"Land for who deserve it": Chilean agrarian reform and the meritocracy of the Institute for Rural Education (1954-1970)

Abstract

In this article, I argue that the Institute of Rural Education (IER) was a decisive institution in the Chilean agrarian reform, influencing its paths with a political-pedagogical strategy. Since 1954, IER acted daily in the peasant bases, offering formal education and certified technical training. It built a network of political-pedagogical trust among the Chilean peasantry, vocalizing their subjectivity and values, but also exercising the power to expand opportunities to obtain a plot (parcela). I argue that IER linked peasants with national policy as an institución-nexo, weaving an economic moral made up of three components: sacrifice, meritocracy and cooperativism. Its social-christian cooperativism coexisted with the rejection of communism and the declared sympathy by United States. My sources were the magazine Surco y Semilla, Revista de Educación, materials from Minagri and Mineduc, and interview.