“Taking in the Broad Spectrum”: Human Rights and Anti-Politics in the Chile Solidarity Campaign (UK) of the 1970s

Chile’s 1973 military coup has often been cited as a watershed moment in the history of contemporary human rights. To be sure, the overthrow of democratically elected socialist President Salvador Allende and the brutality of Pinochet’s new military junta inspired wide international outrage, much of which came to be articulated in the language of human rights. Yet international opposition to Pinochet did not begin predominantly as a human rights movement. In examining the Chile Solidarity Campaign (CSC) in the United Kingdom, this article suggests that the Chile solidarity movement’s eventual embrace of human rights talk was due in part to the left’s turn to “anti-politics.” The CSC sought to “take in the broad spectrum” of political opinion in its campaign because such a tactic fit the organization’s goal of isolating the junta internationally, avoided the threat of division among the Chilean and British left, emulated the success of such broad fronts in other European Chile solidarity organizations, and abided by the tactical direction of much of the Chilean left in exile. The ostensibly “anti-political” language of human rights promoted organizational unity and also allowed the CSC to skirt accusations of political bias. However, the rejection of overt political considerations had longer-term implications. As Chilean Christian Democrats (PDC) altered the face of opposition to Pinochet in the late 1970s, the CSC and other international allies increasingly supported the more moderate line promoted by the PDC leadership.