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CHOICE Review

Arriagada's small book is the clearest and most illuminating work on the current Chilean military regime. Eminently qualified as a lawyer, publisher, and scholar, the author has also been a prominent figure in the Christian Democratic party. Presented as Volume 6 in the University of New Mexico series, "Thematic Studies in Latin America," this work is both fascinating and distressing. With clarity and logic Arriagada painstakingly details the events that brought the Chilean military to intervene in national politics in 1973. He then examines the authoritarian control Pinochet used to alter the armed forces. Impressive charts are provided to prove the dictator's complete control over the military. Arriagada concludes that the current political situation has become a "stalemate" and a "catastrophic balance," arguing that Pinochet's power rests almost entirely on a united, obedient, hierarchical, and nondeliberative military, which has also dominated the universities, the foreign service, and the state enterprises. Therefore, it has become the most militarized regime in the history of South America. At the same time democratic parties are alive and well organized; they control professional organizations, the trade unions, and the labor confederation. Additional opposition to the regime comes from the Catholic Church, which is committed to free elections. This quality book is not to be missed. R. H. Terry York College of Pennsylvania