (Torres Dujisin 2020, 333). The program of the UP aimed to better the lives of Chileans like those who came to live in the Villa San Luis. They were called pobladoras and pobladores (Fig. 1.5). Mario Garcés indicates that, in Chile, such terms have traditionally been linked to the city poor. In the 1960s, Garcés continues, because of their visibility these city dwellers became a new ‘subject of study’ in the social sciences, particularly in Sociology and Urban Studies, which engendered the notion in academic circles of a “theory of marginalization” (2002, 14–15). Hence, having marginalized individuals reside properly in Las Condes was a political act on the part of the UP government. Postcoup, however, they were no longer welcome. With the aid of the so-called Chicago Boys and a new Magna Carta for the nation, the Pinochet dictatorship cemented the way, per Pierre Bourdieu, for “objective structures” that guided a neoliberal habitus (1989, 14). The State shrunk 6 Samuel Dastrup and Ingrid Ellen state that “Higher-income neighborhoods tend to offer a richer set of amenities and opportunities. This tendency is generally true for the neighborhoods surrounding public housing in New York City… Of households in [New York City Housing Authority] developments surrounded by low-income neighborhoods, 72 percent were zoned to attend public schools in the bottom quartile of proficiency in 2012. By contrast, only a minority of households in increasing- and high-income neighborhoods were zoned for schools with such low proficiency rates. This stark contrast suggests that children growing up in public housing surrounded by higher-income neighborhoods reach a much more enriching set of schools” (2016, 95).

1

INTRODUCTION

9

Fig. 1.4 Miguel Lawner speaking at the Museo de la Memoria in 2017. The background photo shows the remains of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes surrounded by glassy high-rises (Photo courtesy of Constanza Romero)

considerably while the private sector widened its scope and took gigantic steps toward profit. Maria Olivia Mönckeberg describes that economic groups—nurtured, protected, and secured under the wing of the Pinochet regime—began to form powerful and complex networks of power that permeated and altered the nation (and that later thrived under the new democracy) (2015, “Introducción”).7 This economic thrust marked the birth of the empresarios [businesspeople]. It also attracted the perks of 7 María Olivia Mönckeberg declares that under Pinochet, the Chilean State became depleted of its assets: “The process of privatization of State companies that took place in Chile between 1985 and 1989 was the first in Latin America and it was much more radical even than that of England, considered the cradle of privatization. Between 1985 and 1989, the State of Chile got rid of thirty companies, which meant a loss that was estimated at more than one billion dollars, that is, more than 570 billion pesos today” (2015, “Los hombres de las privatizaciones”).

10

P. VILCHES

Fig. 1.5 Pobladora, pobladores, and their families during construction of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes (n.d.) (Photo courtesy of Archivo Miguel Lawner)

a neoliberal market with “foreign investment… shopping malls, beginning sky-scraping, gating, [and] credit consumption” (Therborn 2017, 233). Within this new habitus , the military government sought capitalist ventures that impacted the urban space in Santiago, transforming parts of the city. The nation’s soil was liberated for the marketplace by the dictatorship. Rodrigo Hidalgo contends that from the perspective of twentieth-century housing policies in Chile, a 1974 decree to regulate emergency and informal living was a critical starting point for actions carried out by the military government between the late 1970s and most of the 1980s, “where large transfers and settlements of a population associated with campamentos [informal settlements] and Operaciones sitio took place” (2019, 386).8 Neoliberal practices were applied to spatial development not only in Santiago but also in other large Chilean cities; the plan 8 Operación sitio (pl.) operaciones sitio was a program established during the presidency of Eduardo Frei Montalva (1964–1970). People were provided with a piece of land where they could build their own houses. More on this in the Glossary.

1

INTRODUCTION

11

was to open the soil and the economy toward the “exploitation of certain natural resources,” which, in turn, would accelerate other types of economic growth that would engender development areas, “mobilizing capital and population towards those objectives” (Hidalgo 2019, 400–401). In Santiago, empresarios took aim at lucrative real estate development that, in the style of other capitalist world economies, injected spaces of opulence with massive, gaudy high rises while creating imposing personal fortunes. In carefully chosen comunas, therefore, languorous, old-fashioned European-styled buildings—either residential or prototypically commercial areas—were replaced by architecture that was infused with first-world, American-style, glitter. We could say that Pinochet engendered in Santiago a neoliberal space that was sensorially strident. Suggestively, in the border between the comunas of Providencia and Las Condes, an area called Sanhattan—for ‘Santiago’ and ‘Manhattan’— became the epitome of a new landscape. Its architecture exhibited edifices from the First World which symbolized forbidden spaces for the majority of Chileans.

Apartment Block 14: A Monumental Construction The Villa San Luis no longer exists. Yet, Block 14, the sole surviving edifice, literally provides a concrete reminder of the mission and purposes of the Socialist president. A ‘working-class’ version of La Moneda, the one remaining building of the población is an emblematic space for the former president.9 Block 14 is akin to the National Palace in the sense that it stands for Allende’s government. Like La Moneda, its original shape was destroyed. Unlike La Moneda, which has always stood as a regal monument of patria, Block 14 no longer is what it once was, one of many modest edifices built in a población. It is now a symbol, part of the lieux de mémoire (Nora 1989, 7) of Allende’s thoughts and designs for the city. Important, it is the only visualscape that differs from its surroundings. Any citizen or visitor who walks down the old grounds of the Villa San 9 In the chapter “La Moneda in Ruins: The Palace Tomb and Epitaph of Salvador Allende,” I analyze the space of the Chilean National Palace within the context of Salvador Allende’s last day of existence, while he confronted the coup d’état. I contend that “Chile’s National Palace helps citizens remember and conceptualize the socialist president as he fought for his political dream and cemented his legacy at the same time. Allende is so much a part of La Moneda that one cannot be conceived without the other” (Vilches 2020, 300).

12

P. VILCHES

Luis will find a Disneyworld-type emblem of capitalism, with aspirational constructions that want to compete with First World economies. In this sense, what replaced the proletarian Villa San Luis became a distorted, or rather, grotesque version of inflated capitalism, turning itself into material culture exclusively for the rich. Led mainly by pobladoras, the former residents fought back with the intent to sacralize the space of their former población. The empresarios were formidable enemies and perhaps they thought initially that their adversaries were tilting at windmills. Against the odds, however, the protesters prevailed. Over time, the groups became reconciled over the significance of the población’s soil. The Villa San Luis was officially decreed to be a part of Chilean history and was declared a national monument in 2017 by the CMN. Block 14 was ratified as a national heritage site in 2020 (Fig. 1.6). As Göran Therborn asserts, “Monumentality is directly geared to the production of meaning. … Through its built ensembles, statues, plaques and museums, a city’s monuments try to remind us of events and persons and to convey a particular history narrative, urban and/or national” (2017, 19). Block 14 retains a capacity to provoke nostalgia as its stands symbolically for Allende’s quest for renewal and hope (Fig. 1.7). Concurrently, it has become a model for compassionate social integration, an aspect of Allende’s presidency that an increasing number of Chileans are beginning to comprehend decades later. The Socialist president’s purposes toward a just city have gained critical importance over time. Both literally and metaphorically, Block 14 stands for Allende’s goals for spatial justice.

Chapter Contents Each of the chapters in Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis: Icons of the Just City underscores sociopolitical implications and historical developments that explain the birth and decimation of the población. These include Chilean governments’ policies before the UP and their attempts to contain an ever-increasing housing problem. The initiatives became more solidified and were contested by different civic groups in the 1960s and 1970s. The chapters also help narrate the challenges inherent in the Villa San Luis project. In this light, Chapter 2, “Chile and Its Spaces of Difference,” sets a socio-historical frame and provides an exposition of the Villa San Luis project through literary, musical, and visual representations. In Martín Rivas (1862) by Alberto Blest Gana (1830–1920),

1

INTRODUCTION

13

Fig. 1.6 Interior of Block 14 of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes in 2021 during the process of deconstruction (Photo courtesy of Ana María Epuñan)

social stratification in Chile, as well as market-oriented capitalist, practices become uncloaked through the characters and their social relations. The rich keep their turf barricaded from outside parvenues. Martín Rivas, a hard-working student from the provinces, makes connections in both the upper echelons of society and the humble quarters inhabited by the people of medio pelo, the mid-to-lower middle classes.10 The foundational text serves as a model for citizens’ preoccupation with rank, monetary matters, and so on, expounding a hero that manages to break through socially, all the while maintaining his liberal sociopolitical views. In the 1870s, Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna, for his part, offers a stark description of marginalized spaces in Santiago. As an Intendente, mayor of the

10 The term medio pelo, denoting a person of modest origins, is a critical element that personifies some of the characters in Martín Rivas (1862), by Alberto Blest Gana. I discuss it more at length in Chapter 2.

14

P. VILCHES

Fig. 1.7 Former pobladoras of the Villa San Luis inside Block 14 on 27 September 2022. From left to right: Gladys Arriagada, María Aravena, Margarita Monjes, and Antonieta Miranda (Photo by Patricia Vilches)

city, Vicuña Mackenna depicts an unjust city, with pitiful quarters for the downtrodden and obscenely ostentatious houses for the opulent. In twentieth-century Chile, Palomita blanca (1971) by Enrique Lafourcade was a bona fide best-seller. It was published in the year when the first concrete was being poured at the Villa San Luis. The novel became a Chilean ‘Romeo and Juliet,’ a tragedy that brought together two people from totally different social backgrounds. In the novel, Juan Carlos is from Las Condes, the same location of the Villa San Luis, while María is from a población in the Recoleta neighborhood of Santiago, the old and humble la Chimba of the 1800s. Juan Carlos has a fast car and drives to Maria’s poor neighborhood, oblivious to the surroundings. For María, her first encounter with Las Condes and other adjacent areas generates such a dazzling sensorial experience that it takes her breath away. In “Las casitas del barrio alto” [Darling Houses in the affluent neighborhood]

1

INTRODUCTION

15

by Víctor Jara, we encounter that same landscape, expressed by an ironic narrative voice that describes the beauty of capitalism, where “everything is appearance” (Rodríguez 2011, 486). Jara describes the well-to-do and their immersion in cultural capital. Andrés Wood’s Machuca (2004) depicts an educational project of social inclusion that, like the Villa San Luis, took place during the Allende administration. A prestigious private school in Santiago admitted to its aristocratic academic realm boys from a población. With fictionalized names and places, Wood narrates a real episode of inclusion at Saint George’s College, his own alma matter. Because of this social initiative, a true friendship arises between a boy of the upper sectors and one of the boys from the población. The educational social experiment at Saint George works like a mirror for the emblematic project at the Villa San Luis. A philosophy of social integration was instrumental in the designing and constructing of the Villa San Luis. Lawner would eventually become known as the ‘Architect of the UP’ among his constituents. On this subject, Chapter 3, “The Years of Constructing Daringly,” provides the historical background of the población’s project. It recounts the critical need for viviendas sociales in twentieth-century Chile. Inspired by a social movement, members of the Comités de pobladores sin casa [committees of the homeless] started tomas [illegal seizures of land and property] to circumvent the situation and make governments fulfill their programs (Castells 1983, 200). The Allende mandate called for drastic measures to remedy the situation. With his team, Lawner dove head-first into a sociopolitical debate on urban planning. The CORMU was careful not to build “a ghetto in reverse, a sort of island in conflict with its surrounding,” reaffirming a compromiso to have Santiago extolled as an integrated city (Lawner 2007, 3; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). As well, Seguel, assessing the considerations of the CMN, stresses that the CORMU attested with the Villa San Luis how the management of a city may be thought through and designed with spatial justice in mind. Within this philosophical stance, Seguel adds, at the CORMU a core value was associated to an urban and architectural proposal that emphasized a dignified housing policy for people without means (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). Chapter 4, “The Just City Invaded,” enumerates the impetus and sociopolitical objectives set forth in Allende’s integrated city. It also narrates the fate of the pobladoras and pobladores of the Villa San Luis.

16

P. VILCHES

After 11 September 1973, they lost the right to the city. The nation had changed radically from one day to the next. The Armed Forces penetrated every aspect of Chilean society and the fierce demonstrations of animosity that had taken place in the public space for or against Allende were gone. With the dictatorship, the country had entered a new, silent chapter in which obedience and hierarchical order were the only things that mattered. Curfew hours controlled the lives of Chileans for years after the coup. Night life as it had been ceased to exist. Arbitrariness in how authorities imposed ‘order’ instilled deep fear in people. Whimsical, unpredictable, violent social gestures kept people obedient. To illustrate, vehicles carrying members of the Armed Forces would stop men in the street and cut their hair—if they considered it to be too long—or shave their beards if they looked too ‘revolutionary.’ Some women would be stopped if they were caught wearing trousers—deemed not appropriate for a lady. They would cut the trousers off at the knee level. In different interviews done by this writer, the former inhabitants of the Villa San Luis attested that after the coup they had strong reasons to fear. The población stood out as a space redolent of the UP and its president. The residents’ mere existence provoked hatred in the new military regime. In time, most of the families were evicted. Former poblador Carlos Vera recalls that things became strange when the monthly payments for the apartments’ mortgage were frozen by the collecting institution. Vera remarked that “the people in charge said that they could not receive our payments” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 56). This was a ruse used by the authoritarian government to claim that the residents had executed a toma and that, as a consequence, they would be evicted from their homes. As former inhabitants recalled, some of the families were woken up at night and ordered to gather their belongings which the military then placed in garbage trucks. Subsequently, the families themselves were forced into the same garbage trucks, to be dumped, literally, in peripheral areas of Santiago (Allende and Olave 2018, 14–18; “Documentos sobre erradicación”). The inmobiliarias [real estate companies] and constructoras [construction companies] had a prominent role in the demise of the Villa San Luis, which is a main subject of Chapter 5, “From Social Experiment to Chile’s Most Expensive Paño Geográfico.” The chapter also underscores how deeply Pinochet’s rule penetrated Chile’s social fabric. His new Constitution fundamentally altered the role of the State, especially with respect to healthcare and education. He lost the 1988 plebiscite, yes, but he had

1

INTRODUCTION

17

already cemented a relentless constitutional legacy. His ominous presence, therefore, continued to be felt not only figuratively but also physically, and this allowed him to seize the Villa San Luis property for the Army at the rebirth of democracy. The developers symbolized the aspirations of the neoliberal world and the land covered by the población fulfilled the habitus of the New Chile. Indeed, the dicta of the 1980 Constitution set into relief the strong connections that would be made between the habitus and the ‘rule,’ in Bourdieu terms. In this sense, the Magna Carta of the dictatorship embodies a “historical emergence of an express and explicit action of inculcation” (Bourdieu 1995, 20), one which penetrated and reshaped the Chilean nation. The press and the media echoed the fascination of the mundo empresarial [business world] with the area’s strategic location. Not far from the Villa San Luis, the Mall Parque Arauco and a Hyatt Hotel have stood since the early 1980s, two hallmarks of an ‘internationalized’ Las Condes. The buildings were referred to as a much-needed face-lift for the nation and proof of Chile’s globalizing aims. The población simply was not part of this jubilant vision in Las Condes. It became a desaparecido building. It felt as if the población and its inhabitants had never existed. Allende’s social experiment lay buried by the market practices set into motion during the Pinochet era. Additionally, Chapter 5 details the fight by civic groups, such as the Fundación Villa San Luis (henceforth ‘Fundación’), which united the former residents to convert the remains of the Villa San Luis into a national museum. The path was not easy, with many obstacles that had to be sorted out by the advocacy groups. Case in point, in 2017, even after it had been proposed to declare the remains of the población a national monument, a constructora which was also an inmobiliaria managed to tear down a good part of that very same proposed historical landmark. Critical contemporary events in Chile, viewed through the lens of the vivienda social, as well as reflections on Allende’s legacy are part of Chapter 6, “The Villa San Luis: Five Decades Later.” The just city of Allende found its way into the nation via Block 14. Former pobladoras and pobladores, with some as members of the Fundación, and other forms of civic support fought to keep Allende’s project relevant. Now Block 14 is being turned into a national museum. The struggle to keep Block 14 from being destroyed took place while Chile was coming to terms with the outcomes of almost four decades of the nation’s 1980

18

P. VILCHES

Magna Carta. It had been another coup for the general. The new Constitution had situated him as President of Chile for eight more years. Mönckeberg describes how Pinochet then transferred from the Diego Portales building to La Moneda to execute a dramatic altering of the nation’s system. That was the time when his administration started the calamitous pension reforms for Chileans (2015, “La reforma de [José] Piñera”).11 Four decades later, an increase in public transportation ignited an Estallido Social [Social Outburst], with massive demonstrations and riots in the capital and main cities of the country. This caught the Piñera administration by surprise. Shortly before, Piñera had said that “In the midst of a convulsed Latin America, Chile stands as a true oasis, with a stable democracy. The country is growing, we are creating 170,000 jobs a year, [and] wages are improving” (qtd. in “Mentiras Verdaderas” 2020, 00:06:00–00:06:14). The Estallido announced that citizens had had enough of decades without the right to the city. A year later, however, people remained divided regarding the Estallido’s meaning. Some started calling the civic uprising the Estallido Delincuencial [Criminal Outburst]. As followed, when people exercised their right as citizens and protested, they were overshadowed by groups who used violence and provocation, burning, and destroying. Graffiti, broken stop lights, shops ‘open’ but keeping gates down, burnt supermarkets, and the like, had become the ‘new normal.’ Who was doing the violence to the city? Conservatives said that Chile’s own citizens were vandalizing the nation. Progressives said that it was the work of organized delinquents. According to Chilean psychologist Benito Baranda, member of the Chilean Constitutional Convention (2021–2022), gangs with links to

11 Mönckeberg describes how during the Pinochet dictatorship a new era of privatization affected Chile in critical ways, this included State-owned companies, as well as Chileans’ education and health. The influence of the Chicago Boys was palpable: “private initiative and the free market,” “optimal allocation of resources,” was the conversation in the early 1980s. In 1980 economist Miguel Kast, father of 2021 presidential candidate Juan Antonio Kast, announced Ministerial Programs that reduced the role of the State and enhanced that of private capital, “regulated by the free market.” A most impactful change in Chileans’ lives was the Pension Reform. “In one fell swoop”, says Mönckeberg, Chilean workers’ social security resources were transferred to the private system. This was the beginning of the controversial AFPs [Chilean Pension Fund Administrators]. The journalist enumerates that, “In total, eleven corporations with fancy names, flashy corporate images and battalions of specially trained vendors launched themselves to compete in a market that was made for them” (Mönckeberg 2015, “La reforma de [José] Piñera”).

1

INTRODUCTION

19

narcotráfico took advantage of people’s massive marches during the Estallido—and on subsequent occasions: “there are gangs that assault and steal in the middle of people’s demonstrations” (qtd. in “Mentiras Verdaderas” 2020, 00:39:42–00:40:08). Then, the pandemic happened. On 21 November 2021, two years after the Estallido, a first round of the presidential election took place. José Antonio Kast, candidate of the brand-new Partido Republicano, received 27.9% of the votes, which was the largest percentage received by any of the candidates. Kast was an ultra-right candidate who stood for order and made a point of vindicating Pinochet and his dictatorship. Gabriel Boric, who eventually won the presidency in the second round, followed Kast with 25.83% of the vote. The third biggest percentage in the first round went to Franco Parisi, the candidate of the so-called independent Partido de la Gente. The amazing fact about Parisi was that he conducted his entire campaign from outside of Chilean soil. Within this highly divided political panorama, things became resolved on 19 December 2021. Kast and Boric went face to face. Because of Kast’s particular ideological stance, Chileans of different political spectra confronted the ghost of the Pinochet era. On 16 December 2021, the death of Lucía Hiriart, Pinochet’s wife, added intensity to the political momentum. Boric and Kast revealed Chileans’ utter disagreement about what their nation should be. Equally, the narration of Allende’s effort toward a just city via the Villa San Luis, as well as the obstacles triggered by a stalwart opposition to his mandate, lend themselves well to represent graphic and differing ‘constructions’ of the country to twenty-first century Chilean citizens. Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis: Icons of the Just City serves as a roadmap for Allende’s proactive social stance that, in one way or another, has managed to continue as an indelible legacy, no matter how hard efforts have been to decimate his project of social integration in Las Condes. Therefore, from the perspective of the Villa San Luis, we learn about a tumultuous chapter in mid-twentieth-century Chilean history. The remaining Block 14 reminds each visitor how a quixotic president held absolute faith in the betterment of Chileans, especially the underprivileged, and how, despite stiff opposition, he followed democratic processes to bring his initiatives to fruition. The CORMU thus withstood the assault of its opponents and kept things democratic in the construction of the población, even when things became extremely difficult. Just like Allende’s government, the Villa San Luis was created against many odds and was decimated abruptly by opponents that had long abandoned the

20

P. VILCHES

democratic way. Now, as a national monument it stands as a symbol of a spatial turn in the city.

References Allende, Francisca, and Scarlett Olave. 2018. El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes. Cómo los camiones de la basura de la dictadura desterraron una población al olvido. Santiago, Chile: Ceibo. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1989. “Social Space and Symbolic Power.” Sociological Theory 7 (1): 14–25. https://www.jstor.org/stable/202060. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1995. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Translated by Richard Nice. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. Castells, Manuel. 1983. The City and the Grassroots: A Cross-Cultural Theory of Urban Social Movements. Berkeley: University of California Press. Dastrup, Samuel, and Ingrid Gould Ellen. 2016. “Linking Residents to Opportunity: Gentrification and Public Housing.” Cityscape 18 (3): 87–108. www. jstor.org/stable/26328274. Accessed 28 January 2020. “Documentos sobre erradicación de pobladores Villa San Luis, Las Condes.” n.d. Arzobispado de Santiago. Fundación, documentación y archivo de la Vicaría de la Solidaridad. http://www.vicariadelasolidaridad.cl/node/36304. Accessed 14 November 2021. Garcés, Mario. 2002. Tomando su sitio: El movimiento de pobladores de Santiago, 1957–1970. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Hidalgo, Rodrigo. 2019. La vivienda social en Chile y la construcción del espacio urbano en el Santiago del siglo XX. Santiago, Chile: RIL Editores. “‘La memoria es lo único que nos queda’: Exhiben escultura de ministro de Allende oculta por 40 años.” 2017. RT . 17 November. https://actualidad. rt.com/actualidad/255379-exhibir-primera-vez-escultura-ministro-salvadorallende. Accessed 8 January 2022. Lamont, Michèle. 1992. Money, Morals, and Manners: The Culture of the French and American Upper-Middle Class. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Lawner, Miguel. 2007. “Demolición de la Villa San Luis en Las Condes: Historia de dos despojos.” Santiago, Chile: CENDA (Centro de Estudios Nacionales de Desarrollo Alternativo). https://www.cendachile.cl/autores/miguel-law ner#h.pND-WmCtY6N58 (Destacados). Accessed 14 January 2020. Lawner, Miguel. 2008. “Viviendas dignas para hombres dignos.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al., 281–305. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Lawner, Miguel. 2020. “Estado, conflicto social y construcción de la ciudad durante la Unidad Popular.” Revista Anales 18: 165–86.

1

INTRODUCTION

21

Lefebvre, Henri. 1991. The Production of Space. Translated by Donald Nicholson Smith. Oxford: Blackwell. Lefebvre, Henri. 2000. Writings on Cities. Selected, Translated and Introduced by Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas. Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell. “Mentiras Verdaderas.” 2020. YouTube Video, 01:30:29. “Estallido.” Posted by Mentiras Verdaderas La Red on 19 October 2020. https://youtu.be/EOJvkv jfkyo. Accessed 21 January 2022. Mönckeberg, María Olivia. 2015. El saqueo de los grupos economicos al estado de Chile. De Bolsillo. PDF electronic text. Nora, Pierre. 1989. “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux De Mémoire.” Representations (26): 7– 24. https://doi.org/10.2307/2928520. Pulgar, Claudio. 2008. “Coloquios Invi 2008: Derecho a la ciudad.” 27 June. Invitro: Hábitat residencial y territorio. Blog del Instituto de la Vivienda de la Universidad de Chile. https://invi.uchilefau.cl/80/. Accessed 19 May 2021. Rodríguez, Laura. 2011. “La proyección urbana de un creador: Víctor Jara y la canción ‘Las casitas del barrio alto.’” Polis 10 (30): 477–93. Available: https://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-65682011000300022. Romero, Constanza, and Felipe Santibáñez. 2022. Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende. Santiago, Ediciones Cinco Ases. Soja, Edward. 2010. Seeking Spatial Justice. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Soja, Edward W., Frédéric Dufaux, Philippe Gervais-Lambony, Chloé Buire, and Henri Desbois. 2011. “Spatial Justice and the Right to the City: An Interview with Edward Soja.” Justice spatiale—Spatial Justice. https://halshs.archivesouvertes.fr/halshs-01722418/document. Teitelboim, Volodia. 2008. “Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al., 17–23. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Therborn, Göran. 2017. Cities of Power: The Urban, the National, the Popular, the Global. London: Verso. Torres Dujisin, Isabel. 2020. “La ‘Vía Chilena al Socialismo’. El largo recorrido desde el Frente de Acción Popular a la Unidad Popular.” In La Vía Chilena al socialismo: 50 años después, vol. 1 Historia, edited by Robert Austin Henry, Joana Salém Vasconcelos, and Viviana Canibilo Ramírez, 319–36. Buenos Aires: CLACSO. PDF electronic text. Vilches, Patricia. 2020. “La Moneda in Ruins: The Palace Tomb and Epitaph of Salvador Allende.” In Negotiating Space in Latin America, edited by Patricia Vilches, 300–28. Leiden and Boston: Brill.

CHAPTER 2

Chile and Its Spaces of Difference

Abstract This chapter provides a glimpse of the spaces of difference in Chile through literary, visual, and musical expression. It uses these media to shed light on the initiative by the Allende administration to construct Villa San Luis in the affluent comuna of Las Condes. Alberto Blest Gana’s Martín Rivas (1862) reflects the difficulties experienced by individuals navigating Santiago’s social space in the 1800s. Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna compares the excesses of the rich to the poor’s stark lack of means in Santiago. Finally, in the twentieth century, Enrique Lafourcade’s Palomita Blanca (1982), two songs by Víctor Jara from the 1970s, and Andrés Wood’s Machuca (2004) add to Chile’s discourse of difference. Lafourcade’s novel was published when construction began at the Villa San Luis. Jara depicts the social inequality found in Santiago. Wood’s film is a retrospective look at an educational and social initiative during the Allende administration. Keywords Villa San Luis de Las Condes · Social class · Social housing · Habitus · Santiago

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8_2

23

24

P. VILCHES

Santiago and COVID-19 Throughout its history, Chile has aggressively maintained segregated social spaces. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Jaime Mañalich, then Chile’s Minister of Health, stated that while visiting parts of Santiago he had become acquainted with a different city: ‘What is the level of infection? In parts of Santiago there is one level, but there are other areas in which the elevated level has become a quarantine drama. I refer to a sector of Santiago where there is a degree of poverty and overcrowding, pardon me for saying this, of whose magnitude I was not aware. [In my official capacity] it is common to visit different living spaces in a comuna. As I revisit them now, I find that, whereas before 10 people used to live in a house now there are 100 people living there,’ … ‘I am not in possession of [precise] medical statistics, but it has become very difficult to impose social isolation on people living under these terrible circumstances. The rate of infection therefore is increasing by the day. I’m so sorry for demarcating social dividing lines in our nation, but a huge rate of infection is overwhelming Santiago Poniente [the western part of Santiago]’. (qtd. in La Tercera 28 May 2020)1

The words of Mañalich could be interpreted as a camouflaged, dissembling—perhaps even feigned—manner of speaking about the problem. But his words reporting on the pandemic certainly betray the astonishment of a person coming to terms with the harrowing living conditions of the poor. He saw why the poor of the sector poniente [Western part] of Santiago experienced the COVID-19 pandemic worse than their sector oriente [Eastern part] counterparts. Geographer Juan Correa Parra explains how the dictatorship exacerbated a social divide map in Chile that during the pandemic acquired colossal proportions: “There began a policy of social fragmentation, where under the façade of providing [poor] families with housing, they began a process of eradication of those families toward the periphery. In fact, Augusto Pinochet said that Chile would

1 Translation mine. All translations from Spanish to English are mine, unless otherwise indicated.

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

25

stop being a country of proletarians to become one of homeowners. Ultimately, his administration separated families and friends and crushed the social fabric” (qtd. in Zuñiga 2021, “La ciudad de la furia”).2 Decades later, and confronted with a global health crisis, Health Minister Mañalich saw the devastation the virus triggered in the poor comunas. A striking point is that Santiago may as well be a city in which two nations coexist, following Francisco Vergara Perucich and a team of researchers: one for the rich and the other for the poor, the latter vulnerable to any type of social setback. This condition became especially heightened during the pandemic. The spread of COVID-19 in Chile thus underscored geographically and medically the nation’s social inequalities. Even though COVID-19 did not itself discriminate about who it would infect, the fact was, “A segregated city is impacted by the spread of the virus and how individuals will experience the disease or if they will die facing it” (Vergara Perucich et al. 2020, “Ciudad y COVID”). From this perspective, Mañalich’s words evince an emotionally stunning moment; they indicate a total perplexity mixed with bewilderment at realizing how ‘the other side’ lives. Here we see what Pierre Bourdieu calls the socialized norms, “the system of structured, structuring dispositions,” (1990, 52), the go-to cultural conceptualizations of the former Minister of Health. They describe his habitus . 2 In Santiago there are about 32 comunas. The wealthiest comunas, such as Lo Barnechea, Las Condes, Providencia, and Vitacura, are found in the eastern part of the city. The poorest comunas, such as Cerro Navia, Lo Espejo, Pedro Aguirre Cerda, and La Pintana, are located in the western and southern parts of the capital. Journalist Diego Zuñiga reports that in a nation like Chile, social inequality becomes patent not only through huge gaps in salaries or the level of education on the part of the people living in the comunas for the ‘rich’ and those for the ‘poor.’ He proclaims that even if separated by a few kilometers, the living conditions of the poor compared to the affluent in Chile are staggering: From this perspective, Zuñiga claims that “it is not the same thing” to wake up in crowded quarters, in a neighborhood that has been taken over by the narcotráfico than to do so in a gated comuna which is equipped to provide safety for its citizens, green areas and parks for children (2021, “La ciudad de la furia”). With respect to the COVID-19 situation, the social segregation of Santiago, conceived as part of a ‘world city,’ presented challenges to citizens in the poor sectors. For instance, enduring a quarantine proved to be an impossibility for those who lived with many others in tight quarters. As stated by Francisco Vergara Perucich and a team of researchers, “from the perspective of planetary urbanization, cities are vital to prepare optimal responses to a pandemic like the one we are experiencing now. It will not suffice to set up temporary or modular hospitals. It is essential that a world city crisis be understood, also, as a call to plan a collective space from the stance of solidarity. Hopefully, we are up to the task as a society” (2020, “Ciudad y COVID”).

26

P. VILCHES

Mañalich wanted to lend gravitas to his informative session during Santiago’s rampant pandemic outbreak. Unintentionally, perhaps, he provided an ‘unmasked’ moment that exhibited deep unawareness of how destitute the poor are in Chile. As well, his hesitancy ‘to call a spade a spade’ helped sharpen our conceptualization about Santiago’s geographical social order. COVID-19 forced Mañalich to address it, but he found himself at a loss for words. The pandemic was brought mostly into the country by Chileans who became infected while spending time abroad, as evidenced by the first verified case, a person who had returned from Singapore. The situation became critical for those individuals from the poorer comunas who became infected afterward. Some were incapable of ‘staying home’ because they held much more informal work and, at home, they did not have the conditions necessary for any type of social isolation (Vergara Perucich et al. 2020, “Ciudad y COVID”). From this perspective, the pandemic has made the social divide vivid. This lens helps us to envisage the impact in Santiago of the construction of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes at the beginning of the 1970s. Many of the neighbors reacted viscerally to the proposition of a vivienda social within the premises of Las Condes. To be sure, unforeseeable circumstances—as proved by the COVID-19 pandemic—and cultural artifacts serve as aids in internalizing social class in Chile and what the Villa San Luis was trying to overcome.

The 1800s, Marti´n Rivas, Pelucones and Pipiolos With the implementation of the Spanish colonial system, through Independence and the establishment of the republic, the land in Santiago has historically been in the hands of a few. In the 1800s a small number of wealthy Chileans could boast to possess ‘old’ aristocratic ties or nobility titles, but fortunes in Chile were made for the most part through a mix of capitalistic endeavors, agricultural development, mine exploitation, and fluctuations in the market. In the words of Chilean historian Alfredo Jocelyn-Holt, these types of capitalist endeavors “confirm the precarious internal solvency of [Chile’s] rural order, both in an economic and social sense” (1997, 192). Additionally, Jocelyn-Holt alludes to the fact that the rural order in Chile did not contemplate those who were marginalized: “In fact, we would exaggerate if we said that the peripheral dwellings in the slums, the conventillos [tenement houses], and later what came to be

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

27

known as the poblaciones callampas 3 [shantytowns] were contemplated as being constitutive axes of a sociopolitical order [in the nation]. This should not surprise us; people living in those conditions not only were considered inferior, pseudo-urban, displaced, individuals, but they had also been evicted from the land” (1997, 192). In early twenty-century Chile, the rural order had given way to an urban order that perpetuated the exclusion of the peripheral subjects. They did not count in the design of the city and they may as well have been invisible. Alberto Blest Gana’s Martín Rivas (1862), Chile’s foundational text, illustrates how social acceptance in nineteenth-century ‘good society’ had everything to do with having pots of money. The saga of Martín Rivas— penniless due to his father’s reckless search for a mine—and that of his counterparts describes the opposition between the rich and powerful and the discredited and poor. It also made clear that in the 1800s money and access to viable networks were essential to triumph in the city. While fortunes were being made to the delight of the ‘new rich,’ they were also being unmade catastrophically as volatile markets and the pursuit of capitalism rose and fell following a Machiavellian concept of fortuna and virtù. “Everything began to give way to wealth” (Blest Gana 2000, 66), and thus once obscure people turned into monied aristocrats. In the case of don Dámaso Encina, a Santiago scion, he constructed a spectacular mansion to bedazzle his peers and promote his capitalist agenda. The Encina family’s mansion stood as a synecdoche for don Dámaso’s wealth. Blest Gana’s novel takes place in 1850, roughly thirty-two years after Chile could call itself independent. As in European nations, the world of the elite was politically divided by their propinquity to the Catholic Church. They struggled with different philosophies regarding the direction and the meaning to be given to the new Nation State. Those that stood closely by the Church’s tenets were called the pelucones [conservatives]; as portrayed in Blest Gana’s novel, they had to contend with a progressive sector, the pipiolos [liberals], influenced by scientific advancement and societal changes emanating from Europe and the United States. Accordingly, they advocated for a more resourceful-minded nation, which also meant that more altruistic ideas went hand-in-hand with commercial adventures. They especially opposed the reactionary choke that the Church held on Chile, principally since the Chilean prelates had adhered

3 The term callampa means ‘mushroom’ in Quechua.

28

P. VILCHES

to monarchic beliefs and had become, in a way, enemies of the Republic by preaching from their pulpit against the new nation; on the other hand, with the encouragement of a segment of liberal-minded patriots, the new country interfered with and confiscated properties from religious orders (Collier and Sater 2004, 42–43). No matter, the conservatives used religious tenets to emblematize moral comportment in society as well as to keep a tight grip on who would govern the nation (which endowed the conservatives with political and religious convenience). Martín Rivas develops the improbable sentimental relationship between Martín and Leonor Encina, don Dámaso’s daughter. The two young people are from different sectors of society and live parallel lives, he in Copiapó (in the provinces) and she in Santiago. Through his father, Martín has a connection with the Encinas. They eventually meet because Martín and his family are in a dire economic situation, and the young man is compelled to immigrate to Santiago to further his studies. A room in the attic of the Encina mansion becomes his living space. The novel also pays homage to the Sociedad de la Igualdad [Society of Equality] (1850),4 an organization that united the letrados of the time (mostly liberals from the mid-upper and upper classes), with civic-minded artisans and working-class folks. Blest Gana’s novel describes how these pipiolos stood together to fight against conservative governments, demanding a better education and social opportunities for all Chilean citizens (admittedly, their conception of who had the right to citizenship was rather reduced). The discontentment erupted into the streets of Santiago during the Motín de Urriola [Insurrection of Urriola] in 1851. Don Dámaso’s changes of perception reflect antagonistic points of view in society. He changes his political views constantly; one day he is with the pelucones and the next day with the pipiolos . But no matter his political oscillation, Don Dámaso has power and carries all the cultural capital of his class. His fortune narrates the steps taken by the nouveaux rich to situate themselves at the top of society. His progress includes a key acquisition: a productive silver mine in Northern Chile, obtained at the 4 The Sociedad de la Igualdad was founded in 1850 in Santiago by liberal intellectuals who desired to free the minds of Chileans. They were influenced by Enlightenment ideals of social equality. Among the leaders were Santiago Arcos, Francisco Bilbao, and Eusebio Lillo. They were driven to combat the rigid social codes which had been established during numerous and consecutive conservative governments. For James A. Wood, the progressive members of the Sociedad de la Igualdad sought “an alternative, more egalitarian and democratic vision of the republic” (2011, 187).

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

29

expense of José Rivas, Martín’s father. Once he gets hold of Rivas’s mine, don Dámaso becomes a truly rich man. In relation to material assets, the novel’s accounts of happiness (or despair) in love are in part triggered by monetary exchanges that include land for just a few at the expense of less fortunate people; the novel contains extensive descriptions of the type of living arrangements for those who have and those who do not. Albeit moderately, Blest Gana chronicles the social anxieties that are present in a young Chilean nation, especially with reference to inequality and to people’s attachment to land and material possessions more broadly. These aspects keep characters in a constant state of anxiety, fearing ostracism from ‘good society’ if they cannot keep up with their counterparts (Vilches 2017, 142). The few exchanges between the aristocrats and the siúticos 5 [a type of social upstart] allow us to perceive the spaces that each inhabits. Some of the siúticos are in the medio pelo class, defined by Blest Gana as people who find themselves in a state of social in-betweenness. While the moneyed people hold a tertulia, an aristocratic social gathering, the medio pelo people attend the picholeo, an event that mimics the tertulia but that exhibits customs of the pueblo. In the novel, there were those who remained unnamed, the lowest of society.6 Martín is an immigrant who arrives in Santiago, but he is a member of the bourgeoisie, even though the text alludes “to a social gap” between Martín and more wealthy counterparts, a divide “that did not really exist” (Álvarez 2021, 21). Nonetheless, Martín Rivas offers descriptions of a social divide in Santiago. Over time, considerable quantities of displaced people had created an informal population in the city, a fact which worried authorities enough to attempt to halt their arrival and settlement. Armando de Ramón specifies that in 1827, in what “it seems 5 The word siútico denotes a social upstart. Elsewhere I have analyzed the siútico within nineteenth-century Chilean fiction in connection with a rhetoric of nation building in Chile. For example, in the literature of Alberto Blest Gana, the social upstarts’ behavior has all to do with feigning a subjectivity to appear above their station to others. Social upstarts in the novels of Blest Gana, therefore, lead their lives with upward mobility in mind, pushing through paranoia and dissolving social barriers, even at the risk of showing their true colors. To be sure, the description of a siútico fits in well with Augusto Pinochet’s ways during his reign in Chile. See “The Social in Social Order: The Rise of the Siútico” in Vilches, Blest Gana via Machiavelli and Cervantes, 2017. 6 Ignacio Álvarez examines how the narration in Martín Rivas ‘cannot bring itself’ to describe ‘low’ subjects: “That inability, that glaring omission is recorded in the text itself, when it finds it impossible to describe a maid from the Molina family, someone who is below medio pelo” (2021, 22).

30

P. VILCHES

to have been the first case of ‘eradication,’” from the capital, Santiago authorities transported those people to a new space which came to be known as San Bernardo, a new settlement in the periphery of the capital (1990, 7). The population grew and social problems increased to a point of saturation. The urban space could no longer contain its people and different administrations sought ways to deal with the city’s struggles. This would become a crucial and perpetual reality, one that would rise like a river after torrential rain in the twentieth century and would be addressed by Salvador Allende in various forms, arguably in the most spectacular way possible by the paño geográfico chosen by his administration to erect Villa San Luis and to designate it for the downtrodden.

Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna, Intendente of Santiago Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna was a liberal politician, a patriotic letrado who became a member of the Sociedad de la Igualdad. He was a close acquaintance of Blest Gana, and they both shared patrician roots that were not necessarily backed by wealth. In his ideas, Vicuña Mackenna contemplated historical themes and topics of a letrado nature, like authorship, readership, and the nation. As characterized by Guillermo Feliú Cruz, Vicuña Mackenna showed foresight in becoming aware of the preciousness of the environment, indicating the benefits of preserving forests, as well as having better river drainage, drinking water, implementation of sanitation methods, and urbanization and transformation in Santiago (1958, 16). In the 1870s he was the Intendente, what would now be a mayor, of Santiago and set about to change what he considered to be the bad ways of the city. He expressed the sentiment of the upper classes of the time when he conceived the nation’s capital as a place geographically divided by a city of letrados (the affluent, in the center), and a city of barbarians (the poor, in the surrounding areas). In spite of this elitist view, Vicuña Mackenna during his mandate strove to alleviate the spaces of poverty in the capital through improvements, transforming some areas and beautifying the urban space in general. The Intendente spoke of the inequalities that he had found in the city. He informed the citizenry how the poor were the most vulnerable, referring for example to an epidemic that assaulted Santiago in 1872. He declared that it mainly affected the humble sectors, where he saw people forced to live in muddy, sorrowful houses, “the proletariat

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

31

that lived like insects, under the dazzling mantle of [Chile’s] aristocratic opulence” (Vicuña Mackenna 1873, 167). By ordering the construction of institutions that catered to the destitute, he took care to integrate the insolvent into society. As alluded to in his text, Vicuña Mackenna’s plans were executed for the well-being of Santiago’s citizens, which included the remodeling of the Cerro Santa Lucía, the canalizing of the Mapocho River—where he describes the pitiful houses of the poor—and tree planting to embellish squares and avenues. Vicuña Mackenna did not hesitate to name a few culprits who maintained the status quo in Santiago, censuring the arrogance of a few immensely prosperous families. He called them “the 100 families” and proclaimed that they possessed more wealth than the Chilean State as a whole. Vicuña Mackenna argued that the budget for the city of Santiago was pitiable, while privileged families egregiously spent vast amounts of money to acquire land and construct palaces and mansions for themselves, without any regard for the less fortunate of society (1872, 17). The Intendente addressed the need for the beautifying and the overall aesthetic and sanitary betterment of the different sectors of Santiago. He enumerated the type of effort that would enhance the areas mentioned, starting with the eastern part of the city. He felt poplar trees would be once more planted after a nefarious decision to cut them down had depleted the space of its old splendor. As the areas mentioned got further west, his tone changed as he referred to a grave situation in the living arrangements in the Barrio of San Diego: It is true that the dismal organization of that part of the city— characterized as a nomadic population that lives on land rented a piso 7 (a system that is only good for populating hospitals that treat infectious diseases)— is the cause of many of its ailments: its incurable backwardness, its inexhaustible filth, and its physical and moral unhealthy state that fluctuates between the Penitentiary and the Slaughterhouse. During the last epidemic, more than five thousand cartloads of filth were extracted

7 Armando de Ramón explains that “together with the occupation of vacant spaces or land for public use, renting a piso seems to have been the oldest form of land occupation in the urban periphery. It consisted of the division of a rural property located next to the city. It would be divided into lots by its owner and then rented to families who had to construct physical living spaces there” (1990, 6).

32

P. VILCHES

from their inhabitants’ ranchos and conventillos . (Vicuña Mackenna 1873, 53)8

The incessant population growth of the city of Santiago was presented by Vicuña Mackenna as an urgent situation to be remedied, specifically when alluding to measures and reforms that would guarantee social hygiene in the living quarters of the poor (Hidalgo 2019, 24). The Intendente’s depictions of the fragility of the viviendas used by the vulnerable sectors of society typified the gravity of the situation. It also acknowledged that urban growth had produced a market for urban land, one that had intensified its use, purposes, and profit (Torres Dujisin 1986, 68). The Intendente fought capitalism to obtain better living conditions for the at-risk population. It would become a challenge. As we know from Rodrigo Hidalgo, the Intendente encountered resistance when he proposed reforms that would impact the informal living arrangements of marginalized subjects. As expected, owners of these viviendas were making a strong profit and they were not willing to sacrifice the status quo. On the other hand, the tenants themselves were not eager to move or to pay higher rent (2019, 25). Toward the beginning of the twentieth century, the heirs of “the 100 families” still maintained a hold on the most productive land in Chile, including the lands around Las Condes. This is true of the ownership of the fundo [large estate] San Luis. This vast piece of land represents the genesis of the Villa San Luis, a subject further explored in Chapter 3. Plans for the property became contextualized within the twentieth-century transformation of Santiago, where modernization affected viviendas and living in general. Succinctly, physical space in Las Condes became altered rapidly. Previously most of the land had belonged to private citizens, but by the late 1960s—and with a few remaining exceptions, such as the fundo San Luis—the comuna’s geographical space had been sold by private families to become divided, commercialized, adjudicated-for-private-use residential areas, and so on. By the time the Chilean State had intervened and taken hold of the fundo San Luis, which looked odd compared to its surroundings, rapid modernization and urbanization within the northeastern part of the city had turned Las

8 For further information on ranchos, conventillos , and other informal living arrangements begun during nineteenth-century Chile (or earlier), refer to Chapter 3.

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

33

Condes from a countryside village into a prosperous part of the fabric of Santiago, no longer viewed as an adjacent parcel.

Love, Friendship, and Social Divide in Palomita Blanca and Machuca Constructions of social inequality prevail in Enrique Lafourcade’s novel Palomita Blanca (1982), where an improbable love affair develops between Juan Carlos Eguirreizaga Montt and María Acevedo Acevedo. The love story has steadily become the Romeo and Juliet or Love Story of Chile’s early 1970s. The two young lovers meet during Allende’s fourth presidential campaign; the novel ends in summer 1971, after Allende was ratified by Congress as president of Chile in November 1970. Just like the surnames of the owners of fundo San Luis, the geographical space where the Villa San Luis was built, the protagonists’ names in the novel conjure up geographical spaces of difference for Chileans. The young man belongs to Chile’s elite, with its prestigious surnames, including Montt, which belongs to three Chilean presidents. On the other hand, María is a member of the proletariat, with one repeated last name that, at the time, signaled that a person could have had an illegitimate birth. Palomita Blanca became a best-seller and ranks among the top-selling Chilean novels of all times, indicating the nation’s fascination with Lafourcade’s novelistic social experiment that coalesced Juan Carlos’s space of wealth with Maria’s space of poverty. Lafourcade was successful in conceptualizing for both 1970s and contemporary readers the “framework for understanding the city,” describing with zest the segregated spaces in Santiago’s “geographical imaginations” (Harvey 2009, 27). Juan Carlos lives in the barrio alto [affluent neighborhood] and she lives in a población, in a barrio popular [working-class neighborhood], “behind the Vega Central” … “between Salas and Lastra streets” in Santiago (Lafourcade 1982, 46). They only meet because María and a friend attend a Rock Festival in the barrio alto that attracts the oxymoronic ‘rich hippies’ of the time. That is, María must leave her space for an encounter between her and Juan Carlos ever to take place. It is clear from the beginning that he remains utterly unaware of the world María inhabits. On the day they meet, the young man drives María around like a maniac in a Mini Cooper; at one point, he decides

34

P. VILCHES

to drive to his house to fetch some things, which gives María the opportunity to comment on the meandering, intricate, new geography she is encountering: We were already arriving at Américo Vespucio and we turned to the left and almost flipped over because it seemed that the car turned on one side and gave a tremendous squeak, but [Juan Carlos] said to me, don’t worry because the tires are special, they won’t get a flat, he told me. And there we went again on an avenue that took us towards a street full of gardens, very pretty, and everything was nice. Despite the fright I felt I was fixated on the surroundings, and with the heated car I felt warm inside, but I was still frightened, what can I say, and he drove through other streets with plenty of beautiful, white houses and huge gardens, and suddenly Juan Carlos stopped the car when we reached the most beautiful and biggest house on the block. (Lafourcade 1982, 26)

Lafourcade’s text finds itself in conversation with Víctor Jara’s “Darling Houses of the barrio alto.” Part of the long play El derecho de vivir en paz (1982), the song was adapted by Jara from Malvina Reynolds’s “Little boxes”—which was interpreted by Pete Seeger. Called a “soft satire”, the Chilean singer songwriter includes the involvement, as a sport, of the young well-to-do in the assassination of a general (referring to Chilean General René Schneider’s crime. He was attacked on 22 October 1970. He died in hospital three days later) (La bicicleta b, no. 59, 36). In the first part of the song, and following María’s description above, Jara describes “the characteristic urban space of Santiago’s barrio alto.” In the second part, he depicts the ideological tension in Chile and how it related to current events, as the progressive artist moved “from modernity to postmodernity” (Rodríguez 2011, 479): The darling houses of the barrio alto / with fences and a front garden, / a beautiful driveway / waiting / for a Peugeot. They are pink, green / white and light blue. / The darling houses of the barrio alto, / all put together with glue. And the people of the darling houses / smile and visit each other. / They go to the supermarket together / and they all have a T.V. set.

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

35

They are dentists, retailers / landowners and traffickers, / lawyers and landlords. / And they all wear polycrón.9 They play bridge, they drink martini-dry / and the children are blonde / and with other blonde children / they go to a posh school together. And daddy’s son / then goes to college, / beginning his problematics / and social intrigue. He smokes cigarettes while driving an Austin mini, / plays with bombs and politics, / murders generals / and is a gangster of the sedition. And the people of the little houses / smile and visit each other. / They go to the supermarket together / and they all have a T.V. set. They are pink, green / white and light blue. / The darling houses of the barrio alto, / all put together with glue. (La bicicleta 1984b, no. 59, 24)

Jara’s song illuminates the space of affluence inhabited by Palomita blanca’s Juan Carlos, his family, and his friends. These Chilean spaces of exclusion have also been explored in visual expressions, such as in Machuca (2004) by Chilean filmmaker Andrés Wood. In the film, fiction and reality intertwine in an educational experiment enacted by the Allende administration. The initiative brought boys from Santiago’s poorest neighborhoods and so-called campamentos (not far from the beautiful houses of the barrio alto) to a private, prestigious school run by priests, St. George’s (St. Patrick’s in the film). Wood derived the script of Machuca from personal experience, having himself been a student at St. George’s during the administration of Father Gerard Whelan, in the film Father McEnroe (interpreted by Ernesto Malbrán). The ethos of the school had maintained the cultural capital for people of wealth, with ample classrooms and a narrow entrance. Considered to be a “revolutionary educational program,” boys from campamentos were to receive a proper education. This social integration of boys from low-income areas to the classrooms at St. George’s sought to ignite cooperative learning among the school’s pupils. The goal went toward shared knowledge which in turn would provide constant interaction among the students themselves, no matter their parents’ annual income. This was supposed to achieve the desired cognitive objectives and purposes of a well-rounded 9 The term ‘polycrón’, (an alternative word used is ‘prolén’), was a type of fabric advertised on T.V. as being able to make people succeed at whatever they set their minds to do. The other term, recipol, which I have translated as ‘glue’ was advertised as being able to glue anything together, “even ideas”, said Jara (Rodríguez 2011, 486).

36

P. VILCHES

education and investment in the future of all pupils (Martínez Peric 2014, “Una reforma educacional”). Wood and his team place the narrative in 1973, the decisive and last year of Allende’s presidency. During the first part of the film, scenes reproduce a time of chaos but also of optimism, with actual events blended within the filmic narration, particularly in the progressive actions of Father Whelan/Father McEnroe. From a stance of Christian compassion, the priest was eager to accomplish the social agenda of the UP government. The film shows how Santiago was deeply divided between a city for the rich and a city for the poor and how these two social spaces became intertwined briefly by the Allende administration’s effort around educational integration. Pedro Machuca (Ariel Mateluna) makes a huge leap when he starts attending St. Patrick’s. He lives in the población El Esfuerzo [The Effort]. In fact, this was a real settlement from which many of the pobladoras and pobladores of the Villa San Luis originated. Machuca meets and strikes up a friendship with St. Patrick’s student Gonzalo Infante (Matías Quer), who in turn, becomes acquainted with the world ‘on the other side of the tracks,’ previously unknown to him. Like in Palomita Blanca, the main characters’ last names narrate a strong story for a Chilean audience: Gonzalo’s surname has historical ties and sounds patrician whereas Pedro’s last name implies the idea of machucar [to bruise], a “physical activity typical of lower-class employment” (Bost 2009, 49–50). Both actors ‘fulfill’ the stereotypical looks of the space they are supposed to occupy in the city, Mateluna has dark, indigenous, features while Quer is white and blond. The film sketches multiform social borders. Uniforms define the ethos of the school and the students of St. Patrick’s. The first scene presents Gonzalo looking at himself in the mirror putting on his uniform; the attire constructs the upper-class image that the school projects to society. The boys from El Esfuerzo are shown not wearing the school’s clothing and they appear as transient, disconnected beings, foreign to the school’s environment. When Father McEnroe goes into Infante’s classroom to introduce the new boys, two worlds meet head-on. The well-to-do students look puzzled by the visitors. The boys from the población look timid and embarrassed and they do not seem to know how to position their bodies or where to put their hands. They all stand silently against the blackboard and appear completely different from their new, rich classmates. St. Patrick’s is an English school for boys and, as expected, English is the main language in the classroom. This is a language of prestige that

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

37

none of the boys from the poor areas understands. In a specific instance, during an English test, while the traditional students answer the vocabulary sheets, the humble boys look at each other with resigned looks. In another scene, Machuca speaks gibberish and says it is English. Infante smiles at Machuca’s ‘pretend’ English. Wood enacts in Machuca the dynamics and circumstances surrounding the residents of Villa San Luis. Machuca depicts for a twenty-first-century audience the collusion—and collision—in an educational space between the traditional students of the real St. George’s and the poor boys from the fringes10 ; likewise, the remnants of the Villa San Luis showcase for present-day Chileans the directives for spatial justice undertaken during the UP government. Lawner relates that the displaced families set up campamentos in moneyed areas for reasons that included maintaining their familial and social ties as well as preventing a long commute to their places of work. Extensively, they fought eradication to peripheral areas in the city. Living far meant a potential loss for them not only in their source of income but also in their quality of life (2008, 291; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). In Machuca, Father McEnroe introduces the new group of boys to the traditional students and asks if they recognize any of them: “They don’t live far from you,” he says. Father McEnroe seems surprised that nobody in the classroom seems to recognize any of the boys and encourages them to indicate if they do. A boy finally raises his hand and says that he is acquainted with one of them; he is the son of the lavandera, the lady who washes his family’s clothes. Both boys salute each other with hesitancy. Before leaving the group in the classroom, Father McEnroe tells the class: “I hope you give them a warm welcome, just the way it should be, like welcoming a brother or a new friend” (Machuca 2004, 0:04:52–0:05:41). Unlike other members of Chilean society, the Machucas did not have any rights granted by the city that would protect them or their families, proving that “The important and ever-expanding labor of making 10 An intense exchange at a parent and teacher meeting at St. Patrick’s brings out the animosity felt among some parents toward the poor boys who are attending the school. Machuca’s mother speaks about her own upbringing in the countryside, without any hope of bettering her life. She is interrupted by an elegantly-clad mother who looks furiously at and speaks directly to Father McEnroe, screaming the following: “Get all of these Marxists out of the school once and for all!” The mother’s words allude directly to a similar statement by a woman from the barrio alto, shown in the documentary La Batalla de Chile (Vilches 2016, 55).

38

P. VILCHES

and sustaining urban life is increasingly done by insecure, often part-time and disorganized low-paid labor” (Harvey 2012, xiv). These people were organizing themselves in their aspirations for a home, forcing the hand of the government. Because of their marginalization within the urban structure of Santiago, people living in campamentos and other unofficial settlements were part of the so-called informal economy. Too many unfavorable conditions propelled the squatters to come together to organize themselves at the community level. This reminds us of unity, solidarity, and the cooperatives established by the members of the Comités sin casa, a movement that peaked in the late 1960s (Castells 1983, 200). The names El Esfuerzo and El Ejemplo [The Example] underlined the importance of the workers’ stance, also reflecting the idealism behind these operations (Lawner 2008, 291). Various scenes from Machuca take place in the humble living quarters of the Machucas. The camera travels through the muddy paths of El Esfuerzo, with men and women working the land and turning the arid ground into a truthful home. As comes across in Wood’s film, the families of El Esfuerzo put up a united front for others and for themselves. Machuca’s población was part of the childhood of some of the Villa San Luis inhabitants. In fact, many of the former residents of the Villa San Luis, such as Ximena Salinas, first lived in El Esfuerzo. Salinas stated that she became acquainted with one of the boys that participated in the St. George’s educational program (Salinas Interview 16 December 2021). In the film, El Esfuerzo is presented in a different orbit from the rest of Santiago: doors remain open and neighbors coexist in close proximity to one another. The first time we see the poor boy’s población is from a distance, from the gaze of wealthy Gonzalo Infante. He cannot figure out what he is looking at. It is an area that he has never truly seen, the poor side of the Mapocho, so opposed to Gonzalo’s own house located within urban prettiness, a comfortable abode on the nice, exclusive, ‘proper’ side of the river. In this regard, “Wood accentuates the social differences through the geographical divisions that separate ideological stances as the nation becomes increasingly rigid and disjointed” (Vilches 2016, 47). In fact, a telling scene presents Infante pedaling his bicycle while he gives a lift to Machuca; the camera is angled at a distance and we can see how the two boys on the bicycle go from the barrio alto into the slums of Santiago; once they arrive at the barrio popular, they encounter a wall

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

39

with the following written on it: “momios beware”11 (Machuca 2004, 0:32:58–0:33:48). Infante and Machuca’s living spaces are not physically distant from each other, yet, one connotes prosperity and the other one poverty; in a Lefebvrian sense, they signify the “strong points” vs. the “weak points” of the city (Lefebvre 1991, 421). Both homes are metaphorically thousands of miles away from each other. Capitalism’s “strong points” are where “large-scale enterprises” and decisions take place, affecting how people live and how they relate to the city. On the other hand, Pedro Machuca lives in an unimportant area, part of the “weak points” of the city, subdued by capitalism and exploited in terms of labor. This is how the people who live in the “strong points” are able to continue their accumulation of goods and maintain their standards of living (Lefebvre 1991, 421). Wood does not spare us the violence of the dictatorship. There are brutal actions executed by the military on Machuca’s población, whose inhabitants are considered by the Armed Forces from a perspective of worthlessness. El Esfuerzo is ransacked and literally made to disappear by the military. Wood presents the effect of the coup at St. Patrick’s, with boys receiving severe haircuts that emblematize the new order. Additionally, the poor boys are gone from the school. Everything is now how it was before Allende. Gonzalo pedals his bicycle to the población for the last time to find out about Machuca and his family’s fate; the boy witnesses the violence, the annihilation inflicted upon the población’s members by the military. Men, women, and children are being thrown out of their humble homes, shouted at, beaten, and mistreated in general by soldiers while the noise of weapons being fired is relentless in the background. To an extent, the ransacking of El Esfuerzo touches on what was endured by the families evicted from the Villa San Luis during the dictatorship. In Machuca, the scenes in El Esfuerzo bring memoryscapes from the violence inflicted on deprived sectors of society during the dictatorship. The father of Silvana, a friend of the two boys, is beaten with the back of rifles by soldiers and, when defended by his daughter, a soldier shoots her at point blank. After that execution, the next scene is silent; we cannot comprehend the brutality. Gonzalo himself is abruptly stopped by a soldier. Afraid for his life, and to no avail, the boy tells the soldier 11 In Chile, ‘momio’ is a neologism that derives from the word, ‘momia’, ‘mummy’ in English. It was in vogue during the Allende era. It denotes an ultra-conservative person, not willing to accept change.

40

P. VILCHES

that he comes from the other side of the river. He says that he is not one of ‘them,’ that he is not a poblador. Desperate for his life, Gonzalo finally exclaims at the top of his lungs: “Look at me!” The soldier, an actor with accentuated indigenous features, finally ‘sees’ Gonzalo Infante and realizes that the boy does not belong in Machuca’s población; he is from the upper classes, from the ‘strong points’ of the city, from the ‘right’ side of the Mapocho. Frustrated, the soldier pushes Infante and yells at him to “get the hell out” (Machuca 2004, 1:41:01–1:45:43). In Palomita Blanca, María Acevedo cannot unglue herself from a relationship with a disappointed, disoriented young man. Juan Carlos mistreats her and yet, she is mesmerized by his looks, his clothes, and his difference. Money does not seem to solve his problems: his parents have a façade of a marriage; he does not get along well with some of his siblings; as he himself declares, he has lost interest in the world in which he lives or in the material assets that bedazzle and subjugate his family and friends. With María, Juan Carlos becomes acquainted with a new way of approaching life. For her part, she becomes familiarized with previously prohibited spaces, such as Las Condes, La Dehesa, Zapallar, etc. The young man ‘descends’ to the humble neighborhood where María lives, but for the most part, she is made to ‘transgress’ into his geographical domain. The encounters between these two areas are at times extremely difficult for María, especially when she finds herself at the mercy of her boyfriend’s relatives or friends. In Machuca, the humble boy’s friendship with Infante allows Pedro to enter a new world of fine eating, expensive shoes, and readings of the American comic ‘Lone Ranger.’ In fact, Infante enacts a young version of a loner with Machuca as his sidekick, ready to combat Chilean society. Like Juan Carlos, Gonzalo appears detached and uprooted from his family, finding footing in Machuca’s family and friends. Toward the end of Palomita Blanca, Juan Carlos becomes implicated in the assassination of General Schneider. As Juan Carlos is being protected and hidden by his peers, María is left to her own devices, continuing her life in the poor areas of Santiago. The social order is thus reestablished. But there is some glimmer of hope. Toward the end of the novel, during the first summer of the Allende administration, María’s mother (portrayed as a horrible alcoholic and political agitator), pays a visit to her daughter at the home of María’s godmother, where the young woman lives. Exuberant, the mother tells María that things are looking up for the likes of them:

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

41

My mother came for a visit … and she said that they were going to give her another job, and that they were going to give them some houses, that they were already delivering them and that the houses had water and electricity, and that the compañero presidente [comrade president] was going to carry them forward to better things. (Lafourcade 1982, 184–185)

In Wood’s film, the coup abruptly ends the boys’ friendship. We fear for Machuca’s fate, as we last see him desolate, looking at Gonzalo as he pedals away from the inferno on his bicycle; Machuca has nothing to hope for and he and his family are now at the mercy of the military. Asked about the impact of ‘seeing’ the violence of the dictatorship, Wood expressed that it was especially important to bring forth for a younger generation such a sordid episode in Chile’s history. He revealed that he himself originated from a space of privilege in Chilean society, traditionally negative toward Allende’s mandate. Reading about what took place during the Allende government and its aftermath propelled him to chronicle the Allende story and its aftermath. For the filmmaker, one of the greatest triumphs of the dictatorship, beyond a new Constitutional law, privatizations, economic systems, etc., was that for many Chileans intent on pursuing their capitalist dreams a person’s life became dispensable, a casualty of ‘war.’ Wood adds that the dictatorship greatly contributed to citizens’ alienation by inciting in them a fear of the other: “The dictatorship encouraged separation; the dictatorship segregated neighborhoods and dissolved places of connections; the dictatorship made a habit of not telling the truth; the dictatorship forbade people to think differently in any aspect of their lives. That’s a very dramatic legacy” (“Demasiado tarde” 2013, 0:13:37–0:14:50). In Machuca, the final scenes transition from abominable human behavior toward the inhabitants in Pedro’s población to pristine, angelic-like scenes in Gonzalo’s side, the ‘good’ side of the Mapocho. To create a distorted and rather grotesque segue, Wood has a scene in which Gonzalo appears pedaling on his bicycle again; yet, he is now keeping a leisurely pace (unlike his frantic pedaling away from El Esfuerzo), and he sticks to a path of beautiful houses with manicured lawns. By this time, Machuca’s población has become invisible, obliterated. Furthermore, we come to terms with the fact that Infante and his family (minus his father who has previously left for Europe) have benefited from the coup. The Infante family has moved up to an even better home and neighborhood. The military intervention thus has allowed the

42

P. VILCHES

family members to find an even better position within the ‘strong points’ of the city. Life goes on as ‘usual’ for Gonzalo and for people like him, the former Allende opposition. At St. Patrick’s the ‘undesirables’ are now gone and Infante is back to being only with acquaintances from the elite. Nonetheless, Wood sends a final reminder that Chile is now a nation that lives under a violent regime; the space used to make this statement is Gonzalo’s own bucolic, carefully kept neighborhood. As they watch Gonzalo on his bicycle, three young children on a sidewalk, while making loud gun noises, turn their arms into the shape of rifles as they aim at Gonzalo. They ‘shoot’ him as he passes by. One of the youngsters screams: “You are supposed to die” (Machuca 2004, 1:47:25–1:47:27).

On the Mapocho River, Cats Are Brought to Die Lawner explained that the CORMU’s objective was to make use of the paño geográfico following the ideas proposed by architect Miguel Eyquem; however, the area had to remain “open to the demands of all sectors of society without any type of exclusion” (2007, 3). Emphasis on social integration made the apartment blocks of the Villa San Luis a focal point: “The four-story viviendas became a political statement. Allende executed a coup which was a coup for the Villa San Luis. For his government to build first for the upper classes while there were homeless people was incompatible” (Eyquem qtd. in Uribe). Architects, engineers, and other professionals involved in the project sought to build the población to bring forth the notion of an “integrated city, including areas contemplated for middle or middle-upper layers” of society (Lawner 2007, 3). The president proposed with Villa San Luis to enable people like María (from Palomita Blanca) and Pedro (from Machuca) to access an impenetrable space. The Allende administration had begun a conversation via the CORMU with the comuna of Las Condes. The president’s vision and plans for the Villa San Luis and its inhabitants was cataclysmic for the posh comuna. Accordingly, city hall in Las Condes put up barriers to avoid acknowledging the completion of the project; hence, the new owners could not finalize the necessary legal work to receive their property deeds: “the new owners were left in a limbo; they had been pre-assigned a living space; they were occupying the apartments, but they had no certificate of ownership” (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). The Municipality of Las Condes had understood clearly what was intended with the new neighborhood. Its administrators stood for the

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

43

‘strong points’ of the city, from a Lefebvrian sense, and they were heavily predisposed to prevent the lowering of social barriers in the comuna. They did not desire to incorporate individuals from the ‘weak points’ of the city who, they considered, had penetrated their turf. For its part, the CORMU encouraged the residents of the Villa San Luis to perceive themselves as legitimate members of a comuna they looked at from a distant perspective. Even though they had lived physically in Las Condes, living in the periphery had kept them in a modus vivendi that recalled a rural existence. By becoming integrated, the pobladoras and pobladores were able to partake in the benefits other inhabitants of Las Condes enjoyed, which included sanitation, electricity, and other necessities of modernity that resulted in a productive and satisfying urban life. The move to the Villa San Luis, from a Lefebvrian perspective, made the residents become affected by a different “social and ‘cultural’ life” (Lefebvre 2000, 72). It propelled the people from the Comités sin casa to leave behind their rural, marginalized, way of life. The fact that Allende provided affordable housing in a privileged space to a group of destitute Chileans turned many against him. Wood’s Machuca apprises viewers of the living arrangements along the Mapocho River which housed many of the future residents of Villa San Luis. That was one of the few areas where these new city dwellers, many of them rural immigrants and their descendants, had not been barred from settling (Lawner 2007, 2). In the song of Víctor Jara, “En el río mapocho”, the river figures as a central space for those dwellers not wanted by society. They bravely have made the Mapocho River their place of residence. Jara’s narration describes how during the winter months the locals remain vulnerable to the elements of the weather, fighting not to succumb to the cold while enduring the storm stoically and even with some humor to erase the realities of their hard lives: On the Mapocho River / cats are brought to die / and in the midst of the water / they are thrown away in sacks. / But in the poblaciones / when the storm hits / men, dogs and cats / it is the same thing. They say that in these cases / it’s better to laugh / and in the middle of the mud / bring me a pilsener. / A child plays in the midst / of the storm. / He pretends he is the captain of a ship / that has capsized. We are taking out babies, / tables, walls. / The sky doesn’t scare us. / It’s raining cats and dogs. / I would be more scared / if the case were / that my brunette lady did not want / to give me a hug.

44

P. VILCHES

The strong gusts of wind, the water, / knock houses down. / But we are not becoming complacent. / For those of us who work / that would be something. / Ah! if it were true / that one day we could laugh away / the elements. (La bicicleta 1984a, no. 57, 24)

In a Lefebvrian sense, the banks of the Mapocho became housing for city nomads. The city, for its part, had not given them the right to live the urban life, to ‘inhabit’ the city in a proper way (Lefebvre 2000, 76). For years, the Mapocho accommodated the families and made them part of the urban fabric of the city. Hellmuth Stuven, at the time an engineer and computer scientist for CORMU, described that a considerable number of families from campamentos on the banks of the Mapocho River went to the brand-new Villa San Luis apartment blocks to live close to people who employed them. He also indicated that they did so right under the noses of the Military School officials (“Entrevista” 2007, 0:0:48–0:0:59). Surely, like the lands for the Villa San Luis, Chile’s Military School was constructed on land purchased from the fundo San Luis. Francisca Allende and Scarlett Olave narrate that for the new owners, “the new apartments were heaven on earth compared to the ranches nestled on the banks of the Mapocho” (2018, 54).

Inhabiting an In-Betweenness The modest new residents were cognizant of the decisively rare parameters for the población; they were self-aware of both their mis/place and otherness in the city. Stuven recalls that the homeowners asked Lawner and the CORMU’s team of architects and engineers, Stuven himself among them: “‘how long are the officers going to accept that you continue building for humble families so near their Military School, [practically] in their own backyard?’ … and, it turned out that [the military] did not put up with it for that long,” finishes Stuven (“Entrevista” 2007, 0:1:00–0:1:12). These rural immigrants stayed in the physical space of the población in a state of in-betweenness, within and without. In the words of Edward Soja, their positionality placed them in a “thirding-as-othering” stance. For Soja the ‘in’ and ‘out’ of a geography defines the “trialectics of spatiality.” This comprises our own and others’ perceptions as well as our own conception of self and others, which goes together with the ‘real’ and lived space that we occupy in society. This “trialectic” informs us about ourselves and others, which communicates to us about our own place in

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

45

the world and how we relate to others in terms of “spatiality-historicalitysociality.” This defines a conceptualized and yet concrete and ‘other’ place that is embodied by the idea of a thirdspace. Soja argues that it derives from the space in which individuals find themselves: in a material and a mental space, a dualism that expands itself further into a spatial imagination, a third place that people conceive as both “real and imagined” (1996, 10, 11). In Santiago, rural immigrants and their families rapidly learned the new cultural codes of the city while they retained feebly or by inertia, their old, ‘rural’ ones, slowly metamorphosed by modernity. The urban context was key, placing them in a thirdspace, within the city margins but outside the city itself. María Acevedo and Pedro Machuca felt out of place when visiting the barrio alto neighborhoods. Correspondingly, the residents of Villa San Luis, especially after the military coup of 1973, stood and conceived of themselves as being an ‘other,’ principally because they inhabited a thirdspace in Las Condes. As well, the very same población Villa San Luis, from the coup to the twenty-first century, has been characterized as a thirdspace in the comuna of Las Condes. In fact, the families that still lived in Villa San Luis in 2008 spoke of their feelings of otherness in the place: “We’ve suffered a lot here. These houses have been paid for with tears” (Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 38). By virtue of their existence, the remaining apartment blocks were sites of resistance and otherness. Nowadays, Block 14 is the sole edifice standing in the prized real estate space. It has become a consecrated space. The thirdspace continues.

References Allende, Francisca, and Scarlett Olave. 2018. El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes. Cómo los camiones de la basura de la dictadura desterraron una población al olvido. Santiago, Chile: Ceibo. Álvarez, Ignacio. 2021. “New Problems of Realism in Martín Rivas.” Open Cultural Studies 5: 16–26. https://doi.org/10.1515/culture-2021-0007. Bianchini, Maria Chiara, and Pulgar P. Claudio. 2008. “Villa San Luis de Las Condes: Lugar de memoria y olvido.” Revista De Arquitectura 14 (18): 29– 40. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-5427.2013.28163. Blest Gana, Alberto. 2000. Martín Rivas: Novela de costumbres político-sociales. Edited by Guillermo Araya, 5th ed. Madrid: Ediciones Cátedra. Bost, David. 2009. “No pasó nada and Machuca: Bildungsroman as Historical Understanding.” Latin Americanist 53 (2): 49–60. onlinelibrary.wiley.com. Accessed 15 July 2013.

46

P. VILCHES

Bourdieu, Pierre. 1990. The Logic of Practice. Translated by Richard Nice. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Castells, Manuel. 1983. The City and the Grassroots: A Cross-Cultural Theory of Urban Social Movements. Berkeley: University of California Press. Collier, Simon, and William F. Sater. 2004. A History of Chile, 1808–2002, 2nd ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. “Demasiado Tarde.” 2013. YouTube Video, 00:26:07. “Capítulo 54: Andrés Wood habla sobre Ecos del desierto.” Posted by demasiadotardetv on 5 September 2013. http://youtu.be/fp3krcLn1gY. Accessed 7 February 2014. De Ramón, Armando. 1990. “La población informal. Poblamiento de la periferia de Santiago de Chile. 1920–1970.” Eure 16 (50): 5–17. https://repositorio. uc.cl/handle/11534/3703. “Entrevista Helmuth Stuven 1 de 2.” Undated. YouTube Video, 00:04:27. Posted by Unctad III on 30 January 2009. https://youtu.be/Jcn9A4FBVq0. Accesssed 18 January 2020. Feliú Cruz, Guillermo. 1958. Benjamín Vicuña Mackenna, El historiador. Santiago, Chile: Ediciones de los Anales de la Universidad de Chile. Harvey, David. 2009. Social Justice and the City. Vol. 1, Rev. ed. Geographies of Justice and Social Transformation. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press. Harvey, David. 2012. Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution. London and New York: Verso. Hidalgo, Rodrigo. 2019. La vivienda social en Chile y la construcción del espacio urbano en el Santiago del siglo XX. Santiago, Chile: RIL Editores. Jocelyn-Holt Letelier, Alfredo. 1997. El peso de la noche: Nuestra frágil fortaleza histórica. Ariel, Editora Espasa Calpe. La bicicleta. 1984a, 9 October. “En el río Mapocho.” No. 57. La bicicleta. 1984b, 6 November. “Las casitas del barrio alto.” No. 59. Lafourcade, Enrique. 1982. Palomita blanca. Santiago, Chile: Ediciones de Lafourcade. Lawner, Miguel. 2007. (Destacados) “Demolición de la Villa San Luis en Las Condes: Historia de dos despojos.” Santiago, Chile: CENDA (Centro de Estudios Nacionales de Desarrollo Alternativo). 1 part, 1–16; 2 part, 17–32. https://www.cendachile.cl/autores/miguel-lawner#h.p_NDWmCtY6N58. Accessed 14 January 2020. Lawner, Miguel. 2008. “Viviendas dignas para hombres dignos.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al., 281–305. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Lefebvre, Henri. 1991. The Production of Space. Translated by Donald Nicholson Smith. Oxford, UK: Blackwell. Lefebvre, Henri. 2000. Writings on Cities. Selected, Translated and Introduced by Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas. Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers.

2

CHILE AND ITS SPACES OF DIFFERENCE

47

Machuca. 2004. 115 mins. Dir. Andrés Wood. Actrs. Matías Quer, Ariel Mateluna, Manuela Martelli, Tamara Acosta, Francisco Reyes, Ernesto Malbran, and Aline Küppenheim. A Wood Producciones Production, in CoProducción with Tornasol Films (Spain), Mamoun Hassam (England), Paraíso Production (France) and Chilefilms (Chile), DVD, 2005. Martínez Peric, Rodrigo. 2014, January 7. “Una reforma educacional que pudo haber cambiado la historia.” CIPER. https://ciperchile.cl/2014/07/01/ machuca-una-reforma-educacional-que-pudo-haber-cambiado-la-historia/. Accessed 11 February 2020. Rodríguez, Laura. 2011. “La proyección urbana de un creador: Víctor Jara y la canción ‘Las casitas del barrio alto.’” Polis 10 (30): 477–93. https://doi. org/10.4067/S0718-65682011000300022. Soja, Edward W. 1996. Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-andImagined Places. Malden, MA: Blackwell. Torres Dujisin, Isabel. 1986. “Los conventillos en Santiago (1900–1930).” Cuadernos de Historia 6: 67–85. https://cuadernosdehistoria.uchile.cl/index. php/CDH/article/view/46536/48550. La Tercera. 2020, May 28. “Mañalich reconoce que en un sector de Santiago ‘hay un nivel de pobreza y hacinamiento del cual yo no tenía conciencia de la magnitud que tenía’. https://www.latercera.com/politica/noticia/manalichreconoce-que-en-un-sector-de-santiago-hay-un-nivel-de-pobreza-y-hacinamie nto-del-cual-yo-no-tenia-conciencia-de-la-magnitud-que-tenia/5BQZLGLOP VDDPKQ2SNSSSWRGYU/. Accessed 10 November 2021. Uribe, Begoña. Undated. “Clásicos de arquitectura: Villa San Luis/CORMU.” Plataforma Arquitectura. https://www.plataformaarquitectura.cl/cl/761 203/clasicos-de-arquitectura-barrio-san-luis-cormu. Accessed 10 November 2021. Vergara Perucich, Francisco, Felipe Encinas, Carlos Aguirre Núñez, Juan Correa Parra, Riccardo Truffello, and Felipe Ladrón de Guevara. 2020, March 25. “Ciudad y COVID-19: Desigualdad socio espacial y vulnerabilidad.” Ciper. https://www.ciperchile.cl/2020/03/25/ciudad-y-covid-19-des igualdad-socio-espacial-y-vulnerabilidad/. Accessed 10 January 2022. Vicuña Mackenna, Benjamín. 1873. Un año en la Intendencia de Santiago: Lo que es la capital i lo que debería ser. Santiago, Chile: Imprenta Librería del Mercurio. Vilches, Patricia. 2016. “Andrés Wood’s Machuca and Violeta Went to Heaven: The Geographical Spaces of Conflict in Chile”. Latin American Perspectives 43 (5): 45–61. https://doi.org/10.1177/0094582X16651084. Vilches, Patricia. 2017. Blest Gana via Machiavelli and Cervantes: National Identity and Social Order in Chile. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars.

48

P. VILCHES

Zuñiga, Diego. 2021, January 26. “La ciudad de la furia: Barrios para muy ricos, barriadas para muy pobres.” DW . https://www.dw.com/es/la-ciudadde-la-furia-barrios-para-muy-ricos-barriadas-para-muy-pobres/a-55992454. Accessed 10 January 2022.

CHAPTER 3

The Years of Constructing Daringly

Abstract This chapter presents the foundations, literally and metaphorically, of the Villa San Luis. The need for housing came to a critical level in the late 1950s in Chile. Heavy and steady immigration to Santiago had created a marginalized and house-insecure population and belts of abject poverty. Some of the pobladores sin casa started a grassroots effort, aided by left-wing and left-center political parties. When they felt there were no options left for them, they started illegal seizures of land, tomas, where they settled to formalize their living arrangements. The Frei Montalva administration had started initiatives to provide housing for those who in the past had been left out but the needs surpassed the apparatus provided by the government. The Allende administration accommodated the most vulnerable sectors. Through Villa San Luis, the CORMU effectuated a redefinition of the urban space, aiming to address the pressing needs of the pobladores sin casa. Keywords Villa San Luis de Las Condes · Tomas · Campamentos · Población La Victoria · Social housing · Santiago

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8_3

49

50

P. VILCHES

Dis/Locating the City Henri Lefebvre describes the transformation of medieval cities when “agricultural production” and “landed property” began to be displaced by “banking and commercial capital” (2000, 66). Major cities in the West established new exchange commodities and, subsequently, their urban landscape redefined itself to house those new financial institutions. The refashioned constructions foreshadowed the reign of capitalism. These types of edifices were also being recreated in emerging economies such as Chile, altering the space in the urban areas of the country. Santiago’s architecture, streetscapes, waterscapes, private and public spaces underwent a transformation which, in turn, modified the city dwellers’ way of life. Santiago mutated into a large financial center, and the nation’s elite turned into venture capitalists. During the first half of the twentieth century, the thriving of capitalism made members of Santiago’s aristocracy sell or leave behind their rural properties and change themselves into businesspeople to amass even bigger fortunes. At the same time, they transformed their segmented land from rentals a piso (a domain of the underprivileged), into constructions aimed at the middle classes, who were able to pay better rents or even buy their own homes, a development that affected the living situation of the poor (De Ramón 1990, 8). Modernity had penetrated the city of Santiago. Unskilled laborers ceased to reside in rural tenements and increasingly started occupying the urban space to chase jobs in industrial developments in the city. Factors that contributed to this exodus were an increase in land expansion in large properties, a more specialized labor-intensive exploitation, and a move toward technical rationalization of work in businesses and industry (Hidalgo 2019, 23). Between 1865 and 1920, immigration to the city increased dramatically and the city of Santiago grew a total of 339.61% (Torres Dujisin 1986, 67). Capitalistic developments became architecturally depicted in the urban areas in Santiago. A constant and proliferous flow of inhabitants to the capital—and other important cities in the nation, such as Valparaíso—created the conditions in poor urban areas for socially precarious, unsanitary, and structurally informal living arrangements. These became known as cuartos redondos [rooms with just an entrance door and no windows]. There were also the ranchos, defined by hygienist physician Puga Borne as “rooms built on the basis of materials composed of moist and rotting structures” (qtd. in Hidalgo 2019,

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

51

35).1 Finally, the conventillos became the most prevalent in the city. Most of the conventillos were in the northern periphery of the city and to a lesser degree toward the southwest part of Santiago (Hidalgo 2019, 78). These became a profitable business for landowners because they were made of poor-quality materials and could accommodate many families in a small space, without any regard for urbanization or hygiene. A capitalistic mindset and attitude prevailed. A regulation decreed in 1899 defined conventillos as such, “property designed to be let by rooms or by sections, to the proletarian people. The property should display a patio or a hall that will serve as a common space within the several rooms or the body of the building to be let” (Torres Dujisin 1986, 70).2 In Santiago, individuals with properties in the city began a journey away from the city center. Wealthy families had slowly begun leaving the city proper to find ‘more adequate’ locations in less inhabited, more lavish areas in the eastern part of Santiago, physically and metaphorically higher, closer to the Andes mountains. As a result, they left behind remnants of their opulence in old, large, and splendorous mansions that had served as a boast of people’s wealth and monetary gain. These structures now appeared inadequate for the city center and were being reformulated to more humble uses. They became divided into sections to be sublet for profit to the immigrating masses (De Ramón 1990, 8; Hidalgo 2019, 27). These previously patrician spaces were now overpopulated and had acquired working-class status to the point that they were also considered conventillos (Garcés 2002, 31). These urban ghettos exhibited changes of spatial perspective regarding land and profitability on the part of landowners. However, as need for working hands increased in the city even these new living arrangements were not able to handle the demographic explosion (De Ramón 1990, 8).

1 Translation mine. All translations from Spanish to English are mine unless otherwise indicated. 2 Regarding the transition from cuartos redondos to conventillos , the second structures represented some form of hygienic and social improvement for their inhabitants. Washing and cooking were done in an independent space. During the summer months, the families could gather together in their communal open space and, to an extent, socialize. For this reason, the life in a conventillo caught the attention of travelers and became the subject of articles in the press. “This way of living,” declares Rodrigo Hidalgo, “has been fundamentally associated with a collective type of living arrangement, with variegated characteristics, and different origins” (2019, 26).

52

P. VILCHES

The conventillos became the most characteristic living quarters of the popular sectors. Baldomero Lillo, a Chilean author known for accounts that concerned social issues, provided readers with protagonists from within the working classes and the downtrodden. Lillo held an empathic vision toward those subjects, narrating about their tribulations while offering a view of their living spaces in the conventillos : “[these were] rooms whose sordid appearance denoted the carelessness or avarice of the property’s owner … separated by thin walls the rooms had no windows and only had one door, the upper part of which had some holes that allowed some air to pass from the outside. Workers and day laborers occupied these rooms” (1968, 315–16).3 In a 1910 article for El Mercurio, an acute observer displayed distance and empathy when describing the composition of the people who flocked to such sorrowful arrangements: This type of housing agglomerates a part of the population that is most difficult to accommodate in good conditions. Accommodation for people who live on a fixed income or salary undoubtedly offers fewer difficulties than a worker who receives a weekly salary ... The problem is even more complicated in the case of numerous groups of people, especially women, who live from a manual trade or practice some small industry such as washerwomen, female greengrocers, and seamstresses, and who find refuge in the conventillos because nowhere else could they find a cheaper, but also more unhappy living space. (qtd. in Torres Dujisin 1986, 76) 3 Baldomero Lillo recounts the miserable life of Sabina, the protagonist of “El conventillo”: “It was Sabina, the laundress. She was a young woman, twenty-eight at the most. She was of very dark complexion and medium height, with withered features and sad brown eyes. She was a tireless worker, seen from dawn to dusk dedicated to her chores. Her husband, a baker by trade, despite earning forty or more pesos a week, allocated only an insignificant part of his salary to his family. As a result of this, the mother and her children, three boys and as many girls, spent a life of narrowness and misery that Sabina’s work could hardly relieve. When Onofre, her husband, did not get drunk, the family enjoyed a life of relative ease. With the two pesos, which were his daily contribution, they could stave off hunger in the household. But these periods of tranquility did not last long, and any day the oldest of the boys, who went every morning to wait for his father and bring a supply of bread back, would come to the room empty-handed and pronounce the sacramental sentence: – The old man has been drinking... From that moment on the mother had to multiply her tasks, work day and night adding more to her daily jobs and reduce consuming food herself to satisfy the voracious appetite of the hungry mouths that harassed her endlessly with the refrain. – Mamita, I want a piece of bread. Give me bread, mamita” (Lillo 1968, 317–18).

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

53

The housing problem was confronted variously by each administration, with the Catholic Church in a prominent role. In 1906, encouraged by a Papal Encyclical, a noteworthy step was taken when the Ley de Habitaciones Obreras [Law of Residential Housing for Workers] was enacted. Between 1906 and 1924, there were about 193 cités built in Santiago (Hidalgo 2019, 79). The name derived from the fact that the constructions recalled a medieval walled city, with a group of row houses that shared a private area and communicated with the public space through one or more entrances (Arteaga 1985, 18). The cités were supposed to remedy the housing deficit and the unsound conditions in which the poor lived. One of the main purposes of the Ley de Habitaciones Obreras was to build cheap and hygienic housing to be rented or sold to workers. However, poor planning meant that constructions that had been deemed unhealthy, which included numerous conventillos , were torn down very quickly while the construction of new, more adequate housing never equaled the amount that had been demolished (Hidalgo 2019, 55). In 1925 the Ley de Habitaciones Baratas [Law of Inexpensive Residential Housing] attempted to settle issues by creating cooperatives in which workers would be involved in solving their own housing issues. It is during this time that a collective awareness about ‘housing’ on the part of the government and beneficiaries began to take place, with the adoption of the term población to describe a single-family, residential unit for either employees or workers (Hidalgo 2019, 131). This was a significant step toward a social commitment on the part of the State to support the rights of citizens to housing; it indicated how a final realization of citizens’ needs had activated “a new residential urban morphology” with purposes that no longer connoted the construction of a residential space for the underprivileged “in any given street or isolated alley,” as administrations had done in the past. The city had begun to be more ordered (Hidalgo 2019, 131).

A History of Tomas National properties designated certain spaces for public use. Riverbanks and drainage canals, for example, were made available to underprivileged families but, by their own nature, they were highly insecure and hazardous living spaces. They signified egregious poverty. An emblem of these areas is the historical Zanjón de la Aguada, a riverbed that crosses the city of Santiago. Pedro Lemebel chronicles his childhood in Zanjón

54

P. VILCHES

de la Aguada (2003). The author arrived in the area with his family after having been pobladores of a conventillo. Lemebel states that the Zanjón de la Aguada “accounts for my beginnings as a writer. My vision of that landscape, numb with poverty, was my first chronicle. My roots as a writer are in the Zanjón de la Aguada … It is like a watering hole for the excesses of this city. It is in parallel with the Mapocho River, but it is more concealed: it represents the evacuation of social and political projects that have been vanquished” (qtd. in Gómez Bravo 2003, “Pedro Lemebel”). These precarious living conditions signaled extreme urban poverty and indicated a human geography of massive migrations from the rural locations to the urban space of Santiago (De Ramón 1990, 9–10). To be sure, affluent comunas such as Las Condes regularly contained pockets of informal housing for the marginalized. That is, the rich lived in the vicinity of a few vulnerable residents. Since its formation—first for agricultural space—Las Condes has been the choice of residency of some of the wealthiest citizens in the nation. By way of comparison, in the twentyfirst century the Municipality of Las Condes has a poverty level of 0.3%, the lowest of all the comunas in Santiago whereas the Municipality of La Pintana, located in the southern part of the city, has a 31% poverty level among its population (Márquez 2011, 88). Armando de Ramón examines how continuous immigration to Santiago aggravated the living conditions of the vulnerable. Between 1946 and 1964 all presidential administrations attempted to control this crisis by constructing different conceptualizations of viviendas for displaced families (1990, 12). Despite these efforts, governments did not address aggressively the social implications of massive migration to the urban space. This separated even further the poor from the rich. The exceptional difference in per capita earnings made cheap labor readily available for the city’s affluent, producing a further segregation that drove people “to the point of maximum separation of function” (Lefebvre 1991, 362). Santiago was following in the footsteps of many cities in Europe and Latin America as it modernized. A push for a new economic system turned Chile’s capital on its head, with private and public segments of the nation relying more and more on “capital, manpower … technology and science” (1991, 413). Architect Yves Besançon explains that the idea of social housing had not truly been formulated before the Villa San Luis (qtd. in López 2020). Governments and professionals in general pursued a prescription that more than anything else entailed removing poverty from principal

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

55

communities and relocating it to dispossessed land of little value in peripheral areas. The CORVI, Corporación de la Vivienda [ Housing Corporation], was created in 1953. The institution chose Santiago’s peripheral areas to build viviendas sociales. In its capacity as a construction agent, the CORVI benefited many while it also provoked a social geography that unleashed and perpetuated the idea of a segregated society (Hidalgo 2019, 247). The right to the city was not for all. New homeowners found themselves with a vivienda but far from relevant destination points in the city. Their homes were situated in districts that featured minimal urbanizing development, a fact which, according to De Ramón, diminished the quality of life for workers—they commuted long hours back and forth from their places of employment—and “exacerbated urban spatial segregation” (1990, 12). This did not solve the housing deficit. Any emptied informal housing left in the city by families who transferred to the periphery was occupied quickly by newly incoming immigrants until the available areas became saturated (De Ramón 1990, 11). The drive for industrialization and urbanization relied on electing governments that would deflate the role of the State. It gave priority to the primary outcomes of capitalism, with its market fluctuations, its competitiveness, its profit, and, as Lefebvre summarizes, with “its blind but rapid accumulation” that resulted in “slums at the edge of the city” (Lefebvre 1991, 316). By the mid-twentieth century, housing had become a pressing matter. After 1945, groups of homeless families began tomas of unused terrains to procure more permanent, although still insecure, living arrangements. An economic crisis endured by Chile in the 1950s exacerbated matters because the viviendas built with the aid of the State did not reach the projected number. As a consequence, tomas became even more prevalent (Hidalgo 2019, 250). With an ever-increasing vulnerable population, more informal structures were put together, made of pressed cardboard sheets for roofs and clay floors. They would spring up from one day to the next, set up as emergency solutions, but they quickly became permanent in the city. They became known as poblaciones callampas or casas callampas . As defined by Mario Garcés, these were improvised constructions made of waste materials and typically without any type of urbanization. They were erected by riverbanks, on slopes of hills, in public areas or on land of low commercial value (2002, 31–32). These constructions became ubiquitous in the urban space and they became synonymous in Chile with the idea of slums

56

P. VILCHES

(Besançon qtd. in López 2020). Additionally, ever since the 1939 earthquake, emergency constructions had started to be built to accommodate victims of natural disasters. These prefabricated homes were known as mediaguas and they became prevalent in the 1960s and are still used in Chile in times of emergency (Lawner 2010, “Mediaguas”).4 Toward the end of October 1957, a fire devastated a población callampa located in the cordón de la miseria [poverty belt] of the Zanjón de la Aguada. One thousand and more families abandoned the premises and headed toward an agricultural paño geográfico owned by the State, a terrain known as ‘La chacra de la Feria,’ located in what is now the comuna Pedro Aguirre Cerda. The pobladores sin casa executed a toma. It was the first organized seizure of land in Latin America; in Chile, it became known as the Toma de la Victoria. It was a sign of how charged the end of the 1950s had become.5 In such a light, the blueprints for the población La Victoria were designed by architects such as Lawner, part of a generation of architects from the Universidad de Chile that had studied the discipline of architecture under a new curriculum, with emphasis on urban renewal and social change. The families were following the guidelines of a new consciousness as homeowners and claiming their rights to the city; that is, they were taking by force what previously had been denied to them (Giannotti 2014, 41–42; Lawner 2019, “Miguel Lawner”).

4 Describing the poor quality of the mediaguas built during the first Piñera administration, Miguel Lawner emphasized the faulty structures of the emergency constructions. He indicates that Piñera stated that heavy storms had made the flooding of the mediaguas inevitable. Lawner had this to say: “No, señor Piñera. It was not inevitable to construct bad mediaguas … On March 13, I watched on t.v. the first mediaguas made by Un Techo para Chile [A Roof for Chile]. I wrote an essay called ‘Mediaguitas’ drawing attention to the poor quality of the product. I indicated that the partitions lacked diagonals, that the mediaguas did not have eaves and that the foundational supports were not reinforced. I did not capture it all. I did not notice the absence of a layer of felt for the waterproofing of walls and roof. I could not know either the poor quality of the wooden sheds, which makes the hermeticity of the union between pieces impossible. Neither was I aware then that the current mediaguas are delivered without windows or doors as such, but with covers made out of the same shed. This formula makes it impossible to seal these elements with their walls. The first rain laid bare the fraud. The mediaguas became a strainer from side to side and also from above. The interior flooding raised the floorboards, moistening the few belongings that victims had saved from the catastrophic earthquake of 27 February or had acquired later” (2010, “Mediaguas”). 5 For a panorama of the Toma de la Victoria, see Las callampas (1958), by filmmaker Rafael C. Sánchez. Available at http://archivofilmico.uc.cl/archivo/las-callampas/.

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

57

The new occupants had become social actors of a housing deficit that could no longer be ignored by the government. Formerly subdued by the nation’s dominant cultural and capital interests, the residents now sought legality and ownership on their own, aiming for ‘La chacra de la Feria.’ The takeover of land by the pobladoras and pobladores of La Victoria was conceptualized with affect by key sectors of society. In all their long negotiations with the Chilean government after the toma, the new dwellers were supported by official entities such as left-wing political parties, parts of the Catholic Church, as well as progressive students. But this organized action for securing a vivienda ‘desde abajo’ [from below] was unprecedented. The Toma de la Victoria was a milestone event in the movement of pobladores sin casa and its impact continues to resonate (Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 32; Cortés 2014, 240; De Ramón 1990, 15; Garcés 2002, 25; Giannotti 2014, 41–42; Lawner 2019, “Miguel Lawner”).

Tomas and Campamentos, 1960s and 1970s The appropriation of ‘La chacra de la Feria’ by those who had been previously homeless was nothing short of revolutionary. This unique and forceful political action by the Chilean working classes relied on popular leadership, grassroots efforts, and the advancement of sociopolitical thinking. After the Toma de la Victoria, political parties of all colors understood that they could no longer propose programs without including the ‘housing issue,’ designing solutions with different degrees of urgency to address the magnitude of the topic (Gross 1991, 37). By the 1960s the tomas and campamentos had become heavily politicized. Some slogans of the time underscored the relationship between a toma and political power: “De la toma del sitio a la toma del poder” [From taking land to taking power] was a slogan of revolutionary groups, such as the left-wing MIR, Movimiento Izquierda Revolucionaria [Revolutionary Left Movement] (De Ramón 1990, 14–15). On 16 March 1967, with poblador Juan Araya as their leader, a large group of families executed a toma in the old comuna of Las Barrancas to build a población that came to be known as Herminda de la Victoria (Garcés 2002, 356). (Herminda was the name of a baby that, we now know, had died of bronchopneumonia during the days of the toma.) The dramatic episode of Herminda de la Victoria was musicalized by Víctor Jara in a concept album called La Población (1972), with songs and dramatizations that

58

P. VILCHES

include episodes of life in a campamento. These are stories from subaltern subjects, hopeful to escape marginalization and achieve a dignified space in the city. Despite the fight by families who were living insecurely, the housing problem during the first half of the 1960s followed a traditional hierarchical route. Governmental removal of vast numbers of inhabitants from casas callampas in the main parts of the city to marginalized areas without urbanization continued. This promoted further social division in the urban space while also provoking an unwanted horizontal growth in the city (Hidalgo 2019, 276). The first official Plan Regulador Intercomunal [Intercommunal Regulatory Plan] of Santiago came about partly as a result of the ‘housing issue.’ Created in 1960, it was formulated by architects Juan Honold, Pastor Correa, and Jorge Martínez. It had high aspirations. The government sought to deal with the vast, disorderly, and informal sprawling in the city by planning an orderly, horizontal growth that, primordially, would designate borders between urban and suburban areas. The goal was to control urban expansion and conurbation with neighboring urban centers, such as San Bernardo, Puente Alto, and Maipú. This mega project assigned specific zoning for different types of spaces in Santiago, such as those designated as industrial, green, residential, and urban infrastructures. It was an ambitious plan that also addressed the need for constructing bigger roads for private as well as public transportation. It meant the birth of modern-looking paved roads apt for heavy traffic, such as Avenida Américo Vespucio and Carretera Norte-Sur (“Plan regulador”). According to Pablo Seguel, from CMN, the Villa San Luis was guided by this regulating instrument: it revealed “how the management of the city was conceived organically in the 1960s from an urbanistic and architectural perspective” (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). President from 1964 to 1970, Eduardo Frei Montalva pushed the Operación Sitio, an initiative that conceived the space of Santiago from the perspective of the proposed urbanization of the Plan Regulador. Operación Sitio aimed to guarantee at least “urbanized plots of land” where future occupants could build, using subsidized credit, basic homes with elements of urbanization (Allende and Olave 2018, 30; Kusnetzoff 1987, 159). Unfortunately, Operación Sitio became beleaguered soon after being implemented. According to Rodrigo Hidalgo, the Frei Montalva administration had counted on “an orderly social mobilization” that would be agreeable to “negotiate within the spaces” provided by

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

59

the government; but things did not go as projected, with social organizations subverting the control of the State (2019, 332). The slow progress of constructing affordable housing could not accommodate the great numbers of those in need. For Manuel Castell, the program was not successful, first, because “of the structural limits of the system (the difficulties of redistributing resources without affecting the functioning of private capital)” (1983, 200). Castell indicates that another difficulty became the pressure exercised by interest groups such as the Cámara Chilena de la Construcción [Chilean Chamber of Private Builders], and Savings and Loan businesses. Their goal was to use the program mainly for profit, which meant building for the middle classes (1983, 200). By the end of the 1960s, the población La Victoria was already consolidated. Despite efforts to bring order to the city, the ‘housing issue’ was still out of control. The pobladores sin casa grew increasingly impatient and grouped together to continue with tomas . There was a general sense that governments were not willing to address the marginalized in earnest. Half a million Chileans lacked housing and the pressure was mostly felt in Santiago. During its last year, the Frei Montalva administration repressed the illegal takeover of land, a desperate move that on 9 March 1969 caused a massacre in Puerto Montt, a southern city in Chile. This heinous act was repudiated by all and had the effect of reversing governmental impetus to suppress land seizure. This allowed for the continuation of mass squatting. Settlers were represented by committees, such as the Comités sin casa that, in turn, were advised by left-wing political parties (Castells 1983, 200–201). The conflict over procuring viviendas sociales narrated how the political winds were moving in Chile at the end of the 1960s. As he readied to leave La Moneda, Frei Montalva found himself without the support that had brought him to the nation’s highest office. The Christian Democrats had lost their power, which, on the one hand, caused the rise of “the traditional right-wing” parties and, on the other, further advanced the rise of the proletariat and revolutionary thoughts, with “the mobilization of strong popular opposition to the government” (Kusnetzoff 1987, 160). In the early 1970s, Las Condes possessed the greatest number of campamentos of any of the other areas in Santiago (Lawner 2008, 281; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 33). As the Allende administration took the housing issue in its hands, there were about 300,000 people living in campamentos in Santiago. These settlements visually exposed “the failure of the Christian Democratic

60

P. VILCHES

programme for urban reform,” as well as the limits of the government’s current system, and “the pressure of interest groups” that were always opting for profitability on purchased land, which meant that a prominent amount of housing was destined to the middle classes (Castells 1983, 199–200). The pobladoras and pobladores mobilized in ways that caught Chilean social institutions unprepared; they simply did not wait any longer and within months of energetic actions, underprivileged families were successful in obtaining “housing and services, against the prevailing logic of capitalist urban development” (Castells 1983, 201). The nature of the tomas illustrates how the nation was still following guidelines of an old order that completely disregarded the marginalized; for better or for worse, the new social agenda could no longer be stopped.

The Making of the Villa San Luis The Villa San Luis developed from the fundo San Luis, a large agricultural estate that occupied a space that included what is now the aristocratic Avenida Kennedy in Santiago. It was owned by Ricardo Lyon Pérez and his wife Loreto Cousiño Goyenechea. In their last names alone, these two individuals symbolize a space of affluence (more on this in Chapter 2). Their vast estate consisted of 153 hectares and had its Northern border on Avenida Kennedy; in the South on Avenida Los Militares; in the West on Avenida Américo Vespucio; finally, in the East it bordered with Nuestra Señora del Rosario. There had been a few issues along the way. Not surprisingly, the paño geográfico’s ideal placement resulted in a family dispute. Upon her husband’s death, Cousiño Coyenechea had the intention to turn the property she had inherited into a space that would benefit society. In the 1930s she bequeathed the lands to the nation for beneficence. However, use of the land for charitable purposes was objected to immediately by Cousiño Goyenechea’s own inheritors, who were aware of the highly commercial value of the space. Lawner recalls how decades of family litigation positioned the fundo San Luis in a type of a limbo. The disagreement and subsequent litigation kept the property from developing for decades, and until 1970 it remained a farmland, left uncultivated and unconstructed, surrounded by progressive architecture and “first class residential areas” (Lawner 2018, “Historia”). Stuck in the past, it gave off an aura of bygone times in the middle of Las Condes. In the late 1960s the fundo was still a bucolic scape: “Because fundo San Luis was a farm, in the middle of Las Condes one could still see cows

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

61

grazing … Las Condes had grown around the farm, which was in the heart of the comuna, and lingered in the past without being developed” (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). It remained an oasis in an area that had become known as a vibrant, European-looking urban space. Following the “garden city” model, modernized and urbanized Las Condes felt miles away from the fundo San Luis. The visualscapes of the latter included a vacant lot; however, it caught the attention of many because of its privileged location and extensive size, as well as its “great potential for connectivity and land use” (Uribe “Clásicos”). The fundo became meshed with social reform. President Frei Montalva initiated a more intense remodeling, rehabilitating, and rejuvenating of the urban areas in Santiago (Gámez Bastén 2006, 9). In 1965 his administration created the CORMU. Because of its mission the CORMU embraced the imperative of completing projects not geared necessarily toward a speculative exchange value of the land. To accomplish its urban improvement goals, the Frei administration gave the CORMU necessary legal frameworks. For the fundo San Luis, the CORMU had been endowed with the right to expropriate lands for public use. With legal teeth, and empowered by the State, the CORMU solved the endless Lyon Cousiño family litigation and resolved the fate of fundo San Luis by expropriating the lands in the name of the Chilean nation. This gave the CORMU a better chance for proper management and the use of effective mechanisms of urban planning (Lawner 2008, 289). The expropriation of the fundo was done in synchrony with the Christian Democrat government’s goals. Frei Montalva attempted to reach a middle ground that would satisfy society’s needs as well as entrepreneurs (Allende and Olave 2018, 33–34; De Simone 2018, 103; Lawner 2007, 2; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). The urban improvement project planned for the former fundo was known by the Frei Montalva administration as “Remodelación Parque San Luis” [Remodeling of Parque San Luis]. Its intention was to create a type of micro-city; it included a residential community for sectors of the middle- and upper-middle classes, with sprawling green areas and its own cultural center. There were plans to construct sixty-one 17–20 story shoe-shaped tiered towers with descending terraces. The project for such a community was without precedent in Chile (Allende and Olave 2018, 34–35; Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 32; De Simone 2018, 103– 104; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 19; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020).

62

P. VILCHES

Allende’s plans made clear that the social reforms of the Christian Democrat government had not been enough to erase the remnants of Jorge Alessandri’s 1958–1964 conservative period, which strongly adhered to “traditional capitalism” (Allende 1998, 4). In the midst of the Cold War, Frei Montalva’s campaign had been called Revolución en Libertad [Revolution in Liberty], which proposed to implant societal changes by the use of democratic tenets, distancing itself from the izquierda and eschewing any political rapport with the Soviet Union (Mu˜ noz Riveros 2013, 26). The idea of incorporating the underprivileged into the fabric of society became tangled up with the government’s careful association with capitalist global economies. Hence, the Christian Democrats had the spirit for social reform but not the capacity or willingness to bring it into effect; it was not good enough for the Chilean left, by any means. The extrema izquierda saw the democratic processes as bourgeois and destined to disappear. On the other hand, the extrema derecha felt the country was losing its compass and was heading in the direction of extrema izquierda radicalization. Ironically, the derecha progressively broke its ties with what had been traditionally considered constitutional democracy in Chile. Stalwart supporters of an old order regrouped under the Partido Nacional [National Party] (Mu˜ noz Riveros 2013, 35–36), redolent of the country’s ties to the land. In a way, the Partido Nacional incorporated the ethos of the old pelucones in much of their sociopolitical thinking which prompted them to push back the social clock, to uphold the cultural capital that the party’s adherents perceived as dissipating. Throughout his career, Allende adhered to—and had blind faith in— the processes of traditional democracy. No matter the cost, he believed in the power of the ballot. Despite the huge influence of the Cuban Revolution in Latin America, especially on young adults, “Allende knew that Chile was not Cuba” (Mu˜ noz Riveros 2013, 22). As the UP candidate, he alluded to a significant number of initiatives put in place by the Christian Democrat administration that needed to be reinforced or transformed. For the social welfare of low-income Chileans, he aimed high: The social aspirations of the pueblo of Chile are legitimate and feasible to satisfy. The people want, for instance, viviendas dignas without repairs that drain their income; schools and universities for their children; sufficient wages; an end to price hikes once and for all; stable work; timely medical care; street lighting, sewerage, drinking water, paved streets and sidewalks; a social welfare without privileges, fair and functional, without

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

63

hunger pensions; telephones, police, kindergartens, sports fields; tourism and resorts catering to the working classes. The satisfaction of these legitimate wishes–which in truth constitute rights that this society must recognize–will be the greatest concern of the UP Government. (Allende 1969, “Programa básico”)

When Allende took office, “Remodelación Parque San Luis” became transformed; the new President of the Republic gave priority to social housing. Following the urban and housing policies of the UP, it was critical to avoid past segregation of vulnerable people, who had been offered viviendas that were altogether unreliable and located only on the city’s periphery. Poverty in the past hindered what the nation wanted to express to the outside world and, equally, to its own citizens. Hence, along with providing housing, an effort had been made toward “making poverty invisible” (Besançon qtd. in López). Allende now looked toward an integrated type of architecture. In the words of Lawner, the CORMU professionals were on a mission, idealistically compelled to build a better world. They were inspired by world movements toward spatial justice, akin to the US movement to end racial segregation (2019 “Miguel Lawner”). From this angle, the intention of the Villa San Luis, as conceived by the Allende administration, was to create an emphatic and empathic integration of the lower sectors, who had become accustomed to living in informal settings, into an area of connectivity in the city (Allende and Olave 2018, 40; De Simone 2018, 104; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). The reevaluated project for “Remodelación Parque San Luis” still included viviendas for the Army and a field stadium for the University of Chile soccer team. Families were given the key to the first 252 apartments on April of 1972, seven months short of Allende’s second year in power.6 The apartment blocks were four or five stories high, with two or

6 Allende was moved by a sense of urgency: “Time was an obsession for the Socialist physician” (Toro Agurto 2014). Lawner described a meeting with President Allende to discuss the project: “Chicho [Allende’s nickname] asked: ‘By the way, how many houses are being built in Recoleta on the corner of Américo Vespucio?’ [Planning director] Sergio López remained silent. We all looked at each other. Eight seconds passed and Allende told us, ‘very well, gentlemen, notify me when you are ready’” (Lawner qtd. in Toro Agurto 2014). This energetic modus operandi on the part of the Socialist president became a magnet for a plethora of professionals who became equally committed to Allende’s designs.

64

P. VILCHES

three bedrooms and about 60 and 80 m2 [about 646 and 861 sq ft]; as more were finished, the apartment blocks became the residence of more than 1,038 families (De Simone 2018, 104–105). The creation of the población firmly established a precedent that all Chileans, no matter their social standing, had the right to have a home (Lawner 2008, 284; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). Lawner explained the CORMU’s decision at the time: We weren’t going to send anyone to the peripheral areas, so I called Miguel Eyquem, who had designed the first models [for the Remodelación Parque San Luis], and told him: ‘This part of the fundo San Luis will be designated for the homeless in Las Condes. They work in the area’. So why not? Why couldn’t the poor live in a wealthy comuna if their jobs were there? Why would we send the people from the campamentos to live at [the comuna of] La Pintana?. (qtd. in Toro Agurto 2014, “Villa San Luis”)

For Lefebvre the “process of industrialization” transformed cities in different ways, bringing forth an “urban problematic” which contemplated how cities, as they developed, would deal with growth, planning, leisure life, and the like, for their citizens (2000, 65). Overall, the creation of the Villa San Luis—constructed as a vehicle to deal with Santiago’s immigration, industrialization, and urbanization—ultimately was an emblem of the UP government. It showcased how Allende fought against urban segregation and endeavored to ignite social reform that included a spatial reorganization through egalitarian architecture and engineering. It was a critical point in mid-twentieth-century Santiago, both in its direction and growth as a city. From its inception, the población was conceived as ultra-urban: rows of apartment blocks to contain and prevent further urban sprawl toward the periphery. There had been construction of this type at the end of the 1960s, with “high-rise housing tower blocks” built in different parts of Chile and in the northern part of Santiago, localized at the Circunvalación [Ring Road] Américo Vespucio (Hidalgo 2019, 335–36). In this sense, the apartment blocks of the Villa San Luis embodied a new modality in the urban space; its aesthetics were progressive and innovative for the times (Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 35; Lawner 2008, 289–90). In fact, the formulation of apartment blocks caused a bit of perplexity in the future occupants. Since the targeted audience was not familiar with the idea of vertical domiciles, builders persuaded future new owners to warm up to the idea of apartment blocks with the vibrant (and

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

65

political) slogan Ahora vamos pa’arriba [Now we are going up] (Lawner 2008, 289). The blueprints for the Villa San Luis concretized the program of the UP government and its radical democratic turn. In this manner, material culture itself articulated Allende’s wishes for change. It transmitted “a type of architectural-urbanistic ‘artialisation (see Glossary)’” within the area; it defined an anticipatory image of a new landscape, a “resemantization of the urban space” in Santiago (Raposo and Valencia 2005, 5). In the words of David Harvey, Lawner and his team brought to light “that the way space is fashioned can have a profound effect upon social processes” (2009, 24). Certainly, the technical drawings of the property delineated a rupture, an opening in the oligarchical spaces of Chile. Right at the heart of a geographical space inhabited by most of Allende’s fierce opposition, Lawner and his team graphically ‘excavated’ the UP’s precepts toward spatial justice. It was a tremendous accomplishment. Lefebvre indicates: “The right to the city is like a cry and a demand. … [It] cannot be conceived as a simple visiting right or as a return to traditional cities. It can only be formulated as a transformed and renewed right to urban life” (2000, 158). So that the right to the city could be opened to more, the CORMU set up methods of savings and loans for people who did not have traditional access to them. The UP government felt that amending the ways in which housing had been traditionally administered was fundamentally important. With these gestures of inclusion, Allende’s presidency started to solve as best it could the housing problems, but it was not enough to end an increasing volume of tomas by pobladores sin casa (Lawner 2008, 286). These now had escalated to include a toma of a vivienda and not just of a terrain. Allende understood the danger and knew the housing matter had to include outlets previously unavailable to the working classes.7 There were many issues to solve, but the significance of the Villa San Luis still stands as a central aspect of Allende’s political dreams. For the project of the Villa San Luis meant physically transforming the societal layout of the nation’s capital. Whereas in the past the

7 Lawner indicates that the Minister of Housing from the outgoing Frei administration

handed over to supporters “keys to 5,000 apartments in the Metropolitan Region.” Those apartments “were finished and unassigned.” Lawner recalls that “Allende made a personal appeal to persuade the participants of these tomas to abandon the apartments. It was to no avail. This made the tomas become a disastrous precedent, one which came to haunt us throughout the Allende government” (Lawner 2007, 5).

66

P. VILCHES

space of the underprivileged had been kept marginalized, during Allende’s tenure the architectural goals were rearranged so that the wealthy areas would now exhibit actual proof of social equity. The CORMU furnished a dignified space in the city for the people of the Mapocho River. The inauguration of Villa San Luis was, therefore, a momentous occasion, truly, unprecedented: From mud to pavement, from darkness to light, from a modest ranch to a comfortable apartment. For most people it had been an unattainable dream. Several mothers cried when they received the keys from the población’s leaders, who handled the entire operation with extreme zeal. Designated young people were invested with authority and leadership conferred by their own counterparts and behaved as true homeowners. They knew the blueprints in detail, the assignments for the other new owners as well as the apartment numbers. They instructed the new residents with assuredness about the management of sanitary appliances or electrical panels. They advised the new owners to abandon useless stuff. ‘Why are you bringing these rotten boards, compañerita [female comrade]! ... you should see the beautiful closets that we have for you’. (Lawner 2007, 5)8

The level of involvement of the pobladoras and pobladores in the construction of the Villa San Luis was unheard of at the time. The CORMU took different measures because they were dealing with an unusual type of buyer. As a result, the future residents became emotionally involved with the Villa San Luis even before it started to be built. Namely, people were given agency in the process of designing their future homes, an action that set a precedent for urban construction in Chile (De Simone 2018, 105). By pre-assigning each apartment to a future owner from the beginning, the CORMU also helped to safeguard the households from tomas , with the future residents being vigilant about protecting their homes as they were being built (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). In fact, Lawner recalls how families made a point of visiting the architects, engineers, and other professionals at the CORMU, eager to learn how 8 Lawner provides details of moving day for the new occupants: “They knew the apart-

ments they were moving into, but, as they arrived many of them could not quite believe it. A closet was an absolutely unknown element to them. They had shown up with drawers, sugar crates, baskets, some with wooden boards from their mediaguas … Little by little they began to throw things away; a gigantic pile was built with all that junk they had brought and a bonfire was started” (qtd. in López García 2017, “La última pelea”).

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

67

the project was advancing. During the weekends, whole families would set up picnics in the surrounding areas of the CORMU offices and celebrate each new development as it would bring them closer to attaining their dream home (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). Alfonso Raposo and Marco Valencia analyzed the CORMU’s architectonical-urbanistic drive in the decade 1966–1976, asserting that it underscored “emblems of social integration, and new collective images in a symbolic space, all of which were expressed in the field of production of urban space, especially when carried out from the public domain” (2005, 9–10). As Lawner stated, the political formulation of Allende’s government, a democratic way toward Socialism, was unheard of at the time, “an unusual case, unique until now in humanity” (2019 “Miguel Lawner”). The CORMU ‘cemented’ a new path toward social integration promoted by the State. It gave the right to the city to people who had lived insecurely in the past. The Villa San Luis not only meant a transformation in the urban space but also a new societal order, altering the hierarchical modus operandi of Chilean society. For Hidalgo, “The purpose [during the UP] was to build viviendas that would satisfy not only the housing shortage, but also the needs of the city” (2019, 376). The CORMU typified a compromiso, an effort of political-administrative institutionalization and consciousness, within which a framework of relatively unprecedented channels became opened in the national psyche. Ultimately, the CORMU’s directives toward spatial justice gave exemplary definition to one of the many reasons Allende pushed for the presidency for eighteen years.

References Allende, Francisca, and Scarlett Olave. 2018. El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes. Cómo los camiones de la basura de la dictadura desterraron una población al olvido. Santiago, Chile: Ceibo. Allende, Salvador. 1969. “Programa básico de la Unidad Popular.” https://www. marxists.org/espanol/allende/1969/diciembre17.htm. Accessed 20 January 2020. Allende, Salvador. 1998. “Allende por Allende.” In Salvador Allende en el umbral del siglo XXI , edited by Frida Modak, 1–7. Mexico, D.F.: Plaza & Janés. Arteaga, Óscar. 1985. “El cité en el origen de la vivienda chilena.” CA: Revista oficial del Colegio de Arquitectos de Chile 41: 18–21.

68

P. VILCHES

Bianchini, Maria Chiara, and Pulgar P. Claudio. 2008. “Villa San Luis de Las Condes: Lugar de memoria y olvido.” Revista De Arquitectura 14 (18): 29– 40. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-5427.2013.28163. Castells, Manuel. 1983. The City and the Grassroots: A Cross-Cultural Theory of Urban Social Movements. Berkeley: University of California Press. Cortés, Alexis. 2014. “El movimiento de pobladores chilenos y la población La Victoria: Ejemplaridad, movimientos sociales y el derecho a la ciudad.” Eure 49 (19): 239–60. De Ramón, Armando. 1990. “La población informal. Poblamiento de la periferia de Santiago de Chile. 1920–1970.” Eure 16 (50): 5–17. https://repositorio. uc.cl/handle/11534/3703. De Simone, Rosa-Liliana. 2018. “Instalando la ciudad del consumo: El palimpsesto urbano del primer shopping mall chileno en el fundo San Luis, Santiago.” Eure 44 (133): 91–112. http://www.eure.cl/index.php/eure/art icle/view/2326/1111. Gámez Bastén, Vicente. 2006. “El pensamiento urbanístico de la CORMU: 1965–1976.” Urbano: 9–18. http://revistas.ubiobio.cl/index.php/RU/. Accessed 11 January 2020. Garcés, Mario. 2002. Tomando su sitio: El movimiento de pobladores de Santiago, 1957–1970. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Giannotti, Emanuel. 2014. “Una ciudad de propietarios. El caso de la Población La Victoria. A City of Owners.” Revista AUS 15: 40–45. https://doi.org/ 10.4206/aus.2014.n15-08. Gómez Bravo, Andrés. 2003. “En el Zanjón de la Aguada están mis raíces como escritor.” La Tercera. 12 July. http://www.memoriachilena.gob.cl/602/w3article-96709.html. Accessed 15 January 2022. Gross, Patricio. 1991. “Santiago de Chile (1925–1990): Planificación urbana y modelos políticos.” Eure XVII. 52/53: 27–52. http://www.eure.cl. Harvey, David. 2009. Social Justice and the City. Vol. Rev. ed. Geographies of Justice and Social Transformation. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press. Hidalgo, Rodrigo. 2019. La vivienda social en Chile y la construcción del espacio urbano en el Santiago del siglo XX. Santiago, Chile: RIL Editores. Kusnetzoff, Fernando. 1987. “Urban and Housing Policies under Chile’s Military Dictatorship: 1973–1985.” Latin American Perspectives 14 (2): 157–86, JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/2633701. Lawner, Miguel. 2007. “Demolición de la Villa San Luis en Las Condes: Historia de dos despojos.” Santiago, Chile: CENDA (Centro de Estudios Nacionales de Desarrollo Alternativo). https://www.cendachile.cl/autores/miguel-law ner#h.p_ND-WmCtY6N58. (Destacados). Accessed 14 January 2020. Lawner, Miguel. 2008. “Viviendas dignas para hombres dignos.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al. 281–305. Santiago, Chile: LOM.

3

THE YEARS OF CONSTRUCTING DARINGLY

69

Lawner, Miguel. 2010. “Mediaguas: No era inevitable.” Plataforma Urbana. 16 May. https://www.plataformaurbana.cl/archive/2010/05/16/mediaguas-% E2%80%9Cno-era-inevitable%E2%80%9D/. Accessed 12 January 2022. Lawner, Miguel. 2018. “Historia de la Villa San Luis de Las Condes.” defendamoslaciudad.cl. Accessed 31 January 2020. Lawner, Miguel. 2019. “Miguel Lawner en primera persona: ‘Participé en la toma de la Población La Victoria, lo digo con orgullo.’” DiarioUChile. 14 https://radio.uchile.cl/2019/05/14/miguel-lawner-en-primera-per May. sona-participe-en-la-toma-de-la-poblacion-la-victoria-lo-digo-con-orgullo/. Accessed 10 November 2021. Lefebvre, Henri. 1991. The Production of Space. Translated by Donald Nicholson Smith. Oxford, UK: Blackwell. Lefebvre, Henri. 2000. Writings on Cities. Selected, Translated and Introduced by Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas. Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. Lillo, Baldomero. 1968. Obras completas. Biographical Introduction by Raúl Silva Castro. Santiago, Chile: Nascimento. López, Constanza. 2020. “Otra vida para la Villa San Luis.” Pauta. 4 July. https://www.pauta.cl/ciudad/historia-de-la-villa-san-luis-en-las-condesacuerdo-constructora-y-familias. Accessed 27 September 2020. López García, Estela. 2017. “La última pelea de la Villa San Luis.” 7 July. Qué Pasa. http://www.quepasa.cl/articulo/negocios/2017/07/la-ult ima-pelea-de-la-villa.shtml/. Accessed 28 March 2021. Márquez, Francisca. 2011. “Santiago: Modernisation, Segregation and Urban Identities in the Twenty-First Century.” Urbani Izziv 22 (2): 86–97. https:// www.jstor.org/stable/24920580. Accessed 27 January 2020. Mu˜ noz Riveros, Sergio. 2013. A partir de la UP: El aprendizaje democratico. ´ Santiago, Chile: La Copa Rota. “Plan regulador de 1960.” Undated. Memoria chilena. Biblioteca Nacional de Chile. http://www.memoriachilena.gob.cl/602/w3-article-93812.html. Accessed 12 November 2021. Raposo, Alfonso, and Marco A. Valencia. 2005. La Interpretación de la obra Arquitectónica: “Historia de las realizaciones habitacionales de CORMU en Santiago 1967–1976”. Diseño Urbano y Paisaje 2 (4): 2–23. Romero, Constanza, and Felipe Santibáñez. 2022. Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende. Santiago, Ediciones Cinco Ases. Toro Agurto, Ivonne. 2014. “Villa San Luis: La caída del último bastión de Allende en Las Condes.” The Clinic. 19 May. https://www.theclinic.cl/ 2014/05/19/villa-san-luis-la-caida-del-ultimo-bastion-de-allende-en-las-con des/. Accessed 25 May 2020.

70

P. VILCHES

Torres Dujisin, Isabel. 1986. “Los conventillos en Santiago (1900–1930).” Cuadernos de Historia 6: 67–85. https://cuadernosdehistoria.uchile.cl/index. php/CDH/article/view/46536/48550. Uribe, Begoña. Undated. “Clásicos de arquitectura: Villa San Luis/CORMU.” Plataforma Arquitectura. https://www.plataformaarquitectura.cl/cl/761 203/clasicos-de-arquitectura-barrio-san-luis-cormu. Accessed 10 November 2021.

CHAPTER 4

The Just City Invaded

Abstract This chapter narrates the fate of families forced to abandon their legitimate homes during Chile’s dictatorship. After the coup d’état of 11 September 1973, Pinochet took the helm and cemented his legacy, with a noted record of human rights violations. He knew the potential monetary gain he could obtain from appropriating for the Army the land of Villa San Luis. About three years after the coup, among other groups from the Armed Forces, army personnel started despojos [evictions] of the families that lived at the población. Most of the expelled families were transferred to peripheral areas of the capital, far from Las Condes. Some were shoved into garbage trucks and dumped into sitios eriazos [deserted areas]. In a nation that had abruptly begun an era of censorship and restricted communication, most Chileans never knew of this egregious violation of human rights carried out by the Armed Forces against its fellow citizens. Keywords Villa San Luis de Las Condes · Chilean dictatorship · Despojos · Santiago

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8_4

71

72

P. VILCHES

Construction, Affect, and Fear of Tomas Patricio Gross summarizes the complications and critical effects of modernity in the urban space when Allende started his UP government. Decades of rapid and relentless sprawl in Santiago caused progressive “urbanization [and] metropolization”1 in the city, provoking marginalization and subpar living arrangements in the poorest sectors of society. In time, revolutionary ideas brewing in segments of the extrema izquierda, such as that of the MIR, started to promote tomas as a political means to attain the power of the people. The thinking and the acting of a toma triggered a strong current toward social movements and resulted in a conception of the land that tended toward urban informality (1991, 45). This could be observed in the way a toma became contextualized and applied. The Villa San Luis was built to satisfy the needs of many pobladores sin casa but a vast number of families without any prospects for permanent residence continued to settle in campamentos , putting pressure on presidential administrations prior to the UP government, a fact which became accentuated during the Allende administration. Campamentos had started to spring up not only on the periphery but also in nearby high-income neighborhoods in the Eastern part of Santiago (Gross 1991, 45). According to Rodrigo Hidalgo, by 1971, there were about 57,000 families living in campamentos in Santiago alone. And the numbers were not about to diminish. Hidalgo has examined the compelling influence of the extreme political stance of the MIR when dealing with the housing scarcity. The left-wing movement viewed the housing problem as a broader issue, one that reflected poorly on what were the best interests of Chilean governments for the pueblo. By organizing the masses, the MIR felt that the people could become the protagonists of their own destiny, an effort that had the effect of displacing and truncating attempts at planning an orderly city (Hidalgo 2019, 353). Armando de Ramón argues that since the pobladores sin casa chose different parts of the city where they would seize a piece of land indiscriminately and causally, the political act of the toma in a sense resulted in narrowing spatial urban social segregation (1990, 16). Ultimately, however, the construction of the Villa San Luis in a space like Las

1 Translation mine. All translations from Spanish to English are mine unless otherwise indicated.

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

73

Condes testifies to the radical choice of the CORMU—for the times—to shelter families with social housing needs in a pristine urban space. Affect for Las Condes played a major role in the lives of people who lived in insecure viviendas in the prestigious comuna. Many had emigrated to Santiago at some point or had been born in Las Condes as the offspring of rural immigrants. For the children, their lives had been spent in informal conditions. Adults had secured a place of work in the vicinity, as gardeners, in domestic service, as chauffeurs, and so on. The ideal location of the población allowed the residents of the Villa San Luis to continue their work in the neighborhood (Allende and Olave 2018, 40; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020; Pulgar 2010, 112). Besançon specifies that the very idea of the Villa San Luis was ahead of its times, creating a rapprochement among different social strata in a thriving urban space, “what today we would call a mixed and inclusive neighborhood” (qtd. in López 2020). It was an effective move that attempted to stop what Santiago had become, “a city divided into neighborhoods for the rich and neighborhoods for the poor” (Pulgar 2010, 112). The construction of the social housing was developed directly by the social philosophy of the professionals of the CORMU. It was “driven with great impetus by Miguel Lawner and very much in accordance with the ideas of the times. It [was] commissioned to several architects who added their own touch to the different sets of apartments. Miguel Eyquem, Arturo Baeza, Luis Emilio Alemparte, and Cristián Fernández,” were some of the prominent names in architecture at the time and they became involved in the CORMU project (Besançon qtd. in López 2020). Some of these professionals went beyond the duties of architecture and worked in close contact with Chilean citizens that had suffered from housing insecurity all their lives. The CORMU planned and executed a spatial turn in the city of Santiago, within “the materialized and the socially constructed spatiality of human life” (Soja 2009, 12). The amalgamation of young professionals and pobladores sin casa became a twentieth-century version of what had occurred in Chile’s 1800s with the Sociedad de la Igualdad,2 which united liberal patricians with artisans and

2 The implementation of the Sociedad de la Igualdad within the context of Chilean culture is further explored in Chapter 2. In some ways, the nineteenth-century Sociedad de la Igualdad presented a pre-Allende sociopolitical initiative of sorts. It aimed to disrupt the social order that the Chilean elite held in its grip. Many of its members, emanating from aristocratic, liberal sectors, were “seeking an alternative, more egalitarian and democratic

74

P. VILCHES

people from the working classes. In nineteenth-century Chile, it was an extraordinary case of solidarity and empathy that probed into Chile’s hierarchies, bringing together “top hats and frock coats… with straw hats and woolen ponchos,” which became a truthful “cross-class political mobilization,” to quote James Wood (2011, 188). In the twentieth century, the CORMU catalyzed the spirit and the aims of such society. It brought together people from different sectors to follow Allende’s vía chilena. The harsh winter of 1971—by Chilean standards—complicated construction work on the Villa San Luis. According to a meteorological report from the time, snow fell in Santiago on 21 June 1971, between 2:00 am 5:00 am. For the capital, dealing with 5 centimeters [about 2 inches] of snow was at best challenging; at worse, it incapacitated the city. There were other storms unrelated to the weather. There had been conflict on the left over the UP program, which affected the vivienda in Chile. The MIR had promoted tomas as a political means to attain the power of the people. For its part, the government promoted dignified living via traditional, democratic, methods, all informed by the Villa San Luis project itself. Additionally, the Allende administration had to confront a formidable enemy, the Cámara Chilena de la Construcción (Hidalgo 2019, 365–366). The institution felt threatened by the egalitarian designs of the various construction projects and boycotted the effort of the UP government, standing firm with the private sector “to protect the capital of the entrepreneurs associated with such institutions” (2019, 366). According to the CORMU engineer and computer scientist Helmuth Stuven, most established constructoras were boycotting the project: “there were just five companies that had the courage to come forward and say, ‘well, let’s get this thing done’” (“Entrevista” 2007, 00:01:42-00:01:51).3 1971 was the first year of the Allende administration and the new president was already confronting a daunting, tenacious, and relentless opposition. Allende, however, had had decades to make up his mind vision of the republic” (Wood 2011, 187). As I stated elsewhere, the members of the Sociedad de la Igualdad “put the state of the republic into question in a way that resonated again later during Allende’s long bid for the presidency” (Vilches 2017, 15). 3 For the first stage of the Villa San Luis, the plan was that the CORMU would build apartments in two different areas, 120 in one and 256 in the other. The following five inmobiliarias would build the rest of the apartments: Arquín 121, Desco Dos 117, Desco Cuatro 175. Moller & Pérez Cotapos 127, and Boetsch & Cía. 122. It would amount to 1,038 apartments in total (Allende and Olave 2018, 43).

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

75

about what version of Chile he wanted to develop. As a medical student in the late 1920s, Allende stated that he studied with progressive classmates and that part of their activities entailed reading Marx and Lenin. He also recounted that during that time as a student from the provinces, he lived in student housing, in a modest barrio, a fact that made him build a rapport with the pueblo (“Compañero presidente” 1971, 00:06:17– 00:06:43). With respect to the viviendas for the Villa San Luis, his decision had been made immediately. Despite his convictions, the path to success was tough. To illustrate, construction material was in increasingly short supply. The external pressures erupting from the Cámara Chilena de la Construcción and other private areas propelled the CORMU to take extra measures to obtain what was necessary to finish the población. Furthermore, there was yet a greater peril, a fear shared by the CORMU, the constructoras hired by the CORMU, and the future neighbors of the Villa San Luis: the constant menace that the apartments could fall prey to tomas . These illegal seizures had become a permanent and generalized form of intimidation and affliction for citizens and had created abundant political tension. For Lawner, the tomas plagued the efforts of the Allende administration while also serving as fodder for the opposition (Lawner 2007, 4; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). For their part, these denizens of Las Condes became hyper-vigilant and felt in their own skin how their dreams of being homeowners could risk going to waste: “Our husbands would wake up at night and take turns guarding the apartments to prevent people from other poblaciones from doing a toma,” says Juana Albornoz, at the time a pobladora from the Villa San Luis (qtd. in Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 26). Likewise, Ana María Epuñan, who lived in the población from the age of twelve until nineteen remembers that even before her family moved into their new apartment, her parents went every single night to the construction site to guard the apartment they had been assigned, fearful that their future home would become part of a toma: “my mother always took good care of our apartment, during and after construction,” reminisces Epuñan. She added that “as a family, we became attached to the place months before it was finished. We were frightful of a toma but at the same time we felt the strength of knowing that we were not going to allow anybody to take our dream home from us” (Epuñan Interview 16 December 2021). Considering the long, litigious history of the fundo, the first segment of the apartment complex was completed in record time. Alberto Collado, partner in Arquín, one of the construction companies involved in the

76

P. VILCHES

project, stated that “there had been heavy rains and everything was full of mud. Those ended up being the most complicated problems of delivering [the apartments], not the homes themselves” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 52). Nonetheless, the threat of tomas of the Villa San Luis apartments increased each day and changed the outlook of the site for the brand-new constructions. The future occupants felt compelled to set up a micro version of campamentos on the construction site to guard their future properties. Norma Molina, a former pobladora of the Villa San Luis, explained that even though her family’s apartment was not yet finished, they were always on the premises. Informal settlements had sprung up not far from the new población: “people wanted to do a toma of our homes. At various times we had to come and throw people out of the apartments to which we had been assigned legally. We had no choice but to come this way and to stay put by the main entrance of our future apartment” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 52). Likewise, Marmaduque Barrera, a former poblador, indicated that things became difficult for the families assigned to live in the población, “people felt compelled to set up tents to guard their apartments, feeling the pressure that other families could do a toma of their homes.” Like many others, Barrera decided to wait it out close by his assigned space, “I stayed vigilant until we were able to receive the viviendas legally” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 51–52). The future occupants were not exaggerating in their zealousness; the real possibility of a massive toma of the población was weighing heavily on the CORMU and the people from the constructoras. They decided to speed up deadlines. As a result, the first apartments were distributed earlier than expected—some of them were not yet completely finished. The tomas demonstrated distinctly that the Villa San Luis could not fulfill the needs of all. This turn of events had unique impacts in the población. It made the settlers acutely attentive to the construction process, starting from blueprints up through the concrete structures that would become their homes. They knew that determined external forces wanted to rob them of their long-sought goal. We can see how far the tenets of democracy were being stretched at the time by some pobladores sin casa, willing and eager to take somebody else’s home illegally. The circumstances also exposed how a political opposition, unwilling to support or negotiate measures for a better distribution of wealth, complicated the población’s construction. Families without a home knew that a hierarchical administrative system was not working for them or rather, had never worked for them. On the other hand, the construction of

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

77

the Villa San Luis exemplified how the homeowners felt understood and supported directly by the new Executive power. This interconnectedness showed that during the UP government, a dignified vivienda social was coming to fruition politically but not administratively, necessarily (De Ramón 1990, 16; Gross 1991, 46). In a general manner, thus, the way the pobladoras and pobladores related to the Executive branch vis a vis their right to a vivienda told the history of the three years of the UP government. Allende felt in unison with the pueblo. For him, a dignified way of life included the fact that the pueblo could write its own Constitution (“Compañero presidente” 1971, 00:23:12–00:23:44).

A Site of Despojos The Villa San Luis was greatly impacted by the coup d’état. Its very existence was an affront to Allende’s opponents, many of them residents of Las Condes. Demonstrating the abundant political freedom for the opposition during the UP government, the municipality of Las Condes had set up numerous barricades to prevent the población dwellers from taking full possession of their new homes. Lawner affirms the commitment on the part of the pobladoras and pobladores. Even though they had dutifully made their monthly mortgage payments as residents of the apartments, the municipality had delayed the trámites [procedures, bureaucratic steps] of the homeowners. The aim of this delay was to prevent the inhabitants from obtaining their title deeds. Among the trámites was the critical step of finalizing the connection of water, sewer, and electricity, for example (Lawner 2007, 6; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). This tug of war between the CORMU and city hall revealed how everything had become politicized. Now, with the Military Junta, there was only one authoritative voice in Chile and, as could be expected, the población suffered. The Allende administration program was disassembled by the Armed Forces. Over time, circa 1,000 Villa San Luis families, who had been given the keys to their new homes, and legally assigned to their apartments, were forced out by the Army and other Armed Forces groups. As stated earlier, there had been animosity at the administrative level of Las Condes when the locals had moved into proper residences in the posh neighborhood. Now, backed by the dictatorship, the citizens of Las Condes singled out and demonized the proletarian families. The inhabitants came to be characterized as terrorists and subversive spies, “the rich didn’t want us nearby. They saw us as a source of danger,” said Gabriela Ríos (qtd. in

78

P. VILCHES

Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 38). They adduced that the residents had made a toma of the apartment blocks and claimed that the homes had originally been assigned to military personnel. In writing, the new authorities proclaimed that those transgressions would be remedied and that “the offenders would be reinstated to various other points of the city” (Lawner 2007, 9). The householders and their families were subjected to intimidation, violence, and their rights to homeownership were taken away. Signaling the Army’s keen desire to acquire the Villa San Luis, the despojos of the families were executed from the early years of the dictatorship (a few of them right after the coup) (Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 33–34; Allende and Olave 2018, 70; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 49). The evictions had been carefully and orderly planned by the Pinochet administration. Shortly after the coup, the Junta government made an abrupt stoppage of the monthly mortgage payments from the families. These were formerly paid by the occupants into an account that, on behalf of the CORMU, had been opened especially by the CORHABIT, Servicios Habitacionales [Housing Services] through the CORVI, Corporación de la Vivienda [Housing Corporation]. According to Pablo Seguel, from CMN, the CORHABIT and the CORMU used this type of mechanism to circumvent the minimum amount of money that the homeowners would have needed to qualify for a home. The families were pre-assigned a home and, then, they began their payments. A total of 787 apartments were pre-assigned (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). Some families had their monthly mortgage deducted by payroll at their places of employment, as Epuñan explains had been the case for her family (Epuñan Interview 16 December 2021). The families became aware that the mechanisms for the payments had stopped after the coup. Many say that, upon learning this, fear had overwhelmed them. The majority did not want to exacerbate matters by inquiring about the stoppage of mortgage payments; they felt that perhaps their best bet was to remain ‘invisible.’ They hoped the Junta de Gobierno would leave them alone. A few brave families attempted to remedy the uneasy circumstances provoked by the dictatorship. Lawner states: “Some went to the CORHABIT to find out about their unusual situation, but they never received an answer” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 56; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 48). With the matter of mortgage payments in limbo, the families experienced days of extreme uneasiness and anguish. They had reason to fear. The Junta government erased the legality of the administration of the apartments

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

79

which laid the groundwork for the Army to use the excuse that the residents had performed a toma of the apartments. Lawner laments, “The account that the CORMU had set up for the residents of the Villa San Luis at the CORHABIT had been made to disappear” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 56; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 48). In time the pobladoras and pobladores of the Villa San Luis received a letter, slipped at night under the door of each home, signed by Ramón Gutiérrez as Deputy Director of the SERVIU Metropolitano, (see Glossary), pointing out that “because the apartment that you now illegally occupy has been transferred [as a property] to another institution, the SERVIU is renovating another property for you to make possible your relocation in adequate and stable conditions” (qtd. in Lawner 2007, 9). Epuñan remembers that her family received the ominous letter on a Friday, at a time when she was the only one at home: “I didn’t know what to do when I read about the eviction. I felt that I had nowhere to turn, nobody to call. I found myself in a desperate situation. Worse, I had to convey the terrible news to my family” (Epuñan Interview 16 December 2021). The message by the SERVIU belied the reality of what would eventually take place. Without any regard for actually making “possible your relocation in adequate and stable conditions,” as the letter stated, the families were ill-treated by the uniformed troops who had been sent to evict them. Most of them were dumped in various parts of Santiago, all poor or semi-rural geographical spaces that were very distant from Las Condes. These dramatic and violent despojos took place at night while Santiago slept. As a case in point, on the night of 28 December 1978, various sources and informants specify that at least 112 families were expelled from the premises.4

4 It should be noted that the Consejo Monumentos Nacionales, enumerating the criteria used to declare the Villa San Luis a national monument, used 1976 and not 1978, as the year that the despojos of 112 families took place: “That, on 28 December, 1976, in an act condemned by public opinion, a group of 112 families were evicted at midnight and transferred to various points in the capital, 17 of them were taken to a vacant lot in Pudahuel, 20 were left on a soccer field at bus stop 37 in Santa Rosa, 8 on a road in San José de Maipo, 4 in a garbage dump in Lo Curro. The rest of the families were transferred to Renca. Of the evictions carried out between 1975 and mid-1980, for diverse reasons only 95 families were not relocated. In the 1990s, the SERVIU delivered title deeds for apartments in blocks 14, 15, 16 and 17, corresponding to lot 18-A” (CMN 2017, Decreto No. 135).

80

P. VILCHES

The homeowners never forgot the garbage trucks used for their families’ despojos , according to Constanza Romero and Felipe Santibáñez in Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende (2022). Evicted families were forced to travel on Army vehicles, buses, or other types of locomotion, such as the infamous garbage trucks, with little time given to gather personal possessions, furniture, or the like. Many of those interviewed narrate that the moment felt unreal, like a horror film, with parents quickly gathering their children and a few of the items they owned. María Eugenia Cáceres recounted that as she gathered her belongings, the military personnel that had been sent to her house ran out of patience. They took the things from her hands and threw them out the window. Soldiers stationed below picked them up and pitched them into a garbage truck (Cáceres Interview 28 June 2022). Some of the trucks had the logo of the Municipality of Las Condes while others had the Municipality of Santiago: “They put two or three families together in each garbage truck. The trucks hadn’t even been washed. At least, they could have said to themselves that ‘no matter how poor they are, we’re going to clean this up before we put them in these trucks.’ As they piled us up in the back of the truck, I remember how it reeked of garbage everywhere” (Cáceres qtd. in Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 47). Families had fought tomas and endured general uncertainties to have a home in the Villa San Luis, a place that became idyllic for Antonieta Miranda. She immediately made friendships and considered herself lucky to have an apartment close to amenities and places to play. It all turned into a nightmare on that 28 December, when Miranda was not yet thirteen. She recounts how they heard harsh orders shouted from outside the door and how her family’s home was surrounded by military people that night. “I saw my parents cry, devastated by what was going on. They didn’t know what to do at first, where to put our things, how to choose what to bring with us to an uncertain future we didn’t know where,” Miranda recalls. “They became impatient and started to take things from my parents’ hands and started to throw them down the balcony, without a sheet for protection or anything of the kind. Our belongings fell on a garbage truck, the same vehicle where they would later order us to climb in. I still remember my mother’s silent tears and my father’s look of desperation because he couldn’t do anything to protect his family or to prevent being kicked out of the Villa San Luis.” Miranda underlines that after that horrific night, they became completely disconnected from their previous lives, not knowing exactly where they were, with the only

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

81

certainty that it was impossible ever to return to their beloved población: “We were very aware that there was no turning back. After decades of living here I have come to terms with the idea that this is my home. This is my barrio. But it still hurts to know that what my parents invested in was taken away from them, from us, in such a cruel manner,” she adds (Miranda Interview 16 December 2021). The families had found a home in the Villa San Luis. Gladys Arriagada had arrived at the población via her daughter’s father, who had lived in one of the campamentos on the banks of the Mapocho River. After he was assigned an apartment, he moved his family with him and bequeathed the property to Arriagada and their daughter. She relates with exactitude that she and her family were ousted from the Villa San Luis on 23 April 1980. What she could gather of her belongings was thrown into garbage trucks where she, her partner, and their daughter were also roughly loaded into that night. They were transported to a southern comuna called Lo Espejo, shaped like the comuna Pedro Aguirre Cerda, both known for their highdensity population and soaring levels of poverty. In fact, she is now a neighbor of Epuñan. Arriagada describes how she lost the right to the city. Indicating that her life changed overnight, she underscores the loss of the amenities of the comuna of Las Condes. She could not comprehend where she had been relocated to or where her whole social network had gone. She and her family were on their own. Even in the twenty-first century, decades after the Army’s heinous act, Arriagada still does not have easy access to some of the basic needs of a community, such as a metro line to go to work, supermarkets to do grocery shopping, banks, and other types of organizations that can provide a dignified type of living. She remarked that on that fateful day in 1980, life took an irremediable turn for her: “when I lived in Las Condes I was very close to my place of work. I could leave my daughter with trusted people and that would be it. Afterwards, it took me more than two hours to get to work. For a while I stopped working but after I finally separated from my partner, I was forced to leave my daughter alone at home while I went to work. I had no other option but to survive” (Arriagada Interview 16 December 2021). The streets that surrounded the apartment where she and her family lived are still vivid memories for Ximena Salinas. As a nine-year old, she describes the happiness she experienced when on the very first day of her arrival at the Villa San Luis, she made a plethora of new acquaintances and also greeted the children she already knew from where she used to live.

82

P. VILCHES

The Salinas family, like many others in the población, came to the Villa San Luis via the población El Esfuerzo, a settlement on the banks of the Mapocho River, which has a prominent role in Andrés Wood’s Machuca (2004) (More on this in Chapter 2). The coup d’état extinguished any hope for a brighter future for her family, Salinas explains. They were afraid to lead normal lives, fearful of the military. Worse, in October 1978, shortly before the family was evicted from the población, Salinas had been hit by a car and was bedridden. She narrates that, on the night they were expelled from the población, military personnel turned up and surrounded the family with machine guns, proceeding immediately to push and shove the family, ordering them to gather their belongings quickly. She says that all the material things that were dear to them and had been obtained with much sacrifice by her parents went flying off the balcony: “They treated us very ill. I don’t think they viewed us as people, but as inferior beings that needed to vacate the premises immediately.” At one point, since she could not walk on her own because of the automobile accident, Salinas was picked up by her father to bring her downstairs. He was abruptly intercepted by a raging military man, a person who added insult to injury by saying to Salinas’s father that he was a “mother-- and take your bastard child with you downstairs fast,” while continuously hitting her father in the ribs with the back of his machine gun. “That’s how my father and I left the Villa San Luis,” emphasizes Salinas. “This will remain with me for the rest of my life. And I have told this story to my children and to my grandchildren” (Salinas Interview 24 December 2021). Her family arrived in the población because of a personal commitment by Salvador Allende to provide housing for the poor, recounts María Yolanda Flores. As part of the community of El Esfuerzo, Flores and her family attended a rally shortly before the 1970 September election held by the UP candidate for the Presidency. Flores recalls that Allende announced that if elected, he would change things in the nation. They would no longer be afraid of floods during wintertime or feel so vulnerable all the time, “I’ll take you away from the river,” he had promised them. At first, Flores lived in an apartment at the Villa San Luis with her mother; however, at some point after the coup, through acquaintances that she had made at her place of work at the SERVIU, Flores was given a key to her own apartment in the Villa San Luis. She was now married and was herself raising her own family, a little girl and a recently born son. On that fateful 28 December, military personnel arrived and told them that they were going to get a new home, which Flores said was a lie

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

83

that they concocted to dissuade them and disarm any opposition. They did not allow her family to take any of the furniture that they had acquired with their savings. Once on a military truck, things took a turn for the worse. Flores noticed that her son, only months old, was turning purple. Although fearful of the uniformed men, she mustered the courage to tell one of the military people that her son was not doing well. One of them said curtly: “We are not stopping anywhere for you. We are doing exactly what we were ordered to do and that’s it.” Thankfully for Flores, the man driving the truck took compassion: “‘You’re talking to a human being’ he appealed to the other man. ‘Don’t you have any children yourself?’” Flores said that the words had an effect. The first man did not do or say anything for a few moments. Suddenly, he made a gesture indicating to the driver that they would do something about the sick baby. The truck changed course and went in the direction of the hospital Calvo Mackenna in the also affluent comuna of Providencia where mother and son were allowed to go into the Emergency Room. The truck waited. Flores’s son was seen by physicians who determined that the baby had contracted bronchopneumonia. He was hospitalized. Flores’s despair became even more acute, quickly realizing that she had no other choice but to leave her infant son at the hospital. She knew the military people would not wait for that long. She went back to the truck and joined the five other families that had suffered from a despojo that night. Many extended their arms and patted Flores’s back to give her comfort. “Nobody spoke a word for the rest of the trip,” added Flores. They were trying to come to terms with their circumstances, unaware of their destiny. The military people stopped in a sitio eriazo [uncultivated land] and left the families there, the truck taking off without any instructions from the person in charge. “We were just dumped there,” says Flores. They were now on their own to fend for themselves. Narrating her story Flores stated that “my breasts were so swollen. I didn’t have my baby with me. I didn’t know when I would see him again.” Flores would eventually see her son again at the hospital 15 days after the family was evicted from the apartment (Flores Interview 27 December 2021). Once she and her family were thrown onto a garbage truck, Cáceres recounts that their sense of smell made them acutely aware of a fetid odor; they abruptly realized that the vehicles had neither been washed nor even cleaned before they had been piled indifferently into them. The pobladora and her family’s pitiful journey to an uncertain destiny was intensified by the loss of their property and valuables as the truck sped away from the

84

P. VILCHES

Villa San Luis. Drivers were feverishly looking for a back route so that other Chileans would not witness what was taking place at the Villa San Luis. Cáceres said that she and her family had been literally ‘piled up’ with other families: “the trucks were so full of belongings that these began to fall and spill onto the road. Behind, another garbage truck had brought personnel who were collecting items that fell from our truck and throwing them away.” On that ominous journey, Cáceres said that her family lost many boxes, including one that had many precious belongings, such as a set of curtains that she had saved for and bought to beautify her home. “There they were, floating onto the highway,” says the pobladora. She also lost boxes with personal information, such as her marriage license, insurance cards, employment certificates, and school documentation for her children. “I had to work very hard to gain back our lives. I was left with no legal paperwork. I fought to get back documentation for my children, so they could go to a new school. I lost all rights to a pension. I had no way of proving that I had worked many years.” Cáceres adds that what awaited them in their new homes left her despondent: “They took us to where Army families had lived. I found a stinking place, without any kind of comfort. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. In the bathroom, the toilet was cut in half, filled with worms and other disgusting things. We had to deal with bed bugs that infected my poor children. It all felt like a nightmare from which I couldn’t wake up” (Cáceres Interview 28 June 2022). In the documentary, “Villa San Luis: La consagración de la pobreza” (2015), documentalist Jaime Díaz Lavanchy interviews former residents who recount a similar experience. Ester, a pobladora who faced a despojo choked back tears as she recounted her story: “It was horrendous. It was truly ugly. But we had no choice in the matter … [The night we were evicted] we were on the lookout for which tower they [the military] were getting into. When they finally came to ours, I said to my husband, ‘we are dead’, because our apartment was on the first floor… It felt like everything that had been ‘us’ had ended. That was the thing. I just took my child into my arms and I had to do whatever they said. There was nothing else to do … It is still so painful for me. That’s why I don’t like to talk about it. I don’t know whether I would be capable of seeing the Villa San Luis again” (qtd. in Díaz Lavanchy 2015, 00:15:33-00:16:50). Jorge Cepeda, a teenager at the time, said that he saw many of the evictions. He and his family were not part of the original families; they arrived at the Villa San Luis in 1978, via a family member who was in the military.

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

85

Because of their particular circumstances, they became longtime residents. The matter of the previous status of the apartment that the Cepeda family occupied became the elephant in the room in our interview, with that history being left unsaid during our conversation (Cepeda Interview 17 December 2021). It could only be hypothesized that perhaps the Cepedas had become occupants of an apartment left vacant by a family forced out of the población. Cepeda underscored how inhabitants came to be identified by their different backgrounds, as ‘civilians’ on the one hand or ‘uniformed’ on the other, demonstrating how the make-up of the población was being changed by the dictatorship. Cepeda described that the evictions took place during the early years of his residency there. He was a witness to residents being taken out of their apartments by force, with their things thrown off balconies onto trucks, and with families piled up into different vehicles. A gregarious person, he had befriended many of his ‘civilian’ neighbors, and years after, he says that it appeared to him as if they had left the country because he did not know where they had been relocated (Cepeda Interview 17 December 2021). The Villa San Luis was known as phase 1 of a project that envisioned a second set of apartment blocks. These constructions are known as Villa San Luis 2 and, in the words of Pablo Seguel, from CMN, that segment of the población remains exactly as it was when built, “with a typology very similar to the structural archetype of the Villa San Luis” (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). The Villa San Luis 2 became the refuge for the family of one of the people interviewed for this book. Lawner comments how Villa San Luis 2, with apartment blocks in terracotta color and no more than 250 meters—circa 821 feet—from the original población, became the pride of architecture students from the Universidad Católica (Allende and Olave 2018, 47). Born six months before the coup d’état, Nano Aguirre narrates the events that took place during the despojos suffered by his family from the perspective of his family’s accounts: “It was very dramatic. I have no way of knowing what happened that night, but I’ve heard about it from my parents and other family members. My sister says that even though she was five years old she has never been able to forget it; she remembers it clearly. After the coup [the military] came to our house and threatened us, especially my father. They pointed a machine gun at him while they started to turn things upside down in the house. My family said that they even kicked my crib.” Like Cáceres, Flores, and Salinas, Aguirre’s parents had lived in El Esfuerzo. In fact, forty members of his

86

P. VILCHES

family had been allocated apartments at the Villa San Luis and most of them had been previously living in El Esfuerzo. Equally, the whole family was evicted from the Villa San Luis: “With that eviction they divided our family; including us, one part was transferred close by to the Villa San Luis 2. The rest was sent to the comuna Pedro Aguirre Cerda. This separated our family forever. It has never been the same again. The despojos were a crime that they committed against more than 1,000 families. Many people died of grief since it was a hard blow to leave Las Condes for other comunas and with all that moving itself implied. It killed their spirit” (Aguirre Interview 10 January 2022). The evicted families were in shock, according to Francisca Allende and Scarlett Olave, authors of El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes (2018). Luis, one evicted member of the población, for example, was not aware where he had been ‘disposed of’ by the Army. In desperation, he reached the Vicaría de la Solidaridad [Vicariate of Solidarity] by foot. He made it there because as he asked around and told his sorrowful story, fellow Chileans recommended that he head for the Vicaría. He spoke with Bishop Enrique Alvear and Rita Farías, a social worker and a Vicaría staff member. He said that Army personnel had arrived at his and other families’ homes at the población and had told them that they had to leave their homes: “‘You have one hour to get into the vehicles that are outside, take everything you can from your homes and get into the vehicles with your families’ … it was at night with weapons and everything,” Luis explained as he was still in a daze (Allende and Olave 2018, 9–10). With the help of Rita and the Bishop, Luis was able to retrace his steps back to where he, his family, and other families had been ‘relocated’: Once [Luis, Rita and the Bishop] reached the displaced families, they saw numerous people that Rita had never met before. They made such a big impression on her that she has never forgotten their faces. The adults had contracted, expressionless mouths, betraying distress and sadness. ‘We never heard a single complaint, not a single lament from anyone,’ Rita recalls. Some were crying quietly, others remained lost in their thoughts and in such a state of despair that not even the presence of Rita nor that of the Bishop could give them relief … ‘They were busy thinking about what they were supposed to do, how they would manage the children, what they were going to eat. They were dealing with fundamental aspects of human survival,’ says Rita. (Allende and Olave 2018, 12–13)

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

87

Paradise Lost Ester, a former inhabitant interviewed by Díaz Lavanchy in his documentary, became very animated when asked about her feelings being the owner of a brand-new house. She reminisced that her apartment in Las Condes was beautiful, “and while there we achieved several things. We bought a refrigerator, for example, which we didn’t have before. Things started happening for us. I worked at home and [my husband] worked at a barbershop… we were able to save money and afford to pay for the mortgage. We were doing well” (qtd. in Díaz Lavanchy 2015, 00:14:4900:15:32). Arriagada underscored how much easier life had been in Las Condes for them, with many more guarantees for a good life, “health, education, all types of benefits. I never had to walk long to go to the supermarket or get errands done. Afterwards, we entered a new environment where nothing was available. We are all poor here. Who is going to help you or how could you ask anybody for help? I hurt for my daughter when I think about the quality of life she would have enjoyed had we stayed at the Villa San Luis” (Arriagada Interview 16 December 2021). Epuñan described the easiness with which she could get in touch with people in Las Condes, “my parents worked in houses that had phones and my contacts could leave a message for me. I never lacked for work or for things to do with friends. I was active in many social groups and I always had something to do.” At one point, Epuñan said that her parents for a while worked in service in the presidential residence of Allende in Tomás Moro, and that she made the president’s acquaintance (Epuñan Interview 16 December 2021).5 Cepeda did not share an eviction story, but he also did not evade the subject matter of the despojos and is nowadays an independent witness of that part of Chilean history. Likewise, his words communicated empathy toward what his neighbors endured. For his part, Aguirre was a baby when his family was evicted. Nonetheless, he understands the ins and outs of the chronicle of the población: “Villa San Luis has two histories, that of the families that were evicted and that of those who came to live in the apartments afterwards. These were people in the military 5 The comments of the former pobladora Ana María Epuñan echo the findings of a study done on public housing in New York City by Samuel Dastrup and Ingrid Ellen: “Higher-income neighborhoods tend to offer a richer set of amenities and opportunities. This tendency is generally true for the neighborhoods surrounding public housing in New York City” (2016, 95).

88

P. VILCHES

or family of the military. These are two visions. You spoke with Choche [Cepeda], he was the son of a military family. I stayed in the Villa San Luis 2 and he and I started to share things on a daily basis. We studied in the same schools. There were soccer championships that we were part of. We started a friendship that continues to this day. That’s how things went for Choche and me” (Aguirre Interview 10 January 2022). In this respect, the memoryscapes of a happy time while living at the población were shared by all who once lived in the Villa San Luis. Reminiscing about the población, all the people interviewed projected an elation of sorts toward the neighborhood of Las Condes. Perhaps, a few of Cepeda’s words betrayed some guilt, derived from understanding the goodness that had been bestowed upon his own family when they were transferred to the población and the loss for those who were evicted. Undoubtedly, he transmitted affect for the población: “I lived my life to the fullest while at the Villa San Luis. I played sports, I belonged to various Youth Centers, and made many friends. I still hold on to some of those acquaintanceships. It was the time of my life” (Cepeda Interview 17 December 2021). Likewise, Aguirre, who no longer lives at the Villa San Luis 2, gives testimony to how things would have been in the original Villa San Luis had people been allowed to remain there: “What I experienced in the Villa San Luis 2 I could not have experienced anywhere else. It was mystical, a unique thing.” He also reflects on how the passage of time has changed things for the occupants of the Villa San Luis 2: “Now it is not like that so much. Many old folks have already left us. And there are many new tenants who believe that by living in Las Condes, their social status has gone up. But for us who were born and raised in Las Condes, we know that things do not necessarily have to be like that. We learned to live with different types of people, with people who had more and people who had less. It did not matter” (Aguirre Interview 10 January 2022). The fate of the pobladoras and pobladores of the original Villa San Luis was not uniform. A few of the families from the apartment blocks were never evicted by the Armed Forces or others during the 1970s or early-tomiddle 1980s. Those families were spared the fate of most of the people that were interviewed for this book. In fact, a few families who remained ‘till the bitter end’ at the Villa San Luis managed to strike lucrative deals with the inmobiliarias interested in the paño geográfico (more on this in Chapter 5). Romero and Santibáñez narrate that the former homeowners would become uneasy hearing of the monetary deals made by some of their counterparts. They “look down, turn their heads, run their hands

4

THE JUST CITY INVADED

89

through their hair or twist their mouths”; some manage to say feebly that they ‘got paid at least’.” The journalists add that the evicted people do not seem to resent those families. “Some shrug their shoulders, indicating that ‘such is life’ and ‘good for them.’ The majority prefer not to comment at all” (2022, 77). In the case of the Cepeda family, Choche Cepeda says that his mother, a person who earned a living as a military cook, at one point—when many of the apartments had already been abandoned or torn down—became intimidated and pushed to leave the premises by a neighbor who belonged to the CNI, the Pinochet secret police. She did not offer much resistance and acquiesced to the neighbor’s orders, much to Cepeda’s chagrin (Cepeda Interview 17 December 2021). In a sense, Cepeda’s family was expelled in a similar manner by the Pinochet people. Overall, fate was cruel to many of the families of the Villa San Luis. But it was not fate, in fact; it was an authoritarian government that could do as it pleased. Living with such a tragic change of circumstances has marked many of these individuals, who remain acutely aware that they lost something dear to them. The Villa San Luis is described unanimously as an ideal space, a place for possibilities, at times remembered as a paradise lost, where they once led dignified lives. As Epuñan emotionally states, “my wings were cut the night we were cast out. I was nineteen. I worked and studied in the comuna of Las Condes … I felt like a stranger in my new neighborhood of Santa Olga in the comuna of Lo Espejo. Nothing made sense. There were no buses or any type of transport that would connect us to the rest of Santiago. I lost all my contacts, my work, my life” (Epuñan Interview 16 December 2021).

References Allende, Francisca, and Scarlett Olave. 2018. El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes. Cómo los camiones de la basura de la dictadura desterraron una población al olvido. Santiago, Chile: Ceibo. Bianchini, Maria Chiara, and Claudio Pulgar. 2008. “Villa San Luis de Las Condes: Lugar de memoria y olvido.” Revista de arquitectura 14 (18): 29–40. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-5427.2013.28163. CMN. 2017. Decreto No. 135. 29 June. “Declara monumento nacional en la categoría de monumento histórico a la ‘Villa Ministro Carlos Cortés (Villa San Luis de Las Condes)’, ubicada en la comuna de Las Condes, provincia

90

P. VILCHES

de Santiago, region metropolitana.” https://www.monumentos.gob.cl/mon umentos/monumentos-historicos/villa-ministro-carlos-cortes-villa-san-luiscondes. Accessed 9 March 2020. “Compañero presidente: Entrevista de Régis Debray a Salvador Allende Gossens (1971).” YouTube Video, 00:32:42. Posted by Felipe Henríquez Órdenes, 8 March 2013. https://youtu.be/NeNeIl9BXII. Accessed 28 March 2021. Dastrup, Samuel, and Ingrid Gould Ellen. 2016. “Linking Residents to Opportunity: Gentrification and Public Housing.” Cityscape 18 (3): 87–108. www. jstor.org/stable/26328274. Accessed 28 January 2020. De Ramón, Armando. 1990. “La población informal. Poblamiento de la periferia de Santiago de Chile. 1920–1970.” Eure 16 (50): 5–17. https://repositorio. uc.cl/handle/11534/3703. Díaz Lavanchy, Jaime. 2015. “Villa San Luis: La consagración de la pobreza.” YouTube Video, 00:32:42. Posted by Memoria Visual Producciones, 26 December 2015. https://youtu.be/kfEIDE4btPA. Accessed 28 March 2021. “Entrevista Helmuth Stuven 1 de 2.” 2007. YouTube Video, 00:04:27. Posted by Unctad III on 30 January 2009. https://youtu.be/Jcn9A4FBVq0. Accessed 18 January 2020. Gross, Patricio. 1991. “Santiago de Chile (1925–1990): Planificación urbana y modelos políticos.” Eure XVII (52/53): 27–52. http://www.eure.cl. Hidalgo, Rodrigo. 2019. La vivienda social en Chile y la construcción del espacio urbano en el Santiago del siglo XX. Santiago, Chile: RIL Editores. Lawner, Miguel. 2007. “Demolición de la Villa San Luis en Las Condes: Historia de dos despojos.” Santiago, Chile: CENDA (Centro de Estudios Nacionales de Desarrollo Alternativo). https://www.cendachile.cl/autores/miguel-law ner#h.p_ND-WmCtY6N58 (Destacados). Accessed 14 January 2020. López, Constanza. 2020. “Otra vida para la Villa San Luis.” Pauta, July 4. https://www.pauta.cl/ciudad/historia-de-la-villa-san-luis-en-las-con des-acuerdo-constructora-y-familias. Accessed 27 September 2020. Pulgar, Claudio. 2010. “Lugares de memoria y olvido, el derecho humano a la ciudad.” In Ciudad y memorias, desarrollo de sitios de conciencia en el Chile Austral. Santiago, Chile: Salesianos Impresores, S.A. Romero, Constanza, and Felipe Santibáñez. 2022. Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende. Santiago: Ediciones Cinco Ases. Soja, Edward W. 2009. “Taking Space Personally.” In The Spatial Turn: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, edited by Barney Warf and Santa Arias, 11–35. London: Routledge. Vilches, Patricia. 2017. Blest Gana via Machiavelli and Cervantes: National Identity and Social Order in Chile. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars. Wood, James A. 2011. The Society of Equality: Popular Republicanism and Democracy in Santiago de Chile, 1818–1851. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.

CHAPTER 5

From Social Experiment to Chile’s Most Expensive Paño Geográfico

Abstract This chapter explores the fate of the Villa San Luis de Las Condes after Chile’s transition to democracy. Pinochet and his cabinet did not properly formalize their original and illegal seizure of the población in the 1970s. Making questionable use of an official 1971 decree between Allende’s government and the Army, Pinochet acquired the land on behalf of the Army, making a substantial profit by selling it to the private sector. Most of the población was transformed into affluent and shiny constructions, becoming what is nowadays Nueva Las Condes in Santiago. Most certainly the pressure of the approaching 1988 plebiscite caused one part of the real estate, lote 18-A, to revert back to a few families that had not been evicted from the población. They sold their properties to real estate companies while the previously expelled Villa San Luis inhabitants struggled for memorialization of Allende’s architecture for a just city. Keywords Villa San Luis de Las Condes · Pierre Bourdieu · Cultural capital · Affluence · Vulnerable population · Santiago

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8_5

91

92

P. VILCHES

Pinochet’s Hand in a Capitalist Imagined Community Looking at the effect of a long-term military regime and the influx of capitalist markets on a new Chilean democracy, this chapter examines the fate of the Villa San Luis. For the Military Junta, the establishment of an au courant, more ‘modernized’ Chile had implied new ways of perceiving the nation. Private ownership, investments in global markets—to the detriment of a national market or a larger State—high risk speculation, and so on, were now fundamental pieces of “an imagined political community” (Anderson 2006, 6). In the hands of the private sector, most of the población was eagerly razed by bulldozers. A semi-abandoned space, its structures began a steady decay, a fact that did not reverse the course of its fate during transition to democracy. It took decades for some of the original dwellers to receive even symbolic compensation, during which time Chileans progressively began to give credit to Allende’s ambitious goals to create a just city. Pinochet’s extreme actions toward the Villa San Luis lay bare his formidable control over the nation, even at the dawn of a new democracy. The general swiftly took away the rights to the city from its modest inhabitants. Pinochet had waited all his life for his role as Supreme Director. In the highly rarified political atmosphere of 1973, Pinochet had performed loyalty and convinced Carlos Prats, then general-in-chief of the Army and Allende’s trusted man, that he would make a safe and suitable choice as head of the Army in the event Prats were to resign. Forced by the circumstances, on 23 August Prats finally threw in the towel—his personal and professional life in shreds—and proposed Pinochet’s candidacy to Allende and the president accepted: “They had not yet discovered his limitless capacity for treachery and ambition”1 (Amorós 2019, 327). The reversal executed by Pinochet is said to have impacted Allende hard. This just shows how “from a Machiavellian perspective, the general knew how to perform the role of an obscure military man for political purposes” (Vilches 2017, 305).2 1 Translation mine. All translations from Spanish to English are mine unless otherwise indicated. 2 Pinochet performed the role of the subservient subject to perfection: Elsewhere I have said that “Prats fatefully erred in his appreciation of Pinochet. He did not foresee the true nature of the man he considered to be dull and manageable. To his chagrin, Prats

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

93

From 1973 to 1980, the government privatized most State-owned companies and agencies, following a plan to transform the totality of “Chile’s political economy” (Constable and Valenzuela 1991, 189–90). Privatization of the industrial sector invited a globalized investor-friendly atmosphere. In the beginning, the path was rough. In the early 1980s, private groups acquired a plethora of companies owned by the State and became overextended in their debt, causing a near bankruptcy of the nation. Via a capitalismo popular, a type of oxymoronic working-class capitalism, the workers bailed the empresarios out of their predicament. The State also had to intervene to reverse the trend (Mönckeberg 2015, “Otras preguntas sobre el pasado”). Things levelled off and the empresarios became successful in their enterprises. Deploying the language and practice of trickle-down economics, the mundo empresarial proudly announced that making some of them extremely wealthy was merely a result of invigorating the country as a whole. The benefit would be for the well-being of all. Starting in 1987, international investors took advantage of favorable market rates and joined in Chilean capitalistic ventures. Some invested directly (‘cold’ capital), while others used what became known as ‘hot’ money, relying on capital gains and fluctuations in interest rates (Agosin 1995, 468; Constable and Valenzuela 1991, 192). Pinochet saw himself as a trail blazer, a guru of capitalist markets who was not bound by political ideologies of the past. Indeed, he even considered himself above and ahead of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher (José Piñera qtd. in Constable and Valenzuela 1991, 190). This bonanza for a few meant the exclusion, impoverishment, and complete elimination of previous State benefits for a host of unfortunate Chileans (Joignant 2012, 588). The United States eventually raised pressure on Pinochet for a suitable exit from power. The dictator had become a thorn in the side of the powerful nation, and, in a way, he had become passé. The American nation encouraged and approved the extreme free-market economy that Pinochet had built, but it felt disquieted by Chile’s autocratic rule. Worse, the dictator himself, with his airs of grandiosity and notorious record of human rights abuses, had never truly been ‘appealing’ to the giant of the North. Its State Department was concerned that Pinochet had set down roots and that he had decided to stay in power permanently after 1989. He had to go, but it had to be done nonchalantly, brought into the limelight a siútico, a resentido social, a social misfit, with an enormous thirst for power and recognition” (Vilches 2017, 314).

94

P. VILCHES

in a way befitting the times, without the intervention of a revolutionary left, for example (Amorós 2019, “El sabor de la derrota”). A critical point arrived in 1988. The Constitution of 1980, put together by the Comisión Ortuzar [Ortuzar Commission], the Consejo de Estado [State Council] and the Military Junta, was written to resist political parties with leftleaning sympathies. The new Magna Carta had not neglected to formalize Pinochet as president for eight years. One of its articles stipulated that, after those eight years, a new candidate for the presidency—unsurprisingly, it became Pinochet himself—would need to be ratified by plebiscite, with a subsequent term of eight more years. The dictator had provided his opponents with an opportunità, in a Machiavellian sense. But the opposition had been dormant and suppressed for so long that its prominent members could not quite believe it at first. Ultimately, a grassroots movement grew into a sophisticated campaign for the 5 October 1988 plebiscite, where the opposition mended fences and became united in forcing the autocrat’s hand. By choosing ‘No’ at the plebiscite, more than fifty percent of Chilean citizens kicked the dictator out. The power of the ballot had brought democracy back, a fact that was hailed by the national and international community. In fact, a Chilean newspaper stated humorously that Pinochet had been the only candidate running in the election and he had still managed to lose the race. There had been no need of an upin-arms confrontation against Pinochet. Slowly, the plebiscite developed expectations in the opposition. The publicity for the ‘No’ campaign hit the bull’s-eye with its offer of hope, optimism, and change. Things were looking up, it seemed. Yet, the country had experienced profound changes at the hand of Pinochet and the 1980 Magna Carta was one of the most formidable leyes de amarre, best interpreted as ‘tie-up laws,’ binding laws, of the pinochetismo. Having the country firmly under his grip, the general—aided by economic groups, among them the ‘Chicago Boys’—had made use of virtually any and all capitalist economic tools to raise the profile of Chile, at a tremendous cost to the majority of the country’s citizens. Per Pierre Bourdieu’s theories on social relations, Pinochet’s status made him connect with a most enticing cultural capital (1986, 16–17). The general had waited for the right time to reveal his narcissistic ways, eager to be flattered while betraying “a desire for ostentation, explainable in a middle-class individual who became overnight the owner of a country” (Gazmuri 2012, 376). Upper-class and a sector of middle-class

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

95

Chileans reaped economic benefits during the dictatorship. When it came to Pinochet, they made a Faustian bargain, and the Villa San Luis was one of its objects. Even under democracy, they denied the violence of the Junta and its secret agents, or they simply looked the other way; they “accept[ed] moral complacency as the price of economic comfort” (Stern 2004, xxvii). Having the allegiance of Chile’s wealthiest citizens, Pinochet was catapulted to incredible heights.

Pinochet and the Villa San Luis in Democracy Even after the authoritarian government went out, Chileans continued to imagine themselves as part of a dictatorial community. Under these conditions, Chile took on the onerous task of reshaping itself after a militaristic legacy of 17 years. Its citizens stood eager, but they were also perplexed as they faced this next chapter of democracy. Books, essays, visual arts, soundscapes, ceremonial events, and a multitude of other artistic expressions have been dedicated to capturing the affect and effect of Chile’s transition to democracy in the 1990s.3 Pamela Constable and Arturo Valenzuela describe how the coup “had frozen society at a point of great trauma and divisiveness” with people closing channels of social interaction and keeping to themselves, unable to interact, “remain[ing] locked within separate microcosms, nursing their mutual fears and private dreams” (1991, 10). María Olivia Mönckeberg in her groundbreaking book El saqueo de los grupos económicos al Estado chileno, describes the private practices and machinations of powerful financial groups who became extremely wealthy during the dictatorship. Their actions jumpstarted the nation’s economy. The country came to be hailed by the international markets as neoliberal practices propelled the republic forward. Chile looked like a First World nation to many on the outside. But the cost was high, and it favored a very narrow sector of society while condemning many to a lesser life. The title of Mönckeberg’s book literally means ‘The Looting of the Chilean State by Economic Groups.’ It was first published

3 For further reading on the Pinochet era and transition to democracy, see Steve Stern’s Remembering Pinochet’s Chile: On the Eve of London 1998 (2004, Duke University Press) and Reckoning with Pinochet (2010, Duke University Press). See also David Aceituno Silva and Pablo Rubio Aiolaza, ed., Chile 1984/1994: Encrucijadas en la transición de la dictadura a la democracia (2021, PUCV).

96

P. VILCHES

in 2001, a decade after democracy had returned to Chile. With incisiveness, the Chilean journalist characterized the status quo of a misinformed, passive citizenry, dormant or narcotized by the giant leaps taken by the nation. There was a Pinochet-induced lethargy that overcame the nation, Mönckeberg commented. These conditions allowed for the continuation of gross injury to the State and the Chilean economic system, inflicted by a select economic group. This state of affairs impacted the journalistic profession, which lacked the means to do what their vocation demanded: Unlike other nations, including many on this continent alone, I should say that with a few exceptions the practice of journalism in Chile neither interprets nor investigates current events. This is not due to a supposed lack of interest on the part of journalists but because the necessary conditions for them to do so in the mass media have not been set up accordingly ... After analyzing current events that have taken place in Chile in recent decades, as well as how such events have evolved within the last few months, I have concluded that behind any political activity in our nation lies a deep history moved by the threads of economic interests that have names and surnames. Assuredly, since the late 1970s I have been able to appreciate—in some cases—that the same network of power that governed under Augusto Pinochet is still in force today, with its own language and actions, trying to influence the economic and political developments of our nation. (Mönckeberg 2015, “Presentación”)

Insidiously then, Pinochet managed to remain in power behind the scenes via a tenacious group that would not allow the country to veer away from increasing their own profit. He was a principal architect in reversing the initiatives started by the UP government. In this light, Pinochet’s actions around the Villa San Luis followed a deliberate plan. Fate had presented the previously obscure military man with the gift of an entire nation at his disposal, he thus swiftly began the development of the material culture that would describe his time in power. The Villa San Luis was a personal matter. Exposing his siútico 4 roots, he put everything into the creation of a glittery version of the nation, one which irremediably created an unjust city, characterized by vast social inequality with respect to access to education, health, and pensions, especially. From this standpoint, Allende’s just city in Las Condes became an object of desire for the mundo empresarial, which for its part was carefully nurtured and 4 For more information on the word siútico, see Chapter 2.

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

97

modeled by the Pinochet regime. Ultimately, the Villa San Luis, idealistically built for the purposes of social integration, after the coup became immediately and permanently vulnerable to the turns of the economy. It remained both oddly and pitiably closed in, isolated from the rest of its affluent neighbors. Its location, dimensions, and material culture in general, reflected the vanquished quixotic dreams of Allende and the UP government.

Chile’s Habitus The conditioning for Chile’s habitus , in the Bourdieusian sense, required tiptoeing around the atrocities of the dictatorship and acquiescing to the radical free-market economy imposed by the autocratic government. In this way, democracy did not enter the nation through the front door but really through the ‘service entrance.’ As a frame of reference, we can cite the inaugural address of Patricio Aylwin, who was sworn in as President of the Republic in March 1990. Aware that Chile’s booming economy was achieving international recognition from First World nations, Aylwin expressed a desire that was already shared by many not to rock the boat. His words indicated that it was critically important to avoid a ‘slippery slope’ while finding a reconciliación [reconciliation]. Aylwin treated the subject of seeking justice and retribution from abuses by the former dictatorship as a dangerous proposition. It was a delicate matter that, following Albert O. Hirschman’s Jeopardy Thesis, could lead the nation “to a sequence of events such that it would be dangerous, imprudent, or simply undesirable to move in the proposed (intrinsically right or just) direction” (Hirschman 1991, 83). The brand-new president encouraged Chileans to address injustices but, concurrently, he urged them to do so with discretion. The best-case scenario for Aylwin was to begin the new democracy with a symbolic tabula rasa, stating that looking too much into the past—to seek reparation—was not the most appropriate step to take as it would produce neither gain for the future nor health for the nation and its people: In this necessary exercise of justice, we must avoid the risks of wanting to relive other times, of reissuing the complaints of the past and of engulfing ourselves indefinitely in searches, recriminations and witch hunts that will distract us from thinking toward the future. I am compelled to keep time from slipping out of our hands by looking into the past. The spiritual

98

P. VILCHES

health of Chile requires us to find ways to fulfill our efforts of moral healing within a reasonable time, so that sooner rather than later the moment will come when, reconciled, we will all look to the future with confidence and join forces in the tasks that the country will demand from us. (Aylwin 2007)5

Aylwin’s words were hopeful, optimistic, and cautious. Granted, this method of prudence had already been used, at the nation’s inception. Even then, curing the social body was necessary, and this required rationalizing and suppressing the memories of the colonial period. As it would do again in the 1990s, the new Republic of the 1800s pursued a political condition “of apparent oblivion, judicial oblivion, [and] imposed oblivion” (Loveman and Lira 2000, 9). In the 1990s, Pinochet was on the winning side. The general had secured a stern “distribution of cultural capital” (Bourdieu 1986, 18), which guaranteed the loyalty of those who had championed the ‘Pinochet’ economic system, even if in a dissembling manner. This had insured a strong class division in the nation. As well, the 1980 Constitution kept the general vigorously present. The Constitution sequestered significant tenets of Chilean democracy by preventing the new government from producing much change. ‘Looking at the future with confidence’ as the new President of a restored democracy urged Chileans, had not worked entirely. When Aylwin died in 2016, the meaning of his legacy divided the opinion of Chileans. He came forward clearly with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that he set up during his four years of presidency, 1990–1994. He addressed the nation and asked for forgiveness from the families of the victims of the dictatorship, urging the Armed Forces and other entities of order “to make gestures of recognition of the pain they inflicted and work together to reduce it” (Aylwin 1991, 00:0:17–00:00:33). At the same time, for some citizens Aylwin’s death, which triggered a widespread analysis of his political life, brought back memoryscapes of his staunch opposition to the UP

5 By virtue of being the President of the Transition, Patricio Alwyn had to contend

with oppositional political sentiments, often finding himself between a rock and a hard place. A vast majority of Chileans were eager to bring to justice those who had committed egregious human rights violations; on the other hand, a significant number of Chileans were part of the Armed Forces or supported the Armed Forces and what they stood for, unwilling to back any type of investigation carried out against them (Aylwin 2007).

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

99

government, a form of resistance which helped clear the path to the 1973 coup d’état, for which Aylwin initially demonstrated firm support.6

Under the Nose of a New Democracy The appropriation of Chile’s most expensive paño geográfico is a case of egregious exercise of power whereby Pinochet legalized for the Army a piece of real estate that belonged to the Chilean Treasury. We could say that the strong links between General Prats and the Allende government facilitated Pinochet’s future real estate heist. In 1971, at the urging of General Prats—who contended that the Army had no grounds to secure residential homes for its members—an agreement was signed between the Army and the CORMU. This came to be known as the Convenio Ejército de Chile-CORMU [Army of Chile-CORMU Agreement], and Lawner, head of the CORMU, was appointed president. This agreement became instrumental for real estate developments for the Army, such as the Villa Militar del Este and Villa Militar del Oeste [East Military Village and West Military Village]. To regularize and formalize acquisitions of State property by the Army, a decree with the force of transitory law was promulgated by the Ministerio de Defensa Nacional [Ministry of National Defense]. The Ministerio had a period of ninety days to regularize the ownership of this real estate through a decree that became known as the PAF (Patrimonio de Afectación Fiscal) [Allocated Fiscal Patrimony]. Through the PAF, the State could allocate an entity a sum or a good for specific expenses or purposes (Lawner 2019). The PAF thus allowed the Armed Forces, in exceptional situations, to sell fiscal real estate and to raise cash (Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). This became a tool that the Army used in the 6 In a discourse delivered in 1972 during a ‘March for Democracy’ and in his capacity as Chair of the Senate, Aylwin referred to the Allende administration as a reckless vehicle that would deprive Chilean citizens of their most basic rights: “Ever since Allende took office as President of the Republic, he has lost no opportunity to say that his government is leading Chile towards Socialism in democracy. This he says is being done through a vía chilena redolent of red wine and empanadas, with pluralism in mind and adhering closely to the national traditions of respect towards the Constitution and the law. However, every instant these facts are being tested. It is true that democracy, public liberties, and legal institutions are alive in Chile, but it would be inexcusable blindness or cynicism to ignore that the permanent and implacable pressure to which they are being subjected is progressively wounding them to death and may be able to assassinate them” (Aylwin 1972, 2).

100

P. VILCHES

future with ‘tweaks.’ That is, Pinochet reinterpreted the basic notion of the PAF decree. Jaime Díaz Lavanchy details how “a transitional article of a War Decree Law No. 1 of 1971” became permanent for twentyseven years (2015a, “Cómo el Ejército”). As an illustration, by 1975, when Pinochet was operating with absolute power, he granted the Armed Forces total ownership of its real estate—which had been ceded traditionally by the Chilean State—with the added authorization to make it commercially available (Lawner 2019; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020).7 Unconcerned by the eight-year presidential term limit inscribed in his own Constitution, Pinochet was so convinced that his mandate would be extended indefinitely that he neglected to regularize the usurpation of land and residences that the Army had carried out in the 1970s and first half of the 1980s at the Villa San Luis (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 68). Once he found himself ‘out,’ he proceeded to issue so-called leyes de amarre that would ensure correction of his previous oversight or negligence. As the paño geográfico of the población had never been formally transferred to the Army, it continued to appear as the property of the Metropolitan SERVIU, Servicio de Vivienda y Urbanización [Housing and Urbanization Services]. This was the new depository institution of the patrimony that had once belonged to the CORMU, which ceased to exist in 1976. On 12 December 1989, just a day after Aylwin’s historic election to the presidency, with the country still under Pinochet’s mandate, the Metropolitan SERVIU, brandishing a public deed that followed the required procedures for a property transfer, hastened to transfer to the Ministerio de Bienes Nacionales [Ministry of National Assets] lotes 8 13-A,

7 Miguel Lawner recounts how Pinochet reinterpreted the purposes of the PAF, estab-

lished by the Convenio Ejército de Chile-CORMU: “This decree No. 1 of 1971 was the basis for the Military Junta to issue in 1975 a Decree Law No. 1,113, whose article 1 establishes the following: ‘The Commanders of Heads of Army Engineers, Service of Works and Constructions of the Navy, Air Force Logistics Command, Logistics Directorate of Carabineros, Logistics Headquarters of the Chilean Investigative Police, with prior authorization from their Generals-in-Chief, General Director or Director General, if applicable, will have the authority of the Fisco [Treasury] to acquire, in any capacity, real estate for their institutions and to dispose of them’” (2019). 8 Lote, (pl.) lotes denotes a division of a specific area of land that will be used for construction. A piece of land may have many lotes; in this case, each lote is independent of the others.

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

101

14-A, 15-A, 16-A, 17-A, and 18-A from the Villa San Luis. The CORMU had divided the Villa San Luis project into different lotes, or urbanized plots of land. When consulted on this transaction, SERVIU declared in writing that on that occasion it made “a perpetual and irrevocable donation to the Chilean Treasury” (Allende and Olave 2018, 84). According to Lawner, this first allocation to the Ministerio de Bienes Nacionales became an essential intermediate step because the SERVIU itself was not empowered to pass on directly to the Army the State property where the población stood (2007, 17; Díaz Lavanchy 2015b, 00:08:45–00:09:38; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 67). On 21 June 1991, during the first year of democracy in Chile, through Decree No. 38, which was exempted from being officially recorded by the Contraloría General [Office of the Comptroller General], the Ministerio de Bienes Nacionales assigned to the Ministerio de Defensa Nacional and other subsidiaries, the State-owned real estate designated as portions of land and apartment blocks that made up the Villa San Luis, a physical area of 112,155.54 m2 [about 28 acres]. Decree No. 38 clearly indicated that the property became allotted to the Army for the sole purpose of procuring housing. It could not be used in any other way: If the beneficiary service were not to use this property for the purposes indicated or if it were to transfer it, under any title, this present assignation will be terminated immediately, being sufficient reason only a report emanating from the Secretaría Regional Ministerial de Bienes Nacionales [Ministerial Regional Secretary of National Assets] of the Metropolitan Region of Santiago, to certify the occurrence of any of the aforementioned circumstances. (Allende and Olave 2018, 88; Díaz Lavanchy 2015b, 00:09:43-00:10:12; Lawner 2007, 17; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 68)

The transferring meant a lot of paperwork; it did not hide that, effectively, the military had itself executed a toma of the población. In March 1973, the families living in the Villa San Luis amounted to about 1,038 in number. Thrown out of their homes, the families lost any rights to their properties. Many families from the lote 18-A which held apartment blocks 14, 15, 16, and 17 did not share the fate of their unfortunate neighbors. Because of the despojos of families, Blocks 14 and 15 had been emptied. Lote 18-A was spared the fate of other areas in the población most likely because of the military families that had occupied the apartments left vacant by the evicted families (Allende and Olave 2018, 91, 115–16;

102

P. VILCHES

Lawner 2007, 22–23).9 Since some families remained in lote 18-A, it became the most contested part of the Villa San Luis deal. Unsurprisingly, the remaining families at one point found themselves at a crossroads. Already in 1988, the Metropolitan SERVIU had caught up with residents still living in the población and before too long, they were duly in receipt of notices to vacate the premises. Aware of the threat and cognizant of their former neighbors’ fate, they acted quickly and sought protection. Specifically, Carmen Castro and Margarita Sotela, who had lived at the población since its beginnings, on behalf of the ninety-seven families that were still at Villa San Luis, met with Lawner—he had already returned to Chile from exile—to help them plead their case (Lawner 2007, 15; Lawner Interview, 21 April 2020). The eviction notices from the SERVIU were ultimately withdrawn due to various causes. These included: the work of the Vicaría de la Solidaridad, one of the few organs that worked to fight the human rights violations and general injustices committed during the dictatorship; the solid connections that Lawner had built during his years at the CORMU (such as with the architect Eugenio Salvi); and the proximity and significance of the 1988 ‘Sí’ or ‘No’ plebiscite, when the international press was focusing on Chile. Lote 18-A, with families still inhabiting Blocks 16 and 17 (and the emptied Blocks 14 and 15), was eventually returned to its residents. This paño geográfico consisted of the northern part of Presidente Riesco avenue, the southern part of Cerro El Plomo avenue, the west end of Pasaje Urano street, and the eastern part of the old lote 19. On 15 October 1993, another exempted Decree, No. 228, which emanated from the Ministerio de Bienes Nacionales, made things official. It declared that lote 18-A was no longer part of the real estate that had been transferred previously to the Army. Instead, lote 18-A was assigned back to the Metropolitan SERVIU. And, on 26 November 1993, yet another exempted Decree, No. 270, clarified that Blocks 16 and 17 had been 9 Lawner states the following: “My hypothesis is that some Army people, immediately after the coup d’état, took advantage of the confusion and the fear of the residents. Some of them had to escape fearing persecution, leaving empty living spaces. The Army then took hold of some of those apartments in that sector. For me it is the only reasonable explanation to understand why the families were not removed from the premises during the dictatorship. While they took out the rightful occupants, they brought personnel, from old poblaciones that the Army had, to live in the apartments of those evicted. The Ministry never bothered the military families with mortgage payments. They lived peaceful lives there” (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020).

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

103

reassigned, free of charge, to the remaining families of Villa San Luis. By the year 2000, the inhabitants of the población were in a safe place; they had received their official titles deeds (Allende and Olave 2018, 91, 102; Lawner 2007, 15–17; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 68). Unlike the occupants who still lived in lote 18-A, the families evicted in the late 1970s and early 1980s had been stripped permanently of their homeowner rights. They had no say during the Pinochet era and they continued to be ignored while in democracy. When the lote 18-A people became legal residents, Patricio Hale remarked that since tacit legitimacy was given to one group of families, “why not the others?” He added that the remaining families were favored because of a fortuitous situation. It was simply “because these residents were still living there” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 132, emphasis mine). A few of the former residents questioned the legitimacy as original owners of all the remaining homeowners at the población. As for the fate of the other lotes of the Villa San Luis, Pinochet ignored the restrictions imposed in 1991 by Decree No. 38. By 1994, through the following proclamation, the real estate that had been designated for exclusive use of the Army was made available to the private sector: Considering that the Servicio de Bienestar Social del Ejército [Army Social Welfare Service] does not contemplate in its plans to either benefit from or develop the property described, and that instead it finds that it is highly convenient to proceed with the sale of such property, the following has been resolved: to declare it dispensable. (qtd. in Lawner 2007, 18)

The apartment blocks had been targeted almost as soon as Allende was ousted. Pinochet knew that the constructions made manifest the goals of the UP government; it was essential to transform the area where they stood as a means to negate or rather erase Allende’s mandate for social integration. It should be noted that in 1998, the Contraloría General, under the leadership of Arturo Alwyn—sibling of President Aylwin— cited a statute of limitations to cease all property allocation by the Armed Forces. But Alwyn’s dictum did not prevail. The Army continued marketing their real estate transactions via a peculiar use of the PAF. For Lawner it was an illegal action based on an improper use of DFL N°1 of the Undersecretary of War of 1971, which contemplated a transitory article with a deadline within 90 days of validity, which expired on October 12, 1971. For the Chilean architect, it was wrong to resort to

104

P. VILCHES

such legal provision 20 years after its expiration (Lawner qtd. in Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 69; Lawner 2019). The press at the time specified that the money that the Army had made with the sale of the property allowed them to pursue plans for a brand-new military hospital, which was estimated to cost in the vicinity of $50 million dollars. In their investigative report of the despojos , Francisca Allende and Scarlett Olave address how the focus of the media and the press was persistently on the deal and the substantial sum of money that was to be made from what once had been a State property. Very little was written about the people who had been violently thrown out of their homes. In almost every way, it was as if they had never lived on the premises: “They were not consulted, their signatures were not requested, and perhaps [Chilean citizens] were not even aware of their existence and their history. The former inhabitants of the Villa San Luis had become ghosts of a past that the narrative of a modern city needed to hide and confine to other spaces” (Allende and Olave 2018, 124). The apartment blocks, sturdy constructions that belonged rightfully to people who had paid monthly to live there, began to be demolished one by one. The expelled residents had proof of their legitimacy as owners. Romero and Santibáñez describe how the pobladoras and pobladores interviewed for their book on the despojos at the Villa San Luis exhibited with pride stacks of old yellowish documents that showed the monthly mortgage payments they had made for their apartments at the población. Those documents support the truth about their case (2022, 50). According to Lawner, under a new democracy the Chilean State had stood idly by, failing to prevent neither the unlawful transfer and seizure nor the demolition of nearly the whole of the población. To repurpose the space for the wealthy, the State had squandered its patrimony and torn down structures that were still in good condition (2008a, “derecho”).

The Inmobiliarias Build a Habitus In the words of Bourdieu, one of the most pernicious aspects of the 1980 Chilean Magna Carta was the solidification of the habitus , the legitimization of “structured [and] structuring dispositions” of practical functions actively constructed in society (1990, 52), which set the stage for a flagrant neoliberal operation in Chile. The foundation was constructed, then, for “symbolic boundaries,” derived from a categorization of “objects, people, practices, and even time and space” (Lamont

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

105

1992, 9). By the time Pinochet left power, the country’s drastic turn toward an individualistic, free-market economy had been inculcated firmly in Chile’s national mores, a cultural capital controlled by a few who profited greatly from the markets and the designs of the Pinochet administration. Deploying neoliberal mantras, the empresarios proclaimed to mainstream citizens that Chile now occupied a special place in Latin America (and the world at large). These notions remained ingrained in the thinking of leaders of the new democracy as ‘the law of the land’: “the market is the best allocator of resources,” “for a market to exist there must be many suppliers and demanders,” “the role of the state is subsidiary,” and so on (Mosciatti 2021, 00:03:38–00:03:58). With the exception of lote 18-A, through an Army Decree of May 1996, the former Villa San Luis became official property of inmobiliaria Parque San Luis S.A. for an amount that has been estimated to be at about US$89 million dollars (Allende and Olave 2018, 93; Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 70). The fact that the country was already functioning under the designs of a new democracy should have affected the outcome of the Army’s negotiations. Merely invoking Decree No. 38 would have provided sufficient cause for the new government to stop the illegal sale by the Army of a national patrimony (Díaz Lavanchy 2015b, 00:08:05–00:08:44). By 1997, the Army was intent on clearing the Villa San Luis of undesirables, even if that meant evicting their own personnel. Having been assured that they could stay for at least a year until their official retirements, these lower-rank Army officers had become residents of the población. They had never been offered a title deed, making them vulnerable residents which meant they were eventually forced to leave the premises (Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 71). In fact, some of them offered a bemusing spectacle when they became ‘entrenched’ after being told they needed to vacate the premises, resisting and banding together to stop the bulldozers (Allende and Olave 2018, 147–52). Ultimately, however, the inmobiliaria prevailed. Construction of the biggest finance center in Santiago was soon to be under way, and nobody could stop that from happening, not even disgruntled Army personnel (Allende and Olave 2018, 98; Lawner 2007, 19; Lawner 2008b, 292). In the words of Henri Lefebvre, the inmobiliarias were concretizing for Las Condes a “place of privilege … a make-believe world of habitat ”

106

P. VILCHES

that aimed to narrate happiness and fairy tales (2000, 84).10 Customarily, the economic groups involved in this endeavor became wealthy or added to their coffers with the privatizations of the 1980s. Eager beneficiaries knew that Las Condes emblematized in its spatiality the “cultural resources,” “social-structural constraints,” and “group membership … based on shared emotions” (Lamont 1992, 11–12), that would maintain their exclusivity. The financial center in Las Condes thus became the epitome of a neoliberal space, a place of cultural capital that housed, for example, the corporate headquarters of the privatized National Air Line which was controlled then by two-time Chilean president, Sebastián Piñera (Allende and Olave 2018; 93–94; Díaz Lavanchy 2017). On 26 May 1997 El Mercurio, Chile’s oldest and arguably most conservative newspaper, announced that the comuna of Las Condes had been anointed as the future location of the largest real estate development in the country. It would occupy the space of the Villa San Luis. Joaquín Lavín, mayor of the comuna, took the initiative to play up this coup via the press and the media. Lavín wanted a visual of the población being torn down. The audience was wide, and among those watching T.V. and reading the newspapers were a number of former residents of the población. They reacted vigorously by creating the Movimiento Reconquista de Nuestros Derechos [Movement to Reacquire Our Rights], led by former residents Violeta Aguayo and Damaris Morales.11 They were aided by a small group of attorneys and, prominently, by architect Lawner and parliamentarian Patricio Hales, who helped to present their cases to the authorities. They wanted to proclaim to the nation what had happened to them. They also sought monetary compensation from the inmobiliaria Parque San Luis (Allende and Olave 2018, 93, 129–30, 140–43; Lawner 2007, 21). The former members of the comuna of

10 Investors in the inmobiliaria Parque San Luis included noted business leaders, such as Marcelo Zalaquett and Alberto Kassis, with strong connections to the Pinochet Foundation as financiers and board members. Another partner, Juan José Cueto, was a member of the Lan Chile board in 2001, when the company Sinergia, which carried out the work of Parque San Luis S.A., opened the first corporate tower (Allende and Olave 2018; 93–94; Díaz Lavanchy 2017; Lawner 2007, 19). 11 When some of the former residents realized the extraordinary business deal that the Army had struck with the inmobiliarias, they became motivated “to demand some kind of compensation” via the Reconquista de Nuestros Derechos. They could not understand how the despojos that they had endured could have such a positive result for the Army. It had been “such an impudent business” (Lawner 2018, 9).

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

107

Las Condes and their advocates knew they were up against intimidating opponents. Inmobiliaria Parque San Luis had invested US$800 million dollars to develop the area. Part of it would be an integrated business center in the style of Europe and the United States (Allende and Olave 2018, 96– 97). The inmobiliaria’s proposed cultural capital in Las Condes paved the way for luxury offices, high-end restaurants, high-level recreational and ecological areas for people of Las Condes12 ; that is, “enclaves to which not everyone is admitted, select salons and clubs” (Bourdieu 1990, 137). On 15 July 1997, everyone in attendance, supporters and opponents, solemnly awaited the start of the población’s demolition. Mayor Lavín was photographed in a hard hat seated on top of a backhoe ready and eager to start the demolition of the Villa San Luis. Despite his eagerness, the mayor encountered substantial obstacles to tearing down Allende’s dream for a just city; designed by the CORMU 25 years before, the foundations proved hard for Lavín to crack (Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 71). The central part of the building had previously been treated and weakened to facilitate Lavín’s bulldozing spectacle, but witnesses testified that the structure would not yield to the mayor or his backhoe. The foundation stood proud, unmoved by the mayor’s attempt to make it fall. In 1997, the winter had been ferocious; heavy storms in Santiago in June of that year had taken a heavy toll. Roofs in viviendas sociales in the area of Puente Alto—later known as the Casas Copeva—had totally collapsed. Comparing the Casas Copeva disaster to the quality of the archetype of the vivienda social from the Allende years was inevitable: “This is a crazy world. They are destroying what is in good condition while new buildings, made out of cardboard and plastic, are falling apart on their own. They have been trying to demolish this población for more than a week and here it is, still standing, no matter how hard they beat against it” (an eyewitness, qtd. in Lawner 2007, 20). On the other hand, the Casas Copeva had been constructed disinterestedly without the affect and the sense of social mission that the CORMU had embraced when it built the Villa San Luis (Allende and Olave 2018, 126; Lawner 2007, 19– 20; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020). 12 In 1993, Mayor Joaquín Lavín had already approached architects and engineers of the Universidad Católica to justify the demolition of the población. Lawner notes that, in 1971, the same university helped the Allende administration to draw up the blueprints for the Villa San Luis (2007, 25).

108

P. VILCHES

For Lawner, the destruction of solid housing from the past had become a pathetic metaphor of Chilean society, “As Lavín tried [in 1997] to tear down a wonderful project, in Puente Alto the shitty Casas Copeva were collapsing from storms …That’s how strange our country had become” (qtd. in Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 71). Interventions by experts and the use of dynamite eventually brought all the apartment blocks down—except for those in lote 18-A. Irretrievably for the former owners, the población had ceased to exist. The predicaments of the mayor with his infamous bulldozer were soon forgotten, and the headline of the newspaper Las últimas noticias gave the full meaning of the población’s demise: “With a single stroke Lavín destroyed a myth: the desire of the Unidad Popular government to open the wealthy areas to the most deprived sectors” (qtd. in Lawner 2008b, 292). Indeed, Lavín in the end, despite earlier struggles and embarrassment, had succeeded in dealing the final blow to the CORMU’s emblematic población. Although enthusiasts celebrated the future constructions as innovative and audacious, the relentless clamor of former Villa San Luis residents caused the Inmobiliaria Parque San Luis to take notice, which meant that the mundo empresarial would be required to face up to Pinochet’s atrocious act against the legal residents. In the late 1990s and early aughts, the determination, organization, relentlessness, passion, and strength of the Movimiento Reconquista had managed to agitate the empresarios and “paralyze [their] pharaonic plans” (Lawner 2007, 23). It was a Goliath vs. David struggle, the establishment against the other. A number of former pobladoras and pobladores, aided by Hales, filed a lawsuit against the inmobiliaria. The politician was aware that their real aim was the State and the SERVIU, but he wanted to help the former residents to recover something from what they had been put through (Allende and Olave 2018, 140). With greater resources on their side, however, the investors of the inmobiliaria predictably brought a counter suit against the former inhabitants. Hales recalls that the developers once even asked him: “What do you have against us?” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 142). The politician responded that he did not have anything against them but that the empresarios could no longer hide their heads in the sand; they had to come to terms with the way they had obtained the paño geográfico (Allende and Olave 2018, 142). The members of the mundo empresarial made fortunes off the despojos of the former residents of the población. The military had forced the pobladoras and pobladores to liberate the space. For some of the people

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

109

connected to the inmobiliarias, the former residents simply represented the necessary casualties of war that kept the neoliberal world rolling. In spite of their reluctance to concede, at some point the inmobiliaria decided to come to an agreement with some of the homeowners. Hales remembers: “Finally, the inmobiliaria contacted the lawyer and they settled on a compensation. Very little, but we hugged each other and cried when we celebrated the delivery of that compensation” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 142–43). For many, the settlement truly was a cause for celebration. Others, however, were not that satisfied. Moreover, the passage of time complicated matters for the inhabitants who would have preferred to stay put. Along with other pressures, the former homeowners had to confront the possibility that a judge would dismiss their case by citing a statute of limitations. This compelled them toward an out-of-court settlement. By 2002, the inmobiliaria began to construct elegant glass and steel towers of at least twenty floors (Lawner 2018, 10). Yet, as time went by, even the homeowners who had been elated at first later reckoned that the agreement had not been favorable to them at all. Important, no representative authority ever gave the former residents of Villa San Luis an official apology or acknowledged in any way what they had suffered during the dictatorship (Allende and Olave 2018, 142–47; Lawner 2007, 23–24).

Contested Meanings for the Same Soil The paño geográfico of the former Villa San Luis inspired diametrically opposed attitudes. For the empresarios , the space of the former población mattered greatly. It allowed them to boast about their winning ways. The paño geográfico epitomized for them a most attractive habitus of symbolic wealth reserved for a selected group of Chileans, that is, for themselves and their peers, a place of prestige that would be enhanced continuously “by the rigour of its exclusions” (Bourdieu 1990, 137). They would not budge, but, neither would the expelled homeowners. Like their wealthy adversaries, the former inhabitants of the Villa San Luis were also heavily invested. The block apartments were for them a legacy of social integration bequeathed to them by President Allende, as Yolanda Flores had first stated when referring to her years at the Villa San Luis (Flores Interview 27 December 2021). It was the zeal and courage of the former inhabitants of the población that mitigated the designs of developers, inmobiliarias, and authorities of Las Condes. It was they alone

110

P. VILCHES

who stood in the way of the dreams of the mundo empresarial. Constanza Romero and Felipe Santibañez narrate that the former pobladoras and pobladores joined forces with advocates to create the Fundación Villa San Luis (henceforth Fundación); to them, the menace of a collapse felt real and having a Fundación represented “a protective measure to prevent the fall of the last bastion of Allende” (2022, 94). The Fundación fought for memorialization, while the inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco—itself a constructora and major investor in the paño geográfico—fought for development in the area.13 The inmobiliaria also had to deal with the residents who remained living in Blocks 16 and 17; and, the threat of real estate development kept those people vulnerable. Allende, co-author of El despojo de la Villa San Luis, explains that around 2012–2013, before any decision was made about memorializing the area, the inmobiliarias offered very attractive sums of money to the few families still living in the premises. Many of them refused or resisted selling because of their loyalty and emotional bond to the población: “In fact,” added Allende, “their attachment to the meaning of the población was more powerful than money. This is an important factor because it prevented those remaining apartment blocks from being torn down” (Allende Interview 7 July 2021). As sophisticated material culture became the signature of the area, lote 18-A appeared like a humble island, surrounded by what came to be known as Nueva Las Condes. The developers were intent on creating a cosmopolitan conglomerate that relied on the idea of ‘exclusivity’; in every way, Nueva Las Condes was created according to a vision that was the exact opposite of that of Allende for the Villa San Luis. In the neoliberal, thriving free-market economy that shaped the habitus of empresarios , developers sorted out legal matters through machinated loopholes, financial enticement, and overall, by placing undue pressure on the remaining inhabitants to vacate their apartments. An impending threat of a bulldozer became a constant. Disheveled and partially destroyed, the buildings called attention to themselves and turned into objects of hatred for many who wished them to be assimilated into the habitus of Las Condes. Razing them would guarantee that the CORMU’s emblematic constructions would lose their capacity to narrate 13 Architect Yves Besançon asserts that “the inmobiliaria wanted to enforce its rights. From their perspective, it was unfair that the State had sold to them a piece of land that later the State itself had declared an historical monument” (qtd. in López 2020).

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

111

a story of an integrated city. As material culture from the población, they had become a bothersome metaphor of Allende and the UP government; they narrated a story of an idealistic, if truncated, just city that could now only be visualized as the ghost of a población that was never meant to be. Chiara Bianchini and Claudio Pulgar, who did an investigative report on what remained of the población, described the buildings’ capacity to narrate and memorialize the past: Villa San Luis—or what’s left of it—is located in a business district in the comuna of Las Condes, in the Easternmost and most modern part of the city of Santiago. The remains of the población, built between 1971-1972 under the government of Salvador Allende Gossens, are situated among glass high-rise buildings. The población is also very close to Parque Arauco, one of the country’s largest and most symbolic shopping centers. What you see today when you arrive at the Villa is a dusty soccer field, surrounded by two 4-story apartment blocks, where 116 families live. There are also two other uninhabited apartment blocks in an obvious state of deterioration. The Villa San Luis seems like a relic, a piece of the past embedded in modernity. (Bianchini and Pulgar 2008, 29)

A voice-over narration for a documentary “Reportaje a la Villa San Luis” [Investigative Report on Villa San Luis] by Chilean T.V. Channel Mega transmitted a combination of admiration, surprise, and bewilderment about the last apartment blocks in the población. The young interviewers appeared empathetic about the homes and their inhabitants but unintentionally turned both the structures and the interviewees into the ‘other’ from the outset: “it appears to be a poorly embedded piece of a puzzle. That is because for us it is common practice that our cities be divided by social classes; the poor and the rich have their own neighborhoods” (“Reportaje” 2010, 0:04:27–0:04:28). In various visual images, the premises appeared modest, humbled, and ‘intimidated’ by the tall and robust new buildings of Nueva Las Condes. The narration hammered home the point that the working-class homeowners shared a space with affluent neighbors many of which were not sure what the población was all about. The buildings and their inhabitants had become a jarring visual in an aesthetically pleasing area.

112

P. VILCHES

The Fate of Lote 18-A It was reported that the Army finalized the sale of lote 18-A on 15 December 2011. The real estate was considered precious. Regulations approved in the 1980s had facilitated this sale, exhibiting the privileged legal status of the Armed Forces (Díaz Lavanchy 2015a, “Cómo el Ejército”). In fact, it was reported that between 2005 and 2008 the Inmobiliaria Proyecta Gestión had offered substantial amounts of money to the families that inhabited the place. It was said that some took the offer while others waited for a better price. Empresarios responded that the twenty-three families had not received sound advice and that their claims were excessive, adding that it was not in the interest of Gestión to continue to offer the families monetary compensation (Allende and Olave 2018, 112). However, lote 18-A had become an object of desire for the inmobiliarias and residents continued selling their apartments at different prices, a proposition that wreaked havoc among the inhabitants, gradually deteriorating whatever level of unity they might have had in the past. The various accounts of the last years of the Villa San Luis disclose how divided the neighbors had become, with some opting to sell and ‘get it over with’ while others were resisting and saying that they would fight to the end. At some point, the Municipality of Las Condes allowed for a property appraisal, which contemplated a division for lote 18-A. It was disclosed that meetings held in March and April 2014 brought together the empresarios and co-owners of the apartment blocks. In those meetings, “the subdivision of lote 18-A would have been agreed upon.” Afterward, “the Municipality of Las Condes approved the subdivision plan, dated 3 December 2014” (Díaz Lavanchy 2015a “Cómo el Ejército”). The outcome was favorable for the inmobiliarias, having now more flexibility with a lote 18-A1 and a lote 18-A2. This change in the division of the surface put the residents at a disadvantage (Allende and Olave 2018, 109–21; CHV Noticias 2018; Díaz Lavanchy 2015a, “Cómo el Ejército”; Lawner Interview 21 April 2021; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020; Toro Agurto 2014). Millionaire deals were going on for the few fortunate families that had stayed on through the decades. The evicted families were deeply hurt by how different their lives had unraveled from the families still at the población. With proper documentation and paid dividends, the former residents had been forced to relocate to poor, peripheral areas of the capital. They brought up these concerns, again, about the validity of

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

113

all the remaining people as original settlers (Allende and Olave 2018, 91; interviews with former pobladoras and pobladores from 16 December 2021 to 10 January 2022). By 2014, four decades after the first evictions, most of the old lote 18-A families had struck deals with the developers and had left the población. By then, there were only eight homeowners left on the premises but seven of them had already come to individual agreements with the inmobiliarias and would be leaving soon. The last person still unwilling to sell was Ana Jiménez.14 She exerted her right as an original resident by stating that she had laid the first stone with the Minister Carlos Cortés; she said that she would die at the población. Although her determination was admirable, pressure from her own family members, one suspects, made her finally ‘give in’ and sign on the dotted line (Allende and Olave 2018, 109–21; CHV Noticias 2018; Lawner Interview 21 April 2021; Seguel Interview 10 March 2020; Toro Agurto 2014).

Allende’s just City On 28 June 2017, during the second administration of Michelle Bachelet, CMN declared lote 18-A1, from the Villa San Luis, an historic landmark. It was named Decreto [decree] No. 135. The positive outcome for memorialization had been made possible by the hard work of the Fundación, with many former pobladoras involved, including Antonieta Miranda and Ximena Salinas (both interviewed in this book). The pobladoras had received the support, too, of young professionals. They came to be known as the Comité de Defensa de la Villa San Luis [Committee for Defense of the Villa San Luis]. Within the guidelines for declaring a national monument, the decree from CMN enumerated the

14 Starting in 2012, the inmobiliaria pushed aggressively to acquire the apartments from lote 18-A. The first bid was 60 million Chilean pesos [approx. US$125,000 in 2012] per apartment. The offer went up to 70 [approx. US$145,000 in 2012]; later to 90 [approx. US$186,500 in 2012]. The residents accepted. A group of about 20 families had refused to accept and the inmobiliaria responded with the offer of 120 [approx. US$250,000 in 2012]. They accepted. Yet, there was still a group of eight families, “headed by experienced leader Ana Jiménez,” that did not accept that offer. Jiménez had been a leader of Patria Nueva, one of the Comités sin casa from around the Mapocho River. After some time, the inmobiliaria ended up paying 490 million [approx. US$1,015,000 in 2012] “for 60 m2 apartments [approx. 646 square feet] that had been built four decades before” (Lawner 2018, 10–11; Lawner Interview 21 April 2020).

114

P. VILCHES

violation of human rights that had taken place during the despojos by the dictatorship. It also stipulated that the Villa San Luis “was conceived as an emblematic social project of integration and redistribution of urban space following criteria of socioeconomic equity, to combat urban segregation in the city, within the framework of the Sectional Plans policy promoted by [the CORMU]” (CMN 2017, Decreto No. 135). On 24 June 2017, however, the inmobiliaria Lote 18—in charge of a mega project in the paño geográfico—took preventive action. The fate of lote 18-A1 was to be decided by a vote after the long San Pedro and San Pablo Chilean holiday. A vote of ‘yes’ meant that Blocks 14 and 15, two of the apartment blocks in the area, would become historic landmarks. The inmobiliaria acted quickly to make the upcoming vote a moot point. On San Juan’s day, workers from constructora Grupo Flesan—in its capacity as a demolition company—brought vehicles equipped with backhoe loaders and wrecking balls and proceeded to destroy the two buildings. The Villa San Luis activists had brought people to the vicinity to prevent damage to the structures. They notified the group, and they came as quickly as they could to the premises to stop the destruction. When confronted by members of the Comité de Defensa, people from Flesan could not produce the required legal documentation that would have permitted them to continue demolishing the buildings. The Comité de Defensa prevailed and the backhoe loaders and wrecking balls from Flesan were stopped. But the damage had been done. Block 14 had been badly damaged and Block 15 was gone. As reported by Romero and Santibáñez, “One of the buildings was left with a deep dent in its center. Fortunately, its four main pillars were still able to support the rest of the skeleton. The block apartment to its left had been completely demolished” (2022, 84). Days later, the former pobladoras, some as members of the Fundación, the Comité de Defensa, and others headed to the Municipality of Las Condes and confronted Guillermo Ramírez, chief of staff of Mayor Lavín, who on behalf of Lavín stated that “‘the permits for executing the demolition are in order’. Nobody believed Ramírez” (Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 88). Mayor Lavín did not meet with either the former residents or their supporters. He took to his Twitter account to ratify that the demolition—by Grupo Flesan—had been stopped because there were still no approved mitigation measures in place. However, he defended the demolitions process: “From a municipal point of view, we only

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

115

receive complaints because those buildings are abandoned and vandalized,” adding that “the municipality has proposed to the CMN to make a ‘beautiful memorial’ to preserve its history” (qtd. in The Clinic 2017, “Lavín defendió demolición”). Rodrigo Gertosio Swanston compared the unscrupulous move by the inmobiliaria to that of “‘random’ fires in heritage buildings” (2019, “Villa San Luis”). After the damage had been done, the inmobiliaria was able to affect public opinion and start different conversations, pushing an idea devoid of the historicity embodied by Block 14: “Why keep a building that is completely in ruins? What architectural value can it have? Wouldn’t it be better to demolish that dilapidated building and erect a large, modern office building that harmonizes with its surroundings?” (2019, “Villa San Luis”). It was a day of defeat for the Villa San Luis and its legacy. The two emblematic buildings had taken terrible blows, “with each impact, the constructions lost stability, like a boxer who has already received too many punches and whose legs have been left shaking” (Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 83). This underhanded action by the inmobiliaria depicts what Allende said all those decades ago, as he formally began his presidency: “we should begin from the fundamental aspects of a class struggle. We know that the oligarchic groups, the plutocratic groups, the feudal groups, will try to defend their privileges at all costs” (“Compañero presidente” 1971, 00:30:03–00:30:11). Soja states that conceptualizing the just city took many years even in progressive areas like New York and Los Angeles as they went from theoretical debates to real action to effect an “actual political practice” (Soja et al. 2011). Through the CORMU, Allende became a pioneer in twentieth-century Latin America in adapting, repurposing, and reshaping the city from the perspective of social integration. He aimed toward a just city. His decision to provide a permanent habitat for the pobladores sin casa of the Mapocho River in the affluent comuna of Las Condes exhibited true vision and bravado. Allende helped to raise the quality of those people’s lives in ways that surpassed any other action that could have come from the UP government. It is no coincidence, therefore, that the dictatorship quickly appropriated, defiled, and annihilated one of the most relevant architectural legacies of the UP period. Lawner, the ‘Architect of the UP,’ laments the present conditions of Santiago’s distribution of wealth: “For us professionals trained in disciplines that concern themselves with physical organization, it is painful to admit that the right to the city has been forbidden to such a high number of our compatriots”

116

P. VILCHES

(2008a, “derecho”). For Pinochet, hierarchical order was of the essence. The place known as the Villa San Luis needed to be forgotten and its people ‘put in their places,’ where he felt they truly ‘belonged.’ Additionally, Pinochet had gawdy designs for the paño geográfico of the Villa San Luis. It would help tremendously to firmly establish his neoliberal policies. Lefebvre contends that the city appears as an oeuvre; it is the result of a history, one that narrates with efficacy the social relations constructed among its citizenry, its people, individuals that help to design and construct the oeuvre itself, “in historical conditions” (2000, 101). The professionals at the CORMU participated in the debates about social integration and dignified housing and, following the Allende mandate, constructed the Villa San Luis as a space of inclusion in an effort to make a better history, a better oeuvre, in Santiago. The evicted families have survived their cruel fate through remembrance of Allende’s oeuvre which for them meant a time of hope and optimism in their very own población. Some were children at the time of the evictions and grew up aware of the historic events that shaped their lives. As one of the former residents said, “I keep in my mind all the good things. My family had a real living room, real bedrooms, a proper bathroom. It was so pretty. We had a neighborhood” (Salinas Interview 24 December 2021). The adults are already dead. As stated by another, “my papito died two years after they took us to Santa Olga. He was never himself after the despojo” (Epuñan Interview 16 December 2021). The memoryscapes of Allende’s social experiment keep the former residents fighting for their rights. In a way, they became like exiles, not taken by plane to international soil but taken by vehicles, some in garbage trucks, to poor neighborhoods. They express affect for the Villa San Luis, saying that they lived the best years of their lives but that their lives became truncated and marked permanently by the despojos . The pobladoras and pobladores state that they have fought for memorialization of where they once lived so that Chileans do not forget. They do not wish their fate on anybody and emphasize that it is critical that an experience like theirs should never happen in Chile again.

References Agosin, Manuel R. 1995. “El Retorno de los capitales extranjeros privados a Chile.” El Trimestre Económico 62 (248.4): 467–94. JSTOR, https://www. jstor.org/stable/20856919.

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

117

Allende, Francisca, and Scarlett Olave. 2018. El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes. Cómo los camiones de la basura de la dictadura desterraron una población al olvido. Santiago, Chile: Ceibo. Amorós, Mario. 2019. Pinochet: Biografía militar y política. Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial. Pdf electronic text. Anderson, Benedict R. O. G. 2006. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso. Kindle edition. Aylwin, Patricio. 1972. “La democracia marcha por Chile. Discurso del Presidente del Senado camarada Patricio Aylwin, en la concentración multitudinaria realizada en Santiago, el 12 de abril de 1972.” Repositorio Digital Archivo Patricio Aylwin Azócar. http://www.archivopatricioaylwin.cl/. Accessed 8 January 2022. Aylwin, Patricio. 1991. “El discurso con el que Aylwin pidió perdón a las víctimas de la dictadura en nombre del Estado.” YouTube Video, 00:00:40. Posted by Diario Financiero, 19 April 2016. https://youtu.be/_7CDsR7 Lw04. Accessed 8 January 2022. Aylwin, Patricio. 2007. “La Comisión chilena sobre verdad y reconciliación. Ius et Praxis [online] 13 (1), http://doi.org/10.4067/S0718-001220070001 00014. Bianchini, Maria Chiara, and Pulgar P. Claudio. 2008. Villa San Luis de Las Condes: Lugar de memoria y olvido. Revista De Arquitectura 14 (18): 29–40. https://doi.org/10.5354/0719-5427.2013.28163. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1986. “The Forms of Capital.” In Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, edited by John Richardson, 241–58. Westport, CT: Greenwood. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1990. The Logic of Practice. Translated by Richard Nice. Stanford: Stanford University Press. CHV Noticias. 2018. “La Villa San Luis en Las Condes.” YouTube Video, 00:03:32, 16 June. Posted by Mundo Actual. https://youtu.be/COGHfH zq4As. Accessed 25 May 2021. The Clinic. 2017. “Lavín defendió demolición de villa San Luis y propuso hacer un ‘memorial bonito’ para preservar su memoria histórica.” 27 June. https://www.theclinic.cl/2017/06/27/lavin-defendio-demolicion-villa-sanluis-propuso-memorial-bonito-preservar-memoria-historica/. Accessed 15 March 2021. CMN. 2017. Decreto No. 135. 29 June. “Declara monumento nacional en la categoría de monumento histórico a la ‘Villa Ministro Carlos Cortés (Villa San Luis de Las Condes)’, ubicada en la comuna de Las Condes, provincia de Santiago, region metropolitana.” https://www.monumentos.gob.cl/mon umentos/monumentos-historicos/villa-ministro-carlos-cortes-villa-san-luiscondes. Accessed 9 March 2020.

118

P. VILCHES

“Compañero presidente: Entrevista de Régis Debray a Salvador Allende Gossens (1971).” YouTube Video, 00:32:42. Posted by Felipe Henríquez Órdenes, 8 March 2013. https://youtu.be/NeNeIl9BXII. Accessed 28 March 2021. Constable, Pamela, and Arturo Valenzuela. 1991. A Nation of Enemies: Chile under Pinochet. New York and London: W.W.W. Norton & Company. Díaz Lavanchy, Jaime. 2015a. “Cómo el Ejército vendió el último terreno de Villa San Luis.” The Clinic. 9 June. https://www.theclinic.cl/2015a/06/ 09/como-el-ejercito-vendio-el-ultimo-terreno-de-villa-san-luis/. Accessed 22 January 2022. Díaz Lavanchy, Jaime. 2015b. “Villa San Luis: La consagración de la pobreza.” YouTube Video, 00:32:42. Posted by Memoria Visual Producciones, 26 December 2015b. https://youtu.be/kfEIDE4btPA. Accessed 28 March 2021. Díaz Lavanchy, Jaime. 2017. “Cómo la elite financiera se apoderó de Villa San Luis.” The Clinic. 5 July. https://www.theclinic.cl/2017/07/05/la-elite-fin anciera-se-apodero-villa-san-luis/. Accessed 1 February 2020. Gazmuri, Cristián. 2012. Historia de Chile. 1891–1994. Política, economía, sociedad, cultura, vida privada, episodios. Santiago, Chile RIL editores. Gertosio Swanston, Rodrigo. 2019. “Villa San Luis, o la insoportable levedad del patrimonio en Chile.” Invitro. 10 July. https://invi.uchilefau.cl/villa-san-luiso-la-insoportable-levedad-del-patrimonio-en-chile/. Accessed 10 May 2021. Hirschman, Albert O. 1991. The Rhetoric of Reaction: Perversity, Futility, Jeopardy. Cambridge, MA and London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Joignant, Alfredo. 2012. “Habitus, campo y capital. Elementos para una teoría general del capital político.” Revista Mexicana de Sociología 74 (4), October– December 2012, 587–618. JSTR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/43495631. Lamont, Michèle. 1992. Money, Morals, and Manners: The Culture of the French and American Upper-Middle Class. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. Lawner, Miguel. 2007. “Demolición de la Villa San Luis en Las Condes: Historia de dos despojos.” Santiago, Chile: CENDA (Centro de Estudios Nacionales de Desarrollo Alternativo). https://www.cendachile.cl/autores/miguel-law ner#h.pND-WmCtY6N58 (Destacados). Accessed 14 January 2020. Lawner, Miguel. 2008a. “El derecho a la ciudad.” Fundación Defendamos la Ciudad. 31 August 2011. https://www.defendamoslaciudad.cl/index.php/ columnas/item/2620-el-derecho--a--la--ciudad. Accessed 21 April 2021. Lawner, Miguel. 2008b. “Viviendas dignas para hombres dignos.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al., 281–305. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Lawner, Miguel. 2018. “Historia de la Villa San Luis de Las Condes.” defendamoslaciudad.cl. Accessed 31 January 2020.

5

FROM SOCIAL EXPERIMENT TO CHILE’S MOST EXPENSIVE …

119

Lawner, Miguel. 2019. “Miguel Lawner: Villa militar del Este, un nuevo escándalo del Ejército de Chile.” Nuevo Mundo Diario Digital. 3 May. https://www.radionuevomundo.cl/2019/05/03/miguel-lawner-villamilitar-del-este-un-nuevo-escandalo-del-ejercito-de-chile/ Lefebvre, Henri. 2000. Writings on Cities. Selected, Translated and Introduced by Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas. Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. López, Constanza. 2020. “Otra vida para la Villa San Luis.” Pauta. 4 July. https://www.pauta.cl/ciudad/historia-de-la-villa-san-luis-en-las-condesacuerdo-constructora-y-familias. Accessed 27 September 2020. Loveman, Brian, and Elizabeth Lira. 2000. Las suaves cenizas del olvido: Vía chilena de reconciliación política, 1814–1932. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Mönckeberg, María Olivia. 2015. El saqueo de los grupos economicos al estado de Chile. De Bolsillo. Pdf electronic text. Mosciatti, Tomás. 2021. “Una victoria superior a la de Allende.” Comentarios BioBio. YouTube Video, 00:16:41, 21 May. Posted by BioBio on 21 May 2021. https://youtu.be/lGgcLfvKnOg. Accessed 24 May 2021. “Reportaje a la Villa San Luis. Canal Megavisión.” 2010. Programa La Liga. YouTube Video, 00:39:36, 2 September. Posted by sitkoweb on 13 July 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoqzFB6KrOs. Accessed 14 January 2020. Romero, Constanza, and Felipe Santibáñez. 2022. Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende. Santiago, Ediciones Cinco Ases. Soja, Edward W., Frédéric Dufaux, Philippe Gervais-Lambony, Chloé Buire, and Henri Desbois. 2011. “Spatial Justice and the Right to the City: An Interview with Edward Soja.” In Justice Spatial—Spatial Justice, https://halshs.arc hives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01722418/document. Stern, Steve. 2004. Remembering Pinochet’s Chile: On the Eve of London 1998. Durham and London: Duke University Press. Toro Agurto, Ivonne. 2014. “Villa San Luis: La caída del último bastión de Allende en Las Condes.” The Clinic. 19 May. https://www.theclinic.cl/ 2014/05/19/villa-san-luis-la-caida-del-ultimo-bastion-de-allende-en-las-con des/. Accessed 25 May 2020. Vilches, Patricia. 2017. Blest Gana via Machiavelli and Cervantes: National Identity and Social Order in Chile. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars.

CHAPTER 6

The Villa San Luis: Five Decades Later

Abstract This chapter provides concluding thoughts on Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis: Icons of the Just City. The grassroots efforts by civic institutions to keep Block 14 from being demolished paid off. Allende’s project of social integration became officially recognized by Consejo Monumentos Nacionales (CMN) in 2017. Within the framework of Chile’s twenty-first-century media and press, matters of memorialization, real estate value, government pressure, and the like, are analyzed. While memorialization was being sought for Block 14, the Estallido Social of 2019 touched deeply on the roots of Chile’s social division. The Piñera government had decided to hike subway and public bus transportation fares by thirty pesos and ten pesos, respectively. Students reacted and their older counterparts followed along. A rebellion reverberated throughout the country. Social issues had been ailing the nation for decades and the price hike ignited a previously dormant spirit. This context surrounds the meaning of Block 14 for twenty-first century Chileans. Keywords Villa San Luis de Las Condes · Consejo Monumentos Nacionales (CMN) · Salvador Allende · 1980 Chilean Constitution · Estallido Social · Boric administration

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8_6

121

122

P. VILCHES

A National Monument On 28 June 2017, the campaign to keep Block 14 standing came to a meeting convened by CMN to resolve the issue. Former residents waited outside of the room where the decision would be made. María Eugenia Cáceres was chosen as a spokesperson for the group. She turned to the members of the CMN and narrated her family’s experience: What I am about to tell you is coming from the bottom of my heart. If you are mothers and fathers, please try to understand our plight. Because all of us who were eradicated from Villa San Luis were parents with small children who cried and suffered when leaving their well-established homes. Despite the shortcomings that we might have had, we had [our own home] and our simple comforts … But when we left the apartments, we were forced to live elsewhere in terrible conditions. The apartment blocks where we were destined were infested with bedbugs; there is no family that was spared burning beds or mattresses in their new homes … In the name of the Lord, I hope that the Villa San Luis may be declared an Historical National Monument. God knows that a serious injustice was committed against us. Thank you very much for listening to me and may the Lord bless you. (qtd. in Romero and Santibáñez 2022, 92)1

The Chilean media and press noted the verdict of the CMN. Decreto No. 135 confirmed lote 18-A1 as a national heritage site (see Chapter 5). This ruling ignited comments from diverse sectors, which was to be expected in a country with strong divisions in politics and public opinion. Radio Cooperativa reported that, on hearing the news, the reaction by the former occupants and their supporters was to cheer and do a rallying call—a twitter feed showed jubilant people chanting an impromptu ceacheí, ‘chi-chi-chi-le-le-le, Viva Chile’ [Long Live Chile]. In fact, many of the former residents interviewed by this writer spoke of the profound relief they felt when they heard the news. They had cried before on the grounds of ‘their’ Villa San Luis and had thereby monumentalized it far before it officially became a national patrimony. Mayor Lavín had a different reaction. In the 1990s, he had actively aided in destroying the material culture left by the UP government in Las Condes; in 2017, 1 Translation mine. All translations from Spanish to English are mine unless otherwise indicated.

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

123

he reticently accepted the verdict by CMN. As he had done days before during the illegal demolition (see Chapter 5), the mayor took to twitter to comment: “If this means simply to leave [the apartment blocks] as they are, I would be very sorry because they are ruined, abandoned, vandalized” (qtd. in Cooperativa.cl 2017). Likewise, Emol (El Mercurio online), offered a terse commentary that stressed the limitations of this momentous decision: “Of the entire Villa San Luis, however, only lote 18-A1 has been endowed with patrimonial heritage value. This means that two of the buildings still standing, which occupy a total of 3000 of the 11,000 square meters of land, will be protected by the State. Since the land in its entirety continues to be owned by the inmobiliaria Lote 18, the rest of the buildings may be demolished to erect commercial buildings in their place” (Emol.nacional 2017). For his part, Vicente Domínguez, head of the Association of Real Estate Developers, did not concern himself with the history of the Villa San Luis. He gave his opinion by comparing Casa de Italia in Viña del Mar (a city west of Santiago)—also designated as an historic landmark—and the Villa San Luis: “[Casa de Italia] is a beautiful, attractive place that as a real estate property can be a contribution to heritage preservation. In the case of [Villa San Luis] in Las Condes, we are talking about ugly and relatively new apartment blocks, which do not compare with a century-old house” (qtd. in Gutiérrez 2017, “Dueños de terreno”). Finally, architect Emilio de la Cerda, at the time President of CMN, affirmed that what was in dispute during the push to make the Villa San Luis a national monument was “the land, not a set of ruined buildings.” For de la Cerda, tension was built on “that specific urban fabric … by the exchange value, the historical value, and the social value assigned by different groups and members of society” (2017, 147). Ángel Cabeza, at the time Vice President of CMN, asserted that a vital point of the designation was to recognize the despojos suffered by the people of the Villa San Luis, the legitimate owners of the apartments, which meant the area was being considered now a space of memorialization (Cooperativa.cl 2017). Marco Gutiérrez presented a point of view from the mundo empresarial. The journalist underscored that the lote 18A1 was made a national monument under the following circumstances: the CMN was a dependent entity of the Ministry of Education—the decree was signed by Adriana Delpiano, at the time Minister of Education; the voting had taken place during a key football game between Chile and Portugal; the voting, comprising ten in favor and two abstentions, had at least seven voting members that worked for either a ministry or some

124

P. VILCHES

State organization. Gutiérrez also noted the reaction from the inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco, the parent owner of the old lote 18-A of the Villa San Luis. He reiterated that the business partners had made a legitimate purchase of the paño geográfico from the State; that they held a blueprint and official permission from the Municipality of Las Condes to develop a project on the premises; that they would respond with legal measures to combat the decision by the CMN; and, adopting the language of the former occupants of the Villa San Luis, that the partners of the inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco would continue their fight because their rights as owners had been taken away by a “flawed and unfair” process (Gutiérrez 2017, “Dueños de terreno”). The litigation of Decreto No. 135 by CMN continued into 2018– 2019, during the second Piñera administration. The inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco received judicial backing from the Santiago Court of Appeals, whose ruling revoked the decree that had declared the remaining buildings historical monuments. This meant that the inmobiliaria would continue its battle at the level of the Supreme Court (Cárdenas 2018, “la reservada trama”). Andrés Méndez, an attorney for the inmobiliaria, underlined that “the ruling [by the Court of Appeals] established the rule of law. We also believe that it made clear that the procedure followed by the Consejo Monumentos [Nacionales] was illegal and disproportionate. We are confident that if this decision is reviewed by the Supreme Court, it will also rule in our favor” (qtd. in CHV Noticias 2018, 00:01:52– 00:02:13). María Eugenia Cáceres, the former pobladora who had spoken at the CMN hearing in June 2017 (also interviewed in this book), appealed to those against keeping Block 14 standing as a site of memory: “They should put their hands on their hearts and think about all the damage that has been inflicted on us.” She indicated that the original Decreto no. 135 from CMN was the only way to end their mourning and pain. “If we continue like this, no healing can take place” (qtd. in CHV Noticias 2018, 00:00:02–00:00:14). The tension was palpable on both sides and the stakes were considerable for the adversaries. For the pobladoras and pobladores, keeping Block 14 as a national monument signified the conservation of a lieu de mémoire, lieux de mémoire of a dignified way of life. For the empresarios , revoking the status of Block 14 as a national heritage site meant that a $110 million dollar project could be completed. All the while, the inmobiliaria kept two conversations going, one with the conservative Piñera government, and the other with those opposed to the mega

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

125

project. Certainly, the final option was to gain a favorable resolution in the courts, with the inmobiliaria and the government promoting a memorial that would not occupy much physical space. De la Cerda, who in 2018 became Undersecretary for the MINCAP, Ministerio de las Culturas, las Artes y el Patrimonio [Ministry of Cultures, Arts, and Heritage], kept a dialogue going with the inmobiliaria and the Comité de Defensa. In what appeared to be ambiguous wording, he said he favored “the construction of a memorial, without stopping the development of the city” (Cárdenas 2018, “la reservada trama”). By mid-2019, the litigation over Block 14 was becoming unsettling at best for the former residents. Javiera Martínez, from the Comité de Defensa, stated “that no response has been given to us.” She also added that the despojos suffered by the people of the Villa San Luis had never been addressed by authorities as a violation of human rights. “So, we would be interested in conveying this fact beyond any type of conversation concerning market interests which the inmobiliaria wants to highlight” (qtd. in CHV Noticias 2018, 00:02:56–00:03:08). There had been constant pressure built by the inmobiliaria, seeking economic development sooner rather than later. This caused backtracking on the 2017 resolution to build a national monument. The fate of Block 14 became “reduced to two types of valuations: the intangible symbolic value vs. the economic value” (Gertosio Swanston 2019, “Villa San Luis”). The partners at the inmobiliaria did not stop until they had negotiated a 90% reduction in the physical limits of a memorialization. They produced documentation showing a supposedly negative stability report on Block 14 carried out by engineers hired by the inmobiliaria. Lawner wrote that “the financing of a structure report by an entity that has been systematically trying to demolish Block 14 could not yield any other result than the one we got.” The architect added that the warning of an eminent collapse of Block 14 had become “a campaign of terror” on the part of the inmobiliaria (2019, “Fulgor y agonía”). By the look of things, it seemed at the time that the inmobiliaria was finding success in proposing a mishmash of ideas: an oxymoronic coexistence of neoliberal, luxurious, high-rise office buildings with a modest remembrance of Allende’s just city. To be sure, the agreement was to set up “a plaque or a commemorative element inserted in that 10% of the territory that remained under the auspices of a national monument (without any trace or footprint of the original

126

P. VILCHES

building, not even its foundations)” (Gertosio Swanston 2019, “Villa San Luis”).2 What had started during the UP government as social integration became paradoxically converted into a space where the richest people in Chile invested their money. Gradually low-income segments began their journey toward the poor comunas of Santiago, with governments indicating that constructing for the modest sectors on the periphery was due to the housing emergency. Truthfully, this was a process that did not take place at random or out of any context. It was meant to be that way (Allende and Olave 2018, 177). By applying sheer pressure and relying on the strengths of an excellent upper-echelon network, the inmobiliaria demonstrated that the pobladoras and pobladores’ fight to turn the land into a national monument to memorialize Allende’s integrated city was an increasingly quixotic dream. Then, in October 2019, everything changed.

´ The Monumento Historico Nacional and the Estallido Social In El Estallido. ¿Por qué? ¿Hacia dónde? Hassan Akram avers that narrating the turn of events that led to Chile’s Estallido may appear to local and global audiences as an improbable script for a Hollywood action film. What exactly happened? A raise of thirty pesos on the subway system and ten for public buses that became effective on 6 October 2019 unleashed an historic citizen protest. It was initiated by students and then it spread to the general population. In spite of the measures taken by the Piñera government, it could not be restrained. In fact, the political misreading and ineffective response of the Piñera administration which confronted spontaneous protests with violent force, made matters worse. It incited more anger and massified the demonstrations. However, as Akram states, “not even this provocation [on the part of the police force] could explain the scale of the protests and the intensity of the people’s anger.” After the first outbursts of protests had begun, the issue was no longer the hike in public transportation. In a survey, people stated that they were fed up with their low quality of life, low salaries, and pitiable 2 Miguel Lawner specified that the Inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco had proposed “the construction and financing of a kind of capsule, located adjacent to the towers” to be built by the inmobiliaria (2019, “Fulgor y agonía”).

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

127

pensions and the prices for basic services, such as electricity, water, health, and education (Akram, Chapter 1 “Chile despertó”). On 25 October, such defiance became solidified. In Santiago alone, a street march concentrated more than a million Chileans of all social classes. They took to the streets to protest the unfair and unbalanced society that grew out of the ‘Pinochet’ Constitution. The consensus was that post-authoritarian governments reconciled too many trespasses from the dictatorship and, to gain access to democracy, negotiated far too little or rather acquiesced to far too many demands from the outgoing authoritarian government. The Estallido Social brought Chileans together unlike any other social movement of the past. The history of the Villa San Luis—considering its beginning in the 1970s and its metamorphosis into a national monument in contemporary times—describes Chile’s prejudices and inequalities, and further explains the protests that took the nation by a storm in 2019. The población had been built in the comuna of Las Condes where empresarios nurtured by neoliberal markets pushed ferociously to convert land into capital culture. To get hold of the paño geográfico, businesspeople obliterated human barriers and the material culture of the pobladoras and pobladores of the Allende era. Certainly, this ignited a literal and symbolical battle between investors and common citizens. From the macrocosm of the Estallido, the Constitution of 1980 had allowed a decentralization of markets and little State control. The nation looked good in the international arena. But ordinary Chileans had to pay dearly for the high regard the Chilean economy had earned abroad. In brief, a plethora of citizens consistently did not receive any benefits from the nation’s greater economic prosperity. Yves Besançon underscores has underscored that for decades Chileans felt invisible and without recourse to better living standards. This urban malaise “became a time bomb that was going to explode at some point.” The architect has also said, “I think something of the Estallido of 18 October was caused by this segregated city” (qtd. in López 2020). Henri Lefebvre puts it succinctly: “The right to the city manifests itself as a superior form of rights: right to freedom, to individualization in socialization, to habitat and to inhabit” (2000, 173). Benito Beranda, at the time a member of the Chilean Constitutional Convention, reflecting on the ramifications of the Estallido felt strongly about the isolation experienced by the marginalized:

128

P. VILCHES

Many poblaciones on the periphery and some that are still in the central part of the city, near Santiago’s downtown, have long suffered from an absence of the State. They were built as ghettos, especially the last ones during full democracy. This is a large territory of 50,000 to 100,000 inhabitants that have not been provided with basic services and whose neighborhoods have been taken over by criminal gangs. (Baranda qtd. in “Mentiras Verdaderas” 2020, 00:38:50–00:39:16)

Lawner also saw a strong connection between the Estallido and the way Chileans were being robbed of a dignified way of inhabiting the city. People were rebelling because they had lost the right to the city: JC Ramírez F.: Do you think the so-called Estallido Social is related to the changes implemented by the dictatorship in the way of inhabiting Santiago? Miguel Lawner: I have no doubt! It is one of the most influential factors in this picture of inequality that we are living now. It shows dissatisfaction and anger by the people at being subjected to living in outrageous conditions and in many cases at having been deceived. Look, since the last years of the dictatorship, from 1986 to 2000, the policies implemented by the Chicago Boys’ disciples in the MINVU collapsed everything that was part of its history. (Lawner 2020, qtd. in “la mala calidad”)

In a Lefebvrian sense, therefore, Chileans were rebelling because they sought a dignified type of living. Lawner explains that in July 2019, he had taken the initiative to place a personal call to Marcelo Cox, one of the CEOs of inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco. The architect declared that the two sides had never been able to have a direct dialogue. Accompanied by architect Mario Neira, Lawner met with the inmobiliaria people for about three months, where they engaged with each other in quite a frank conversation. Nothing truly came out of it. Then, the Estallido Social changed all the stakes. It cut deeply into the fabric of Chilean society, even reaching its upper echelons: “Marcelo Cox called me one day toward the end of October and said, ‘well, don Miguel, let’s see. Why don’t we restart the conversation?’ And, for the first time they accepted to keep the recoverable apartment block [Block 14] in place” (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). Asked about the role of the Estallido, Pablo Seguel from CMN clarifies that he could only give his opinion based on the turn of events. For him, it was interesting that all the positive negotiations regarding the memorialization of Block 14 started to take place after 18 October 2019. Seguel also suggested that the corporate

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

129

image of the inmobiliaria might have been an additional factor in the final agreement between the litigating parties. As of late, Seguel relates, the inmobiliaria has sought projects that involve sustainability and social well-being. Certainly, assuming the cost of a museum for the old Villa San Luis meant the inmobiliaria was doing the best it could within the context generated after the Estallido (Seguel Interview 8 April 2021). The historic Estallido of 2019 had far-reaching and critical outcomes, such as the writing of a new Constitution to replace Pinochet’s, with a plebiscite on 4 September 2022. The inmobiliaria had held firmly but the Estallido reformulated for the inmobiliaria what the pobladoras and pobladores had fought for. Business could not continue as usual for the empresarios : the Villa San Luis would be transformed into a national museum. Modifying in part Decreto No. 135 from 2017, the Resolución Exenta [Exempt Resolution] No. 278, from the Ministerio de las Culturas, las Artes y el Patrimonio, stipulated the following: That, in summary, the aforementioned proposal consists of the construction of a memorial museum (Museum), with a maximum area of 800 m2 [approx. 8611 square feet], and a maximum height of 10.62 meters [approx. 35 feet], located in the place where Block 14 stands now, which is approximately 258 m2 [approx. 2777 square feet]. Additionally, it has been proposed to develop a private space for public use associated with the Museum in the northwest corner of the building, whose landscaping must be consistent with both the Museum and the project to be executed by the inmobiliaria. Likewise, it is noted that the Illustrious Municipality of Las Condes (municipality) has expressed its agreement that the landscaping can be extended to the public space that faces part of the corner of Urano street and Presidente Riesco avenue, to integrate and facilitate access to the Museum … Regarding the architectural project of the Museum, it is proposed that it be chosen through a national architecture competition to which the Chilean Association of Architects and the Association of Bureaus of Architects will be invited as sponsors. In turn, the jury of the aforementioned contest will consist of representatives of the inmobiliaria, the CMN, the Fundación, and the municipality, and it will be chaired by a representative of the CMN. (Resolución Exenta No. 278. 6 June 2020)

On 12 December 2021, CMN announced that action had been taken to effectuate a controlled deconstruction and partial demolition of Block 14, so that the structure would be optimized for its conversion to a

130

P. VILCHES

museum.3 The Estallido had been the catalyst for a final understanding about Chile’s past between the two litigating parties. On this, the past can be addressed effectively only through conversations, debates, disagreements so that people may arrive at a memorialization (Sodaro 2018, 119). The Resolución Exenta 278 made clear that the museum script would be put together as a joint effort of the inmobiliaria, the municipality, and the Fundación, with the participation of the evicted families coordinated via the Fundación.4 The Resolución Externa also indicated that the construction of the museum, its exterior, its museographic project, as well as the contest for its design would be financed by the inmobiliaria, with a maximum budget of 40,000 UF [Chilean Unit of Account] (approx. a million and a half dollars). Empresario Felipe Gilabert, representing the inmobiliara Presidente Riesco, gave the point of view from their end: “We have made a great effort to materialize this Museum project. It recognizes the suffering of the families who were evicted by force. Additionally, during this time we have personally met several former pobladoras. We hope they can experience this memorial at least as a symbolic and worthy reparation for what they lived through” (“Culmina la deconstrucción” 2021).5 Seguel indicates that Resolución Exenta 278 established the forms and mechanisms through which the Fundación and the inmobiliaria were able to unblock their three-year litigation. Roughly, Resolución Exenta 278 implies that the plaintiff would withdraw its injunction against the inmobiliaria and, in turn, the defendant vowed to generate a series of initiatives to modify

3 CMN stipulated that the controlled demolition of Block 14 “took place in three phases: the external reinforcement of the building; shoring by jacks on floors 1 and 2; and the controlled demolition of the collapsed elements of the 3rd and 4th floors. Concurrently, the collapsed structure of Block No. 15 was completely demolished, from which representative samples from the structure were extracted” (“Culmina la deconstrucción” 2021). 4 In researching this book, this writer became aware of recent differences that had emerged within the Fundación between the president and some of the membership regarding the fate of the museum. As this book goes to press, the pobladoras had applied on 13 July 2022 for a new charter: Fundación Desalojados Villa San Luis de la Comuna de Las Condes [Foundation of Evicted Residents from The Villa San Luis of the District of Las Condes]. 5 As the pobladoras and pobladores wait for the approval of their new Fundación, they have maintained regular dialogue with empresarios such as Felipe Gilabert, working toward the completion of the museum.

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

131

the environment and build a memorial museum in the specified area (Seguel Interview 8 April 2021). Although Block 14 is a small manifestation of the overall physical space of the población, the museum itself is a substantial moral victory for the former pobladoras and pobladores. The very fact that Block 14 still exists, that there are still traces of the Villa San Luis in contemporary Chile is a result of the endless activism of twenty-first century civic groups like the Fundación and the Comité de Defensa. They fought fiercely to preserve what was left of the población. At the same time, as a national monument, Block 14 insures, albeit on a small scale, transformation and renewal in the comuna of Las Condes. From the perspective of the former residents, Block 14 sustains both the memory of Allende’s social plan and of the dictatorship’s abuses. It shows that people have “an ethical duty to remember.” Like the Museo de la Memoria, this entity offers a route for Chilean citizens to right past violence and to prevent anything similar from happening in the future (Sodaro 2018, 116). It legitimizes and memorializes Allende’s drive for social change via the right to the city for all urban dwellers.

A Tale of Two Cities The Villa San Luis gives voice to critical social issues of the past and the present with respect to the urban space as well as people’s right to the city. It speaks of the history of rural immigration to the nation’s capital, with many families becoming marginalized and without access to a dignified vivienda while the country was becoming increasingly industrialized. It narrates odious actions against powerless people during the Pinochet era. It signals how the land of the Villa San Luis, a property which belonged to the State, was allowed to be transferred to the Army without any difficulty right after the return to democracy. It describes the impact of the Pinochet-era embrace of radical neoliberalism and its destruction of the ideals of the past. Rafael Gumucio has examined its effect on politicians during post-authoritarian governments, analyzing how the new izquierda was only paying lip service to Allende’s ideals. For Gumucio, thus, the political parties had become “perfectly suited to neoliberalism, which uses democracy as more decent clothing to subject politics to the market”

132

P. VILCHES

(2005, 5).6 ‘Business first’ and a ‘free-market economy’ seemed to have been carefully guarded stances of political parties of all denominations after the dictatorship. Certainly, the travails of the Villa San Luis serve as roadmaps for the Estallido of 2019, which united Chileans, with different political beliefs, in their push for social change. Villa San Luis was built from a platform of spatial justice, during highly contested times. It stands simultaneously for Allende’s progressive actions and collapsed government. Lefebvre asserts that there are various levels of “intervention in the city”; “the architectural approach” foresees new ways of better living or, on the other hand, the improvement on existing cultural models; “the urban viewpoint,” another element proposed to remedy the ailments of the city, seeks a general, holistic approach to what comprises a city; and, finally, “the territorial planning,” which considers the individual communication exercised by each of the networks that are built in the urban space (2000, 207). For Lefevbre, “A real consideration of the city in space must bring together the three levels as well as a strategy and politics of space” (2000, 207). In terms of Allende’s project, his mandate to construct in Las Condes encompassed the three levels adduced by Lefebvre. Because of the coup d’état and subsequent historical transformations, the philosophy on urban planning behind this población is generally learned about and understood by Chileans a posteriori. It is a story of injustice. While the majority of families were taken out, a few stayed and made successful deals with the inmobiliarias when they sold. Some lost it all and others struck it rich. All of this mimicked the effects of the dictatorship. Claudio Pulgar summarizes, “in Villa San Luis, in one way or another, is reflected the history of Chile” of the past decades (2010, 113). From its first iterations, the población was a project infused with ideological and political significance for the CORMU, which strove to provide “a new landscape” for Santiago, one that would express the influx of modernity and how it had transformed the city (Raposo and Palacios 2005, 5). This vision was not allowed to come to fruition as it did it

6 Rafael Gumucio’s whole quotation reads like this, “Today pragmatism is predominant:

what you must do is get rich… I think something similar has happened with the followers of Salvador Allende. Nothing remains of the ideals of changing a society. The Partido por la Democracia (PPD) and the Partido Socialista (PS) are perfectly suited to neoliberalism, which uses democracy as a more decent dress to subject politics to the market” (2005, 5).

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

133

for the Villa San Luis 2, still standing in Las Condes’ contemporary landscape. Through Villa San Luis 2, we can perceive the CORMU’s direction all those decades ago. In a country divided along strict social lines, for contemporary urban dwellers the idea that a población could ever have been constructed on the most expensive real estate in Chile7 puzzles and baffles. It also makes the case why the domain was so fervently desired by Pinochet and Chilean empresarios . The CORMU initiative meant surmounting immense geographical barriers. The area conveys the mandates of the Pinochet era, which were carried out willfully by eager empresarios . Under the hand of Lawner, the CORMU built social housing in Chile in the same way of New York City, Chicago, and other world cities. Pinochet grasped a place of profit and capital in the space occupied by the población. It continued to undergo a transformation during post-authoritarian governments and it is now an emblematic center for Chile’s emergence in the global markets. Beautiful and robust edifices constructed on the premises of the old Villa San Luis appear majestic and proud like a peacock. They help to chart a map of social segregation. The idea was “to make the poor invisible and build a segregated city” (López 2020). Yet, the existence of a national museum, symbolizing the población built by the CORMU, makes this economic center exhibit a now and then. The museum stands for ruins that lie beneath gawdy structures. Block 14 and its surroundings offer distinct perspectives on Chilean history. The same space was used to provide housing for the destitute then. It is now a place to accommodate the most privileged. Via the national monument, the skyscrapers are permanently linked to a social experiment that took place decades ago, under the government of a quixotic leader. Like Allende and the UP government, the conceptualizing of the Villa San Luis is encapsulated in highly idealistic times. If the sleek high rises that replaced the apartment blocks mark the end of Allende’s dream, the national museum shows vividly how the Socialist president’s legacy endures. David Harvey states that “Money is the only well-understood and universal yardstick of value that we currently possess. We all use it and possess both a practical and intellectual understanding (of some sort) as to what it means” (1993, 4). The grounds that once held the población epitomize the power of money. It is a space of quarrelling histories 7 In many of my interviews, informants emphasized that lote 18-A1 was the most expensive real estate in the nation.

134

P. VILCHES

and a battleground for power and meaning. Even with its first iteration as the fundo San Luis, the space was in permanent contention. The paño geográfico has been litigated, become estatizado [taken into state ownership], politicized, capitalized, and, finally, albeit in a small segment, emblematized. In contemporary times, the fate of the last-standing apartment block was at the center of a legal dispute between two sectors of society, the former pobladoras and pobladores vs. the inmobiliaria Presidente Riesco. In a segregated city, particularly in Santiago, the people who suffered from despojos now live far from everything, from places of employment, health care, and the like. They endure pricey, grueling commutes, and a constant sense of isolation, as some of the interviewed pobladoras and pobladores stated. Some described that they had lived in Las Condes surrounded by city parks but that they now are living between a noisy highway and a cemetery. They are in a precarious social situation in Santiago, without the right to the city, and this has taken an emotional toll on them.

The Social Spaces of Allende’s Presidential Candidacies Allende aimed to remedy the stark conditions in which many citizens lived. He campaigned for the presidency for nearly two decades, promising during every election to install a government that, to the horror of the opposition, would follow a social agenda that would give power to the pueblo [the people] (Allende 1998, 4). Allende’s candidacy seemed strong in the late 1960s, with a program of challenges to power-holders on behalf of “populations living under the jurisdiction of those power holders” (Tilly 2006, 182). During his fourth—and successful—candidacy in 1970, Allende indicated that governments had been weak—or not able—to confront the powerful few that kept their privileges at the expense of others, illuminating how little Chile’s society had changed from the 1850s to the 1960s. The Socialist candidate denounced how the nation’s afflictions were not only felt in the impoverished segments, but the pain included a vast majority of citizens that were progressively being subdued by the few that occupied the spaces of privilege: Chile is experiencing a deep crisis that arises from socio-economic stagnation, generalized poverty, and all types of degradation suffered by the

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

135

workers, peasants and other exploited classes. This socio-economic stagnation is felt as well in the growing difficulties faced by employees, professionals, micro and macro businessmen and in the minimum opportunities available to women and youth … A group of entrepreneurs that controls the economy, the press and other media; a political system that threatens the State when the latter attempts to intervene or refuses to favor those who hold power has resulted in a huge social cost for Chileans... Half a million families lack homes and many more live in very bad conditions in terms of sewage, potable water, electricity, and health. The population’s needs for education and health services have been poorly met. (Allende 1969, “Programa básico”)

Allende’s conception of unity created a kinship between himself as president and the pueblo itself, all working together for a more just and empathic society. For Volodia Teitelboim—author, politician, and Allende’s close associate—this connection was perceived by Allende personally, not only as a political promise. For Teitelboim, this Sociedad de la Igualdad-type of cohesion between the stateman and the pueblo, “went beyond the formulations of the UP” (2008, 22). In other words, the “Programa Básico” became a compromiso for the long-term candidate. As president, Allende fought the increasing animosity of a staunch conservative faction while constantly negotiating to maintain his democratic vía chilena with a fractionalized, barely united left.8 Some left-wing parties felt affinity with Allende’s plan while others pushed for and announced a revolutionary-minded stance—which fed the discourses of fear from the right. As evinced in his ‘Last Speech’ at La Moneda, Allende never diverged from a message that the country’s progress had been impeded by powers that had maintained their privileges at any cost. For the 2019 Estallido Social in Chile, he prophesized how severe social inequalities, if not corrected, would inevitably throw the nation into socio-political turmoil (Allende 1998, 6). 8 Salvador Allende had been challenged increasingly by the Socialist party, his own political party. Joan Garcés, Allende’s political adviser and close friend, recalls the words Allende had for Socialist leader Hernán del Canto when the latter arrived at La Moneda on 11 September and asked the president, on behalf of the Political Commission of the Socialist party, what the president wanted them to do: “‘I know what my place is and what I have to do’–Allende responded drily. ‘You have never asked for my opinion before. Why do you ask me now? You, who have boasted so much, must know what you must do. I have known from the beginning what my duty was’. The conversation ended there. Del Canto left the premises” (Garcés 1976, 386).

136

P. VILCHES

Lawner alludes to and reinforces Allende’s compromiso on housing for Chileans. Discussing the directives of the Junta de Gobierno, Lawner indicates how they affected the less privileged. He describes that the dictatorship’s intrusive free-market economy was primarily responsible for the collapse of State institutions that in the past had acted as watchdogs in areas like the MINVU, Ministerio de Vivienda y Urbanismo [Ministry of Housing and Urbanism] (2020, “La mala calidad”). In fact, while Chile came to be hailed as an ideal model for subsidio habitacional [subsidized housing], to be followed in other parts of Latin America, the Chilean architect maintains that the system was faulty at best. Instead of being a housing policy for future lower-income owners, the subsidio habitacional was a patchwork of bland guidelines that built inferior-quality housing. Construction for the poor was a profitable enterprise for a few. It was a neoliberal vehicle that saw the mushrooming of cheap and unsound housing. There had been a return toward the informal constructions of the past. The new versions were more aesthetically pleasing but unsound interpretations of the old conventillos (2020, “La mala cantidad”). In 2006, the MINVU officially recognized the unreliable quality of the low-income housing built from the 1980s onwards, from the years of the dictatorship to the present. The acknowledgment also included a decision to undo and reverse what had been badly constructed, which meant demolishing housing because it could not be salvaged (Rodríguez and Sugranyes 2011, 100–101). Accordingly, Lawner draws parallels with the solid housing construction of the past, with regulations that demanded a compromiso toward heavy investment in the future owners, a vision that looked to enhance the quality of life of its residents. The type of vivienda social constructed during the UP years, Lawner continues, could not be equated with the calamitous structures begun during the dictatorship. The architect concludes that apathetic, poor quality housing is the result of both a deteriorated State (one that could no longer serve as housing regulator), and the prevalence of real estate speculation (2020, “La mala calidad”). Without any governmental incentive to make things better for future residents, architects, engineers, etc., have continued building indifferent social housing without any concerns for spatial justice. Poor construction has turned housing irregularities into a social problem (Rodríguez and Sugranyes 2011, 102).

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

137

A Promise Builds a Legacy Much has been written about Allende’s interrupted presidency and what he could not accomplish. The Villa San Luis, principally, is the legacy of a forward-looking individual who went all out to address the ills of urban Santiago. Lawner refers to the ebullience of the times: “We all had the sensation that we were protagonists of a transcendental historical process: to materialize the ownership of a house for people who had always been marginalized, for those who never had the option of a decent roof, since housing policies had invariably been governed by criteria dictated by the market” (2008, 283). Certainly, it was a brief triumph, but it is now part of the annals of Chilean history. With a memorial museum to honor the emblematic población, the direction toward a just city on the part of Allende and the CORMU lives through the concrete pores of the national monument. The different stages of the población’s demolition epitomize neoliberal ways and capitalism. Before its careful deconstruction, Block 14 had a shabby, broken-down appearance reflecting the segregated city of today. As it is being converted into a museum, it gives expression to the Allende era and his project at the Villa San Luis. Its very existence makes it an iconic space of Allende. The Villa San Luis held special significance for the UP president. As a candidate for the presidency and accompanied by Lawner, Allende had met with displaced people who lived on the banks of the Mapocho River. The Socialist leader saw many families living in overcrowded, vulnerable conditions. The Chilean architect remembers that day very well: “as we were leaving the marshy banks, Allende turned to me, ‘Look, even if it were just to get these people out of the mud, it would be worth it if I became elected President of the Republic’” (Lawner Interview 21 April 2020). Patricio Hales, who advised a few of the former occupants of the Villa San Luis in class action lawsuits, recalls how moved he was when he learned of Allende’s promise: “He went to the poblaciones El Esfuerzo and El Ejemplo. He saw the people. It was winter. There was mud and all of that. He made a promise to them that he would get them out” (qtd. in Allende and Olave 2018, 38). In fact, many of the people who attended Allende’s speech as a candidate on the riverbank of the Mapocho became residents of the Villa San Luis. With edifices like Villa San Luis, Santiago opened itself up to being a just city. Allende gave socioeconomic disadvantaged families the right to a dignified vivienda. He gave them the right to the city.

138

P. VILCHES

References Akram, Hassan. 2020. El Estallido. ¿Por qué? ¿Hacia dónde? Santiago, Chile: El Buen Aire. Pdf electronic text. Allende, Francisca, and Scarlett Olave. 2018. El despojo de la Villa San Luis de las Condes. Cómo los camiones de la basura de la dictadura desterraron una población al olvido. Santiago, Chile: Ceibo. Allende, Salvador. 1969. “Programa básico de la Unidad Popular.” https://www. marxists.org/espanol/allende/1969/diciembre17.htm. Accessed 20 January 2020. Allende, Salvador. 1998. “Allende por Allende.” In Salvador Allende en el umbral del siglo XXI , edited by Frida Modak, 1–7. Mexico, D.F.: Plaza & Janés. Cárdenas, Leonardo. 2018. “La reservada trama que busca un acuerdo para instalar un memorial en Villa San Luis.” La Tercera. 24 May. https://www.lat ercera.com/la-tercera-pm/noticia/la-reservada-trama-busca-acuerdo-instalarmemorial-villa-san-luis/177427/. Accessed 18 February 2021. CHV Noticias. 2018. “La Villa San Luis en Las Condes.” YouTube Video, 00:03:32, 16 June. Posted by Mundo Actual. https://youtu.be/COGHfH zq4As. Accessed 25 May 2021. Cooperativa.cl. 2017. “Es oficial: Villa San Luis de Las Condes fue declarada Monumento Histórico Nacional.” 28 June. https://www.cooperativa.cl/not icias/pais/vivienda/es-oficial-villa-san-luis-de-las-condes-fue-declarada-mon umento/2017-06-28/181327.html. Accessed 8 March 2020. “Culmina la deconstrucción del monumento histórico Villa San Luis.” 2021. CMN . 12 December. https://www.monumentos.gob.cl/prensa/noticias/ culmina-deconstruccion-monumento-historico-villa-san-luis. Accessed 20 December 2021. De la Cerda, Emilio. 2017. “Los valores del suelo”. In “La Villa San Luis un conflicto valórico”. ARQ 97: 146–49. https://dx.doi.org/10.4067/S071769962017000300146. Emol.nacional. 2017. “El futuro que le podría deparar a la Villa San Luis tras ser declarada Monumento Nacional.” 29 June. https://www.emol.com/not icias/Nacional/2017/06/29/864762/El-futuro-de-la-Villa-San-Luis-trasser-declarada-Monumento-Nacional.html. Accessed 8 March 2020. Garcés, Joan. 1976. Allende y la experiencia chilena: Las armas de la política. Barcelona: Ariel. Gertosio Swanston, Rodrigo. 2019. “Villa San Luis, o la insoportable levedad del patrimonio en Chile.” Invitro. 10 July. https://invi.uchilefau.cl/villa-san-luiso-la-insoportable-levedad-del-patrimonio-en-chile/. Accessed 10 May 2021. Gumucio, Rafael. 2005. “Chile entre dos centenarios. Historia de una democracia frustrada.” Polis 10: 1–19. http://journals.openedition.org/polis/7463.

6

THE VILLA SAN LUIS: FIVE DECADES LATER

139

Gutiérrez, Marco. 2017. “Dueños de terreno de ex Villa San Luis afinan artillería legal para revertir decisión del CMN sobre el predio.” Economía y negocios online. 9 July. http://www.economiaynegocios.cl/noticias/noticias.asp? id=377145. Accessed 18 April 2020. Harvey, David. 1993. “The Nature of Environment: The Dialectics of Social and Environmental Change.” The Socialist Register 29: 1–51. Lawner, Miguel. 2008. “Viviendas dignas para hombres dignos.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al., 281–305. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Lawner, Miguel. 2019. “Fulgor y agonía de la Villa San Luis.” elmostrador. 28 June. https://www.elmostrador.cl/cultura/2019/06/28/fulgor-y-ago nia-de-la-villa-san-luis/. Accessed 7 February 2020. Lawner, Miguel. 2020. “La mala calidad de la vivienda es un factor fundamental en el levantamiento popular que estamos viviendo ahora.” Interview by J.C. Ramírez Figueroa. The Clinic. 30 January. https://www.theclinic.cl/2020/ 01/30/miguel-lawner-la-mala-calidad-de-la-vivienda-es-un-factor-fundam ental-en-el-levantamiento-popular-que-estamos-viviendo-ahora/. Accessed 7 February 2020. Lefebvre, Henri. 2000. Writings on Cities. Selected, Translated and Introduced by Eleonore Kofman and Elizabeth Lebas. Oxford and Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers. López, Constanza. 2020. “Otra vida para la Villa San Luis.” Pauta. 4 July. https://www.pauta.cl/ciudad/historia-de-la-villa-san-luis-en-las-condesacuerdo-constructora-y-familias. Accessed 27 September 2020. Pulgar, Claudio. 2010. “Lugares de memoria y olvido, el derecho humano a la ciudad.” In Ciudad y memorias , desarrollo de sitios de conciencia en el Chile Austral. Santiago, Chile: Salesianos Impresores, S.A. Raposo, Alfonso, and Marco A. Valencia. 2005. La Interpretación de la obra Arquitectónica: Historia de las realizaciones habitacionales de CORMU en Santiago 1967–1976.” Diseño Urbano y Paisaje 2 (4): 2–23. Resolución Exenta No. 278. 6 June 2020. Provided by the Ministerio de las Culturas, las Artes y el Patrimonio. Access Requested via Law No. 20,285 on Public Records. Rodríguez, Alfredo, and Ana Sugranyes. 2011. “Vivienda privada de ciudad.” Revista de Ingeniería 35: 100–107. Available: http://www.scielo.org.co/ pdf/ring/n35/n35a16.pdf. Romero, Constanza, and Felipe Santibáñez. 2022. Huellas de Resistencia: Villa San Luis, el último bastión de Allende. Santiago: Ediciones Cinco Ases. Sodaro, Amy. 2018. Exhibiting Atrocity: Memorial Museums and the Politics of Past Violence. Rugters University Press. Pdf electronic text. https://library. oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/30767/642735.pdf?sequence= 1&isAllowed=y. Accessed 22 January 2022.

140

P. VILCHES

Teitelboim, Volodia. 2008. “Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia.” In Salvador Allende: Presencia en la ausencia, edited by Miguel Lawner et al., 17–23. Santiago, Chile: LOM. Tilly, Charles. 2006. Regimes and Repertoires. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Glossary of Terms and Acronyms

artialisation A process that implies an intervention of art to transform nature. It may be effectuated in situ; that is, in the area, in the landscape itself; or in visu, by the area itself becoming elevated to the level of a work of art. barrio alto affluent areas and neighborhoods. It comprises the comunas in the northeastern part of Santiago. People also refer to it as the ‘sector oriente’ [eastern part]. The majority of Chileans with the highest per capita income reside in the barrio alto. barrio popular working-class neighborhood. campamento irregular and precarious settlements where a significant number of families live in poor conditions, lacking access to potable water, electricity, or sewerage. Chicago Boys a group of Chilean economists, the majority of which were trained at the University of Chicago, under Milton Friedman and Arnold Hargerber. They served as advisors or worked at high levels of government during the Pinochet regime. Chile despertó Chile woke up. The motto used during the Estallido Social protests. The consensus was that citizens had been in a type of lethargy and had allowed the status quo to continue for decades, enduring a poor quality of life. cité social housing built in a specific manner, with row houses connected by a private common space. The name was supposed to recall old medieval cities. © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8

141

142

GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ACRONYMS

CMN Consejo Monumentos Nacionales [Chilean Council of National Monuments]. Comisión Ortúzar Ortuzar Commission. Commission for the Study of the New Political Constitution established in 1976 for preliminary work on the 1980 Chilean Constitution. It is known as ‘Comisión Ortuzar’ because it was chaired by Enrique Ortúzar. Comités de pobladores sin casa Committees of the homeless. An organized movement by pobladoras and pobladores led by left and centerleft political parties. It peaked in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The movement exerted pressure on the State to procure homes. compromiso commitment to fulfil a promise, an agreement. Sense of duty towards a promise made to others. comuna, (pl.) comunas a municipal district. This book refers specifically to those in Santiago, Chile’s capital. Consejo de Estado State Council. Constructora, (pl.) constructoras construction company. Contraloría General Office of the Comptroller General. Conventillo, (pl.) conventillos tenement house; informal settlement. CORMU Corporación de Mejoramiento Urbano [Corporation for Urban Development]. It was created in 1965 spearheaded by the Frei Montalva administration (1964–1970). During the Pinochet dictatorship it was replaced by SERVIU, which is represented in each region of Chile. derecha right wing politics. despojo, (pl.) despojos a home eviction; the act of violently depriving a person of what that person possesses. empresario, (pl.) empresarios businessperson, businesspeople. Estallido Social Social Outburst. The date is commemorated on 18th October 2019. On 25th October more than a million Chileans marched in the streets in Santiago to protest against the social anguish caused by neoliberal practices. extrema derecha extreme right-wing politics. extrema izquierda extreme left-wing politics. fundo from the Latin, ‘fundus’, a large estate. An agricultural inheritance, a piece of land where a property has been allocated. inmobiliaria, (pl.) inmobiliarias real estate company. intendente mayor of a city. The contemporary term for mayor is alcalde. izquierda left wing politics.

GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ACRONYMS

143

Las Condes a prosperous comuna in Santiago, in the eastern part of the city. La Moneda Chile’s presidential palace. It was designed by Italian architect Gioacchino Toesca (Joaquín Toesca) who worked on the Neoclassical building until his death in 1799. It was finished by his disciples in 1802. lote, (pl.) lotes division of land; it denotes a division of a specific area of land that will be used for construction. A piece of land may have many lotes; in this case, each lote is independent of the others. medio pelo people of the lower-middle class. Ministerio de Bienes Nacionales Ministry of National Assets. Ministerio de Defensa Nacional Ministry of National Defense MINVU Ministerio de Vivienda y Urbanismo [Ministry of Housing and Urbanism]. Movimiento Reconquista de Nuestros Derechos Movement to Reacquire Our Rights. In the late 1990s, some of the pobladoras and pobladores that suffered from the despojos began searching for former neighbors also affected by the evictions. Once a considerable number had been reunited, the families created the Movimiento Reconquista de Nuestros Derechos and obtained legal status. The organization was presided by former residents Violeta Aguayo, with Damaris Morales as Secretary. MIR Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria [Revolutionary Left Movement]. The movement was created in 1965, influenced by the Cuban Revolution (1959). It included various left-wing philosophies. Its revolutionary, socio-political stance became radicalized within two years. It confronted the traditional left in the latter’s push for parliamentarian, institutional reform. mundo empresarial business world. Operación Sitio, (pl.) Operaciones Sitio spearheaded by the Frei Montalva administration and to counter the tomas, this initiative allowed pobladoras and pobladores, through subsidized credit, to acquire housing with basic forms of urbanization. It envisioned future residents becoming involved in the construction of their own homes in the poblaciones. PAF Patrimonio de Afectación Fiscal [Allocated Fiscal Patrimony]. PAF denotes Wellness Services for the Chilean Armed Forces. paño geográfico piece of land.

144

GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ACRONYMS

Partido Nacional National Party. A staunchly conservative party that supported the candidacy of Jorge Alessandri for the 1970 election. Alessandri had been President of Chile 1958–1964. pelucones nineteenth-century term; conservative members of society, known to have favored ties with the Spanish monarchy; later in Chile, the term came to be associated with individuals of the upper classes with conservative values. pipiolos nineteenth-century term; individuals who identify with a liberal ideology. They were members of the upper strata, influenced by French culture and ideas in general. They opposed the strong hold of the Catholic Church over Chile. a piso (alquiler a piso) small segments of land or property to be let; landowners subdivided their land in numerous portions to rent to people of meager means. población, (pl.) poblaciones in Chile, the term is understood as a residential area that houses middle-lower to lower sectors of society; also, it entails the idea of a barrio popular. población callampa irregular precarious settlements. The term callampa means ‘mushroom’ in Quechua. pobladora, poblador, (pl.) pobladores inhabitant of a población. pobladores sin casa inhabitants of an informal living arrangement, such as a campamento, población callampa, etc. This oxymoronic conceptualization can also be understood as inhabitants waiting for a place to live; it also denotes fighting, occupying a terrain while in search of permanent housing. pueblo the people. reconciliación reconciliation. During the return to democracy in twentieth-century Chile, a commission was established to investigate the numerous cases of human rights violations that occurred during the Pinochet dictatorship. The term indicates a means to find reparation for the pain inflicted on Chileans by the dictatorship as well as a way of finding peace and union among Chileans of all political colors. In the twenty-first century, many oppose the degree of justice applied to those who committed acts of violence on their compatriots. Revolución en Libertad Revolution in Liberty. A platform of Allende’s predecessor, President Frei Montalva. As the name indicates its focus was to implement significant change maintaining democratic tenets and a form of capitalist vision.

GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ACRONYMS

145

SERVIU Servicio de Vivienda y Urbanización [Housing and Urbanization Services]. The SERVIU replaced the CORMU during the Pinochet dictatorship. sonajera rattling sounds. When Allende broadcast his speeches from La Moneda on 11th September 1973, the background noise was strong, with clatter, banging, and so on, while he communicated with the nation. subsidio habitacional subsidized housing. toma, (pl) tomas illegal seizure of land, property. trámite, (pl.) trámites procedures, steps, formalities. UP Unidad Popular [Popular Unity] Coalition of political parties of left and center-left leanings that brought Allende to power in 1970. vía chilena al socialismo Chilean Road to Socialism. Allende’s conceptualization of a democratic and peaceful path toward Socialism, which in his agenda involved weighty political, social, and economic changes. Among the president’s accomplishments stands the Chilenización del cobre [Nationalization of Copper] in 1971. Vicaría de la Solidaridad Vicariate of Solidarity. A human rights organization established in Chile by the Chilean Catholic Church. It followed the order of pope Paul VI as requested by Chilean Cardinal Raúl Silva Enriquez to protect Chileans from the abuses of the Pinochet dictatorship. vivienda, (p.) viviendas housing; residential living space that follows socio-cultural tenets that include urbanization and essential services for a family to live; place or building equipped for people to live, e.g. a house is understood as a vivienda. vivienda social (pl.) viviendas sociales social housing.

Index

0–9 11 September 1973, 11 September, vii, viii, 2, 16. See also coup d’état, coup; Museo de la Memoria 18 October 2019, 18 October, 127, 128

A Acevedo, María, 14, 33, 34, 40, 42, 45 affect, ix, 57, 73, 88, 95, 107, 116 Alessandri, Jorge, 62 Anderson, Benedict, 92 Aylwin, Patricio, 97–100, 103

B barrio alto, 14, 33–35, 37, 38, 45 barrio popular, 33, 38 La Batalla de Chile, 37 Blest Gana, Alberto, 12, 13, 27–30. See also Martín Rivas

Block 14, ix, 3, 11, 12, 17, 19, 45, 114, 115, 122, 124, 125, 128, 129, 131, 133, 137. See also national monument; national museum Boric, Gabriel, 19 Bourdieu, Pierre, 8, 17, 25, 94, 98, 104, 107, 109 Bourdieusian, 97. See also cultural capital; habitus C callampa, 27 Las callampas , 56 campamento(s), 10, 35, 37, 38, 44, 57–59, 64, 72, 76, 81 casas callampas , 55, 58 Chicago Boys, 8, 18, 94, 128 compromiso, 15, 67, 135, 136 conventillo(s), 26, 32, 51–54, 136 coup d’état, coup, vii, viii, 2, 4, 5, 11, 16, 18, 39, 41, 42, 45, 77, 78, 82, 85, 95, 97, 99, 102, 132 cuartos redondos , 50, 51

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 P. Vilches, Salvador Allende and the Villa San Luis, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-18938-8

147

148

INDEX

cultural capital, 15, 28, 35, 62, 94, 105–107

D despojo(s), 77–80, 83–87, 101, 104, 106, 108, 114, 116, 123, 125, 134

E earcons, viii El Esfuerzo, 36, 38, 39, 41, 82, 85, 86, 137 empresario(s), 9, 11, 12, 93, 105, 108–110, 124, 127, 129, 133 Estallido, Estallido Social , 18, 19, 126–130, 132, 135

F Frei Montalva, Eduardo, 6, 10, 58, 59, 61, 62 fundo, 32, 33, 44, 60, 61, 64, 75, 134

G Gonzalo (Infante), 36, 38–42

H habitus , viii, 8, 10, 17, 25, 97, 104, 109, 110 Harvey, David, 33, 38, 65, 133

I iconic space, ix, 4, 137

J Jara, Víctor, 15, 34, 35, 43, 57

Juan Carlos (Eguirreizaga), 2, 14, 33–35, 40 Junta de Gobierno, Junta, 78, 95, 136. See also Military Junta just city, ix, 4, 6, 7, 12, 17, 19, 92, 96, 107, 111, 115, 125, 137

L Lafourcade, Enrique, 14, 33, 34, 41. See also Palomita Blanca La Moneda, 11, 18, 59, 135. See also National Palace Lamont, Michèle, 4, 104 Lefebvre, Henri, 2, 7, 39, 43, 44, 50, 54, 55, 64, 65, 105, 116, 127, 132. See also Lefebvrian Lefebvrian, 39, 43, 44, 128 Lemebel, Pedro, 53, 54 lieu de mémoire, lieux de mémoire, 11, 124 Lillo, Baldomero, 52

M Machiavelli, Niccolò, 27, 94 Machuca, 15, 35, 37–43, 82 (Pedro) Machuca, 36–42, 45 Mapocho, Mapocho River, 31, 38, 40, 41, 43, 44, 54, 66, 81, 82, 113, 115, 137 Martín Rivas , 12, 13, 27–29 material culture, 4, 5, 12, 65, 96, 97, 110, 111, 122, 127 mediaguas , 56, 66 medio pelo, 13, 29 memorialization, 110, 113, 116, 123, 125, 128, 130 memory, 124, 131 memoryscape(s), viii, 3, 39, 88, 98, 116 Military Junta, 77, 92, 94, 100

INDEX

modernity, 34, 43, 45, 50, 72, 111, 132 modernization, 32 modernized, 54, 61, 92 Museo de la Memoria, 2, 131

N national monument, 12, 17, 20, 79, 113, 123–127, 131, 133, 137 national museum, ix, 4, 17, 129, 133 National Palace, 11 neoliberal, neoliberalism, viii, ix, 8, 10, 11, 17, 95, 104–106, 109, 110, 116, 125, 127, 131, 132, 136, 137 Nora, Pierre, 11

O Operación Sitio, Operaciones Sitio, 10, 58

P Palomita Blanca, 14, 33, 35, 36, 40, 42. See also Acevedo, María; Juan Carlos (Eguirreizaga) pelucones , 27, 28, 62 picholeo, 29 Piñera, Sebastián, 56, 106, 124, 126 pipiolos , 27, 28 población callampa, poblaciones callampas . See callampa; Las callampas; casas callampa pobladores sin casa, 2, 56, 57, 59, 65, 72, 73, 76, 115 Prats, Carlos, 92, 99

149

R reconciliación, 97. See also Truth and Reconciliation Revolución en Libertad, 62 S Sanhattan, 11 siútico(s), 29, 93, 96 Sociedad de la Igualdad, 28, 30, 73, 74, 135 Soja, Edward, 5, 6, 44, 45, 73, 115 sonajera, viii soundscapes, viii, 95 spatial justice, viii, ix, 12, 15, 37, 63, 65, 67, 132, 136 spatial turn, 20, 73 T thirdspace, 45 toma(s), 15, 16, 55–57, 59, 60, 65, 66, 72, 74–76, 78–80, 101 Truth and Reconciliation, 98 V Vicaría, Vicaría de la Solidaridad, 86, 102 Vicuña Mackenna, Benjamín, 13, 14, 30–32 visualscape(s), 11, 61 W Wood, Andrés, 15, 35–39, 41–43, 82. See also Gonzalo (Infante); Machuca; (Pedro) Machuca Z Zanjón de la Aguada, 53, 54, 56