Story of a Death Foretold

September 9, 2013
In this densely packed history, Latin American expert Guardiola-Rivera (What If Latin America Ruled the World?) provides an exhaustive study of the career of Salvador Allende, one-time president of Chile and the world’s first and only democratically elected Marxist. In placing Allende’s tenure as president and his eventual deposing by military coup into context, Guardiola-Rivera casts a wide net, exploring a myriad of factors that led to his election, including the revolutionary spirit personified by Che Guevara, and the inevitable involvement of the U.S. through the CIA and Henry Kissinger, among others. But this is more than a story about Allende; it is a far-ranging, passionate look at a suddenly-important part of the world during a period of political turbulence, another battlefield in the Cold War and a front in an ideological clash between democracy and socialism. The author argues that, for all of Allende’s flaws and mistakes, his brief but vital reign as president was far superior to what replaced it. Guardiola-Rivera writes with authority, but his convoluted, circuitous style—scholarly with a hint of poetic—might appeal more to academics than general readers. Nonetheless, Guardiola-Rivera has produced one of the most comprehensive books on 20th-century Latin American politics. Agent: Sophie Lambert, Conville & Walsh Literary Agency.

October 15, 2013
A tangled yet tender study of the revolutionary forces, both leftist and rightist, that converged in Chile during the turbulent 1960s and wrought a political miracle and tragedy. The election of socialist Salvador Allende to the presidency of Chile in 1970 proved a stunning vindication for the people's democracy movement in Latin America, as well as a shock to the Cold War-weary United States, terrified that it had another Cuba in its backyard. Guardiola-Rivera (Birkbeck, Univ. of London; What If Latin America Ruled the World?, 2010, etc.) plunges passionately into the construction of what Allende and his followers and colleagues such as Pablo Neruda called la via chilena, the Chilean Way, defined as a "peaceful transformation of the state" by legal, constitutional means, a deep commitment to building a coalition of all levels of society, including indigenous peoples, agrarian reform, nationalization of industry and banking for the equal distribution of wealth, and a repudiation of violence as business as usual. Building the "revolution from below" took decades and a careful grass-roots movement, as the author argues, that involved returning to enlightenment ideals of the 19th century that had been shunted aside by U.S. imperialist aims in the region since the turn of the century. At the same time, the far right gathered strength from the fascist model of the Spanish Civil War, and the large corporate interests sought help from the U.S. government, which helped strangle Allende's economic measures in boycotts and sanctions. This allowed the military, handed to Gen. Augusto Pinochet by Allende himself, to wait and see which way the wind was blowing. The author gives a truly chilling account of Allende's last hours under bombing at his palace. Avowing there is much misinterpretation of these terrible events from both sides, Guardiola-Rivera invites a deeper, intellectual look inside.

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April 1, 2013

Guardiola-Rivera, a senior lecturer in law at Birkbeck College, University of London, who writes frequently (and edgily) about Latin American philosophy, law, and politics, here chronicles the bloody 1973 coup led by Gen. Augusto Pinochet that toppled Chilean president Salvador Allende.

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

November 1, 2013
One of the saddest and most morally ambiguous episodes of the Cold War was the U.S.-supported military coup against Salvador Allende, the democratically elected Marxist president of Chile. The coup, which was supported by large segments of the population, ended Allende's disastrous economic policies and, aided by Chicago School economic advisors, eventually revitalized the economy. But the price paid in political freedom was heavy, including massive repression and the murdering of thousands of regime opponents. Guardiola-Rivera, who teaches at the University of London, has a leftist perspective, and he convincingly describes Allende as a decent man attempting to usher in a benign form of democratic socialism. He was also naive and incapable of managing the forces, both on the Left and the Right, that he unleashed. At times, Guardiola-Rivera strives for objectivity, but he also spouts too many outdated clich's, such as the plunder of natural resources or the inherent creativity of the masses. Still, he has an important story to tell, and, allowing for his political bias, he tells it well.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)