This paper explores how the identity of the Mapuche people is constructed in post-dictatorship Chilean society as a product of a neoliberal agenda. In so doing, this paper contributes to the wealth of scholarly material that serves as evidence in the Mapuche legal struggle for land rights. In the Araucania region in south-central Chile, between the Bío-Bío and and Toltén rivers, the Mapuche people have lived for centuries. They are a people who not only survived attacks by other indigenous groups, but also were never conquered by the Spanish. In fact, the Spanish crown gave the Mapuche territorial autonomy, and it was not until 1883 that they lost it to the Republic of Chile (Haughney 2012: 202). Over the centuries the Mapuche have developed a strong national identity and love for their land that does not fit seamlessly into the narrative of a multicultural Chilean state; a narrative promoted by the Pinochet and post-Pinochet governments and economic powers. Multi-national corporations that seek to utilize historically Mapuche land have found that they often have the ear of the Chilean government. An effort to build hydroelectric dams on the Bío-Bío river basin, for example, was met with tremendous Mapuche resistance but with strong governmental support (Rodriguez and Carruthers 2008: 8). Mapuche nationalism and land rights clash with the government and socio-economic elite’s vision for multicultural, neoliberal, twenty-first century Chile. They promote a national identity that makes no room for an independent Mapuche one. In Chilean society, the Mapuche are constructed in dichotomous terms by self-identified Chilean nationals. They are classified either as citizens of the Chilean state who subscribe to such multicultural values, or they are classified as “terrorists” who threaten national security and unity. These trivializing constructions are the products of economic interests that benefit from the erasure of the rights and identity of the Mapuche people.
History of the Mapuche in Chile
In order to understand how contemporary Chileans construct the Mapuche identity; it is imperative to examine how the Mapuche have been represented historically. As previously noted, the Mapuche retained territorial autonomy until well into the nineteenth century (Haughney 2012: 202). In fact, lands controlled by the Mapuche were difficult to navigate, and required permission from Mapuche leaders to enter (Crow 2013:19). On July 2, 1852 the Chilean government annexed Mapuche land renaming it the “Province of Arauco,” and in so doing created a new framework for thinking about Mapuche land, as well as the Mapuche relationship to the Chilean state (Crow 2013:19). Previously Mapuche lands had belonged to the Mapuche. This new framework promoted the idea that the Mapuche were simply “inhabitants” of Chilean territory. Scholar Joanna Crow notes the principle reasons for this framework shift:
[T]he occupation of Mapuche territory became an issue of national security for the centralizing state led by Presidents Manuel Montt (1851–61) and José Joaquín Pérez (1861–71). Economic considerations were also important: Chile’s burgeoning agricultural export economy would benefit enormously from the acquisition of the fertile lands of the south (2013:22).
National security as a primary factor for the occupation of Mapuche lands by the Chilean state is important to note. It demonstrates that from an early period the Mapuche were constructed in dichotomous terms for the purposes of economic advancement. Those who submitted to the occupation were partners in the “‘glorious and dignified endeavor’”, as the popular newspaper El Mercurio described the occupation (Crow 2013:22). Those who did not submit were threats to national security that had to be handled. An editorial in El Mercurio even went so far as to call on the government to “take control of those barbarians” (Crow 2013:22). This early narrative of categorizing Mapuche who did not wish to submit to the state as “barbarians” aids scholars in their understanding of how they are portrayed today.
The Mapuche and the Modern Chilean State
The final Chilean offensive against the Mapuche came in 1883. It marked the end of Mapuche autonomy and the beginning of their integration into the Chilean state. Theoretically this integration came with the assurance of equal rights:
In the nineteenth century, (beginning with independence in 1810), liberal policies established equal rights for indigenous people as well as for Chilean citizens. This egalitarianism was the beginning of the indigenous peoples’ disappearance, facilitated by the alienation of their land holdings and by the right to buy and sell land, which started the dismantling of “communities” (Lucic 2005:112-13).
In becoming “Chilean,” the Mapuche lost the rights to their land for most of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In the early 1970s, however, the Popular Unity government of Salvador Allende began to help with the process of restoring land ownership to Mapuche (as well as other indigenous groups’) communities. 69, 436 hectares of land alone were recovered for Mapuche communities between 1971-72 (Lucic 2005:113). But land recovery for the Mapuche came to a halt in 1973 with the military coup. Guided by the neoliberal economic model which promoted a market economy; the military government reversed the land restorations of the early 70s in order to gain more productivity from land resources (Lucic 2005). Multinational corporations and private buyers bidding for resource-wealthy Mapuche territory would bring capital and new economic enterprises into Chile. This free-market competition, the Pinochet government posited, would be better for Chile’s long-term economic health. Though the Pinochet dictatorship finally ended in 1990; Chilean political leadership still clings to Pinochet-era economic policies regarding Mapuche land rights (Rodriguez and Carruthers 2008). Despite promises to do otherwise, “Concertación governments have shared and pursued Pinochet’s economic program for the region. . .”(Rodriguez and Carruthers 2008:8). Concertación refers to the center-left political coalition that has dominated the Chilean government in the post-Pinochet years. Between 1990 and 2010, Concertación governments gave their support to development projects on historically Mapuche land, despite large-scale Mapuche opposition (Haughney 2012). The Neltume Hydroelectric project, for example, was projected to result in the flooding of indigenous lands, but was supported by the government in the face of Mapuche resistance (Haughney 2012). Further, the statistics on ownership of ancestral Mapuche land are disturbing. Despite promises of land restorations, national and foreign timber companies own three times more ancestral Mapuche land than do the Mapuche (Richards 2010). The perpetuation of policies that aid multinational corporations in their depletion of Mapuche lands and resources has accentuated the tense relationship between the Mapuche and the Chilean government (Rodriguez and Carruthers 2008, Haughney 2012).
Neoliberal Multiculturalism and Identity
While tensions have been strained between the successive Concertación governments and the Mapuche; there have been concerted efforts on the parts of these governments to write the Mapuche into the Chilean narrative (on the government’s terms). Moving into the twenty-first century, Chile has become an internationally-recognized paradigm of neoliberal multiculturalism. Multiculturalism in this context should be understood as “the efforts of liberal democratic governments to accept and embrace these ethnic differences” (Richards 2010:65). In Chile, the celebration of ethnic differences is a method for generating tacit consent for neoliberal economic policies.
The reduction of social services, and the export-driven (resource-depleting) market that neoliberal policies promote are harmful to Mapuche interests (Haughney 2007). The tone of multiculturalism, therefore, is an important chord for the government to strike in its’ discourse, so as not to confront large-scale oppositional indigenous mobilization (Richards 2010).
Still, rights and recognition are granted to the indigenous only insofar as they do not threaten state goals in the global economy. Latin American states tend to highlight diversity and grant a limited measure of autonomy, but construe demands for radical redistribution, autonomous territory and self-government as counter-productive for multicultural society. The result is cultural recognition without the economic and political redistribution that would lead to greater equality (Richards 2010:65-66).
Structuring society around a rigid understanding of multiculturalism, as dictated by economic policy, lends itself to constructing identities as accepted or not, based on how well the holders of those identities conform to the interests of the state. In the case of the Mapuche in Chile; conforming to neoliberal policies on land and resources is classified as patriotic and inclusive. Holding a different vision for Mapuche land is called terrorism because it is not only perceived as an attack on the strong Chilean economy, but also as an assault on the ideal of a multicultural Chilean state.
Authorized v. Terrorist Construction
The so-called patriotic Mapuche are individuals who do not engage in political demonstrations, and do not threaten the expectations of Chilean society for their gender or socio-economic class (Richards 2007). They are referred to in sociological discourse as “indios permitidos,” meaning “authorized Indians” (Hale 2004). Many such “indios permitidos” take on government jobs and in so doing make themselves exemplars of the full embracement of neoliberal multiculturalism (Park and Richards 2007). Mapuche women especially are held up as models of the success of neoliberal multiculturalism. In Chilean print media, articles about these “mujeres permitidas,” or “authorized women” far outnumber those about Mapuche political leaders (Richards 2007:567). Often the reason for the media laudation of these women is that they have been able to utilize their culture to turn a profit (Richards 2007).
An authorized Mapuche woman tries not only to preserve her culture but to share it with others and, ideally, to make money from it. She seeks not conflict but connections with others. As an authorized Indian in the neoliberal multicultural system, she approves of government projects and is willing to integrate into the nation and be a citizen on the same terms as all others. In today’s world, being a citizen means being a seller and/or consumer in the global economy (Richards 2007:568).
In many ways connecting to, and participating in the economy that attacks the land rights of the Mapuche is a means of survival. Despite their belief in indigenous land rights, some Mapuche men told one researcher that they accepted government jobs because of a lack of other options (Park and Richards 2007). Functioning in a neoliberal multicultural society is not the same thing as consenting to it; especially when the individual holds a historically marginalized identity.
Those Mapuche who vocalize opposition to the policies of the Chilean state, and/or participate in political demonstrations are classified in the media, and by Chilean nationals, as “terrorists.” Between 1991 and 1992, the Mapuche organization Consejo de Todos las Tierras (All Lands Council), organized peaceful occupations of historically Mapuche land (Haughney 2012). The Concertación responded by charging “144 activists under the Internal Security of the State Law” (Haughney 2012:204). This anti-terrorism law was established under the Pinochet dictatorship and was used to charge enemies of the regime (Richards 2010). Like the Patriot Act in the United States the anti-terrorism law suspends important civil rights. The detention of suspects without charge for indefinite periods, the use of wiretapping on behalf of the prosecution, and excessively long prison sentences are all permissible under the anti-terrorism law used to charge Mapuche activists (Richards 2010).
The application of the terrorist label also has legitimated state violence. Raids on Mapuche communities, in which police brutality and human rights abuses have been documented, have accompanied the conflicts. Three young Mapuche protesters have been shot dead by police: Alex Lemun in 2002, Matias Catrileo in 2008, and Jaime Mendoza Collio in 2009 (Richards 2010:74).
This police brutality is not only made possible by the approval of center-left Concertación government(s), but also by the political right, and the media (Richards 2010). The Chilean print media is overwhelmingly right-wing conservative (Bresnahan 2003). Two corporations, El Mercurio and COPESA, own almost all Chilean dailys, and both companies profited from and supported the Pinochet dictatorship (Richards 2007:557). "Mapuche leaders have denounced what they perceive as an alliance among the mass media, Rightist political parties, and timber companies"(Richards 2007:557). Mapuche activist Alfredo Seguel has documented economic ties between the owners of timber and mass media corporations (Richards 2007). These ties are important to recognize because they demonstrate why Chilean media has an incentive to represent the Mapuche who advocate for land restorations as "terrorists."
While positive media representations of the Mapuche highlight women; negative media representation almost exclusively features men (Richards 2007). The negative articles and images that do show women highlight how these women do not conform to traditional gender roles. They are referred to as "mujeres bravas." These "bravas" participate in land occupations, and make public demands for land restorations. Their break from the hegemony of womens' roles, as evidenced by their vocalizations of opinions, is taken as a statement on the quality of the Mapuche as a people. The "bravas" who do not shy from police altercations are viewed as particularly radical.
While the overwhelming obsession with Mapuche women's participation in the conflict can be chalked up to a general thrill at women's doing what they are not supposed to, the brava image also combines sexist and racist assumptions: Women should not do these things, but Mapuche women do. Mapuche women are different from other Chilean women and dangerous (Richards 2007: 565).
Representations of "bravas" in Chilean media are rooted in the intersectional oppressions suffered by indigenous women. Since they are distinguished from Chilean women because of their expressions of womanhood; it becomes easier for the larger society to misunderstand their intentions. Further, their break from gender roles condemns them to experience similar levels of police brutality as men (Richards 2007). Sexist media portrayals, which emphasize the masculine undertones of confrontations with authorities, subtly promote the use of the anti-terrorism law. Framing activists as violent rallies public opinion against activists. In this way, the Chilean media-timber alliances are culpable for the potentially violent consequences of media representations of the Mapuche.
Conclusion
Chilean nationals construct the Mapuche in the dichotomous "permitido" v. "terrorist" terms, often unaware of the neoliberal multicultural agenda behind them. Researcher Patricia Richards interviewed local elites, Chilean nationals who were important players in the Arauco region, about their opinions on the Mapuche. She found that almost all of the 80 respondents spoke about terrorism in their description of them (Richards 2010). Ultimately th
e pervasive use of these limiting characterizations will lead to their erasure. Their perceived mono-dimensionality as either "authorized" or "terrorist" contributes to their dehumanization. It is through such dehumanization that the Chilean state is able to disregard Mapuche land rights. While most Chilean nationals seek to put the dark days of the Pinochet dictatorship behind them, many of them are complicit in the extension of its policies. Though the Pinochet dictatorship has ended, its legacy remains intact as long as subsequent Chilean governments, and the Chilean people, privilege the expansion of multinational corporations over the restoration of ancestral Mapuche land. It is difficult to predict what the future holds for the Mapuche people. Project proposals for the utilization of resources between the Bío-Bío and Toltén rivers are popular and well-funded. Hopefully, however, through an examination of their past, Chilean nationals can be reminded of what a post-Pinochet society should really mean.