Peronism, that Argentine political mystery

Evita’s faces on Buenos Aires From the facades of a central building, one friendly to the south and another tense to the north, a summary of the changing Peronism, the movement that has dominated Argentine politics and is now fighting to avoid a historic electoral setback.

As difficult to understand outside of Argentina as it is to explain to those who come to this country, Peronism has a birth certificate: October 17, 1945, the day on which the workers who ended up taking the presidency for a year marched from the southern suburbs of the capital. a decade (1946-55) to Colonel Juan Domingo Perón, promoter of social and labor reforms.

More than half a century later, for a 27-year-old young man, Nicolás Yugman, recently graduated as a psychologist, Peronism is like “a contradiction”. “Perón in his different governments had different, contrary ideas. Since the birth of Peronism until now, ideas opposite to its own doctrine have been expressed under its flag.”, he told AFP.

How did it come about?

“Perón did not invent Peronism, Peronism invented Perón,” explains historian Alejandro Horowicz, author of “The four Peronisms”when describing the origin of that movement that organized the working class and improved their income, in a country that was beginning its industrialization.

Witness to Italian fascism in 1930, Perón promoted a “organized community” opposed to liberal democracy. Your economic model “national and popular” It redistributed wealth, enabled women to vote, and was repeatedly legitimized at the polls.

The first ideology of the Justicialista Party was summarized in “political sovereignty, economic independence and social justice”, structured in three corporations: State, unions and businessmen. And only one boss: Perón.

The conservative middle and upper classes opposed the authoritarianism into which Perón fell. In an Argentina full of political hatred, the opposition allied with the military to overthrow him, with violence, in 1955. The coup took place in residences in the north of the city.

Right or left?

Argentina would remain polarized for several decades in which Peronism itself, banned from the polls, changed and adopted even contradictory ideas.

Thus, exiled in the Spain of the dictator Francisco Franco, who protected him, Perón called the “endurance” to the unions and the “national liberation” to young people inspired by the Cuban revolution.

The leader returned in 1973 determined to regroup the party, but he died a year later, in full “third Peronism”in the end devoured by the violence of its two extreme expressions: the Montoneros guerrilla, which proclaimed “national socialism”, and the paramilitary Argentine Anti-Communist Alliance (Triple A).

Always linked to strong leadership, it was only in the 1990s that Argentines elected a “fourth Peronism” with President Carlos Menem, who determined to promote “national union” embraced economic liberalism.

What is “K” Peronism?

The neoliberal experiment, with privatizations and a fixed exchange rate of one peso for one dollar, ended with a serious crisis in 2001. Then the Peronists arrived. “K”, Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007) and his wife Cristina Kirchner (2007-2015), to confirm that Peronism maintained a constant quality: ensuring governability.

With the Kirchners, the active role of the State returned. But the couple did not create a “fifth Peronism”according to Horowicz, and could only oppose “a good capitalism to a bad capitalism”.

“It was an attempt at a progressive government with leftist roots,” that brought the country out of the crisis, historian Felipe Pigna told AFP. “But he made a very serious mistake” in 2008, he wanted to raise taxes on the countryside and confronted the agricultural producers, the engine of recovery. Like Perón in the 1950s, he ended up uniting almost the entire opposition against him.

Does it have a future?

“I feel that today Peronism no longer exists. They say it is Peronism but it is more Kirchnerism. Peronism is that of Perón, the old one, the one from before. The truth is that they don’t come or go to me.”Lucía Cardillo, a 15-year-old high school student, told AFP.

Back in power since 2019 with Alberto Fernández in the presidency and Cristina Kirchner as vice president, the serious economic crisis, with poverty of 40%, hits the electoral base of Peronism.

“Peronism became incapable of mutating,” said Horowicz. It is “the long agony of the fourth Peronism”wrote.

Convicted of corruption and after suffering an assassination attempt in 2022, Cristina Kirchner, the last strong leader of Peronism, increasingly withdrew from the political scene and finally decided not to run for any office in Sunday’s elections.

In extremis, Peronism found Sergio Massa, Minister of Economy, as a circumstantial leader, who will barely reach 30% of the votes in the first round of the presidential elections, according to polls.

Another Peronist leader, Governor Axel Kicillof, acknowledged: “We’re going to have to compose a new song. “People are not listening to us.”.

But no one imagines that its strong imprint can be erased. ““I don’t think Peronism will disappear.”Pigna highlighted.

Source: AFP