El proceso de recuperación democrática

The prolonged resistance and the reorganization of popular and democratic movements that defeated the sustainability of authoritarian regimes in South America was a complex process. Democratization further deepened the demands for the clarification of crimes against humanity committed by the dictatorships.

The chronology of the recovery of democratic institutionalism in the countries that participated in the repressive coordination of Operation Condor was as follows:

• Bolivia: Hernán Siles Zuazo assumed the presidency on 10th October 1982.
• Argentina: Raúl Alfonsin assumed the presidency on 10th December 1983.
• Uruguay: Julio María Sanguinetti assumed the presidency on 1st March 1985.
• Brazil: José Sarney assumed the presidency on an interim basis on 15th March 1985, before being sworn in as President following the death of the elected President Tancredo Neves (by the mechanism of indirect elections carried out by an electoral college).
• Paraguay: Andrés Rodríguez Pedotti led a coup d’état which overthrew General Alfredo Stroessner on 3rd February 1989. Rodríguez Pedotti then called for elections which were carried out later that same year, on 1st May, when he was elected as the constitutional president until 1993.
• Chile: Patricio Aylwin assumed the presidency on 11th March 1990.