The Military and Popular Mobilization

This chapter focuses on how political mobilization affected the state&s;s organizational capabilities by creating new divisions and challenges for state bureaucracies, especially in economic policy making. In the context of state-sponsored mobilization, various non-state actors with a mobilization agenda of their own began to organize intensively among popular sectors. The military confronted two important limitations in implementing mobilization policies. First, there was no programmatic consensus within the armed forces on the need for mobilization among lower-class sectors. Second, there was no prior thinking about the type of mobilization policies that should be adopted. As the state-initiated mobilization project collapsed and was replaced by radical anti-system movements, divisions within the military increased. The state organizations involved in promoting mobilization were either disbanded or fell under the control of the opposition. The Velasco mobilization project was carried out from a state apparatus divided over the goals and methods of mobilization, handicapped by diminishing economic resources, and unable to effectively organize civil society.