**PF**: *The Education conflict was, no doubt, the most remarkable national events during the year that just ended. People from many places ask us how come the theme of Education can be an important and motivating conflict in Chile. How do you explain it?*
**MA**: In Chile there are 30 years of application of a market model to education, a savage market model. That has meant a brutal commodification at all levels, from pre-school to higher education. In doing so, education instead of being a vehicle for social mobility (which should be one of its purposes) in Chile has been a factor of increasing segregation and inequality. The question then is not how could this conflict erupt this year, but how come it took so long to explode?
**PF**: *The education conflict ended up mobilising a huge percentage of the country’s population: high school students, college students, teachers, parents and school governors, in addition to other supporters of the cause. What would you say that united them so powerfully as to bring people to the streets every week?*
**MA**: This is linked to the previous answer. There arose a generation of young people who lost their fear, who reached a level of understanding that the problem was structural and not about a few more resources and some additional scholarships. In fact, the movement began with very specific demands, but quickly escalated in a few weeks to a surprisingly massive demand for structural reforms. And soon began to add more people, teachers first, then other organizations, all citizens eventually. The marches reached hundreds of thousands of people with a moving creativity and beauty, they were not rallies, rather real popular carnivals with all types of artistic expression, with humour, with great joy. While the movement maintained that character, was massive, inclusive, participatory, creative, the positive energy that was present in the marches was thrilling. And the government responded in the worst way: lots and harsh repression, there are many videos of outrageous police abuse against peaceful demonstrators, authorities disqualifying the process with a bellicose language, etc. What brought people together in its essence was a common feeling, a sense of common-unity felt by many people, it was not just the demands, that was the most superficial, deeply and inwardly they breathed a strong sense of fellowship, a sense of power and manoeuvring against the abusers, which produced much strength and energy.
**PF**: *What other social conflicts have weight for the Chilean population and how are they experienced?*
**MA**: Chilean society is the society of extreme abuse and manipulation of power against the citizens. No other country in the world has applied neoliberal policies to such depths; this has led to the commodification of almost all activities of this society, including those most sensitive; for those who have governed Chile in the last 35 years everything could be made into a business and they have done so. Not only education has been commercialized but also health, welfare, security, freedom of movement, and so on. And what has happened is that after several years of intoxication in which people bought and believed the propaganda of the model, today they have become increasingly aware of the false promises of happiness based on the small and vulgar premise that filling oneself of “consumer goods” leads to happiness, or the idea that the mere fact of increasing per capita income will make us a developed society. People, especially young people, are calling today for a true humanisation of society. You could say that the dream promoted by the model is wearing out, not yet in a widespread and massive way, but the symptoms are expressed in those who, while still a minority, are very active in proclaiming their dissatisfaction. People, for many years, endured abuse and manipulation, for that there was supposed to come a prize in the form of “development” that would be achieved. Well, this development has never reached 90% of the people and now they do not seem ready to continue tolerating silently and passively this arbitrary situation. There is much potential conflict that could erupt at any time, as it happened with education in 2011.
**PF**: *We know that while demands were expressed primarily through popular street marches in 2011, there was also a huge number of events that appeared to have a high dose of imagination calling to nonviolent participation. We refer to the pots and pans-banging, the “beach” against Lavin, 1800 hours of running around La Moneda, the “kissathon”, the performances, etc. .. etc. .. Do you think that Chile is deepening a culture of nonviolence, or see these forms of protest simply as skirmishes when confronted with police repression?*
**MA**: That question is very interesting because it points to an issue of great depth and scope. Of course one of the features that attracted much attention of the movement was its creativity, joy of the marchers and especially the non-violent 99% of the demonstrators. It clearly showed a growing awareness of the futility of violence; nonviolence was the actively aware position of the vast majority. This has been very encouraging for those who profess a humanist philosophy of life; what a few years ago seemed a romantic utopia with little acceptance, today is taken as the form of struggle by millions of people. This of course became a problem for the government and the powerful who watched with some despair a growing sympathy and public support for young people and their demands. Then the powerful began the exacerbation of the negligible outbreaks of violence that arose. The police began to act in a very provocative way, with harsh and unjustified repression of peaceful demonstrators at the same time with a clear intention to let loose the tiny actions of violent groups that were very functional for them. The police was then attacking harshly tens or hundreds of thousands of peaceful demonstrators and hardly paid any attention to 200 hooded violent ones. In fact there were several well-founded complaints about infiltrated police, and their authorities, together with the government had to give explanations about the actions of policemen who dressed up and masked were caught inciting violence. Finally, the manipulation of the media, especially TV, reinforced the false accusation that the movement was using violence and therefore helped to justify repressive measures and restricting freedom of expression, even ending up promoting a law that, if approved, will establish harsh penalties, including imprisonment, for those who manifest socially. We can not deny that there are still groups that promote violence as a form of political and social struggle, but they are a small minority and less supported by the population, and that’s a good sign. Of course, we know that the first source of violence is in a system that is violent in nature. We are not only talking about the physical violence of repression, we speak of the many forms of violence that this system uses to sustain its power structure and domination. In my opinion what they fear most is the growth of a NONVIOLENT consciousness, they sense that this may be an unquestionable force and so their efforts to extinguish those sparks of ACTIVE NONVIOLENCE expressed in this movement. It remains to be seen if in the near future that force will develop and expand among citizens and manage to isolate the violent ones in power and those protesters who mistakenly assume that a violent methodology can achieve anything.
**PF**: *Let us talk a little about the government and its ability to give responses. How do you assess the first cabinet change in the portfolio of Education and this second change occurring now?*
**MA**: None of these changes has meant that the government is moving an inch from its economist policies in education. Any changes have been no more than apparent, leaving the core of its philosophy untouched. It has shown a very extreme ideological rigidity; defending the business of education has become almost a “holy war” and it is unfortunate because of its refusal to listen to the clamour that represents 80% of people in Chile.
**PF**: *Do you think the 2012 political year will be different about this conflict? What course is expected the new minister to imprint to the portfolio?*
**MA**: The new Minister of Education is one of the ideologues of the current educational market model. For him education as just another business is normal and desirable. I may be wrong, but I think we can not expect major changes with this minister in what we have seen before. He may be less brutal than Minister Bulnes who was quite aggressive and rude to the movement, but in substance the sign he has given by appointing Harald Beyer is that the government is committed to further deepening the educational model that has generated so much public rejection.
**PF**: *In the new setting there will be also a change in student policies, since after their elections they have replaced their public faces. What do you think will vary with the new leadership? How do you estimate the student movement will behave during 2012?*
**MA**: It’s not easy to predict what will happen with young people, especially because they have shown they operate with a very different logic from what we have known before. One of the characteristics of the movement was not being based so much on personal leadership as on a collective and horizontal action. That would confound any analyst or political actor formed in the landscape of decades ago. I do not think that changes in policies will affect them, precisely because their movement is not based on “personalities”. In fact I think the word “leadership” used in the question does not apply to these movements, they act together, generating and working agreements, refusing to be “led” by those illuminated from above who tell them “how we do things.” In fact, some traditional political actors tried to operate on the movement with their logic and simply bounced off; the results of some elections that were a surprise for traditional analysts reveal that the new generations do not accept the old ways of doing politics where manipulation is the way. I am not able to answer categorically the question about what will happen in 2012 as one of the characteristics of this movement and this generation is that they act in an unpredictable way, especially if you look at the phenomenon with ancient and worn out eyes. I have tried to place myself more humbly before what is going on, rather trying to learn, understand and avoiding the “pontificating” to which my generation is so accustomed.
**PF**: *If you could describe the direction that the conflict will take, where do you estimate that it will direct itself?*
**MA**: Although it may seem incredible to those who do not live in Chile, despite putting more than 500,000 people in the street and having 80% of public support for rather basic and indispensable demands, the government has given away virtually nothing. With great sadness, I have to say, it shows that in Chile we do not live in a true democracy. In my country there are de facto forces that have much influence and political power to manage things in their own way, with total disregard for the feelings of citizen. But also the strength and conviction of this movement showed that these illegitimate powers are weakening because the new generations no longer accept their abusive domination. I see young people very determined and confident; let’s see if the older generations also join strongly this democratizing crusade. Nothing has been solved; on the contrary, the clumsy response has been to deepen their disastrous policies while its popularity continues to fall. I think the movement will remain active, it should probably renew tactics, recycle their demands and slogans, find new ways; everything seems to be very dynamic and requires constant creativity. I am optimistic and believe that young people will know how to recycle and reinvigorate their movement.
**PF**: *As teachers, what assessment has been done internally at the Teachers Association? How do they project themselves towards March?*
**MA**: There may not be a uniform assessment of teachers’ participation in this movement. There are a few who believe that everything was fantastic and we were central actors in the movement, others see all negative and say that nothing was done and the teacher just piggybacked on the students. It seems to me that both views are biased. It is clear that the fundamental strength of the movement was due to the students, both university and secondary, that is indisputable; in the marches 90% of participants were young, but other social sectors also contributed with their presence and activity and that helped to the strength of the movement. Amongst them teachers also had participation, not 100% or in a desirably massive way. This has several possible explanations, but I believe the main one is related to the fact that the outbreak of the youth movement did not find the teachers Union at its best in terms of strength, on the contrary, it was in a weakened state product of heavy defeats in recent actions and with a style of leadership warned out and old that is still used in the union. In spite of this it is not fair to say that the teachers were absent from this movement because it was not so; all over the country thousands of teachers joined the protests, and this considering that the repression and harassment on the part of employers has been and is very hard against teachers who demonstrate and mobilize.
**PF**: *As a humanist national leader, what do you believe is still missing?*
**MA**: No doubt these demonstrations have been very interesting; in fact, they have drawn attention from many parts of the world. It has been an “international surprise” that Chile, the example of the model, is showing these levels of dissatisfaction with the system. As we have seen it is mainly young people the main drivers of this great social expression. Like any social movement it contains contradictions and resolving them should be an important task in the future. For me there are 2 main factors that should be decanted properly to qualitatively advance the movement: one is the issue of violence vs. Nonviolence which would be the struggle between “the old way” and the “new way” which is a strong dialectic within the movement. Clearly there has been a growing awareness of the validity of NONVIOLENCE although there are still groups who believe in violence and apply it, which is obviously very convenient for the powers that be, as it is used to justify an increase in repression and social control. You see a lot of people convinced it makes sense to promote and develop the methodology of Active Nonviolence; it has grown, but requires a lot of conviction and permanence when there are no immediate results, especially with a closed and obtuse government as we have in Chile whose actions are in themselves an incitement to violence. This is a great theme and a central task for those who are convinced that the only truly revolutionary and evolutionary way is nonviolence. The other big issue is the forms of organization, where there is also a dialectic between “old” and “new”; it is clear that the new generations emerge with another landscape, another sensibility that rejects all authoritarian, vertical and imposing forms, all characteristics of the old form present in traditional organizations, in fact this was an element of tension in the student movement since the old organizations (especially political parties) tried to intervene and manipulate in the old-fashioned way and young people reacted and protected themselves from such attempts. We have seen that the requests of this movement were not only for the specific demands to regain the right to an education; there’s a deeper one in the background: the aspiration to a democratic and free society, where the individual is fully respected; it is the exhaustion of the old manipulative manner in which the older generation grew up and it is repellent to young people today.
**PF**: *How do you assess the ability of traditional political parties to become involved in this conflict? How to evaluate the “other opposition”?*
**MA**: I think that much of that question is answered in the previous reply. I would only underline that the actions of traditional parties have been rather deplorable, both from government and opposition – they actually differ very little. Both surveys from the system and direct perception show that the deterioration of the political class is fast and deep. My view is that traditional politicians do not understand what is happening; they look at the new phenomenon, but with old eyes, in which case even those who in good faith are trying to understand what is going on do not get it because it’s actually a new sensibility emerging, they are not political events in the old way; it is that Silo several decades ago called “psycho-social phenomena”, therefore it can not be understood simply from the point of view of the traditional political categories. As for the “other opposition” that arises in the question and understanding by such non-traditional political movements, as might be the Humanist Party, ecological and progressive movements, I must answer with great sincerity that in theory they have an opportunity as everything that has emerged very strongly corresponds directly with the main issues that have been raised by these movements for a long time, but they seem to be a little shy, not acting with the decision and passion that the times deserve. If these groups are politically “uncontaminated” by the rot of the traditional political system it is now the time to show it clearly and unambiguously, and hopefully this will begin to happen in these coming times.
**PF**: *If you could make your voice heard among those who are building this “other opposition,” what would you suggest to be done this year, how do you think it should be, what tactics?*
**MA**: In the unlikely event that I could “make my voice heard” but playing the game of the question, I would say to the “other opposition” to try to understand the new sensibility that is emerging and bet for what is being born, not for what is dying, this is very difficult in politics because this activity is usually moved by immediatist calculation and the urgency of the situation, therefore there is rarely long-term commitment and a look of process. I have no intention of giving any blue-print or lecture, but my modest experience in relation to young people in this process, is that they reject very strongly manipulative relationships, something very common in politics. Therefore, whoever wishes to gain credibility with young people should attend to this very centrally: establish relationships without manipulation, transparent, straightforward, with the truth in front, without double standards … actually a politician might say “but that is impossible, we are politicians!” … (laughter), and perhaps they would be right, but hey, the question is about the “other opposition” and one would suppose they want to do things differently from the traditional parties.
Some videos:
VIDEO WITH ASSESSMENT of 2011 AND PROJECTION for 2012
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsG9DLvvmX8&feature=youtu.be](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsG9DLvvmX8&feature=youtu.be)
VIDEO WITH HISTORICAL WALK
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnuovAPTkbc&list=UU-0SncG26o-jGO5sdebKyJA&index=15&feature=plcp](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnuovAPTkbc&list=UU-0SncG26o-jGO5sdebKyJA&index=15&feature=plcp)
1 MILLION PEOPLE IN FAMILIES MEETING FOR EDUCATION
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZtkGzMsCFg&list=UU-0SncG26o-jGO5sdebKyJA&index=14&feature=plcp](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZtkGzMsCFg&list=UU-0SncG26o-jGO5sdebKyJA&index=14&feature=plcp)
