Memory, Horror, And Reconciliation In Post-Pinochet Chile. Reflections Based On Testimonies Of Civil Collaborators Of The Dictatorship

Abstract

Memory and its public policies constitute a field of study with varied research. The Chilean case has been studied in reference to official truth and justice policies and the early Truth Commission after the return of democracy. However, memory and truth are complex concepts that are not reduced to such policies, and are affected by claims that sometimes confront what has been established by official channels.

In this paper we analyze this problem, following the guidelines of studies on memory battles as a subjective space in dispute and trying to go beyond the analysis of transitional justice and official memory policies, in order to understand the space of “reconciliation” in the search to overcome its past.

For this purpose, we studied from a historical perspective the discourses present in two disturbing testimonies -following Payne’s conceptualization- of civilian collaborators of the Pinochet dictatorship that serve to show the existing tensions in the field of memory. We have been able to show that the principles of contentious coexistence are a useful tool for a better coexistence, even after periods of long public tension resulting from the confrontation in the public space of different narratives. Until now, research on memory in the Chilean case has mainly studied the situation of the victims, and in only one case that of the military perpetrators; here we address the testimony of civilian collaborators of the dictatorship.

Keywords: Memory, Reconciliation, Testimonies, Recent History, Dictatorship