------the Think Tank and The Opposition to the Chilean Authoritarian Regime

Abstract

This article analyzes the opposition in authoritarian rule and its political resources, and concentrates in the role played by research centers or think tanks in Chile, in which hundreds of professionals and leading politicians worked, fulfilling important political functions that threatened the opposition. It pays special attention to the Economic Research Corporation for Latin America (Cieplan), the main economic research center during the dictatorship, whose researchers played an active political role and occupied leading positions in the economic sector in the government of President Patricio Aylwin (1990-1994). We conclude that the enormous power of the study centers created a separate realm of parties and promoted an expert logic that did not favor democratic political development.