“Free Market” Economics is a Disaster; Just Ask a Chilean

After fifty years of forced unfettered capitalism — influenced by Milton Friedman himself — Chile is finally writing a new constitution

Mitchell Peterson
6 min readJan 18, 2022

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Shockingly few people on this planet know what America did to Chile in the early seventies — especially not Americans. That series of events showed the grotesque nature of the Monroe Doctrine, the American empire, and neocolonialism. It’s also an example of insatiable greed utilizing the corrupt state and intelligence agencies to do dirty work on behalf of corporate profits.

It demonstrated that America never cared at all about democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, or any of the other “values” that “the West” claims to hold.

Not only did American intelligence agencies destroy a country on behalf of corporate entities and to intimidate the rest of the world, but they also sent their “best” right-wing economists to rewrite the Chilean constitution in their hellish “free market” ideology.

They made sure those changes were nearly impossible to reverse. As one of those economists said, they needed to “put democracy in chains.”

Chile became the perfect case study for how horrible Milton Friedman’s economic vision truly was, and is, for a society.

Only now, fifty-five years later, are Chileans getting an opportunity to rewrite their constitution. Only now, in 2022, are they getting an opportunity to have a say, engage in democracy, and shed those chains that were put on by American right-wing neocolonialists.

Chile became the perfect case study for how horrible Milton Friedman’s economic vision truly was, and is, for a society.

The Monroe Doctrine and American Dominance

Almost immediately after the Chilean people, in a free and fair election, chose Salvador Allende to be president, America was plotting to take him down, and Nixon shouted those famous words, “make the economy scream,” as he ordered sanctions against the country.

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Mitchell Peterson

Freelance writer on my ninth year outside of the US, currently in Prague reading, teaching, and writing on politics, economics, and travel … IG: @mitchellglenn