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The conservative response to the 2011 Chilean student movement: neoliberal

Article  in  Discourse Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education · July 2014

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Neoliberal Education and Media

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Discourse: Studies in the Cultural

Cristian Cabalin

Abstract: This paper focuses on the relationship between the media and educational policies in

the context of the “neoliberal newspeak,” which has characterized the current circulation of ideas

in cultural production. Using framing theory, the article presents a critical discourse analysis on

the editorials published about the 2011 student movement by El Mercurio, the most influential

newspaper in Chile. El Mercurio is more than a newspaper. It is an institution; an institution that

supports conservative ideas. El Mercurio framed the public discussion about educational policies

and defended neoliberal education based on three discourses: the neoliberal system is absolute,

public education is valued less than private, and education is a technical issue, not political. By

invoking this rhetoric strategy, these discourses attempted to maintain the neoliberal education

system in Chile, which in turn rejected the social struggles of the student movement.

Keywords: Chilean student movement; critical discourse analysis; neoliberal education;

framing; media

Introduction

During 2011, Chile experienced a powerful student movement that transformed into a

social phenomenon. Criticism towards the educational system has moved towards a rejection of

the neoliberal system, which was implemented during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet in the

1980’s. This phenomenon was the first citizen awakening against inherited economic and

political policies of the military regime. These policies continued to be employed without major

1
changes in the ‘90s, when democracy was restored. Students expressed widespread discontent

towards a political system that has been unable to reduce social gaps. The protagonists of this

social upheaval took to the streets and, over more than 7 months of mobilization, showed that it

is possible to think of an alternative system to free market fundamentalism in education.

Proponents of neoliberalism in Chile reacted fiercely and at first tried to discredit the

student movement. However, as the movement continued, neoliberal supporters were forced to

acknowledge the huge impact that the students were having on society. The media, especially

those known for their conservative views, published articles focusing on vandalism and other

negative aspects of the student movement. This illustrates what Di Cicco (2010) called the

Nuisance Paradigm, which is the tendency of the media to present social protests as

“troublesome, unpatriotic and ineffective” (p. 135). Di Cicco, in a content analysis of coverage

of political protests in the U.S., concluded that in 40 years (from 1967-2007), American

newspapers represented the same negative images of social protests, especially among the most

progressive groups. That is, conservative media have reacted to prevent the spread of social

movements by misrepresenting their purposes.

In Chile, newspapers have followed the same trend, be it environmental conflicts or the

struggles of indigenous people, emphasizing concern for social order and representing

movements as permanent conflicts for the nation-state (Del Valle, 2005). El Mercurio, Chile’s

leading newspaper and one of the most prestigious in Latin America, has been associated with

the most conservative sectors in the country since its establishment. Many of the newspapers

articles promoted the 1973 coup against the socialist government of Salvador Allende, justified

and distorted human rights violations of the Pinochet dictatorship, and legitimized the neoliberal

and the political authority of the dictatorship (Veto & Garretón, 2010). This newspaper is an

2
institution in Chile, which sets political guidelines and supports the most conservative ideas. El

Mercurio was also a major player in the political discussion during the 2011 student movement.

In order to precisely analyze the discourses about education and the 2011 student

movement, a critical discourse analysis -based on Fairclough’s approach- was conducted on

editorials that were published between May and November of 2011, when the student movement

was at its most intense moment. This critical discourse analysis adopted aspects of framing

theory, which highlights how the media deploy interpretations of important political events.

Media coverage of educational policies is a recent topic of interest in the academic discussion

that has gained strength in the context of the global architecture of education (Robert, 2012;

Cohen, 2010). The education field is in permanent interaction with the journalistic field,

affecting “both policy processes and texts” (Lingard & Rawolle, 2004, p. 361). Policies are now

mediatized by the mass media, impacting their design, scope, text, context, and discourse (Rizvi

& Lingard, 2010; Rawolle & Lingard, 2010). Therefore, this article proposes a contribution to

the study of media discourses about educational policies.

Neoliberal Chilean Education1

David Harvey (2007) has argued that neoliberalism is a systematic political and economic

project of restoration of ruling class power, where inequalities between social groups are

intensified, promoting the accumulation of capital and exploitation on new and global scales.

Moreover, neoliberalism can be understood as a “social imaginary” that shapes discourses in all

social aspects: from the economy and politics to cultural and symbolic production (Rizvi &

Lingard, 2010). Neoliberalism “is reconfiguring relationships between governing and the

governed, power and knowledge, and sovereignty and territoriality.” (Ong, 2006, p. 3). This

1
For a more detailed description of the Chilean education system and the student movements, see (Cabalin, 2012)
and (Bellei & Cabalin, 2013).

3
process is not a natural order; it is a political and economic construction to debilitate the role of

the state in society, increasing the presence of the private sector and damaging social justice

(McCarthy, 2011). This project began to be executed in the 1980s when neoliberalism was

promoted by the Reagan and Thatcher administrations supporting the guidelines established by

the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (Harvey, 2007). Education has also

been impacted by the neoliberal program.

The financial “adjustments” dictated by the IMF and the World Bank often include the

privatization of education to the detriment of public education. Budget cuts for public schools

and universities have been a constant during each financial crisis, even though education plays a

major role in a country’s development and in the success or failure of political projects. This

expresses a contemporary phenomenon where institutions are morphing into new identities

(McCarthy, Greenhalgh-Spencer, & Mejia, 2011). In the case of education, neoliberalism has

brought about a paradigm shift worldwide and most countries have undertaken reform to address

this.

With the pretext of the expansion of schooling coverage, the dictatorship of Augusto

Pinochet (1973-1990) implemented a reform that meant the incorporation of the free-market in

education. As Contreras and others (2011) have indicated, “In 1979, there were 1,846 primary

schools and in 1982 -only years after the reform- there were 2,285 schools, the majority of them

were for-profit” (p. 5). This trend has continued during the last three decades with the same

pattern: private education is growing while public education is decreasing. Fostering

competitiveness, the dictatorship created the conditions for the proliferation of for-profit

educational institutions, converting education into a commodity.

4
 Chile was the first neoliberal experiment in the world (Harvey, 2007). Pinochet’s

dictatorship imposed neoliberalism, following the recommendations of Milton Friedman, who

was a mentor to an array of Chilean economists who completed their PhDs in Economics at the

University of Chicago during the 1970s. They were known as “the Chicago Boys” (Mönckeberg,

2001), and they implemented the neoliberal system in Chile, which in education can be

summarized in three fundamental elements: school choice, competition among schools, and

privatization of education (Bellei & Cabalin, 2013). Education was commodified whereby

parents are held responsible for their children’s education, while the State plays a subsidiary role

(Oliva, 2008). In terms of access, Chilean education has presented a significant evolution thanks

to specific educational policies and the proliferation of voucher or subsidized schools and private

institutions. The privatization of schooling has considerably increased in the last two decades,

and today, more students attend private schools than public schools.

The current educational policies in Chile are based on neoliberalism (Matus & Infante,

2011). A change in these policies would have been imagined with the transition from the

dictatorship to democracy, but democratic administrations kept the free-market as the method to

develop the country. The governmental objective was to allow access the global economy and

strengthen the modernization process. Nevertheless, the unequal inheritance from the

dictatorship became an annoying burden in education (Cavieres, 2011). Neoliberal educational

policies have crystalized one of the main criticisms of neoliberalism: the colossal inequalities

between a privileged minority and the majority of the population (Harvey, 2007). Educational

inequality has been a major issue in Chile during the past few decades. Chile has a paradoxical

structure in education, because educational coverage is increasing, whereas the unequal structure

5
stays the same. The implementation of free-market policies during the last three decades has not

shown advances in quality and equality in education (Contreras, et. al, 2011).

The supposed neoliberal progress cannot be observed in the reality of Chilean education.

On the contrary, the free-market policies have been shown to be destructive for social justice. It

is precisely for this reason that students took to the streets in 2011 demanding more quality and

equality in the Chilean education system (Cabalin, 2012). The students have demonstrated that

education is a place for ideological discussion in a country, which has tended to perpetuate

privileges, avoiding political conflict. They have recovered part of social mobilization in Chile,

resisting the pressures from conservative technocracy.

El Mercurio and Framing Theory

More than a newspaper, El Mercurio is a political actor in the history of Chile. Linked to

a powerful and wealthy family, this newspaper has represented the voice of the elite since the

nineteenth century. Its pages articulate dominant and conservative discourses, which are deeply

religious and neoliberal. El Mercurio is also one of the most influential newspapers in Latin

America, and as a holding company, it controls an extensive network of local newspapers, online

media and radio stations with a weekly circulation of more than 400,000 copies and the highest

advertising revenue of the Chilean press.

Its strong ties to the dictatorship of Pinochet have been a major criticism of its history.

Stories of human rights violations have been hidden, manipulated, and distorted. The book, El

Diario de Agustín (Lagos, 2009) explains how this newspaper strategically operated to create a

series of false news stories during the early years of the dictatorship that enabled the regime to

repress political opponents, who were mostly members or supporters of left-wing parties. Its

pages were also used to support the implementation of the neoliberal system in Chile and the

6
series of political arrangements that allowed the dictatorship to lay the foundations of the system

that the students challenged in 2011.

In order to analyze how El Mercurio deployed the conservative response to the student

movement, framing theory was utilized. Framing is related to “the assumption that how an issue

is characterized in news reports can have an influence on how it is understood by audiences”

(Scheufele & Tewksbury, 2007, p. 11). For D’Angelo (2002), framing is a research program that

can be described by three paradigms: cognitive, constructionist, and critical. The first refers to

the press coverage (news frames) creating semantics within the individual interpretation schemes

of the subjects. From this perspective, the media provide accessible information so that

individuals can activate prior knowledge and consider this information in their future decisions.

The constructionist approach sees framing as a process of creating “interpretative packages” (p.

877). The media give interpretive frameworks of news events that impact the construction of

social reality. The critical perspective, on the other hand, establishes that the media select certain

facts and omit others to maintain the status quo and favor the dominant powers in society.

Frames would impact the distribution of power within society (Entman, 2007), as the

treatment of news could bias a fact in favor of particular groups. By assuming the media as

agents of power and dominant institutions of cultural production, framing also responds to a

strategy or discursive disposition of the media to influence people’s perceptions and public

discussion of social problems. The basic functions of framing, in line with Entman (1993), are

the definition of the problem, the attribution of responsibility, the moral evaluation, and the

recommendation of possible solutions (p. 52). According to this author, selection and salience

would be the most important factors in framing, referring to the significance of importance that is

assigned to a news event. This usually occurs through the repetition of an idea or interpretation,

7
allowing for the perceptions of individuals to become more permeable with each story. This

study has opted for a critical approach, since the discourses of the media represent an area of

ideological dispute, where the mainstream media reduce public values, such as the right to

education “to nostalgic reminders of another era” (Giroux, 2011, p. 9).

The Critical Discourse Analysis

Discourse is a facet of social life in a dialectical relationship with other social facets

(Fairclough, 2003). By acknowledging this relationship, the understanding of the text is

extended, making the linguistic features an important part of the analysis, but not the central

focus. Fairclough (2003; 2006) suggests understanding discourse as a social process on three

levels: structure, practice and events. Social structures are abstract entities that define the

possibilities of actions and the occurrence of events mediated by social practices. This author

asserts that language is a social structure, while social practice refers to the order of discourse

and events, to facts. The order of discourse, in turn, is composed of three elements: genre,

discourse and style.

The editorial of a newspaper may be considered a genre that has a particular way of

representing the world (discourse) and shaping social identities (style). Therefore, to critically

analyze an editorial, identifying its linguistic characteristics does not suffice. Rather, a trans-

disciplinary theoretical perspective must be adopted in order to detect the relationships of this

particular genre with other discourses and fields in society. Fairclough (2009) emphasizes the

trans-disciplinary nature of critical discourse analysis, because studying changes in language in a

complex society requires relating different theories and disciplines; in this case, I have used

8
framing theory in media studies, because the media are the principal agent of the

recontextualization of discourses. The media have the power to extend or restrict possible

communications in society through their particular language.

I have analyzed the framing of the editorials2 of El Mercurio by establishing a time line

from the start of massive student demonstrations in May 2011 and was concluded in November

2011 because it was at during this time period that the congressional debate about the budget of

the nation was consolidated or the student demands were rejected. In addition, many universities

and schools that had been on strike resumed their academic activities and the students returned to

classes to finish the academic year. The period was marked by 7 months of intense mobilizations

that were widely covered by the national and international press.

All discourses are historically and politically situated. The student movement and the

neoliberal Chilean education system represent the context of the discourses analyzed. The first

methodological stage was to analyze editorials considering Entman’s framing functions, trying to

highlight the definition of the problem, the allocation of responsibilities, moral judgments, and

the recommendation of solutions. This strategy has also been used in other studies about framing

and conservative discourses of the media (Tucker, 1998). To establish the framing categories, the

editorials that addressed the student movement were analyzed to determine whether they

mentioned educational policies, public demonstrations, protests and riots, responses to the

political system, or references to the movement (Cabalin, 2013).

Once identified, the editorials were each read carefully in order to implement a critical

discourse analysis. This analysis was conducted following the model proposed by Fairclough

(2003), who establishes that we must start by considering a social problem that aims to produce

2
For Canel (1999), “the editorial is the genre that sets forth the ideological and journalistic profile; it is the text in
which the newspaper adopts a political position in the name of the paper” (p. 98).

9
an emancipatory change. In this case, this emancipatory change is the rebellion against neoliberal

education in Chile. Moreover, Fairclough (1992) has stated that discourses can be analyzed in

three dimensions: discourse as text, which allows the researcher to observe the vocabulary,

grammar, cohesion and structure of the text; discourse as a discursive practice, in which the

researcher seeks to understand how discourse is produced and distributed in society; and

discourse as a social practice, which allows the researcher to detect when discourse is being

represented and recontextualized in a dialectical relationship with the hegemonic discourses.

This analysis of discourse involves linguistic description, intertextual interpretation, and social

explanation.

Therefore, after identifying the semiotic aspects of the social problem (the discourses

about the student movement), I placed attention on the key words and sentences used to describe

the movement and the neoliberal education system in Chile (e.g. “highly ideological students”,

“efficient private sector”, “lower quality public education”). Then, the analysis highlighted the

recontextualization of the discourses and the social practices embedded in the discourses (e.g.

“maganerialism in education”, “entrepreneurship in education”, “standardized measurements”,

“system of experts”). Considering this, the content of the editorials of El Mercurio can be

understood as a ‘nodal discourse’ (Fairclough, 2006), which represents the conservative response

to the 2011 student movement. This nodal discourse articulates the neoliberal vision in education

through three discourses that cluster around it: the neoliberal system is absolute (does not accept

questions), the public is valued less than the private (the problem is the state, not the market),

and education is a technical issue, not political (the depoliticization of education).

The Conservative Response

From May 13th (when the first editorial appeared) to November 26th, El Mercurio

10
published 97 editorials about education and student protests. This demonstrates the importance

assigned to the conflict and the need to respond from the conservative trenches to the demands of

students. All translations are my own.

Discourse 1: The Neoliberal System is beyond Challenge3

From the critical discourse analysis of the editorials in El Mercurio, emerges the need to

preserve the core values of neoliberal education. The first principle and what seems like an

inviolable rule is the defense of the freedom of teaching over the right to education. This

rhetorical device defends the privatization of the system and maintains the importance of school

vouchers. It encourages the state not to intervene in the system, allowing for only certain

adjustments, such as increasing the number of scholarships for students, so that there is always a

constant flow of students into private universities. It upholds the principle of non-discrimination

to avoid state intervention in favor of public universities and emphasizes the contribution of new

private universities, which do not legally profit, yet some of them act as real businesses. It is

argued that there is no criticism of the system as a whole. For example, El Mercurio states that:

In the debate, there are many approaches to primary, secondary, and tertiary education reform, some of

them valuable, but the main idea of radical change argues that primary, secondary, and tertiary education are in

crisis. It is true that there are a significant number of serious problems, but we are certainly not in a terminal crisis.

(El Mercurio, July 2, 2011, p. A3)

In addition, this rhetoric specifies that there is no actual student interest in mobilizing and

that they do not have representation in society. These assertions are intended to contend the

vision of a general social malaise, hiding the structural inequality that the education system

reproduces. According to the editorials, the system would promote social mobility, equal

opportunities, and access to education. In order to do this, figures and evidence that would

3
I would like to thank one of the reviewers for the recommendations about the categorization of these 3 discourses.

11
corroborate each of the assumptions being promoted are used. It would seem, therefore, that this

successful formula should continue to exist. Utilizing Entman’s framing functions, the editorials

delimited the problem and suggested the following solutions: continuing with the global

neoliberal system and increasing the role that private initiative plays in education.

(Freedom of Teaching) “It seems to be the right path, instead of returning to a system like the one that

existed 40 years ago, which enjoys little appreciation not only in Chile but also in many other countries and among

some of the most distinguished experts.” (El Mercurio, July 7, 2011, p. A3)

A common phrase in the editorials is “not revert to 40 years ago”, which is an indirect

allusion to the socialist government of Salvador Allende. El Mercurio defends the for profit spirit

in education, trying to place the discussion in a dispute between the supposed socialist and

retrograde past and the future neoliberal progress.

(End of profit in education) With this, the country would regress 40 years economically and additionally

would break the delicate, but essential link, between remuneration and effort, the engine of human endeavor in all its

facets. It would be inconceivable for Chile to destroy an invaluable tool of progress, as a result of a poor and

primitive analysis of the problems of the education sector. (El Mercurio, September 2, 2011, p. A3)

With this discourse, neoliberalism is strengthened because it would mean that progress

and development are irreversible global tendencies. The foundations of the Chilean educational

system are situated outside the scope of local political actors, because it is a response to the

hegemonic world structure. In other words, the particular becomes general. This universal status

of the neoliberal system is consistent with its hegemonic project (Fairclough, 2003). This

universality and absolutism of the neoliberal system in education would be sustained in the

global economy and in the process of capital accumulation, so that education may respond to

these objectives and, consequently, the manner in which the economy functions affects the

structure of the educational system. Therefore, the neoliberal project unfolds beyond trade

relations and is also imposed on educational relations. This logic expresses that economic

12
rationality is transferred to education. With this recontextualization, neoliberal discourse is

imposed as a process “construed as being due to inevitable, external circumstances or facts that

must be accepted as irreversible, with no possible reorientation, and as a process with no

responsible actors” (Fairclough, 2000, p. 17). Consequently, the system is absolute,

unquestionable and functions outside of any social tension. The students’ criticism of the

neoliberal system would be unproductive, inefficient and even ingenuous, because the system

alone would ensure its absolutism.

Discourse 2: The Inefficient Public Education

Hand in hand with the defense of the neoliberal system, the editorials support the

superiority of private over public. With reference to the competitiveness and effectiveness of

both, the editorials present education as a business that must be correctly managed. The editorials

fit with Apple’s (2005) criticisms about the public discussion: “The language of privatization,

marketization, and constant evaluation has increasingly saturated public discourse” (p. 19). In

opposition to the values of the private in education, the shortcomings of public education are

exposed. It questions the role of public universities, which are described as dull, mediocre and

are unable to be accountable. The “audit culture”, a term also coined by Apple (2005), is

imposed in the educational setting as unquestionable logic. Public institutions are not modern;

they are ineffective and have shown progressive deterioration. It is established that the modern

and the innovative come from the private. Underdevelopment and delay in schooling are public

issues. Due to this, knowledge also becomes privatized and commodified, transforming it into an

economic value, rather than a social one. As Lipman (2010) states: “The neoliberal agenda

extends the logic of the market to all corners of the earth and spheres of social life” (p. 241).

Knowledge, therefore, is a product of neoliberal education that becomes a commodity. However,

13
the fact that most research universities in Chile, whether public or private, are non-profit

institutes with long tradition, is not recognized.

The debate over whether public funding should be allocated to state universities only because of their legal

nature, without more accountability, is a more complex topic. (El Mercurio, May 13, 2011, p. A3)

Something similar occurs with respect to increases in direct fiscal support or, more generally, the public

funding to state universities. This funding system is in retreat around the world, as more resources are allocated

based on performance agreements with counterparts associated with the volume and quality of research and

development, and specific demands on teaching. (El Mercurio, June 29, 2011, p. A3)

In addition, editorials establish that the students who led the protests are mainly from

public universities and that with their mobilization, they also helped deteriorate the education

system they say they want make better. That is, students are held responsible for the damage to

public education through their actions. Teachers are accused of being interest groups seeking to

protect their jobs without a real commitment to improving education. Therefore, the authorities,

students and teachers of public institutions would be responsible for the deterioration of public

education, erasing the structural factors that resulted from neoliberal policies. The historical

neglect of more than three decades is ignored. On the contrary, there are attempts to demonstrate

a supposed governmental interest in public education.

In this way, for example, the complaints about the neglect of public education would not be consistent with

the broad set of reforms adopted in recent times, whose main priority is precisely to promote this type of education.

It can always be debated if schools are not up to par, but there is no basis to argue that the educational system has

been neglected. (El Mercurio, June 11, 2011, p. A3)

With a smaller proportion of students in public elementary and secondary schools, the possibilities to

strengthen these spaces are becoming more difficult. (El Mercurio, November 1, 2011, p. A3)

By implementing Entman’s framing functions, it is clear that the educational problem

focuses on the failings of the public system; that those responsible for these problems are the

14
agents of these institutions and it is recommended that the benefits for private education

institutions be increased in order to solve this problem. To do this, the effectiveness of the

private sector over the public is emphasized; an argument that neoliberal discourse in education

has sustained since the ‘80s. In the editorials, free education is rejected because it is assumed that

this is a personal investment with high return and the subsidiary role of the state is promoted,

another characteristic of neoliberalism. However, when modern states were first becoming

established, education was seen as a project for the construction of identity and citizenship that

the nation-state required. In the mid-twentieth century, education was essential for

developmental processes and the possibility to expand opportunities to the population, thus

consolidating post-World War II democracy. In fact, in the universal declaration of Human

Rights recognizes the value of education as a fundamental right. But since the ‘80s, education

has become a business or, more precisely, it has transformed into a commodity (Ball, 1998).

The concept of human capital was established as a system in education, but this

“approach is problematic because it is economistic, fragmentized and exclusively

instrumentalistic.” (Robeyns, 2006, p. 69). This conceptual change means that education is no

longer associated with democracy, but with the market, as it is only “useful” if it can boost

productivity and competitiveness in the global economy. For this reason, it does not matter if

schools promote critical thinking or “teach to the test”. The point is to generate a flexible

workforce, which is multifunctional and competitive. This global architecture in education

nurtures the new economy (Carnoy, 2002). For this reason, private education is more functional

to this strategy than public institutions.

Discourse 3: Apolitical Education

The student movement is presented primarily as an assault on institutionalization. The

15
students are criticized for their actions, they are criminalized, and the social protest is presented

as an act of vandalism. The “moral panic” about youth is represented here (Thompson, 1998).

They were also delegitimized as political actors and were denied the opportunity to engage in the

political discussion, because they were considered ineffective and irresponsible. There is

contempt for their autonomy and they are accused of being manipulated. Students are criticized

for their methods of protest. Following one of Entman’s framing functions; editorials make

moral judgments about the legitimacy of marches and demonstrations which, as mentioned

above in Di Cicco’s Nuisance Paradigm, was also done in the US where protests were presented

as bothersome and unproductive. El Mercurio applies the same discursive strategy as American

conservative newspapers to depict the student movement.

We are against the agenda of the left that has not been able to convince the electorate of the desirability of

its proposals and aims to take advantage of the sympathy that is often aroused by the students’ demands to try to

push them. It has become clear that the student or social movements are far from representing the vast majority of

citizens. Therefore, we do not have to dramatize their demands. It is reasonable to try to concentrate again on the

agenda of proper education. (El Mercurio, July 1, 2011, p. A3)

But there is no clear evidence that the country agrees to adopt all the suggestions from students, and less

their way of settling differences is through a permanent street strength test, which radicalized and polarized

positions. (El Mercurio, August 18, 2011, p. A3)

It is constantly emphasized that there is a need to resolve the conflict from a technical

point of view, referring to effectiveness and efficiency as values that should guide the discussion.

One of the changes based on the order of neoliberal discourse is moving management concepts

to education. By making the discussion technical, the discussion is void of meaning and students

are prevented from transforming into political actors. There is a want to encapsulate education

into a technical sphere, by the technocracy and in the field of experts. Education has returned to

be a matter of economic distribution and not of political values, distancing it from society and

16
the critique of citizens.

Therefore, it is difficult to understand the intellectual and empirical validity of the claims of the student

leaders and their supporters, when they seek not only to eliminate entrepreneurship in the field of education, but it is

also easy to notice, that they seek to end it in other productive areas as well. (El Mercurio, November 3, 2011, A3)

The only reference to politics is the critique of the political system established in the

Parliament. The main political criticism made by the editorials of El Mercurio is directed to the

center-left opposition, which after ruling for 20 years, lost to the right-wing candidate, Sebastián

Piñera, in the 2009 election. Citizens have questioned his ability to fulfill promises, his lack of

projects and his lack of support for the student movement, causing him to lose popularity. El

Mercurio has called to achieve elitist institutional arrangements that have characterized the

transition from dictatorship to democracy. However, this style only distanced the public whose

focus is what has generated the delegitimization of Chilean democracy and the political system

(De la Maza, 2010). Editorials try to focus the policy discussion in parliament, removing it from

the streets, to prevent the participation of social actors. Appealing to stop the radicalization of the

student movement, ignoring the structural demands of students and focusing on the settings for

the system to continue to operate without major neoliberal conflicts, El Mercurio attempts to

depoliticize the student movement in an effort to also demobilize students from channeling the

discussion on a path where 20-year institutions have been safeguarded by the legacy of Pinochet.

In order to achieve this goal, students are depicted as idealists and utopians without the expertise

needed. El Mercurio utilizes “ideology” as a pejorative in order to avoid the political discussion.

There is no apparent relationship between abstract aspirations and highly ideological aspirations as the

student movement envisions the country’s educational organization for the future and the real possibility that this

will result in improved quality. (El Mercurio, September 14, 2011, p. A3)

The utopia of reshaping the higher education system, renouncing, for example, its mixed character - which,

incidentally, is historical - should be abandoned. Instead, there should be a serious proposal of a horizon for the

17
coming decades, developing from this goal the necessary reforms and taking care always to use resources well,

while remembering that they have an alternative use and availability in education will always be bounded. (El

Mercurio, November 22, 2011, p. A3)

El Mercurio calls on the political system to address the student movement, but

considering the technical expertise in the design of solutions in order to impose economics over

politics. However, education should be a political discussion, because it is in this sphere that the

future of society is forged. Through it, opportunities for the present and future generations are

organized. It also distributes power in society and roles are assigned in the social structure. In the

neoliberal discourse, ideology is hidden behind a technical approach with the objective of

ignoring the negative political consequences of neoliberal system. However, educational policies

are influenced by ideology, as demonstrated by various projects. For example, in 2004, the

Renaissance 2010 program was implemented in Chicago, which involved the closure of public

schools and the opening of private ones. That is, entrepreneurs entered into the business of

schooling, arguing that the state was unable to manage and deliver quality schools. This project

clearly expresses the intersection between economic policy and educational policy in Chicago,

because powerful groups seek to convert this city into a global economic center (Lipman &

Hursh, 2007). To do that, intervention needs to occur in the city and business options need to be

open to investors. Renaissance 2010 is not, then, only an educational improvement plan, but is

also a political strategy sustained in a neoliberal vision (Lipman & Hursh, 2007).

In the case of Chile, by introducing the technical aspects of education the ideological

lines that support each educational project are hidden, blurred, and transformed into numbers.

With this, the public space is also depoliticized, establishing the boundaries of the discussion on

education, where the voice is that of the experts. Education, therefore, is displayed as a routine

system with a mechanical structure. Everything must be measured, programs, students, teachers,

18
and faculty at the university. The education workforce is subjected to the fragility imposed by the

neoliberal logic to measure, quantify and cut educational plans (Tuchman, 2009).

Final Remarks

The conservative response in El Mercurio’s editorials can be considered a part of the

“neoliberal newspeak”. In the article Neoliberal Newspeak: Notes on the New Planetary Vulgate,

Bourdieu & Wacquant (2001) consider that a public vocabulary has been imposed to transform

neoliberal terms (flexibility, efficiency, to name a few) into commonplaces in the cultural

production, affecting the international circulation of ideas. These commonplaces are now a

“universal common sense” thanks to a media repetition (p. 3). In the case of student movement,

El Mercurio produces this common sense repeating three main concepts that are elements of the

neoliberal discourse: neoliberalism in all social spheres is an irreversible process; the market in

education needs to be free in order to constrain the role of the state; and education is a technical

issue that must be managed by experts. These ideas are the base of the majority of editorials.

There is an ideological disposition in El Mercurio’ discourse to neutralize the student movement.

The editorials call to ignore the students and produce little modifications in the institutionalized

structure without transforming the neoliberal system. Students are depicted as fanciful and

pretentious young people. According to El Mercurio, they cannot be political actors in the

educational debate, because education is a matter for adults and experts. These experts are not

named; it is not known whom they represent, or who they are. With this discourse, the discussion

about educational policies is associated with an apolitical process in order to enhance the

neoliberal system.

The editorials present a discourse that did not change in the seven months analyzed. El

Mercurio has a consistent and coherent discourse during this time, defending the neoliberal

19
legacy of Pinochet’s dictatorship. In its editorials, there are not severe criticisms against the

current Chilean educational system. Rather, there is a constant request to keep the system in

order to avoid going back “40 years” in Chilean history. However, students are not asking for an

educational program like that, they are protesting in favor of more equality and social justice in

education. The editorials try to misrepresent the students’ demands in order to diminish their

power.

El Mercurio acknowledges some flaws of Chile’s education system, but repeatedly

insists that its roots were not systemic, but rather a specific problem related mainly to an “unfair”

allocation of resources among public and private education institutions. The editorials defend the

role of the private initiative and the validity of profit making in the education system. El

Mercurio blames the conflict on the students, the rectors of traditional universities and the

teachers. In consequence, the editorials make a distinction between the promoters of

neoliberalism in education and those who sought to increase the role of the state in education.

Thus, the conservative response to the 2011 Chilean student movement is the nodal discourse of

the editorials that allows seeing how neoliberal education is promoted and protected in Chile.

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