The lastest offering from Robert Stark is an interview with Kerry Bolton on Peron and Peronism. There has been a long debate about whether Peron was on the Right or on the Left. Some say he was a fascist. However, that is probably not the case. What rightwinger would eulogize the death of Che Guevara as a hero and a comrade?
That makes no sense. Peron instituted many populist reforms in Argentina, turning it into something resembling a social democracy. However, he had authoritarian tendencies. After he died, his wife Eva Peron ruled in his stead, and Peronism kept on keeping on. Eva rose to the elite by basically sleeping her way to the top, which I suppose is one way that is always available for any ambitious woman to move up ladders on government or business. When she was in power, she was definitely an authoritarian, and she even had people killed.
Peron’s followers were called the “shirtless ones,” working class or proletarian heroes. The Peronist was simply “the man of the street,” the “ordinary man.” Later Peronism split into right and left wings, the right wing being more or less fascist and the left wing being more socialist or Communist. These splits hated each other so much that they used to shoot it out with each other pretty regularly and campaign rallies often turned into massacres large and small. Sections of the Peronist Left later took up arms as the urban guerrillas known as The Tupamaros.
