Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez (FPMR)

Chile: Interview with synthesis anarchists Boina Anarquista

Interview between synthesis anarchists Boina Anarquista in Chile and JURNAL ANARKI in Indonesia.

1. What motivates you to create this counter-information newspaper?

A: Hello, good day. Well, the platform began as a newspaper, edited precariously with Word. What motivated us was that nearly 11 years ago, in 2013, when the waves of the student movement in Chile were still present, we started researching and came across a book about anarchist propaganda in Chile. We were amazed by how much of it existed in the 1920s.

Around that time, there were other physical-format newspapers: El Surco (2009-2013), El Amanecer (from Chillán, in central-southern Chile) (2011-2013), El Sol Ácrata (from Calama, northern Chile; 2011-2024), Acracia (from Valdivia, far south of Chile; 2012-2019) and Solidaridad, a Libertarian-Communist newspaper, aligned with the branch closest to especifismo or platformism (2010-2016).

It was within this context that we decided to found a newspaper called Periódico La Boina (2014), which only released 7 issues. Financial problems, time constraints, and lack of coordination led to its discontinuation, but we noticed that the website’s visits kept growing, reaching over 100,000 per year.

The need to communicate, reflect, critique, share, and discuss with other comrades enriches our ideas and fosters camaraderie, especially through printed propaganda. What I see as a downside—and something we are also guilty of—is that there’s a lot of digital propaganda circulating on social media. While it’s positive to have more contact with comrades from other places, the information becomes more instantaneous, preventing deeper reflection. It also introduces anxiety over likes, making everything faster.

We believe it’s necessary to return to printed propaganda without neglecting the digital. It’s essential to discuss and reflect as the anarchists of the past used to do.

2. In our informal conversation, you mentioned your involvement in a historical archive project. Could you tell us more about it?

A: Yes, I am currently part of a group called Archivo Histórico La Revuelta, which has existed since 2009. The mission of the archive is to preserve the memory of anarchist history. Archivo La Revuelta publishes a magazine called Acontratiempo, where we present research by comrades on the history of anarchism in Chile and elsewhere.

The issue is that, according to some historians, anarchism arrived in Chile in the 1890s and lasted until 1930, when the last mass anarchist unions existed (of course, there were experiences in the 1950s and 1960s, and we have found active comrades in the 1970s, but they are marginal compared to Marxist groups). After that period, anarchism experienced a revival, gradually growing with counterculture and punk in the 1990s. So the archive has the mission of preserving anarchist memory in this region, both from the 20th century and from the late 1990s and early 2000s. There are many struggles led by younger comrades, as young as 16 years old, who may not be as familiar with the struggles fought in the early 2000s, for example.

That’s why the archive doesn’t just focus on the history of anarchism from 100 years ago but also on the present. We aim to collect and reconstruct the history of anarchism from the 1990s, when there were many zines and the first newspapers, to understand what interested comrades of those years and to share those struggles and discussions with younger comrades so they can learn about the efforts and ideas of those who came before them.

On the other hand, anarchist research has emerged in recent years. Its main historians might include Eduardo Godoy, Manuel Lagos, or study groups like the Grupo de Estudio José Domingo Gómez Rojas, which has the Editorial Eleuterio.

Currently, the archive operates in a physical space called Casa Anarquista La Termita, which is shared with other anarchist projects. Also, with comrades dedicated to research, we are also organizing the IV Congress on Research about Anarchism(s) – Santiago – October 2025. The first Congress was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina (2016); its second edition was in Montevideo, Uruguay (2019), and São Paulo, Brazil (2022).

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June 8, 2024

Almost a month ago I was transferred to the prison where I will have to serve my sentence, the CPF of Santiago. This prison has a rather atypical structure in comparison to other prisons in this territory, since in some areas it maintains the foundations of the old convent that fulfilled the “correctional work for bad women”, from there different modules and sections have been built. Among the sections that were built to segregate specific groups of women prisoners are the following: Special High Security Section (SEAS), New Hope and Direct Custody.

SEAS was created mainly to house prisoners for crimes of political violence in the 90’s. In those years, those prisoners belonged to political/military/subversive groups (FPMR, MIR, Mapu-Lautaro1). With the release of the political prisoners, little by little, those with a history of escapes and/or refractory to the prison regime and leaders of trafficking gangs began to occupy the High Security Prison. It was not until 2010 that the women prisoners for political violence returned to the SEAS, the first “Bomb Case2” allowed the first anti-authoritarian women to take up the thread of struggle left by the first political prisoners. Over the years the SEAS continued with the same dynamic, until a few years ago where this section is used to keep prisoners while another permanent space is enabled for them.

Upon my arrival at this prison, I was informed that the SEAS would return to the place of yesteryear, so if or if I had to be in it. All this came to nothing because today there is a group of approximately 60 women brought from the San Miguel prison, these women live in deplorable conditions.

Another of these special modules is “Nueva Esperanza”, which has only and exclusively women for crimes against humanity, all these prisoners were responsible for some of the many atrocities that occurred during the dictatorship, I am referring to torture, disappearances, permanent kidnappings, murders, etc. Most of these women are former members of the F.F.A.A.*** and of the security forces. Although I do not know the living conditions of the torturers, since special care is taken in everything that surrounds them, but even so I would dare to say that they live in a place more like a rest home than a prison.

Finally, there is the module that I am currently in, Direct Custody. This section was born out of the need to segregate prisoners for violent and high-profile crimes, and over the years this has been maintained to some extent. This section has also been used to keep very specific cases of women for political violence, among these was a former militant of the FPMR and now me.

Since I entered this prison, both my comrades and I have requested through the different bureaucratic instances of the gendarmerie the authorization to continue my university studies, which I started in 2022 in San Miguel prison. This has not been authorized.

A little more than two years ago, I became the first inmate in Santiago to start university studies while I was in preventive prison. A matter that was not without problems, which one by one were solved thanks to the set of solidary wills that made that until today I am studying my third year as a student in the career of Law.

In this prison I have not been able to resume my studies because according to the information provided by the gendarmerie staff, the only thing missing is the authorization of the Regional Director, who can take as much time as he deems convenient to simply manage the continuity of something that has been going on for years.

It seems incredible that the facilities are not given and that obstacles are put in the way of something that seems to be as basic and essential as studying, we cannot ignore that the power structures are capable of breaking their own rules over and over again, according to their convenience.
What is it that the high command of the gendarmerie fears in order to give course to the authorization that does not allow me to study? Do they have direct orders from the Ministry of Justice or another organism? Or is it that they are apprehensive that if they give the authorization the prison population knows that there is no legal impediment that does not allow them to have higher education while in prison? Or perhaps they are exhausting all instances to prevent a prisoner (which they call common, but they maintain quite “uncommon” regimes) to have legal knowledge? Whatever the answer is, I demand that they comply with their own laws and allow me to maintain my university studies.

For this I appeal to all forms of solidarity that can pressure the regional and national directorate of gendarmerie to give course to the relevant authorizations so that I can continue my studies.

With all this I reaffirm that for greater degrees of autonomy the only option for those of us who choose the path of denial against domination is the persistent struggle, which would remain within these walls if it were not for the dozens of hands of solidarity.

Mónica Caballero Sepúlveda
Anarchist Prisoner
May 2024.

Source: Informativo Anarquista

DN Notes

1. – Manuel Rodríguez Patriotic Front (in Spanish: Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez, FPMR). Marxist-Leninist guerrilla organisation, the military wing of the Communist Party of Chile, created with the goal of a violent overthrow of the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet.

– The Revolutionary Left Movement (Spanish: Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria, MIR) is a Chilean far-left Marxist-Leninist communist party and former urban guerrilla organization.

– The Lautaro Youth Movement (Spanish: Movimiento Juvenil Lautaro, or MJL) also known as MAPU Lautaro was a left-wing armed organization in Chile. During the military junta in Chile some members of the Popular Unitary Action Movement formed the Movimiento Juvenil Lautaro to pursue guerrilla warfare. The MJL was named after Lautaro, leader of the indigenous resistance in Chile. MAPU Lautaro continued its armed struggle even after the return of democracy to Chile and democratic elections.

2. ‘Caso Bombas’ 2010: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/caso-bombas

3. The Chilean Armed Forces.

Tag: Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez (FPMR)

Chile: Interview with Synthesis anarchists Boina Anarquista

Chile: Autonomy and Persistence Against Prisons: Words from compañera Mónica Caballero