The role of master narritives of Bolivia and Chile in the formation of their national identities

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THE ROLE OF MASTER NARRATIVES OF

BOLIVIA AND CHILE IN THE FORMATION OF

THEIR NATIONAL IDENTITIES

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29 DE SEPTIEMBRE DE 2015

CONTENT

THEROLEOFMASTERNARRATIVESOFBOLIVIAANDCHILEINTHE

FORMATIONOFTHEIRNATIONALIDENTITIES ... 1

I. Introduction ... 1 1. Aim ... 2 1.1 Research Question: ... 3 1.2 Sub-Questions: ... 3 2. The problem ... 3 II. Methodology... 6

1. Construction and deconstruction ... 6

2. Introducing the interviewees ... 7

III. Theoretical Framework... 9

1. Identities in constructivism ... 10

2. Master narratives ... 12

3. Narrative formation of identity (narrativity) ... 13

IV. Research ... 15

1. Master Narratives ... 16

1.1 Constructing master narratives during and after the war ... 16

1.2 Deconstructing master narratives ... 19

2. National Identities ... 37

2.1 Formation of national identities ... 37

2.2 National identities from the otherness perspective ... 41

V. Conclusions ... 56

References ... 60

APPENDIX 1: Gustavo Fernandez ... 65

APPENDIX 2: Armando Loaiza... 68

APPENDIX 3: Javier Murillo ... 74

APPENDIX 4: Gonzalo Mendieta ... 76

APPENDIX 5: Agustín Echalar ... 82

APPENDIX 6: Carlos Carrasco ... 87

APPENDIX 7: Pablo Michel ... 90

APPENDIX 8: Mario Requena ... 92

APPENDIX 9: Jose Rodriguez ... 97

APPENDIX 10: Claudio Coloma ... 103

APPENDIX 11: Claudio Gutiérrez ... 108

APPENDIX 12: Andrés Angulo ... 112

APPENDIX 13: German Albuquerque ... 117

APPENDIX 14: Jose Concha ... 120

APPENDIX 15: Cristian García ... 128

APPENDIX 16: Pedro Diaz ... 131

APPENDIX 17: Pablo Lacoste ... 132

The role of master narratives of Bolivia and Chile in the formation of their national identities.

Andrés Guzmán Escobari, all rights reserved. Pages: 59

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I wish to express my great gratitude to Mrs. Polly Pallister-Wilkins, supervisor of this thesis, for her guidance and encouragement to improve this work in the most coherent and logical way possible. I would also like to thank Mrs. Imke Harbers, second reader of this thesis, for her observations and precise advice that have made it possible to give this work a more academic and scientific approach.

Special thanks are due to Dr David Laws, Director of the Master's programme in Conflict Resolution and Governance, who has guided my studies in the last year and has taught me to use theoretical tools to analyze conflicts.

Thanks to all the experts from Bolivia, Chile and Argentina who kindly agreed to be interviewed for the purposes of this work. Among them, a very special thanks to Mr. Germán Albuquerque, professor of the Bernardo O’Higgins University of Chile, who has helped me to better apply the theory of constructivism to the questionnaire used for the interviews of this thesis.

In the same vein, I should thank Dr. Bruno Boccara, psychosocial analyst who wrote two books about Bolivia, its traumas and its victimization, and who has kindly shared his works with me.

I have to also thank Linda Mullan and Sergio Alberto Fernandez, for all their corrections and suggestions that allowed me to improve the language and the political approach of this work.

Finally I would like to thank my family and specially my parents for all their support in my academics endeavors.

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This thesis intends to elucidate whether the master narratives of Bolivia and Chile are a determining factor in the formation of their national identities. For that purpose, theories of constructivism and narrativity will be applied to understand the way in which discourses were built and identities formed. To that end, this research constructs and deconstructs master narratives and national identities, taking into consideration the literature available and the opinion of the experts interviewed. The assumptions made by these experts and the scholars who have written about these issues will be discussed and contrasted to better understand the way in which the parties interpret history, and how they see themselves and the other. The dominant assumptions basically assert that Chile has developed a neoliberal and legalistic identity based, among other things, on a sense of superiority towards its northern neighbours. Bolivia, on the other hand, because of the trauma of its loss of access to the sea, has acquired a culture of victimization and a discourse that blames Chile for almost all its misfortunes. In this way, the Pacific War (1879-1884) that resulted in Bolivia’s current landlocked situation is taken as the foundation of the existing tensions between the two countries, and has come to form, together with the 1904 Treaty and the negotiations of the maritime issue, an integral part of their master narratives.

Key words: master narratives, national identities, culture of victimization, sense of superiority, Pacific War, 1904 Treaty and negotiations about the Bolivian maritime

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THE

ROLE

OF

MASTER

NARRATIVES

OF

BOLIVIA

AND

CHILE

IN

THE

FORMATION

OF

THEIR

NATIONAL

IDENTITIES

“The stories we tell define not only what we want, but also who or what we are like. Yet there is an important difference between these two kinds of stories: the narratives through which ourselves are constituted are always the more fundamental; stories of selves are preconditions for stories told about interests” (Ringmar, 1996: 76).

I.

Introduction

The Pacific War (1879-1884) fought between Bolivia and Peru on one side and Chile on the other, officially ended more than 130 years ago. However, not all of the problems that this conflict created have been solved. Some issues are still unresolved and some others, the ones that arose after the war,1 also continue to aggravate the situation and trigger political frictions every so often.

No-one with knowledge of the region’s international relations would seriously assert that these three countries have not had problematic relations from the very beginning of their existence. In fact the legal disputes that Peru and Bolivia recently brought to the International Court of Justice in The Hague (2008 and 2013), both closely related to the Pacific War, exemplify the difficult situation that has prevailed among these three nations since 1879. Indeed, between Bolivia and Chile – the two nations to be analyzed in this work –,2 the main source of conflict is the landlocked status of Bolivia, which has been the subject of many negotiations throughout history and is known today as the Bolivian maritime issue. This situation has created tensions because while one party considers it as a great injustice, the other one portrays it as a natural consequence of the war. These

1 _{Between Bolivia and Chile, there are some issues related to the fulfillment of the treaties that both}

countries have signed and the maintenance of thousands of landmines in the Chilean side of the border. However the most important ones and the most likely to elicit conflict are: the diversion of the Lauca River and the free exploitation of the Silala waters, both undertaken by Chile at the expense of Bolivia.

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different perceptions have had a profound impact on the nations’ understanding of themselves and each other. Hence, in order to contribute to the debate and the understanding of this problem, this work aims to review the role of master narratives of Bolivia and Chile in the formation of their national identities.

This thesis consists of six sections: 1) this short introduction, in which the aim and problem are presented; 2) a methodology section, where the approach of construction and deconstruction is presented and the experts interviewed are introduced; 3) a theoretical section, wherein theories of constructivism and narrativity are examined; 4) a research section focused on the master narratives of Bolivia and Chile and the formation of their national identities; 5) a conclusion, where the results of this work are presented; and finally 6) the corresponding references and appendices in which the translated transcriptions of the interviews are included.

1. Aim

Assuming that the difficulties between Bolivia and Chile will be easier to overcome if both parties try to understand the other, this thesis presents an analysis about the role of their master narratives in the formation of their national identities. In other words, the aim is to elucidate and identify the predominant discourses in both societies regarding to the Bolivian maritime issue and discuss their influence in the distinctive features of each nation.

As secondary objectives, this work tries to identify: 1) the main characteristics of the master narratives of both countries before the Pacific War; 2) the most important features of such narratives after that conflict; and 3) the chief characteristics which define the national identities of both countries at present.

In addition, the research is also intended to contribute to the analysis of some episodes of history and especially to the approach employed so far to interpret them. This is because it seems that the strong dose of nationalism used to construct master narratives in both countries has not helped to overcome misunderstandings, as we will see later. In the same way, the identification of narratives and identities aims to comprehend the current positions of both governments that are currently confronted in a trial before the ICJ.

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1.1 Research Question:

ARE THE MASTER NARRATIVES OF BOLIVIA AND CHILE A DETERMINING FACTOR IN THE FORMATION OF THEIR NATIONAL IDENTITIES?

1.2 Sub-Questions:

1. What were the main characteristics of the master narratives of Bolivia and Chile before the Pacific War?

2. What are the most important characteristics of the current master narratives of Bolivia and Chile in relation to the Pacific War, the 1904 Treaty and the negotiations initiated to solve the Bolivian maritime issue?

3. What are the main features that define the national identities of Chile and Bolivia?

2. The problem

Although the government of Chile currently maintains that there are no pending problems with Bolivia, the absence of diplomatic relations between La Paz and Santiago, the constant exchange of accusations and recriminations between their governments, and the trial in The Hague indicate otherwise.

As previously stated, the primary problem between both countries is the Bolivian maritime issue that has its roots in the territorial reconfiguration produced by the Pacific War and the 1904 Treaty (see Map 1). Indeed, Bolivia lost its only access to the sea in that war and despite the time elapsed (136 years), it is still trying to recover this access on legal, economic, and geopolitical grounds. Its intention is not to recuperate the whole territory lost but at least an outlet (Chile has offered a corridor to the sea at certain times) that would allow Bolivia to regain its maritime condition. In fact, throughout history and from the very beginning of the war, Chile has recognized many times that Bolivia needs its own route to the sea and has accepted to negotiate a solution to this problem. Nonetheless and for various reasons – some of them not only attributable to Bolivia or Chile, but to Peru – the negotiations failed.

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As a consequence of this long history of fruitless talks (the last one was held between 2006 and 2010), in April 2013, the Bolivian government instituted proceedings against Chile before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to recover access to the sea. Bolivia asked the Court to adjudge and declare that Chile has the obligation to negotiate an agreement that grants Bolivia a fully sovereign access to the Pacific Ocean. The legal basis is rooted in the previous negotiations in which the government of Chile pledged itself formally and through its highest-level representatives to cede a coastal territory to Bolivia. Nevertheless as it is evident, that has never occurred.3 In contrast, Chile asserts that there is nothing to negotiate for two reasons: 1) all of those promises were made as part of inconclusive negotiations, and 2) because both countries signed a border treaty in 1904 in which the boundaries were defined in perpetuity. With these arguments, Chile decided to present an objection to the jurisdiction of the Court, arguing that the consent given to the Court by Chile through the Pact of Bogota (1948) contains a clause that restricts the jurisdiction of the Court for all the matters already settled by treaties in force in April 1948 (Article 6). Bolivia responded by clarifying that its claim does not have any relation to the Treaty of 1904, but to the compromises and promises assumed and made by Chile after 1948 (all of them contemplating a sovereign access to the sea). The Court then decided to reject the Chilean preliminary objection to its jurisdiction on 24th September, 2015 by 14 votes in favor to 2 against.4

Contrary to what was expected since the trial began, the animosity between the parties has not decreased but rather escalated. The aggressiveness of the official discourses and the general divergences have augmented, revealing once more the discrepancies between the countries’ stances. While one party holds that it is necessary to solve the problem of the sovereign access to the sea through negotiations, the other states that there are no outstanding issues between the two countries. Speeches usually collide in historical matters. In September 2013 the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales, said to the UN General Assembly: “In 1879 there was no war, there was an invasion. We lost our outlet to the sea and from that time on there have been so many meetings. A treaty is spoken of, but it

3 _{ICJ [online] Application instituting proceedings: Obligation to negotiate Access to the Pacific Ocean,}

24/04/2013 [Accessed: 02/04/2015] http://www.icj-cij.org/docket/files/153/17338.pdf

4 _{ICJ (24/09/2015) Judgment, preliminary objections [on line, accessed: 27/09/2015]}

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is an imposed, unfair and moreover a breached treaty”.5 _{In his response, the Minister of}

Foreign Affairs of Chile, Alfredo Moreno, stated: “The limits were perfectly marked over 100 years ago by the Treaty of 1904… These limits have been accepted and respected by [both] countries; therefore, there are no pending boundary issues between Chile and Bolivia”.6

MAP 1:

TERRITORIES AFFECTED BY THE PACIFIC WAR 1825: Bolivia becomes independent*; 1904: Bolivia and Chile sign their border treaty.

*There are some Chilean historians who assert that Bolivia has never had access to the sea. According to that version, Chile bordered with Peru in the north. Some others say that the northern border of Chile reached the parallel of latitude 23º south of the equator and not parallel 26 º as this map (1825) indicates.

Source: Escobari (2000).

5 _{Translation of “en 1879 no hubo guerra, hubo una invasión. Perdimos la salida al mar y a partir de ese}

momento ha habido tantas reuniones. Se habla de un tratado (el de 1904), pero un tratado impuesto, injusto y además de eso incumplido” (La Tercera, 25/09/2013).

6 _{Translation form Spanish: “los límites están perfectamente marcados hace más de 100 años por el Tratado}

de 1904". "Estos límites han sido aceptados y respetados por los países; por lo tanto, no hay temas de límites pendientes entre Chile y Bolivia" (Infobae, 26/09/2013).

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These views show the different ways each party understands the problem and why Bolivia decided to bring the case to the Court. Also, it clearly demonstrates that there are discrepancies in the perception of what happened in history in general and in the Pacific War in particular. This example is just a small sample of a much bigger issue in which not only the positions of the governments collide, but also the whole imaginary of both societies that is expressed in the views of their experts, in their history books and in the opinion of their citizens who have been educated differently.

II.

Methodology

In line with the main purposes of this work, narratives and identities of Bolivia and Chile will be constructed and deconstructed in order to elucidate and analyze the influence of master narratives in the formation of national identities. With that in mind two methods of research will be applied: 1) the study of the existing literature, in which not only the texts that analyze narratives and identities have been considered but also some classical history books; and 2) the analysis of the structural interviews conducted in Bolivia and Chile with some experts on these issues, whose responses will be contrasted and systematized in tables in order to extract the phrases that best answer the corresponding questions.

In the following lines, the way in which narratives and identities are constructed and deconstructed will be explained and the interviewees will be introduced.

1.

Construction and deconstruction

To construct master narratives, discourses that have justified and contributed to the outbreak of the Pacific War in 1879 will be analyzed and discussed, as well as the narratives used from the end of the war up to the present, to portray the conflict and the negotiations initiated to solve the maritime issue of Bolivia. Likewise, to deconstruct master narratives, the opinions of the experts interviewed will be examined and contrasted against each other, to dismantle them and find similarities and discrepancies between the two countries.

On the other hand, to build national identities and have a wider idea about their formation, the assumptions made by the scholars who have written about these issues will be exposed

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and weighed. In the same vein, to deconstruct national identities and discuss their relationship with the master narratives, the beliefs and assumptions of the experts will be commented on and dismantled, breaking down perceptions of otherness and taking into account the ideological stance of the parties. In this respect, it is important to note that considering the implicit subjectivity of these issues, we will not obtain definitive conclusions but just some hints that will help us to better understand the whole situation.

2.

Introducing the interviewees

With the purposes above mentioned, 17 experts from Bolivia, Chile and Argentina have been interviewed (8 Bolivians, 8 Chileans and 1 Argentinean) in April 2015. The interviewees were selected primarily because of their knowledge of the Bolivian-Chilean relationship and on the history in general. They were also selected because all of them are influential on the public opinion of their respective countries and because their different profiles provide a variety of visions, representing divergent analytical approaches.

TABLE 1

INTERVIEWEES: NAMES AND POSITIONS

BOLIVIA CHILE

N Name Position / Profession N Name Position / Profession 1 Gustavo Fernández Saavedra. Former Minister of Foreign Affairs 9 José Rodríguez Elizondo

Lawyer and journalist

2 Armando Loaiza Mariaca

Former Minister of Foreign Affairs

10 Claudio Coloma Internationalist

3 Javier Murillo de la Rocha*

Former Minister of Foreign Affairs

11 Claudio Gutiérrez Historian Professor

4 Gonzalo Mendieta Romero

Lawyer and journalist 12 Andrés Ángulo Historian Professor

5 Agustín Echalar Azcarrunz

Novelist and journalist 13 Germán Albuquerque Historian Professor 6 Carlos Antonio Carrasco Diplomat, former Ambassador

14 José Miguel Concha Robles

Historian and diplomat

7 Pablo Michel Historian and movie director

15 Cristian Hugo García Psychologist

8 Mario Requena Writer 16 Pedro Díaz Polanco* Lawyer

ARGENTINA → 17 Pablo Lacoste PhD in History

*Answer in writing. Source: Prepared by the author.

With regards to this latter point, it is worth highlighting Agustin Echalar, a Bolivian novelist and journalist, who has written many opinion articles about relations with Chile. He was selected because he is known in Bolivia as the man who does not want to recover sovereign access to the sea, something very rare in Bolivia. On the other side, we have to

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mention Claudio Gutierrez, a history professor from the Human and Christian Academy University of Chile and leader of the group “Mar Para Bolivia” (Sea for Bolivia), and Cristian Hugo Garcia, psychologist and leader of a left-wing student movement. They were chosen because they both are in favour of regaining a Bolivian outlet to the sea. This position contradicts the current standpoint of Santiago and the opinion of most Chileans. However, because the Bolivia - Chile dispute before the ICJ is in progress, and at that time (April 2015) the oral hearings for the preliminary objection filed by Chile were about to start,7 it was not easy to get interviews. Several experts on these issues apologized or simply did not respond the emails sent to them for an interview. For the same reason some of the interviewees did not want to respond orally and instead sent their answers by email. Such is the case of Javier Murillo de la Rocha, diplomat and former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bolivia, who has written a book about these issues entitled “The Long Conflict” (2004), and Pedro Diaz, lawyer and international law professor of San Sebastian University of Chile. Similarly, José Miguel Concha, historian and current official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Chile, who asked not to be questioned about the legal process in The Hague.

TABLE 2 QUESTIONNAIRE

Nº NARRATIVES

1 What was the main trigger of the Pacific War? 2 Was there an invasion?

3 Did Bolivia sign the 1904 treaty voluntarily?

4 Who was most responsible for the failure of the negotiations initiated to solve the maritime theme?

Nº IDENTITIES

5 Do Bolivians believe that Chile is their enemy? 6 Do Chileans believe that Bolivia is their enemy? 7 Is there a feeling of guilt in Chile toward Bolivia? 8 Does Bolivia have irredentist desires?

9 Is there an attitude of superiority in Chile? 10 Is there a culture of victimization in Bolivia?

Source: Prepared by the author.

Nevertheless, most of the respondents were kind and open to talking about narratives and identities, such as Armando Loaiza, former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bolivia, who has been recently appointed as Ambassador to the Vatican; Gustavo Fernandez, also former Foreign Minister of Bolivia, and member of President Evo Morales’ advisory

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group for the ICJ case; Carlos Antonio Carrasco, diplomat, PhD in Political Science and currently professor of the Diplomatic and Strategic Studies Centre of France; Gonzalo Mendieta, lawyer and writer, columnist of the most popular newspapers in Bolivia and co-host of "El Pentagono", a well-known television show about politics; Mario Requena, analyst and writer, who has written about perceptions in the South Pacific, in reference to Bolivia, Chile and Peru given his past experience living in each of the three countries for many years; and finally, Pablo Michel, historian and movie director, who has produced one of the best documentaries on the Pacific War.

In Chile it was not possible to interview a former Minister of Foreign Affairs for the reasons already mentioned. However, other important personalities were open to being interviewed, such as Jose Rodríguez Elizondo, a very well-known lawyer and journalist, who has written many books about the relations of Chile with Bolivia and Peru. Additionally, Claudio Coloma, international relations professor at the University of Chile and specialist in Bolivia; Andrés Angulo, history professor of Human and Christian Academy University; and Germán Albuquerque, history professor at Bernardo O´Higgins University. They all agreed to be interviewed. Finally, Pablo Lacoste, Argentinean historian, Director of the Masters in International Relations of the Santiago de Chile University, professor of the subject “Chile and its Neighbors” and author of many papers about international relations in South America was also interviewed.

III. Theoretical Framework

This section provides a general overview of the theories that analyze narratives and identities. Among them, the constructivist paradigm of international relations has been taken as the most suitable theory for the research of this thesis because, unlike neorealist and liberal theories, which only take into account materialistic elements to explain decisions of foreign policy, constructivism also considers intersubjective elements, such as national identities. Therefore, in the following lines, the concepts of “national identities” and “master narratives” are discussed and defined to present the theoretical framework that in turn is divided in three sections: 1) identities in constructivism; 2) master narratives; and 3) narrative formation of identity (narrativity).

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1. Identities in constructivism

Constructivism is a social approach of international relations that basically asserts the following: 1) human interaction is shaped primarily by ideational factors, not only by material ones; 2) the most important ideational factors are widely shared or “intersubjective” beliefs, which are not reducible to individuals; and 3) these shared beliefs construct the interests and identities of purposive actors (Adler, 1997: 322-323 and Wendt, 1999: 23-27). Constructivism focuses on what Searle (1995: 23-27) calls “social facts”—things like money, sovereignty, and rights—, which have no material reality but exist only because people collectively believe they exist and act accordingly. Understanding how social facts change and the ways they influence politics is the major concern of constructivist analysis. Constructivism’s main analytical competitors (neorealism and liberalism) have thus been approaches of two kinds: 1) materialist theories, which see political behavior as determined by the physical world alone, and 2) individualist theories, which treat collective understandings as simply epiphenomena of individual action and deny that they have causal power or ontological status. In contrast, constructivism analyses the interaction of states also recognizing the existence of ideational elements such as ontology and holism (Finnemore and Sikkink, 2001: 392-393) and intersubjective elements such as collective identities (Wendt, 1999: 224). Taking into consideration that the state’s identity possesses what Wendt (1999: 224) describes as a “material base”, that is people and land, we can conclude that such a “material base” has a relative awareness and memory of Self as a distinct site of thought and activity. Members of a state have joint narratives of themselves as a corporate agent, and, to that extent, corporate identity (a personal identity constituted by the self-organizing and homeostatic structures) takes the collective identity of individual as a fact. Wendt argues that identities are rooted in an actor’s self-understandings (and are thus subjective) but also depend on whether that identity is recognized by other actors, which gives them an intersubjective quality. Thus, identities are constituted by the interaction of these internal and external ideas. This suggests that the number of possible identities is not infinite and the concept not idiosyncratic, since identity formation is always limited by the array of possible identities in the international system at any historical moment (Finnemore and Sikkink, 2001: 399).

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For constructivists, the interests and identity of states determine whether they interact on the basis of enmity, rivalry or friendship, but they differ about how to understand and interpret interests and identities. As Finnemore and Sikkink (2001: 394) assert, understanding the constitution of interests and identities is essential in explaining how a state behaves and what causes political outcomes. Constructivists recognize that research always involves interpretation, and thus “there can be no common body of observational or tested data that we can turn to for a neutral, objective knowledge of the world.There can be no ultimate knowledge, for example, that actually corresponds to reality per se” (Price and Reus-Smit, 1998: 272). Identities have been analyzed by constructivists from conventional (external) and critical (internal) perspectives. According to Cho (2012: 309), the basic idea is that the formation of a state has to be examined not only from its conventional (external) perspective as neorealism does, but also from its critical (internal) vision. In the same way, Campbell (1998: 12) argues that “states are never finished as entities... states are always in a process of becoming”.

Wendt (1999: 224) defines identity as “a property of intentional actors that generates motivational and behavioral dispositions”. Identity, therefore, provides an interpretive framework that allows governments to make sense of the world they live in. Thus, interests are the outcome of an identity building process that is part of larger cognitive structures. What states want depends on what they think they are (e.g. a “world police”, “the heart of Europe”, a “landlocked country”, a “traffic state”, and so on).

Similarly, Van Der Ree (2010: 209) who studied Chile’s national identities from a constructivist perspective, asserts that there are three ways in which a society interacts in the international field based in its identity: 1) through presence (which refers to the ways a country is perceived by others); 2) foreign policy-making (how national identities affect a country’s decisions in the international field); and 3) foreign policy reception (how national identities affect a country’s response to external policies).

In conclusion, as Lapid (1996: 8) asserts, “identity has come to be viewed as a relation rather than a possession, a quality conditional to individuals in different situations rather than categorical pertaining to individuals as such”. Identities are “emergent and constructed (rather than fixed and natural), contested and polymorphic (rather than

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unitary and singular), and interactive and process-like (rather than static and essence-like)” (Ibid: 8). As Goff and Dunn (2004: 244) affirm, “Even though identity is a social construction, it is not whatever we want it to be. A limited reserve of discursive resources constrains the ways in which identities evolve”.

2. Master narratives

According to Smith and Dougherty (2012: 454), master narratives are cultural tropes that influence the ways in which personal narratives are constructed. As such, master narratives are the most known and common interpretations of history in a society that can be supported or rejected at the personal level. The relationship between master narratives and personal narratives has been widely studied by anthropologists. Tannen (2008: 208-209) for example, asserts that there are three types of narratives: 1) Small-n narratives that represent the personal stories and experiences of the story teller; 2) Big-N Narratives that are the larger story lines that create a cohesive and contextual space for the recounting of small-n narratives; and 3) the master narrative which is “a culture-wide ideology that shapes the big-N narrative” (Ibid: 209). People do not always specify the master narrative, but instead it emerges through the consistency of the big-N Narratives that shape the recounting of small-n narratives (Smith and Dougherty, 2012: 454-455).

In Tannen’s (2008: 226-227) words, a master narrative is “a culture-wide ideology providing assumptions which members of that culture take for granted. These assumptions are unstated, but shape what speakers decide to say”. That is, a master narrative is an overarching story that produces expectations and norms within a culture (Bergen, 2010: 47). Operating discursively through textual and other communicative technologies, a master narrative tries to “make normal” both ideology and action on the broadest and most pervasive levels and spheres of society. It becomes (or tries to become) the standard view, what is it defined as a “strategy of legitimization” (Snajdr, 2013: 230). All these approaches conceptualize ‘master narrative’ as a preexisting form of interpretation which is socio-culturally reproduced and thus normalized (Bamberg, 2003: 139). In fact, a master narrative is a form of social domination (Mumby, 1993: 145). The master narrative is directed from and ultimately constructed and reproduced as social reality by dominant institutions, agents and systems (Snadjr, 2013: 234). Nevertheless, not all the members of a certain social group necessarily agree with the master narrative.

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In other words, in most cases there are resistances and contrary opinions that challenge and question what the predominant discourses tell. This is important since the research of this work about narratives of the Bolivian-Chilean history, is mainly based on the assumptions and perceptions of the experts on these issues. This will not give us concrete conclusions to define master narratives but will help us to construct and deconstruct them. Somers (1994: 619) explains that we are embedded in master narratives as contemporary actors in history and as social scientists. Our sociological theories and concepts according to this vision “are encoded with aspects of these master narratives - Progress, Decadence, Industrialization, Enlightenment, etc. - even though they usually operate at a presuppositional level of social-science epistemology or beyond our awareness” (Ibid: 619). These narratives – according to Somers (1994: 620) – “can be the epic dramas of our time: Capitalism vs. Communism, the Individual vs. Society, Barbarism/Nature vs. Civility”.

In the same way, it is important to consider the definition used by the Chilean historian Rodrigo Naranjo (2011: 34), who has studied master narratives of Bolivia, Peru and Chile during and after the Pacific War (1879-1884). He underscores that master narratives are “the diverse field of discourses, writings and ideologies that start or sprout to the Pacific War, which allows us to problematize categories and more or less doctrinaire conceptions of the nation, nationalism, state and sovereignty”.

Finally, having discussed definitions of master narratives and identities, it is necessary to address the relationship between them, that is to say, the role that narratives have in the formation of national identities.

3. Narrative formation of identity (narrativity)

Many scholars of international relations have based their investigations in psychological and sociological studies to analyze the link between narratives and identities in a certain interstate relationship. One of those studies is: “The narrative constitution of identity" by Margaret Somers (1994), which, considering social epistemology and social ontology concepts, asserts that “it is through narrativity that we come to know, understand, and make sense of the social world, it is through narratives and narrativity that we constitute our social identities”. According to this vision, “all of us come to be who we are (however

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ephemeral, multiple, and changing) by being located or locating ourselves (usually unconsciously) in social narratives rarely of our own making” (Somers, 1994: 606). In reference to this, Hønneland (2010: 5-6) asserts that there are two important claims:

“First, narratives – that is, the stories people tell – are not just reflections about the world, but rather constitutive of the self. Hence, narratives acquire an ontological dimension in addition to their traditional epistemological one. They not only give expression to the outside world about who people are, but they also contribute to making people who they are. Second, narratives are “rarely of our own making”. Gergen (2001: 249) claims that ‘(people) do not author their own lives’; instead ‘stories serve as communal resources’ that people avail themselves of when they construct their life stories”.

As Benhabib (1999: 334) explains: “We are born into webs of interlocution or into webs of narrative - from the familial and gender narratives to the linguistic one to the macronarrative of one's collective identity”. From this perspective, what matters are the less endurable stories on important things of life (e.g. race, gender and God), as well as the smaller ones: “These narratives may be micro-scale stories within a family or macro-scale myths about the nation; they are retold, nourished and transformed by various ‘defining communities’ and, quite importantly, people are born into them” (Armbruster & Meinhof, 2002: 19). Or in Benhabib’s (1999: 344) words: “We become who we are by learning to be a conversation partner in these narratives. Although we do not choose the webs in whose nets we are initially caught or select those with whom we wish to converse”. It is our duty to weave out of those narratives to create a life story that makes sense for us, “as unique individual selves” (ibid: 344). In the same way, Gergen (200: 253) explains:

“By using these narrative conventions we generate a sense of coherence and direction in our lives. They acquire meaning, and what happens is suffused with significance. Certain forms of narrative are broadly shared within the culture; they are frequently used, easily identified, and highly functional. In a sense, they constitute a syllabary of possible selves”.

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Williams and Neumann (2000: 363) stress the role of narrative structures in the formation of identities, drawing on the concept of a “logic of appropriateness”, “[t]he narrative resources available to a given actor are neither infinite nor unstructured; they are historically and socially constructed and confined” (Ibid: 363). Similarly, Joenniemi (2008: 121) argues that narratives represent a form of layered social and symbolic power, which “bolster efforts of claiming particular identities and impact the granting or denying them to others” (Ibid: 121). He pays particular attention to the narrative resources of states, asking “which are the narratives carrying the day and why are others doomed to remain at the fringes with little if any constitutive impact?” (Ibid: 121).

For all of these, we have that narrative formation of identity is a process in which we come to know, understand and make sense of our life in relation to others. It is through narratives and narrativity that we form our social (and therefore national) identities. We do not decide which narratives will influence our formation of identity (it depends on where we were born, where we were raised and who we relate to) but we choose, interpret and sometimes take for granted, the stories that best fit our comprehension of life and our interaction with others. In other words, stories are constitutive of the self. Narratives not only give us a version of the world and history but they also contribute to form our identities, at individual and collective levels.

In this regard, it is important to note that this work does not intend to test empirically the conclusions just delineated. Such an attempt would not be easy. The furthest we can go is to map speech regularities in a society or note discrepancies between observed and reported facts. But in this thesis there is no intention to identify lack of correspondence between what people say about the world and how the world really is, instead we are interested in regularities in people’s thoughts. As Hønneland (2010: 132-133) says, “I accept the claim that narrative is constitutive of identities because it ‘sounds reasonable’, although I cannot say that it is necessarily ‘true’”.

IV. Research

As previously stated, in this section the literature available and the interviews conducted in Bolivia and Chile during April 2015 will be reviewed and contrasted. The purpose is

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to construct and deconstruct master narratives and national identities to shed some light on the debate about the relation between them.

In this respect, it is important to note that the analysis of the interviews is not intended to identify a correspondence between what the interviewees say about history and what really happened (historical facts). Rather, what it tries to achieve is to deconstruct the interpretations and assumptions of the respondents to contrast them with the literature available, mapping master narratives of Bolivia and Chile and discussing their role in the formation of the national identities.

1. Master Narratives

There are some important milestones of history that we have to consider to construct master narratives of Bolivia and Chile in line with the purposes of this work. Among them, the Pacific War (1879-1884), is without a doubt the most relevant point of reference in history to this research because it has shaped the way in which both countries perceive and understand each other. For that reason, in the following segment the discourses used during and after the conflict will be exposed and examined to construct the master narratives that have lead the imaginary of both countries. Then, the most important milestones of the war will be discussed to deconstruct the master narratives. In this latter attempt, the 1904 Treaty which determined the legal end of the war, and the negotiations initiated to solve the landlocked situation of Bolivia will be also analyzed and reviewed to find out how master narratives influenced the occurrence of those post-war events.

1.1 Constructing master narratives during and after the war

The Peruvian historian Carmen Mac Evoy (2011: 90) who has written about the narratives that justified the Pacific War in Chile, asserts that the government of Santiago built the concept of a "civilizing war" in its people’s imagination through the media and the publicists of the time. The purpose was to implement its political-military project which was based on “Western, Republican and Christian ideas” (Ibid: 411). These ideas, supported by the Catholic Church of Chile and implemented by Chilean Liberals, had been brought from Europe, where this “civilizing narrative” as a justification for war was more developed. Indeed, according to Mac Evoy (2011: 411), “The civilizing discourse, conceived in the press, will gain space and hegemony as far as the [Chilean] army was taking possession of the Bolivian and Peruvian territories”.

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These ideas and the narrative which portrays Chile as a “superior” nation in relation to its northern neighbours, made Chileans “feel responsible for civilizing the barbarian peoples of Bolivia and Peru” (Mac Evoy, 2011: 17). The explicit message underscored that the “superiority” of Chile should be measured in military, legal, moral and racial terms. Indeed, all these concepts were part of the Chilean narrative that justified the armed intervention. The economic and commercial interests that have been widely considered as the main triggers of the war by the Bolivian historiography were secondary (or not even considered) for the Chilean narrative.

In Bolivia on the other hand, the master narrative in force during the war is not so clear. The country was governed by a military leader, Hilarion Daza, who had come to power through a coup in 1876 and was more concerned about staying in office than protecting national sovereignty (Barros, 1970: 358-359). There was no preconceived strategy to face the conflict, but an absolute confidence that the measures taken against the Anglo-Chilean interests in the Bolivian coastline would not jeopardize the nation (Querejazu, 1979: 217-221). And ultimately, if it did so, Peru and Argentina would act in defense of Bolivia (Carrasco, 1991: 76, 85). Nevertheless, the subsequent events showed that these predictions were not entirely correct.

Regarding the post-war discourses, the author of “Disarm the Master Narrative: an essay on the Pacific War” , the Chilean historian Rodrigo Naranjo (2011: 28), points out that interpretations of the war have been constructed by nationalists, Catholics, contra-insurgents and imperialists rather than by practitioners of history analysis. He says that the conflict was not addressed as a foundational concept of necessity (the war as a necessity) but as a sort of religion, portrayed in Chile in terms of a civilizing mission (Ibid: 29). Moreover, Naranjo (2011: 39) also criticizes the current of thought that emerged during Pinochet´s dictatorship, which categorized the coup of 1973 as a feat or as an epic in order to create unity around the regime. However, according to the “officialist reading of Chile´s history”, such terms are exclusively reserved for the exploits of peoples as a whole, such as the Mapuche Resistance or the Pacific War. That current of thought presently in force, according to Naranjo (2011: 40-42), also legitimizes the nineteenth century “hegemonic narrative” of “the war winners”, and attempts to amalgamate the discourse of nation with nationalism.

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Moreover, the master narrative in Chile, conceived from a historical-positivist approach, is based in the unitary character of the Pacific War, which is seen as an achievement of a conglomerate of people rather than a triumph of the "rotos" (Chilean slang for people of middle and lower classes) who were the ones that went to the war. That is the origin of the typical phrases or tropes used in Chile as: “Roto´s feat”, “race superiority” and “the progress against the barbaric” (Naranjo, 2011: 43-44).

In contrast, the Bolivian master narrative points to the absence of a “national subject” and unity as the main reasons for the country’s failure in the war. It explains that few Bolivians were aware of the Chilean desire to expand their territory even though the Spanish colonization period left a strong residual distrust of foreigners and poorly defined borders. The war is an unfair and unwanted fight with a terrible consequence: “the amputation of Bolivian national body” (Naranjo, 2011: 108-109). And it is also the story of a fratricidal confrontation between whites and mestizos, in which the great absent in the battles was the Indian.8 Certainly, the indigenous peoples were not considered as normal citizens but as inexpensive workers (practically slaves) or, in this case, soldiers.

In this latter respect, the narrative has changed dramatically in recent years with the arrival of Evo Morales to the presidency of the then “Republic of Bolivia” (now the official name is the “Plurinational State of Bolivia”). Indeed, Morales, in accordance with his anti-colonialism, anti-imperialism and anti-republicanism ideology, has promoted the inclusion of the majoritarian indigenous population of Bolivia in the government and in the policy-making process. However, although the master narrative has drastically changed in that respect, it still portrays Bolivia as a victim of the Chilean expansionism, and still considers the war as a result of the contradictions left by Spanish colonialism. Contrary to the master narrative of modernism, asserts Naranjo (2011: 115-116), the war exposes a sort of neocolonial relation between the “usurpers” and the “usurped”, or between the “invaders” and the “invaded”.

In summary, it is possible to assert that the master narrative of Chile since the Pacific War and even before presents a country on the highest grounds of civilization (at least in the region). A country that for its “superiority” in military, legal, moral and racial terms, had

8 _{The word used in Spanish was “indio”, which is a derogatory nickname for a native that was banned by}

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“inherited” from Europe the mission of “civilizing” the barbarian peoples of Bolivia and Peru. Such a discourse, which also portrays Chile as “the “hegemonic power” of the American South Pacific and “the winner” of the war, resurfaced later when Pinochet tried to ignite nationalism among Chileans to generate internal cohesion.

On the other hand, the master narrative of Bolivia has developed the image of a victim nation that has been “conquered”, first by Spanish colonialism and then by Chilean expansionism. The failure in the Pacific War was explained by the difficulty of building a sense of nation among Bolivians and the apathy towards “Indians”. Even though this last perception is not part of the master narrative anymore, because the indigenous peoples are currently running the country, all of the other elements still support the official discourse, which describes Chile as a violent, abusive and uncompromising neighbour.

1.2 Deconstructing master narratives

In this section the opinion of the experts interviewed will be examined and contrasted to deconstruct regularities and discrepancies of master narratives in Bolivia and Chile. The idea is to isolate familiar elements from their usual context to derive the predominant imaginary in both countries. For that purpose, the answers will be systematized in tables, commented on, and contrasted to the opinion of certain recognized historians.

1.2.2 The main triggers of the war

To discuss the triggers of a conflict that has occurred more than a hundred years ago and that has been addressed from different perspectives, it is important to first consider some historical facts to contextualize when the conflict started. In 1879 many foreign companies, especially British and Chilean, had obtained concessions in the Bolivian Department of Litoral (coastline) from the government of Bolivia to extract resources of guano and saltpetre. Bolivia and Chile had signed a boundary treaty in 1874, which according to the Chilean version of the war was breached by Bolivia in 1878. What happened was that the Bolivian National Assembly (Congress) approved a concession contract with the Anglo-Chilean company “Antofagasta Saltpetre and Railway Co.”, on condition that it had to pay 10 cents per quintal of saltpetre exported. The government of Chile assumed that such a measure violated the 1874 treaty, which had banned the “increase” of the export duties in the area for 25 years (Article 4), and declared that its rights over the Bolivian coastline (from the parallel of latitude 23º south to the equator to

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Loa River at 21.5º) had been “reborn”. Few days later, on February 14th, 1879, before reaching an agreement on the arbitration that had to be applied for this kind of disputes (according to the 1875 Protocol), Chilean army troops landed on the Bolivian port of Antofagasta and the war broke out (Bulnes, 1976: 31-37; Querejazu, 1979: 223-245).

Which interests were behind these decisions? Was Bolivia really in breach of the treaty? Was that alleged failure to comply with a treaty enough to justify military intervention? All these questions will be explored in this section, at least partially, contrasting the version of some classic history books and the opinion of the experts interviewed. The

TABLE 3

Q1: WHAT WAS THE MAIN TRIGGER OF THE PACIFIC WAR?

BOLIVIA CHILE

N NAME ANSWER N NAME ANSWER

1 Gustavo Fernández

Chile´s decision to seek affirmation in the Pacific instead of in the Andeans.

9 José Rodríguez Elizondo

There is not even consensus among historians, but there are many triggers.

2 Armando Loaiza

Port rivalry, commercial interests and political instability in Bolivia and Peru, among others.

10 Claudio Coloma

The need of Chile to ensure a rich territory and the breach of agreements by Bolivia.

3 Javier Murillo

de la Rocha Chile´s need of resources. 11 Claudio Gutiérrez

Chile´s economic and commercial interests, and its impoverished bourgeoisie.

4 Gonzalo Mendieta

The Bolivian need to increase its income, as Peru did and Chile's ambition, among others.

12 Andrés

Ángulo Bolivia´s noncompliance with taxes.

5 Agustín

Echalar A geographic fatalism. 13 Germán Albuquerque

The wealth of the region disputed by the three countries, the blurring borders and the 1873 secret Treaty.

6 Carlos Antonio Carrasco

The Bolivian government decision to raise the tax on saltpeter. 14

José Miguel Concha

Bolivia´s violation of the 1874 Treaty.

7 Pablo Michel

Peru´s nationalization of the guano and saltperter, the tax of 10 cents it´s just an excuse.

15 Cristian García

Commercial interests, has to do with the key productive sector of nitrate from two centuries ago.

8 Mario Requena

Bolivia broke a treaty and that was enough for Chile to invade. Chile had interest to stay with the land.

16 Pedro Diaz Chile's ambition to become a wealthy country.

ARGENTINA → 17 Pablo Lacoste

Absence of colonial population in the area, which made limits unclear and the secret Treaty of 1873. Note: phrases of this table (108 characters maximum) are in some cases part of a much longer answer with nuances. The segment selected is the one that best answers the question according to the author. For complete responses see Appendices.

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specific question asked to the interviewees was: What was the main trigger of the Pacific War?

As anticipated, in Bolivia it is generally believed that the main trigger of the Pacific War (1879 – 1884) was related to Anglo-Chilean economic interests. In that sense, 5 out of the 8 Bolivian respondents’ answers highlighted economic reasons (see Table 3). Javier Murillo for example, replied:

“There was only a trigger for conflict, Chile was born to independent life knowing that it was very vulnerable politically and economically. To overcome this situation, it required resources that would enable it to finance its development and living space. These resources were at the north of its border, first peacefully and then violently, deployed its penetration, invasion and war, which broke out in 1879” (see Appendix 3).

Similarly but talking about the risk that the Anglo-Chilean investors felt at that time, Pablo Michel asserts that the main cause of the war was Peru´s decision to nationalize the guano and saltpeter extraction in 1875. That decision, according to Michel, would have induced the Bolivian government to apply the lien of 10 cents per quintal of saltpetre exported in 1878.9 Such a measure, in the opinion of Michel and 3 other Bolivian interviewees, was the perfect excuse for Chile to start the war.

But not only Bolivians believe that the main trigger of the war was related to the economic or commercial interests. Some Chileans, such as Pedro Diaz, Claudio Gutiérrez and Cristian García, also agreed with that assertion directly, and German Albuquerque agreed indirectly. Indeed, Albuquerque answered that the main trigger of the war was “the tremendous wealth of that region in dispute which the three countries involved wanted to secure for their benefit. However for Chilean eyes the main trigger (…) was the blurring of borders, territories were not well-defined, limits were not clear” (see Appendix 13). It is true that many Chileans think that the limits had not been defined, despite the fact that two border treaties were signed by both countries in 1866 and 1874, which had clearly

9 _{The Peruvian historian Carmen Mac Evoy (2011: 20) asserts that beyond the violation of the 1874 Treaty,}

“the war of saltpetre was fought, because the Chilean bourgeoisie felt threatened by the nitrate nationalization commanded by the (Peruvian) government of Manuel Prado”.

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defined the border at the parallel of latitude 24º south of the equator (Bulnes, 1976: 15-19). However “the blurry borders” as a trigger of the war or as an aggravating element is mainly accepted in Chile, an impression that was confirmed by the author of this thesis after having asked the same question to some Chileans in Santiago.10 Following this impression, but from a different perspective, the Argentinian professor Pablo Lacoste, contends that the primary cause of the conflict was the low presence of colonial (Spanish) population in the area. In his opinion this led to a lack of delimitation of the borders and the consequent “confusion” among the new Republics who participated in the conflict (see appendix 17).

In addition, the difficulties that the Bolivian government faced to reach its own coast, in contrast to the Chileans, for whom it was much easier to get there, also played a role in the outbreak of the war (Querejazu, 1979: 285-286). According to the Bolivian writer Agustín Echalar (see appendix 5), who highlighted geographical rather than economic reasons as the main triggers of the war, it took almost 46 days on average to reach Cobija (the main port of Bolivia) from Potosi (the closest Bolivian city behind the Andeans Mountains) either by mule or llama. On the other hand, from Santiago to the same place it took about 2 days by ship. For that reason, Echalar alleges that the main trigger of the war was a “geographic fatalism” that played against Bolivia.

Another trigger mentioned repeatedly by the Bolivians interviewed was the geopolitical need for territories, considering that Chile was a very small country in comparison to its neighbors (taking into consideration only the area that was indisputably under its control at that time). For that reason, as Gustavo Fernandez states, the main trigger of the war was “Chile’s decision to seek affirmation in the Pacific rather than in the Patagonia,” in the region behind the Andes mountains, which was disputed with Argentina (see Appendix 1).

Furthermore, the Chilean internationalist Claudio Coloma, sees the issue from two sides: the Chilean need to secure territories and resources for its development purposes, and Bolivia’s breach of the bilateral agreements. Indeed, as we have seen, the latter reason was used by the government of Santiago to start the war and it is currently the most

10 _{Informal conversations were also held with different people in Santiago in which this perception about}

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accepted reason for the conflict in Chile, as it is widely supported by Chilean historiography (Bulnes, 1976: 32-33). This assertion was also shared by Andrés Ángulo and Jose Miguel Concha (both Chileans), who have used different terms to define what Bolivia did back then: Angulo spoke of a “noncompliance” and Concha of a “violation” (see Table 3). Indeed, according to the latter it was not just about the “tax of 10 cents, there was more behind it”, the Bolivian state was about to seize the “the most important company by far in the Chilean capital” (see Appendix 14).

Another factor mentioned was the secret Treaty of Defensive Alliance signed by Bolivia and Peru in 1873, which was considered adverse to Chile by the government of Santiago (Carrasco, 1991: 83). Indeed the Chilean professor Germán Albuquerque mentioned it as one of the triggers. Likewise, his colleague from Argentina, Pablo Lacoste, asserted that the configuration of power in the region was a key element to understanding what happened. South American states had “governments without experience in handling international relations”. “They saw the great powers and tried to imitate them”, “so they did sign secret treaties as the great powers did, unheeding of what could eventually be generated”. Subsequently, Lacoste also highlights “the Argentina factor” that in his opinion:

“It was very important not only in the Pacific War but in perpetuating the confinement of Bolivia. That is to say, if Argentina had entered in the war or rejected clearly [the Peruvian – Bolivian Treaty of Alliance] we could not say anything. But Argentina approached and then retreated. The Argentinian President gave his agreement to the Secret Treaty, the Chamber of Deputies gave its agreement and the Senate was the only one missing. In other words, they went not far enough to make commitments but to raise expectations and that also contributed to create conditions for the war” (see Appendix 17).

Moreover some of the interviewees answered that there was not a single main trigger but a lot of them. Armando Loaiza (Bolivian) for example, mentioned the rivalry between the ports of Callao in Peru and Valparaiso in Chile, the more consistent Chilean bourgeoisie with consolidated commercial interests, and the political instability in Bolivia and Peru. And in reference to the belief that Chile was a poor and small country, Loaiza asserts that is absolutely false. “In 1870, Copiapo (a Chilean Region of the central valley) was an

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emporium, the second biggest copper exporter in the world after the United States” (see Appendix 2).

With a similar perception, Gonzalo Mendieta explained that there was a conglomerate of triggers: at that time the price of saltpeter was increasing, Peru was receiving much more money than Bolivia because it had nationalized the companies which were excavating saltpeter in its territory and the Bolivian government needed to increase its income. Simultaneously, states Mendieta, Chile´s ambition to expand its territory also played a role in this, because as it is also noted by Mac Evoy (2011: 24), the narrative imposed by the government of Santiago at that time was that the lands disputed were in fact Chilean and not Bolivian (see appendix 4).

1.2.3 The outbreak of the war

On February 14th, 1879, Chilean navy troops landed at the Bolivian port of Antofagasta, starting the Pacific War that would last until 1884, when both countries signed a truce pact (Barros, 1970: 362, 381). This fact, the first act of the war, was named differently in both countries. While in Bolivia the general perception asserts that it was an invasion without a previous declaration of war, in Chile it is not that clear; some speak of an occupation and others of a vindication, military intervention, peaceful occupation and usurpation (see Table 4). Nevertheless, to the question: “Was there an invasion?” not all of the Chileans interviewed responded negatively. Claudio Coloma for example answered that “the facts support that assertion”; Andrés Angulo responded “If one were cold and direct would say yes, but obviously the term most commonly used [in Chile] is occupation”; and Claudio Gutierrez and Hugo García spoke of a “half invasion”, because the majority of the population in the area were Chileans (see Table 4 and Appendices). Considering that invasion is “an occasion when an army or country uses force to enter and take control of another country” (Cambridge Dictionary, 2015), the proportion of locals and foreigners in the territory does not really help us to determine whether or not it was an invasion. What can be taken into consideration is the fact that the Bolivian government did not consent to the arrival of the Chilean troops, regardless the fact that it did not have the military power to repel the attack.11

11 _{In accordance to Querejazu (1979: 247): “Antofagasta´s population, estimated on the basis of the census}

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In that sense, 6 out 8 Bolivians affirmed that indeed there was an invasion (see Table 4), including Agustin Echalar, the one who does not want to recover an access to the sea, who responded that it was “an invasion of force” (see Appendix 5). And the ones who

a total of 6.000 people, of which 5.000 were Chileans, 600 Bolivians, 200 Argentines, 60 Britons, 40 Peruvian and the rest were Germans, Italians and French. Of those 600 Bolivians, 350 were males and 250 females. Of the 350 men, 25 were government officials, 35 were police or guards (not a single military), 20 businessmen, 12 lawyers and several dozen of craftsmen and miners”.

Similarly Carrasco (1991: 74) gives the following numbers: “85 percent of Chileans, 5 percent of Bolivians, 5 percent of Peruvians and 5 percent of Europeans. In one word, in 1874-1879, everything – population, arms, Capital and businessmen – except sovereignty was Chilean in Antofagasta”.

TABLE 4

Q2: WAS THERE AN INVASION?

BOLIVIA CHILE

N NAME ANSWER N NAME ANSWER

1 Gustavo Fernández

Sure, it was an invasion that

sparked a war. 9 José

Rodríguez The first act of war.

2 Armando

Loaiza It was an ineluctable occupation. 10 Claudio Coloma

I think so. The facts support that assertion.

3 Javier Murillo Sure, it was an invasion. 11 Claudio Gutiérrez

There was half invasion, because Chileans were already there.

4 Gonzalo

Mendieta An invasion not an invention.

12 Andrés Ángulo

If one were cold and direct would say yes, but obviously the term most commonly used is occupation.

5 Agustín

Echalar They did an invasion of force. 13 Germán Albuquerque

For us it is an intervention to defend Chilean interests and citizens.

6 Carlos Carrasco

An armed assault to consolidate a military occupation followed by a forced annexation.

14 José Concha

The start of hostilities, a peaceful occupation, in epic terms a vindication.

7 Pablo Michel Yes, there was. 15 Cristian García

I´d not call invasion because Chileans were majority, is not invasion is usurpation.

8 Mario Requena

Yes, Bolivia gave Chile the justification that it was looking while ago to stay with the nitrate

16 Pedro Diaz

Depending on history and provisions of international law, what happened was a occupatio bellica (latin).

ARGENTINA → 17 Pablo Lacoste

Bolivia and Chile were the aggressors because the territory was Peruvian.

Note: phrases of this table (108 characters maximum) are in some cases part of a much longer answer with nuances. The segment selected is the one that best answers the question according to the author. For complete responses see Appendices.

26

answered differently spoke of an “ineluctable occupation” (Armando Loaiza) and of an “armed assault” (Carlos Antonio Carrasco).

On the other hand, Chilean historian José Miguel Concha argued that what happened was “the beginning of hostilities”, “a peaceful occupation, a vindication under the language of the time, in epic terms”. That is because Chile´s official position understood that “once the 1874 treaty was evicted by Bolivia, the Chilean rights to occupy the territory returned”.12 _{Similarly, José Rodriguez Elizondo asserted that it was “the first act of war”}

and criticized the position of President Evo Morales, who started a debate about this topic when he said that in 1879 there was not a war but an invasion. If that had been the case, argued Concha, “almost all the wars of the nineteenth century would be invasions, because such conflicts were generated before declarations of war. Those declarations – according to Concha -, were usually made after firing the first cannon balls.”13 In line with this assertion, the Chilean historian Mario Barros (1970: 362), who also uses the term “occupation”, wrote the following about the day that the war started:

“The excitement for the war in Chile was enormous, especially in central areas and in Atacama [Bolivian coastline]. The [February] 14th in the morning, Colonel Emilio Sotomayor, who commanded the [Chilean] expeditionary force, landed his people and occupied the town in the middle of the most ardent enthusiasm. Flags flew all over the city and workers rushed into the streets, weeping tears of excitement and cheering Chile”.

In contrast, the Bolivian diplomat Jorge Escobari (2013: VI 108), after commenting on the treaties (1866 and 1874) in which Chile had recognized that the Atacama Desert belonged to Bolivia, asserts:

“Soon after, a futile pretext served Chile to trigger war and invade Bolivia. In Bolivia a law was passed creating a small tax of 10 cents per quintal of nitrate exported. A company of Chilean capitalists established in Atacama and linked to the Chilean government ombudsmen refused to comply with that provision. Chile

12 _{The Chilean government maintained that the territory was Chilean before the treaties of 1866 and 1874,}

but due to the alleged Bolivian noncompliance of the 1874 treaty and the nonexistence of the other, the rights of Chile “reborn” (Carrasco, 1991: 60, 73).

13 _{Chile declared the war to Peru and Bolivia on April 5}th_{, 1879 (Carrasco, 1991: 91 and Querejazu, 1979:}