Chile Under Pinochet: Recovering the Truth (Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights) [Hardcover]

Mark Ensalaco (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 18, 1999 | ISBN-10: 0812235207 | ISBN-13: 978-0812235203

"When the army comes out, it is to kill."—Augusto Pinochet

Following his bloody September 1973 coup d'état that overthrew President Salvador Allende, Augusto Pinochet, commander-in-chief of the Chilean Armed Forces and National Police, became head of a military junta that would rule Chile for the next seventeen years. The violent repression used by the Pinochet regime to maintain power and transform the country's political profile and economic system has received less attention than the Argentine military dictatorship, even though the Pinochet regime endured twice as long.

In this primary study of Chile Under Pinochet, Mark Ensalaco maintains that Pinochet was complicit in the "enforced disappearance" of thousands of Chileans and an unknown number of foreign nationals. Ensalaco spent five years in Chile investigating the impact of Pinochet's rule and interviewing members of the truth commission created to investigate the human rights violations under Pinochet. The political objective of human rights organizations, Ensalaco contends, is to bring sufficient pressure to bear on violent regimes to induce them to end policies of repression. However, these efforts are severely limited by the disparities of power between human rights organizations and regimes intent on ruthlessly eliminating dissent.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Essential reading."—Political Studies

"An excellent, in-depth examination of the repression under General Augusto Pinochet's rule—and the human-rights movement that followed. . . . An essential guide to understanding Chile's past."—Foreign Affairs

About the Author

Mark Ensalaco is Director of International Studies at the University of Dayton, and Executive Director of the Inter-American Forum of Human Rights-USA.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 296 pages
• Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press (October 18, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0812235207
• ISBN-13: 978-0812235203
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #600,363 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #50 in Books > History > Americas > South America > Chile

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Chile Under Pinochet, September 26, 2000

By 

Kyle - See all my reviews

This review is from: Chile Under Pinochet: Recovering the Truth (Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights) (Hardcover)

Dr. Ensalaco is one of my professors at the University of Dayton. We had to read this book for his Political Violence course. The book is extremely insightful and probes deeply into the repression of the political left under the Pinochet regime. The information isn't just anti-Pinochet propganda, but gives the facts from both sides of the repression, from assassination attempts by the left to disappearences of leftists and their sympathizers without trials or records that they were ever arrested. If you want to read an insightful account of the situation in Chile during the Pinochet years, I recommend that you buy this book.