Javier Milei, a self-proclaimed anarcho-capitalist libertarian, was sworn in on December 10th as Argentina’s new president. His rapid ascent to power captured widespread attention across legacy and social media in the U.S. and Western countries. In a recent interview with The American Conservative, Agustin Laje, one of the most prominent Spanish-speaking right-wing commentators, explained the motives behind Milei’s disruption of Argentine politics and what it means for the new Right in Ibero-America.
However, a right-leaning outsider candidate winning a presidential election is no longer a novelty in world politics. The United States, Italy, El Salvador, and the Philippines have elected similar figures recently. Nevertheless Javier Milei’s election is noteworthy. Beyond the rumble occasioned by Milei and his Trump-like attraction for ratings and social media, he has laid the ground for a profound transformation of Argentina, South America, the American continent, Ibero-America, and the Christian West.
For at least the last fifty years, the West, from the center to the periphery, has been dominated by an unfit version of liberal democracy run by amoral elites and market-driven profits, and regulated by pagan Marxist corporatist values. Having advanced a dehumanized version of civilization, this globalized model, advertised as an inevitable path toward perpetual well-being, has in fact condemned millions of people to live in poverty in the developing world, produced an abundance of cheap disposable goods, degraded the environment, globalized a decadent culture, disintegrated social institutions, broken communities, and corroded families and churches alike.
Beyond Milei and Argentina itself, Argentina’s new political cycle offers a window of opportunity for those who believe that the unobjectionable transcendence of truth, goodness, and beauty must determine the pillars of our civilization, nations, and political systems. Deeply rooted in its faith and traditions, and marked by a self-esteem sometimes bordering on irrationality, the Argentine nation is a vehicle that, driven in the right direction, can rapidly influence and transform Ibero-America. Beyond its wealth and agricultural, mining, and industrial potential, Argentina’s cultural influence over the Spanish-speaking Americas is surpassed only by the United States. Within South America, Argentina draws the most immigrants. It also attracts a significant number of regional students for undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral studies. Its cultural industry is one of the best in the Spanish-speaking world, and its famous national figures—from Lionel Messi to Pope Francis—are an important part of the cultural imagination of Ibero-America.
Consequently, the election of an Argentine president whose vision of liberalism is “the unrestricted respect for the life of others, based on the principle of non-aggression (PNA) and in defense of the right to life, liberty, and private property,” offers a unique opportunity for those of us in the Americas, from the Arctic to the Antarctic and beyond, to reclaim the liberal democratic system as a human-centered understanding of life, liberty, and property.
There is now an opportunity for all of us, center to Right, to embrace the momentum in a very practical way. We must embrace our shared Christian humanist roots and the heritage that our founding fathers bequeathed. We must bring our intellectual traditions of freedom together, from Wilson and Madison to Alberdi, from Burke and Tocqueville to Maritain and Castellani.
Conservatives in the United States and south of the Rio Grande, and from Spain to the Urals, must deepen and extend our ties. We must build a coalition capable of articulating each tradition’s unique contributions, promoting the sovereign development of our nations and their peoples, and enabling long-term strategic alliances and circumstantial tactical partnerships—a coalition that expands and tightens our collaborations among civil society organizations, political parties, educational institutions, think tanks, and churches—a coalition that enables us to share our resources, know-how, and talents to promote a joint defense against political correctness, globalist, and statist elites, the progressive cultural hegemony of academia, international organizations, big tech, and global corporations.
We need to get to know and understand each other more meaningfully, traveling beyond our borders and visiting each other’s cities and communities, learning about the social, political, and religious leaders, intellectuals, and faculty members who are defending what is true, good, and beautiful. We must encourage meaningful conversations between our cultural traditions through academia, and we should create avenues for camaraderie through educational programs that will train a new generation of conservatives in policy and advocacy best practices.
We must build a coalition that empowers us to respond to those specific needs and contexts where life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness must be defended. It is an opportunity to heal the wounds of our recent history and to reimagine what the New World offers to future generations. We are responsible for rebuilding not an old regime but a renewed civilization and culture where life from conception to natural death is sacred and respected—where personal effort, entrepreneurship, and solidarity—not government welfare—determine the well-being of our families and communities.
The Left, the Marxists, and the corporatists have already done their work diligently and effectively; their agenda has taken too many lives through the pursuit of their failed policies. Javier Milei’s ascent to power must not be just a political victory; it is a clarion call for unity among conservatives, a beacon that shines across the Americas, inspiring a collective journey towards a future where the values of freedom, responsibility, and human dignity are not just upheld, but flourish in the hearts and minds of every citizen.
Source link : https://europeanconservative.com/articles/commentary/milei-argentina-and-conservatism-in-the-americas/
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Publish date : 2024-01-11 03:00:00
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