Hayek and Friedman personally advised and legitimized the Pinochet dictatorship.

Evidence

This combination of vivid description of individual cases with legal analysis would ultimately become central to a new wave of international NGO-led human rights activism that looked dramatically different to postcolonial demands for self-determination and economic sovereignty. This new human rights activism had little impact on Hayek, who travelled to Chile and declared the dictatorial regime ‘an example at the global level’. Hayek’s fellow Mont Pèlerin Society member, the Chicago School economist Milton Friedman, later echoed this assessment, describing Chile as an economic and political ‘miracle’. Neither Hayek nor Friedman were detached observers of this ‘miracle’. Both men gave advice to Pinochet, and both had disciples in his authoritarian regime – Friedman among the Chicago-trained técnicos (or ‘Chicago Boys’), who formulated the regime’s economic ‘shock’ programme, and Hayek among the conservative Catholic gremialistas, who produced an institutional order to protect the economy from political challenge. These two civilian elite factions were to define the economic and political orientation of Pinochet’s regime. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 305

Categorization

• XREF: Directly supports the reader’s connection between human-rights discourse and economic policy literature — the Amnesty-vs-neoliberal clash is the hinge of this whole debate. — connects to: A German pro-market economist excused Pinochet-era repression while resenting traffic lights at home — Dieter Plehwe, Quinn Slobodian & Philip Mirowski (eds.), Nine Lives of Neoliberalism, 344; Hayek repeatedly praised Pinochet, Salazar, and Suharto’s dictatorships as liberty-preserving — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 363; Hayek directly legitimized Pinochet’s dictatorship as more liberal than unrestricted democracy. — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin: The Making…, 1592 (+7 more)
• SEED: Angle: ‘The two elites inside a dictatorship’ — how economic shock programmes and constitutional order reinforce each other, with Hayek on one side and Friedman on the other as competing advisors.

Broader Connections

• Hayek directly legitimized Pinochet’s dictatorship as more liberal than unrestricted democracy. #corroborates (0.90) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1592
• Hayek repeatedly praised Pinochet, Salazar, and Suharto’s dictatorships as liberty-preserving #expands (0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 363
• Hayek actively defended the Pinochet regime against human rights criticism. #expands (0.85) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 304
• Nobel-winning Chicago economists actively endorsed Pinochet’s dictatorship #expands (0.80) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 329
• Chicago-trained economists filled key Chilean ministries under Pinochet #expands (0.80) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1624
• Chicago-school economists delivered a shock-treatment blueprint to Pinochet’s coup regime within days #expands (0.75) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 322
• German scholars documented the Mont Pèlerin Society’s defense of Pinochet’s dictatorship. #corroborates (0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1729
• Mont Pèlerin members silently accepted Pinochet’s authoritarian rule at the 1981 meeting #corroborates (0.75) — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1589