Skip to content →

Month: September 2008

The Septembers of Neoliberalism

It was September 11, 1973, that the neo-liberal experiment began. The brutal U.S.-backed coup against Salvador Allende’s government opened the door for the “Chicago Boys” – a group of Chilean economists who had studied under Milton Friedman at the University of Chicago[1] – to “reconstruct the Chilean economy … along free-market lines, privatizing public assets, opening up natural resources to private exploitation and facilitating foreign direct investment and free trade.”[2] September 7, 2008 – thirty-five years later – that experiment came to an end, not with a whimper, but a bang. The neo-liberal regime of George Bush – more closely…

Comments closed

Crisis in Bolivia

SEPTEMBER 15, 2008 – Thursday Sept. 11, at least 30 people – supporters of president Evo Morales – were killed in the northern department of Pando, victims of right-wing inspired violence. “We were unarmed” said one survivor of the 1,000-strong peasant march which was the target of the attack. “They stopped us some seven kilometers before Porvenir and afterwards they attacked us when we reached the bridge, where they ambushed us and began to shoot with automatic machine-guns.” The massacre was “executed by civilian groups who’d received weapons training by the government of Leopoldo Fernández.”[1] Fernández is one of a…

Comments closed