Neo-Liberalism and the demise of Democracy. (Part One)

1978,1979 and 1980. These years will forever be recorded as a turning point in world history, even more profoundly in human societies and in our perception of democracy. These three dates are linked without any doubt with the "defacto" leading, world dominant ideology, that we call Neoliberalism. In 1978 around 1 year and a half after the death of the grand leader Mao Zedong, a new elite of reformers took power in Beijing. At their head a man called Deng Xiaoping, a man that had always been at odds with the economic ideal of Maoism. His repugnance of the ideal of an industrial superpower that for basis an agrarian society originated with his deception of the "Great Leap Forward" for him this great leap was more so a great leap backwards. And so after the death of ideological father of the Chinese revolution, the revolution would be betrayed by one of it's own. Deng Xiaoping started the great economic reforms that would lead to the installation of a "capitalistic statism", in practice it meant the opening of certain sectors of the economy to private capital, and private enterprise in the so-called Special Economic Zones (SEZs) this was the first step towards the global economic power that China beholds today. But Xiaoping economic reforms did not change much in political or social terms, the fact is that the Xiaoping reforms were the birth of the Neoliberal tendency in China and the real implementation of Neoliberal policies in one country or was it?
In 1979, the United States under Jimmy Carter was on the brink of oblivion, at least that's the perception that the American public had of the denouement of the then being current world affairs. First of all Communism seemed on the rise throughout the world specially in Africa with the newly independent states of Angola and Mozambique. The Soviet army was on the offensive in Afghanistan and the debacle of Vietnam wasn't so far away form American minds. In economic terms the stagnation crisis had undermined the capitalistic model and so in a rush to save American two men would appear. First of that had for objective to save the economy, his name was Paul Volcker he become the boss of the Fed in 1979 with a mandate to curb the power of the almighty American trade unions and to make the inflationary and stagnation crisis history. In 1980 Reagan would join his side after being elected president of the United States of America on a platform of "American Renaissance". In Europe the "Iron Lady" Margaret Thatcher was elected on basically the same agenda. And so the birth of the "new brave world" occurred, little did they know back then that this Neoliberal revolution would forever change the face of the globe. The question that must be asked at some point is the fallowing, certainly the Neoliberal doctrine did help the United States gain hegemony and overthrow the decadent Soviet Union but at what cost? How could a doctrine that was said to be "umbilically" linked with freedom and liberty instate so many dictatorships? Today as the liberalization of the world continues little by little and more and more so, so does the demise of Democracy.

The Chilean prophecy. 

Salvador Allende

The ideological birth of Neoliberalism can be traced back in time to the 1930's and even before, but the object of study here is not Neoliberalism as an idea, instead Neoliberalism as a political actor, and the Neoliberal political actor first took stage on the 11th of September 1973 in the Southern American country of Chili. Neoliberalism first became a political arm during the period form Salvador Allende's election in 1970 to the 11th of September of 1973 the date of the Pinochet coup that would be the start of long bloody, horrid, black page of global history. Salvador Allende a figure very much forgotten in these days and times, was the ancestor of the actual left-winged leaders of Latin America. Salvador Allende implemented what he called the Chilean path to socialism lifting a very important percentage of Chileans out of extreme poverty, through social reforms, nationalizations and public works, his administration reduced unemployment and inequality in the country and prepped-up Chili's heath care and public education, But his most controversial policy was the decision to size land form the rich landowning families that were until Allende's ascension the holders of all the economic and so for political power of the nation. After this decision a multiplication of strikes and the mounting fear of  American in losing their hegemony in the region (the birth of another Cuba) would final terminate Allende's regime through a CIA mounted coup that would bring a military junta to power under the effigy of Augusto Pinochet. 

Augusto Pinochet

 With the arrival of the Junta the Chicago-boys and the American hegemony had the opportunity under this puppet regime to modify the socio-economic structure of Chili to it's guise. As Naomi Klein explains in her masterpiece The Shock Doctrine, through the shock of military oppression Pinochet's junta would liberalize completely the entire Chilean society.  So through the economic policy implanted in Chili by the economic reform plan called the brick. Chili's economic growth would soar, the only problem was that this "economic miracle" (expression used by Milton Friedman) happened in one of the worst dictatorships in world and even probably in world history. The question that immediately comes to one's mind is, how could an ideology that professed that great liberalization economic would automatically engender greater political freedom accept it's practice under a dictatorship?  And how about if Neoliberalism was not indistinguishable form democratic freedoms but instead to the commonly "vehiculated" idea, how about if Neoliberalism need as a basis for it's expanse a dictatorial/corporatist state?

Operation Condor and the accession of Neoliberalism in Latin America.

As in Chili's case Neoliberalism just could make itself a space in the political spectrum, parties that employed their platform of rapid economic liberalization were very unpopular among the peoples of the Latin American states, so Neoliberalism had to overpass the democratic institutions to really take root, and that's where Operation Condor comes into action.
Operation Condor, was the sort of war on terror of the time. It was an operation that had for objective to join all the intelligence services ( more secret policies) of the Latin American dictatorships. The Operation Condor was probably one the most brutal political repression campaigns in modern history. It spanned throughout an entire continent. Under it's banner it encompassed various anti-subversive "tactics" (all of them out of the fascist playbook) such as the "Dirty War" in Argentina, the political repression in Brazil and the death camps under Pinochet in Chili. But then again there is shocking correlation to make between these forms of political repression and the implementation by these authoritarian governments of Neoliberal policies. Under the banner of "containing communism" the United States aided extremist right-wing military groups to gain power and to maintain it through techniques of repression exported through the canals of the School of the Americas, and what was asked in exchange economic liberalization, so that Latin America would be transformed into "economic satellites" of the great American industrial machine. But as was seen in Chili before and throughout Latin America after the Neoliberal economic policies were not accepted by the population, because Neoliberalism wasn't "democratic". Neoliberalism could not withstand "democratization" the first necessary element to instill Neoliberal policies is "dictatorial playgrounds". On that basis the Neoliberal economic policy killed democracy in Latin America for almost two decades, but after the Latin American "triumph" the dark mantle of Neoliberalism would spread through the world and transform itself to adapt in hostile climates.

Gaz, Oil and the "liberalization" of Iran and the Arab world.           

British Petroleum or Anglo-Persian Oil Company

The tale starts back in 1951, a predominant nationalist with socialist penchants is appointed prime minister in Iran. Dr. Mosaddegh then undertakes the important reform of nationalizing the very profitable Iranian petrol industry, that at the time being was in the hands of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (the Iranian BP affiliate of the time), in other words an important pillar of the British economy. For Mosaddegh the plan was very plain and simple, with the revenue generated by the new nationalized petroleum industry he would soar his fellow countrymen out of the grips of poverty. But for the British the lose of such an important economic asset was mere folly and for the C.I.A. and the American government of the newly elected Eisenhower Dr, Mosaddegh socialist principals were flirting with communism in a way that made the United States uneasy. The only option now was a tactic that would become very well know in the future "Regime Change". So the tale of Dr. Mosaddegh and of his "nationalistic" adventure comes to an abrupt end in 1953. With unconditional tactic/strategic aide of the American and British secret services the conservative wing of the army mounted a coup and put on the thrown a new Shah.             
Another turning point in the "liberalization" of the middle east was the ascension of Anwar Sadat to the title of Rais in 1970. After Gamal Nasser's death in 1970, Anwar Sadat a high ranking military general as was Nasser took control of Egypt. First he was view as merely a puppet of the "Nasserist" elite, but through the "Corrective Revolution" Sadat eliminated the entire "Nasserist" vision form the circles of power. He then pursued the economic policy of "liberalization" something that was completely contradictory with Nasser's vision of "Egypt's self-determination".
And then came the period of the 1990's and the arrival of military junta's to power in all of the middle east implementing Neoliberal agenda's, as in Algeria that completely "liberalized" it's gaz and oil industry, the same in Tunisia, the "Tunisian Miracle" under the rule of Ben Ali, and in Libya with reconstruction of diplomatic relationships with country. Throughout the Arab world form Saudi Arabia to the United Arab Emirates, from Bahrain to Yemen, the United States through the C.I.A. and the so-called war against "the evil empire" that represented communism financed authoritarian regimes/ petro-kings and in return the only thing they asked for was the implementation of Neoliberal policies and the "liberalization" of their economies so that American enterprises could operate in total freedom. But what did this lead to? What did this mean for democracy? 
Without any doubt the direct consequences of the Neoliberal policies instilled by the various "puppet" regimes of the United States was grand popular discontentment, in lead to "Bread-Riots" in Egypt, a civil war in Yemen between "Socialist" and autocratic fractions, but the major shift it lead to without any doubt was the Islamic Revolution of 1979. It was a new kind of revolution, a one that did not lean to the west or to the east but stood on it's feet (at least at the beginning, afterwards it turned into one of the most repressive regimes in the world) and fought violently against the Neoliberal policies that were implemented by the Shah and his regime. It was more anti-capitalistic, then anti-occidental or anti-American, and detested the "western" main mise on the Iranian economy, it was the first anti-Neoliberal revolution. And it "breeded" a new sort of protestation Islamic radical terrorism. So we have seen how in the "3rd world" Neoliberalism destabilized and destroyed the democratic process, how it cut the grassroots of democratic aspirations, doing so under the theory that greater economic liberty would defacto engender greater political liberty a more democratic form of governance. But could Neoliberalism infiltrate western democracies and turn them into "facade democracies"? into D.O.I.N.'s (Democracies Only In Name)? Create the same oligarchic regimes that existed in the third world but dressed with the robes of democracy?

Sky