A-Infos (en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #15-25 - One year of opposition to Milei. Interview with the FLA (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

We publish this interview conducted by the International Relations 
Commission of the FAI with some comrades from the Argentine Libertarian 
Federation on the situation one year after the inauguration of Javier 
Milei as president of the country. ---- Q: Could you tell us about the 
economic and social situation in Argentina? ---- A: The first year of 
Javier Milei's government ended in December 2024. I could briefly define 
it from an economic point of view as an ultra-liberal government, while 
from a political point of view it is ultra-conservative. Since the 
beginning of the electoral campaign, Javier Milei, with full media 
support, has proposed lowering the high rate of inflation and 
associating the US dollar with the national currency. These are constant 
systems that have already been applied regularly to the Argentine 
economy for the last 50 years. He has also promoted the transformation 
of part of the state structure.

One year after the implementation of these choices, we can say that the 
government has failed to achieve these two objectives because this plan 
largely depends on the entry of dollars from abroad. In terms of 
domestic politics, the current government relies on the complicity of 
governors and deputies who present themselves as pseudo-opponents, both 
actively and in declarations, who collaborate in the emptying of public 
structures. The bureaucratic unionism, in order not to lose its 
privileges, has not exercised any form of resistance, except for a timid 
sign of opposition at the beginning of the mandate, discarding the idea 
of a general strike against the cuts. The most combative unions, on the 
other hand, have had to give priority to the fight in the face of the 
large number of layoffs, both in the public and private sectors.

At the same time, the signs of government authoritarianism have 
increased, including the forcing of the institutional paths of bourgeois 
democracy, such as the election by decree of two judges of the Supreme 
Court of Justice and the elimination by decree of state sectors of 
science, culture, health, education, accompanied in some cases by the 
massive dismissal of thousands of state workers that has led to the 
paralysis of public service bodies.

During this period, the government has also managed to strengthen the 
security forces and is enforcing new protocols at demonstrations, with 
the return of the indiscriminate use of both tear gas and rubber 
bullets. The use of false-flag operations by the security forces has 
also become common again. I am referring to the use of intelligence 
services for indiscriminate detentions. Added to this are the campaigns 
against people with disabilities and against the LGBTIQ+ movement. Among 
these institutional mistreatments is the situation of pensioners who 
gather every Wednesday in front of the doors of Congress to demand the 
restitution and improvement of their pensions. Since the beginning of 
this protest, now a year ago, the government has exercised a fierce 
repression against the protesters.

In terms of foreign policy, I would say that it is important to mention 
three characteristic points of this government, liberal on the economic 
level and conservative on the political level. The government maintains 
a total alignment with the foreign policy of the USA and Israel, for 
example, it voted against Ukraine together with the USA in the UN 
meeting last February in which unconditional support for Zelensky was 
requested, and at the same time a very close relationship with Elon Musk 
flaunted in all public visits to the USA, and a clear support for 
multinationals.

There is a total agreement, a total alignment with the economic lines of 
the International Monetary Fund, in anticipation of a future loan of 
dollars that is central to the government, to the economic policies of 
Milei, and to the rescue that these could represent. I must remember 
that Argentina has the largest debt with the IMF, even higher than that 
of Egypt and Ukraine, countries currently at war or in conflict.

On the economic level, we can say that in the fictitious current 
economic outcome, pursued by the Milei government, two indicators are 
decreasing. The first is the stable price of the dollar, which is 
maintained with a direct intervention in the market through a massive 
squandering of reserves, and the other is the reduction of inflation 
obtained with the old neoliberal recipe of cooling the economy. This 
reduction and the freezing of wages has led to a fall in consumption 
comparable to the 2001 crisis.

The polls say that the stability given by the link with the dollar and 
the reduction of inflation are the two measures that allow the Milei 
government to maintain the support of a part of society.

To a large extent, these high levels of approval that the government 
maintains have a lot to do with the distinct economic, labor and 
inflationary crises that Argentina has experienced in its history. These 
can be configured as historical social traumas, and economic stability, 
even if temporary, is well regarded despite the fact that, as mentioned 
before, consumption levels have fallen to the levels of the 2001 crisis 
and that the prices of products in dollars are more expensive even 
compared to Europe.

At the same time, on the economic level, we can say that, while 
encouraging the strengthening of the industrial production sector, 
financial engineering is being supported that is guaranteeing fabulous 
profits to speculative capital. It is possible to earn up to 20% in 
dollars, a unique return in the world. A volatile system that will end 
when it is realized that the government is no longer available to meet 
the debt and together they will ask for the return of capital, 
generating, as has already happened many, many times in the economic 
history of Argentina, the collapse of the financial system, which will 
translate into a new major economic crisis for Argentine society. 
Finally, it is necessary to underline that the imposition of these 
economic measures has very serious repercussions on the most vulnerable 
social sectors. With the financialization of public services, 
approximately 40,000 workers in public sectors have been fired and have 
been progressively privatized, but at the same time the private sector 
has been strongly affected by the reduction in consumption that has led 
to cuts in personnel.

Q: How is the social opposition to Milei's government model moving in 
Argentina?

A: After this introduction linked to the economic and social reality of 
Argentina, I think it is important to think about the possible responses 
coming from the revolutionary sectors or at least from the opposition to 
this government that want to build a different reality. Milei obtained 
56% of the votes in the elections, against 45% for the other parties, 
about 11 percentage points of difference. In truth, the hard core of 
support for Milei is around 25%, the rest is a floating mass that moves 
from one party to another and does not fully embrace the president's 
policies, but who looked to Milei because of the disasters of previous 
governments. After the elections, Milei's popularity even grew to 60%, 
but in this last period this support is eroding for several reasons, 
first of all due to the media repercussions of the cryptocurrency case, 
in which Milei and the government are heavily involved[scandal of the 
cryptocurrency $Libra, whose value in February would have first 
skyrocketed and then collapsed due to posts by Milei himself on the 
social channel X]. In this regard, investigations are underway to 
understand to what extent this involvement is not configurable as forms 
of fraud and corruption. It is not known whether they received money 
directly, but they are certainly involved in the affair. This negative 
overexposure affected the media image of the leader at that stage from 
an electoral point of view. But from our point of view, what is even 
more important is what is happening in the streets, with the forms of 
resistance that are being given from the most popular areas. Although 
there have been struggles and forms of resistance, the last part of last 
year, 2024, has been relatively calm. While this year has started right 
away with large demonstrations. One of these was almost spontaneous, 
proposed by an anti-fascist assembly convened in a park in Buenos Aires, 
which launched a call for a march after a week, and which saw tens and 
tens of thousands of people in the streets to repudiate Milei's 
homophobic, discriminatory and fascist attitudes. This demonstration had 
a great impact, it was the first to draw attention in a strong way, 
directly from the street. It was important above all because a police 
protocol is applied that prevents demonstrations in the streets and 
allows demonstrations only on the sidewalks so as not to interrupt or 
disturb the public and traffic. But of course when the demonstrations 
are so massive the protocol cannot be applied.

Another evolving situation that has already been mentioned deserves 
attention: for over a year, every Wednesday, constantly, without 
interruption, pensioners organize a small demonstration, a march around 
the parliament. From the beginning they were heavily repressed, until 
mid-March when all the fans of the main soccer teams here in Argentina 
expressed their support for the pensioners' struggle and so it became a 
big march, which ended with an urban uprising with a lot of repression 
but also with barricades throughout the city, with a very important 
capacity to respond to the repression. This also changed the tone and 
strength of the protest. So much so that the Minister of Security, who 
had given a very harsh speech after the clashes, fired the head of the 
police force. There is an articulation of the forms of resistance, 
which, even if it does not appear when you look at the image of reality 
offered by the media or if you analyze electoral data, nevertheless 
continues to exist and depending on how we manage to articulate it we 
can achieve more interesting and profound changes.

Q: How does the FLA move in this context?

A: The FLA, Argentine Libertarian Federation, constantly participates in 
protests because we believe it is an aspect that should not be left 
aside, because it is one of the few tools we have. The same goes for the 
population that does not have the levers of financial power or the 
forces of the employers, or the security forces. Taking to the streets, 
in large numbers, showing how many people do not accept these policies, 
how many are not willing to submit or be crushed by domination, putting 
our direct involvement into play.

This is why we consider it very important to participate in street 
demonstrations, obviously it is also a question of presence in the 
political action of the street. But for us, perhaps even more important 
and fundamental is the activity that is carried out day by day in 
different social spheres as well as in the construction of paths of 
solidarity, with the construction of a different, anti-consumerist, 
anti-hierarchical and horizontal conscience. We develop this in daily 
militancy. From the permanent reading meetings that we hold weekly, to 
the cinema meetings. The cultural aspect is really very important for 
us, the support for cultural projects also for children with which we 
support the neighborhood, the support for the Escuela Libre de 
Constitucion, a project that wants to develop a horizontal and 
anti-academic educational form, as well as the issue of responsible 
consumption. In short, dozens of activities that aim to build, in 
everyday reality, new forms of life that are not based on a culture of 
sacrifice but rather on sharing. This is because we are aware that 
capitalism is not only a coercive apparatus of surveillance and 
repression, but an apparatus that is built on the construction of 
desire, on the construction of values and desires that citizens 
associate with. So our role is also to build a different form of desire. 
A different expectation of human fulfillment. Our activity also starts 
from this idea of rebuilding our satisfactions, our pleasure, in short 
our fulfillment in different areas from what is proposed by capitalism. 
This is already a plan of struggle. Not the sacrifice against capitalism 
but the construction of values, desires and satisfactions far from what 
is imposed by capitalism. A daily activity that we dedicate a lot of 
time to, and that we permanently develop, and that we try to spread as 
much as possible.

Returning to the marches and street demonstrations. March 24 was the 
anniversary of the 1976 coup d'état, on which the government maintains a 
denialist position that denies the crimes of the dictatorship and 
supports what the dictatorship did. The march that we did for the 
anniversary was different from the demonstration of pensioners a few 
weeks before that was almost insurrectional. A totally peaceful march, 
but multitudinous. They could not apply the repressive protocol in any 
way, there was no police on the streets, this showed that with several 
hundred thousand demonstrators there was no police provocation or 
clashes, it showed the multitudinous and peaceful face of the 
resistance, which nevertheless had a great impact. Consider that this 
demonstration was one of the largest in Argentina since the return of 
democracy in 1983. All these situations show a different reality than 
the government one. Some comrades or militants thought that Milei would 
fall quickly. It has not been so and it seems unlikely that it will fall 
soon. However, an alternative reality is being built from below that 
could force it to stop, although we do not know what the consequences 
are and what will happen after this. It will depend on two factors, our 
daily activity and the current political situation.

Q: Milei has defined himself as a libertarian since the electoral 
campaign, what did this manipulation mean for you?

A: The robbery and manipulation of the word libertarian is something 
quite strong for us. We have already had similar experiences. Various 
coups d'état here in Argentina have been carried out in the name of 
freedom, the manipulation of the word freedom is in fact quite common by 
authoritarians. Let's think about the struggle of the "free world", the 
struggle of the Western and capitalist world. However, in this case the 
word libertarian has been used and manipulated by the so-called 
anarcho-capitalism with a connotation that directly affects us, because 
it tends to invisibilize and dirty the history of anarchist and 
libertarian struggles. We already a couple of weeks before the victory 
in the elections of Milei had released a document as FLA where we warned 
about this and denounced these false libertarians, we briefly recounted 
how this robbery took place starting from the writings from 1971 with 
the publication of the libertarian manifesto by Murray Rothbard, where 
the need to take the term libertarian from the anarchist left was 
clearly theorized. In this document we recounted this as robbery, as 
manipulation but also as a political strategy of the so-called 
anarcho-capitalism to eliminate the libertarian and anarchist 
characteristics in the forms of communism and collectivism. We also 
stated that this is not the question of a simple word but configures the 
basis of a much greater manipulation. The fight for the symbolic is not 
simply anecdotal but has to do with the construction of a discourse that 
is the means that allows you to advance. This document was distributed 
during all the demonstrations and is part of our fight to reclaim the 
true meaning of the word libertarian.

Obviously our impact on society is minimal, minuscule. You can see it in 
the media and how everyone has quickly accepted the meaning of 
libertarian proposed by this gang of exploiters and thieves and how 
difficult it is now to fight this situation. But we know how the ups and 
downs of history are and how it is possible that suddenly meanings and 
interpretations are overturned. We will certainly continue to carry 
forward what we consider to be the true flags and proposals of freedom. 
In relation to this, just this week ago a significant episode occurred. 
The government demolished a statue of Osvaldo Bayer who is a very 
well-known historian, who called himself a libertarian, and who was a 
symbol here for a long time. The government directly destroyed it, and 
this generated a huge wave of indignation, a much-commented news item on 
social networks. Think, the second topic of the week after the triumph 
of the Argentine national team against Brazil by 4 to 1. And the 
interesting thing is that Osvaldo Bayer was presented in all the media 
as a libertarian. This in itself is also a possibility of struggle. I 
mean, the tireless Osvaldo Bayer is continuing to lend us a hand, 
wherever he is at the moment.

by CRInt of the FAI

https://umanitanova.org/un-anno-di-opposizione-a-milei-intervista-alla-fla/
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