Ambassadors of the Working Class: Argentina's International Labor Activists and Cold War Democracy in the Americas (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9780822369059)

In 1946 Juan Per launched a populist challenge to the United States, recruiting an army of labor activists to serve as worker attach駸 at every Argentine embassy. By 1955, over five hundred would serve, representing the largest presence of blue-collar workers in the foreign service of any country in history. A meatpacking union leader taught striking workers in Chicago about rising salaries under Per. A railroad motorist joined the revolution in Bolivia. A baker showed Soviet workers the daily caloric intake of their Argentine counterparts. As Ambassadors of the Working Class shows, the attach駸' struggle against US diplomats in Latin America turned the region into a Cold War battlefield for the hearts of the working classes. In this context, Ernesto Sem疣 reveals, for example, how the attach駸' brand of transnational populism offered Fidel Castro and Che Guevara their last chance at mass politics before their embrace of revolutionary violence. Fiercely opposed by Washington, the attach駸' project foundered, but not before US policymakers used their opposition to Peronism to rehearse arguments against the New Deal's legacies.

Author: Ernesto Sem疣
ISBN-10: 0822369052
ISBN-13: 9780822369059
Publisher: Duke University Press
Language: English
Published: 08/25/2017
Pages: 328
Format: Paperback
Weight: 1.00lbs
Size: 8.90h x 6.00w x 0.70d

Review Citation(s):
Choice 04/01/2018