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In-Depth Information
Of course, the workers could object through the vote at election time,
but the military rulers made sure that the names of the Peronist candi-
dates for whom they would have voted did not appear on the ballots.
The workers felt abandoned.
The younger generation of workers nonetheless resisted the new
decrees from above and fought for recognition. In the factories and
on the work sites, union members consistently cast their ballots for
Peronist labor leaders. They used sabotage and work slowdowns on the
shop floors. Their strikes became political statements protesting their
subordination in the development process and their destitution from
inflation and wage freezes. An unprecedented wave of strikes resulted
in 7.5 million man-days lost in Buenos Aires in 1956, and 3.3 million,
in 1957. It became evident that the older, conservative bosses had lost
control of the unions, while younger, more militant leaders had gained
the confidence of workers.
Certain countervailing legacies, present in the labor movements
since the beginning of the century, however, produced conserva-
tive tendencies in union organization. Once in power, a young
militant leader became more conservative in order to maintain his
power. Labor unions in the 1960s remained powerful organizations.
Employers still deducted union fees from workers' wages in order to
sustain the union bureaucracy. Unions used these slush funds to run
medical clinics, manage pension deposits, and maintain the union-
owned vacation hotels in Mar del Plata and the Córdoba hills. Many a
young militant became accustomed to dispensing discretionary funds
and resorted to fraud and violence to remain the boss. Union politics
gained a reputation for gangsterism. Occasionally, labor leaders col-
laborated with employers and military leaders. A labor boss's official
recognition by the Labor Department helped solidify his control of
the rank and file. As one worker in Córdoba later recalled, some
labor leaders would “betray strikes and sell out to the bosses, and live
in luxury like potentates, with a house in the mountains, fast cars,
women” (James 1994, 229).
More grass-roots militancy and strikes, especially after 1966, tended
to undermine many comfortable labor bosses who seemed to have
turned away from Perón. Because the repressive military was against
Perón, the workers gained strength and resolve in identifying their
interests with “the old man.” In the union halls, they elected leaders
they thought were closer to Perón's philosophy. The movement also had
adherents among unorganized and poor Argentines. Many hovels in
the
villasmiserias,
where migrants first settled into urban life, featured
