The Radical Teachers : The Ideology and Political Behaviour of a Salaried 'Middle Class' Sector in Chile 1920-1935

• Main Author: Roddick, J.
• Published: University of Sussex 1977
• Subjects: 970
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.470805

This study of the political history of the Asociacibn General de Profesores de Chile, the first successful trade union organisation among primary school teachers in Chile, has two fundamental aims: (1) to provide an empirical study of the political bheaviour of a salaried lower middle class sector during a time of apparent social revolution, caused by a crisis in the economic relations between Chile and the world market, a "crisis in the mode of dependency"; and (2) to subject prevailing theories about the role of the middle sectors as a whole in Latin America to a critical empirical examination, by measuring their model of the period against the actual political behaviour of a sector of the salaried lower middle class. Where the second is concerned, I hope it demonstrates that the theories of Johnson, ECLA, Petras and Jose Nun are misconceived, at least in the case of Chile. All these writers envisage the "middle sectors" as playing a latent conservative role: most of them suggest that during this era, the "middle class" manipulated popular desires for reform to provide backing for its own demands for a share in political power, enhancing its own economic position as a result. The history of Chilean primary school teachers during this period shows no signs of latent conservatism (many of the union's activists were close to the I.W.W.) and suggests that far from manipulating the lower classes, this sector was turning to the organised working class as a source of political ideas and even of political leadership. The study also illustrates the instability and inconsistency of this sector's political behaviour during a period of revolution, particularly the disjunction between its support and enthusiasm for each of the self-styled "revolutionary" coups of the era and the manifest reformism and pacifism of its own declared ideology.