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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 October 2009
Since the ghost of Perón and Perónism has never been laid in Argentina, it is perhaps surprising that more attention has not been paid to the thought and ideology of Perón, particularly as expounded in the Peronato from 1945 to 1955. There is a widely held perception that there is nothing new to say about Peronist ideology, as distinct from the political movement, on the grounds that justicialismo was simply an excuse for pure political opportunism. Though Perón's ideology came to mean pure opportunism in practice, it does not follow that it was devised expressly to provide that result. There was rather more to Peronist ideology than that, as this paper hopes to make clear. Accordingly, we shall advance an argument in four stages: first, to show the relationship of the ideology of justicialismo to the classical tradition in political thought; second, to advance the proposition that Perón sincerely believed in his own ideology; third, to show the extreme flexibility of the doctrine; and fourth, to demonstrate the contradictions that destroyed it as a credible body of thought.
1. There is a considerable literature on Perón and Peronism, of which no account will be attempted here. The most useful general works for a study of Peronist ideology are: Lux-Wurm, P., Le Peronisme (Paris, 1965)Google Scholar; Blanksten, G. I., Perm's Argentina (Chicago, 1974)Google Scholar; Perez, Carlos and Cardenas, Gonzalo (eds.), El Peronismo (Buenos Aires, 1969)Google Scholar. Romero, Jose-Luis, A History of Argentine Political Thought (Stanford, 1963) pp. 247–54Google Scholar, is good for orientation, as is Merchensky, Marcos, Las corrientes ideológicas en la história Argentina (B.A., 1961)Google Scholar. Rio, Abel del, El Pensamiento Politico de Perón (B.A., 1972)Google Scholar is a general survey. The collections of Peron's own writings used in this essay are as follows:Perón Expounds His Doctrine (B.A., 1973); The Voice of Peron (B.A., 1950); Conducción Politica (B.A., 1971); Peronist Doctrine • (B.A., 1952). There is also the very important Speech to First National Congress of Philosophy (Mendoza, 1949)Google Scholar.
2. Blanksten, G. I., Peron's Argentina, op. cit. pp. 276–305.Google Scholar
3. Little, Walter, 'Party and State in Peronist Argentina', Hispanic American Historical Review, 53 (1973), pp. 46–65.Google Scholar
4. Kirkpatrick, Jeanne, Leader and Vanguard in mass society: a study of Peronist Argentina (Cambridge, Mass., 1971).Google Scholar
5. P. Lux-Wurm, Le Peronisme, op. cit. The aforementioned quartet of books provide only some of the interpretations advanced for Peronism and in citing them I do not wish to imply that between them they exhaust the range of interpretation.
6. Most of Peron's examples are drawn from ancient Greece. He rarely mentions Rome and the only Roman thinker explicitly referred to is Seneca. See Conductión Politica (hereinafter CP), pp. 301–302.
7. See Perón Expounds His Doctrine (hereinafter PESO), pp. 18, 20, 94, 179.
8. Lux-Wurm, op. cit., p. 229.
9. Speech to the First National Congress of Philosophy (hereinafter SFNCP), pp. 9, 13—14, 20, 34, 46–8.
10. Ibid., pp. 46–7.
11. The Voice of Perón (hereinafter VP), op. cit., p. 114.
12. CP, p. 57.
13. PESO, p. 73;CP, p. 62
14. CP, p. 19.
15. CP, p. 21.
16. There is a good example on p. 80 of PESD.
17. PESD, pp. 20, 169.
18. CP, p. 269.
19. Perón attacks the ‘popular’ Machiavelli on the ground that he advocates ‘divide and rule’ policies. PESD, p. 54. The fact that Perón misunderstands Machiavelli does not affect the truth of the argument advanced here concerning the close similarities between Perón and the ‘real’ Machiavelli.
20. CP, p. 168.
21. Napoleon is referred to or quoted frequently inCP. See pp. 72, 85, 168, 169, 170, 175, 179, 204, 207, 252, 329.
22. CP, p. 161.
23. CP, p. 36.
24. Peronist Doctrine (hereinafter PD), op cit., p. 80.
25. SFNCP, p. 32.
26. Ibid., p. 27.
27. Ibid., pp. 31, 55.
28. PD, p. 81–2.
29. SFNCP, pp. 38, 57.
30. Ibid., p. 55.
31. ‘Class struggle is an agent of destruction and not construction and humanity will never come to a safe harbour by a system of destruction but always by one of construction.’ CP, p. 298.
32. SFNCP, pp. 39, 44.
33. PD, p. 137.
34. SFNCP, p. 33.
35. Ibid., p. 56.
36. Ibid., p. 60.
37. PESD, pp. 25, 49, 51.
38. PESD, pp.20–1; CP, p. 298.
39. PD, pp. 83–4.
40. PESD, pp. 93–4.
41. CP, pp. 71–4.
42. CP, p. 267.
43. PESD, pp.271, 287, 291; VP, p. 154.
44. CP, p. 44.
45. PESD, p. 39.
46. SFNCP, p. 45.
47. PD, p. 86.
48. CP, p. 85.
49. cf. especially Georges Sorel, Matériaux d'une théorie du proletariat (Paris, 1919).Google Scholar
50. PD, p. 111.
51. PESD, pp. 24–5, 39.
52. At times Perón lets the mask slip and admits as much: ‘Our third position is not a centrist position. It is an ideological position that is on the centre, on the right or on the left according to particular circumstances.’ La Razon (Buenos Aires), 5 September 1950.Google Scholar
53. Blanksten, op. cit., pp. 294–5.
54. Richmond, L. T., Argentina's Third Position and other systems compared (B.A., 1949).Google Scholar
55. See Perón, J. D., La hora de los pueblos (B.A., 1968)Google Scholar esp. pp. 150–6; Armando Cascella, ‘Trascendencia de la tercera posicion’, Sexto Continente (B.A., Nov.-Dec. 1950), 7–8, pp. 5–26.
56. PESO, pp. 268–9.
57. For the importance of the notion of popula r sovereignty seePD, pp. 85–6.
58. PD, pp. 173–4.
59. PESO, p. 271.
60. PD, p. 148.
61. PESD, p. 290.
62. On Peronist attempts to build up a popular culture see Revista de la Universidadde Buenos Aires 23 (July-December 1952)Google Scholar, 25 and 25 (January-March 1953).
63. Blanksten, op. cit., p. 282.
64. Perón, J. D., La tercera posicion (B.A., 1973), p. 63Google Scholar
65. PD, p. 200.
66. Kirkpatrick, op. cit., p. 178.
67. Little, loc. cit., p. 661.
68. Stabb, Martin, ‘Argentine letters and the Peronato: an overview’, Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs, XIII, 3–4 (1971), pp. 434–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
69. Hence the distortion in Peron's claim that his movement was ‘formed from all sides, from the most exaggerated conservative to the most petrified anarchist, communist and socialist'. La Razon, 26 October 1953.
70. Smith, P. H., Politics and Beef in A rgentina: patterns of conflict and change (New York, 1969), pp. 244–6.Google Scholar
71. SFNCP, pp. 46–7.
